What’s going on with Elsevier? Plagiarism allegations, zero-explanation rejections after revisions, and zero accountability

I used to view Elsevier as a reputable publisher, but my experiences over the past 12 months have been quite terrible in terms of their editorial standards and ethics. Two examples:

1. My team and I spent over a year on a research project and writing up the manuscript. We submitted it to Telematics and Informatics, only for the handling editor HP to slap us with a split-second rejection for "alleged plagiarism". After asking for details, we received the report of the plagiarism check (“your manuscript exhibits a 40% overlap with prior publications, which exceeds the journal's permissible threshold.”).

What was the source of the plagiarism? Our very own preprint, completely in line with both the journal's and publisher's policy, and we explicitly mentioned that in our cover letter. Why only 40% and not 99%. I have no f**** idea. Did we get a decision correction or even a basic apology when we pointed this out? Nope.

I’m totally fine with rejections based on methodology, scope, writing, or content, or whatsoever. That’s standard peer review. But rejecting a paper for "plagiarizing" ourselves via a declared preprint is just ridiculous.

2. A few weeks back, we submitted a (very different paper) to Technology in Society. We went through a first round of constructive reviews, addressed these thoroughly (sometimes you just feel how your chances are, don’t you? We were a bit optimistic…) and submitted our revised manuscript.

A few days later it was rejected. No re-reviews by the reviewers, no editorial comments, just a template rejection. Editors can do that of course, but rejecting a paper after revisions without giving a single line of justification is terrible editorial practice. If the core concept was flawed, reject it in round one. If the changes are not sufficient, this can happen of course, tell us.

I reached out to the EiC asking for a quick assessment or rationale. Her response? She just confirmed she made the decision, again without a single word explaining why.

The irony is that just a few days after that ghost-rejection, I received an invite from Technology in Society asking me to review for them. Absolutely not. I will not be providing free labor for a publisher that treats authors' hard work with complete contempt.

It really feels like basic scientific integrity and respect for authors has declined. Sure, AI slop is prevalent nowadays and that’s annoying for editors, reviewers (and readers). But often enough researchers spend months if not years on their work only for editors with all the leverage to make split-second judgments without being held accountable at all.

Has anyone else noticed a decline in Elsevier's or other publishers’ editorial standards, or am I just having a streak of terrible luck? Are publishers getting lazier, or has academia just become so dehumanized that hard work is treated like nothing more than an action item to clear from an editor's inbox? As I told the handling editor Telematics:

”We are not just names that appear in an inbox, we are researchers who have worked very hard and over a long period on this manuscript. A rejection based on unfounded allegations is deeply discouraging to those of us committed to contributing in good faith to the scientific community. This is not the kind of academic culture we should aspire to, yet such actions (certainly unintentional!!), reinforce the toxicity in academia.”.

Xpost from r/AskAcademia