Could not agree more…
Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week
Is there any justification for any of these practices other than tradition?
- Choosing titles that deliberately omit new taxon names.
- Slicing the manuscript to fit an arbitrary length limit.
- Squeezing the narrative into a fixed set of sections (Introduction, Methods, Results, Conclusion).
- Discarding or combining illustrations to avoid exceding an arbitrary count.
- Flattening illustrations to monochrome.
- Using passive instead of active voice (especially in singular: “we did this” may be acceptable but not “I did this” for some reason).
- Giving the taxonomic authority after first use of each formal name.
- Listing institutional abbreviations at end of the Introduction section, several pages into the paper.
- Using initials for names in the acknowledgements.
- Refusing to cite in-prep papers, dissertations and blogs (while accepting pers. comm.)
- Using numbered citations instead of Author+Date.
- Using journal abbreviations such as “J. Vertebr. Paleontol.” in the references.
- Formatting references
- Having references at all, rather…
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