The statements made in the original post are so foreign to me. It sounds like the author is digging really deep to try and say something nice about the peer review process. To be fair, it
might be true for CS where they are stuck in the weird trap of publishing in conferences, but in other circles everything goes into journals, and in this case the peer-review processes is definitely not there to "help the authors".
The peer review is there to help the journal maintain its reputation by preventing the publication of sub-standard stuff. Period. Sub-standard can mean uninteresting, incomplete, poorly written, or whatever the journal is aiming for. It is not there to safe guard the integrity of the literature against erroneous results...it's purely self-interest on the part of the journal.
In reality, a rejected paper will just be submitted elsewhere until it is eventually accepted. The authors cannot afford to spend 1-2 years worth of work on a project then have nothing to show for it, just because a reviewer didn't "get it". So authors will keep submitting it (hopefully with some improvements based on past reviewer comments, but maybe not) until it "gets through" somewhere, and eventually nearly everything gets the seal of "peer review".
> There is SO much more I could write on this subject, but I'm trying to stay on point (-:
The peer review is there to help the journal maintain its reputation by preventing the publication of sub-standard stuff. Period. Sub-standard can mean uninteresting, incomplete, poorly written, or whatever the journal is aiming for. It is not there to safe guard the integrity of the literature against erroneous results...it's purely self-interest on the part of the journal.
In reality, a rejected paper will just be submitted elsewhere until it is eventually accepted. The authors cannot afford to spend 1-2 years worth of work on a project then have nothing to show for it, just because a reviewer didn't "get it". So authors will keep submitting it (hopefully with some improvements based on past reviewer comments, but maybe not) until it "gets through" somewhere, and eventually nearly everything gets the seal of "peer review".
> There is SO much more I could write on this subject, but I'm trying to stay on point (-: