In 2018, a relatively unknown X (formerly Twitter) account began quietly posting about instances of predatory publishing in academia. To avoid controversy, the owner of the account, called Publishing with Integrity, chose to stay anonymous – until August 2024, when he revealed himself as Graham Kendall, a computer scientist and deputy vice-chancellor at MILA University in Nilai, Malaysia.
"My decision to be anonymous was because of what Beall faced. Publishers who disagreed with being on his list would write to him or contact senior colleagues, including the chancellor, at his university. I set the goal of going public once I reached 10,000 followers on X." – said Graham Kendall.
Beall, a former librarian at the University of Colorado Denver, maintained a public list of predatory journals and publishers on his blog. By the end of 2016, it contained more than 1,000 publishers. Beall shut down his list in 2017, citing pressure from his employer and publishers.
