Q: What should I do if a predatory journal has published my paper while it's under consideration by a legitimate journal?

Detailed Question -

We submitted to Journal A but had no reply for >1 month on whether the manuscript was received, and if editing was required. We also emailed to ask if have they received the manuscript and if it was rejected, but there was no response. So we submitted to Journal B, which confirmed manuscript submission and sent us instructions on the editing required. We did a re-submission to B, but soon after, we received an email from A on manuscript acceptance and accidentally replied. We realised A is predatory, had our item on their site and emailed for A to withdraw it. What do we do if A does not remove it?

1 Answer to this question
Answer:

You have made several mistakes which could easily have been avoided:

1. You should have done a thorough check before submitting to journal A and not rushed into submission. It is best to submit your paper to a journal only when you are absolutely sure that it is not predatory. 

2. You should not have submitted the paper to journal B without first withdrawing it from journal A. This is unethical and is regarded as duplicate submission.

3. I don't really understand what you mean by "accidentally replied" to the acceptance email by journal A? You have not mentioned what you have said in your reply. Have you agreed to publish the manuscript? 

4. Since you had already submitted your paper to B, you should have at this stage at least asked journal A not to publish your paper. If you have not done that, the journal will definitely go ahead and publish it once it’s accepted.

Once a paper is published, it cannot be withdrawn; it can only be retracted if there is an honest error or ethical breach. However, the retracted paper will also be available publicly.

Under the circumstances, you cannot really do anything to pull down the paper. You can try requesting the journal, but I don't think they will agree. However, please see to it that you withdraw your paper from journal B; if this paper is also published, you will be guilty of duplicate publication, which is a major ethical breach and can lead to a retraction. Have a retraction can be damaging for your reputation. Take this as a learning experience and make sure you don't make the same mistakes in the future.

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