Abstract
A new approach to authorship: Shared responsibility and shared credit
I agree that all valuable input should be acknowledged by authorship, from technical to inspirational. The issue is the inclusion of undeserving authors that manipulate the system to claim authorship and the more generous situation of helping someone along in their career.
Perhaps a situation in which all authors are assigned a percentage for their contribution would be more appropriate (and quantitative). Authors providing the funding to support the research may remove their contribution and authorship if an amicable distribution of credit is not agreed.
With respect to referees, we all have shoddy feedback that is unsubstantiated (or worse). It is time that referees are paid for their professional services, but at the same time, as these are professional assessments, I do not see the justification for maintaining their anonymity. However, I do see very good reason for keeping the anonymity of the authors and their institute until the reviewing procedure is complete. This is entirely irrelevant, or it should be!
What can be fairer than a paid professional assessment of work conducted by unknown scientists and the credit for the work assigned by the authors?
Footnotes
Competing interests
None declared