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Last night, scientists on Twitter starting sharing six-word peer review reports, parodying particular types of referee reports. We were following along, and noticed that a lot of the #SixWordPeerReview tweets were mocking particular types of referee reports: the referees were asking for too many experiments, or the referees wanted the authors to cite their papers. Some suggested the referees didn’t take time to critically read the paper, and others parodied referees who deliberately held back publication of their competitors’ work. We’ve collected a number of them on Storify and a few examples are below. (Storify is also embedded at the bottom of the post)

What started as a fun way to pass the time hit a nerve with several people, and there were calls for change. That is of course exactly what we’re trying to do. Our post-publication peer review model was introduced to prevent papers being held up in peer review; publishing all reviews openly with the name of the referee discourages vindictive or sloppy review; and we ask that referees consider the quality of the science and not ask for excessive additional experiments.

In fact, we recently published the opposite of a #SixWordPeerReview: a review that was longer than the paper itself! Referee Michael McCarthy spent a lot of time on his referee report, which you can find below this paper, and the result is a prime example of why we are introducing metrics and DOIs (soon!) on referee reports: this is scientific output that deserves to be shared! Michael also blogged about his experience writing the review,and discussed it on Twitter as well.

We’re also working on better education for young researchers about peer review. We’re a partner of Sense About Science’s peer review workshops, and are talking to a few institutes about ways we can help teach the next generation of referees. Eventually, we hope to see more referees take pride in their refereeing, and make peer review a better experience for everyone! Until then, enjoy some of our favourite #SixWordPeerReview tweets: