Moreover, the Proceedings of the International Conference on Virtual Learning – ICVL and the proceeding volumes’ Editorial Board will be in connection with other proceeding volumes and/or publishers if this proves to be mandatory or appropriate. With the scope of knowledge improvement and as an effect of the quality of the authors’ work and of the institutions they represent, the act of disseminating the conference papers in the peer-reviewed proceeding volumes published by the National Institute for Research & Development in Informatics – ICI Bucharest has a scientific support.

Consequently, all parties involved – Authors, Editors, Peer Reviewers, Publishers – will comply with the ethical norms as described below:

Duties of authors

Reporting standards

A rigorous report of the work performed and of its significance should be presented by the authors of original research. The conference paper should precisely include fundamental data and adequate details and references. The deceptive or falsified data (including images) are not accepted.

Data access and retention

For the editorial review process, the authors should be prepared to provide raw data for the validation of the obtained results. They should also preserve this documentation after the publication, for an appropriate period of time.

Originality and plagiarism

In all its forms, plagiarism in not accepted. Consequently, the authors have to assure that the submitted work is absolutely original, is not plagiarised and has not been published elsewhere before. They also have to properly cite or quote any work and/or parts of others’ works they have used. All the conference papers submitted to the proceeding volume are going to be checked for plagiarism by making use of a reliable antiplagiarism software. Authors are encouraged to do a plagiarism scan themselves before submitting their manuscripts for possible publication in the Proceedings of the International Conference on Virtual Learning.

Multiple, redundant or concurrent publication

In general, the author should avoid to publish manuscripts that expose the same research in more than one conference volume or primary publication. Simultaneous submission to other publications will result in immediate rejection of the conference paper.

Acknowledgement of sources

The authors have to give an accurate acknowledgement of the work of others. The publications that have a substantial importance in the essence of the reported work should be cited by the authors.

Authorship of the paper

Authorship should include only those who substantially contributed to the reported study. Other substantial contributions belong to those listed as co-authors. Where there are other contributions in different substantive aspects of the research work, they should be mentioned in an Acknowledgement section. All the authors should make sure that the final version of the paper has been seen, certified and allowed for publication and that no inadequate co-author has been included in the author list of the paper. After the acceptance of a paper, no modification of authorship is accepted.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

Any financial or other considerable conflict of interest that might be interpreted as an impact for the results or conceptualization of the conference paper has to be disclosed by the authors. The disclosure of any potential conflict of interest should occur at the earliest phase possible.

Fundamental errors in published works

The author has the obligation to immediately report any considerable error of his/her published work to the conference volume editor or publisher and collaborate with them in order to withdraw or remedy the paper. The author has also the obligation to immediately withdraw or remedy the conference paper if the editor or the publisher discovers from a third party that a published paper contains a considerable error.

Duties of the Editor and the Editorial Board

Publication decisions

The editor decides which of the papers proposed for the conference volume deserve to be evaluated and published afterwards. His selection should be constrained by legal requirements regarding denigration, plagiarism or copy breach. The editor’s decision is entirely based on the academic importance of the conference paper. He is not going to use any unpublished information without the written authorization of the author.

Fair play

In the evaluation of the manuscripts, the editor fairly weighs only the intellectual content of them, disregarding the authors’ race, gender, sexual orientation, religious or political beliefs, citizenship, ethnic or geographical origin.

Confidentiality

The editor and/or any editorial staff will not reveal any information about a submitted paper to anyone other than the corresponding author, (potential) reviewers, the publisher or other editorial advisers as appropriate.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

The editor is not going to use the unpublished materials or any piece of information obtained by means of peer review for personal research or advantage without a written authorization of the author. If the editor has conflicts of interests with any of the authors, companies or institutions involved in a paper, he should avoid himself from considering the paper.

Involvement and cooperation in investigations

When ethical accusations regarding a proposed or published paper have been raised in association with the publisher, the editor will announce the authors of the paper or the proper institutions and he will also make public a remediation if the accusation is maintained. Although it is detected years after publication, any act of unethical publishing behaviour has to be examined.

The Proceedings of the International Conference on Virtual Learning will react to all accusations/distrusts of research or improper publications made by readers, reviewers or other editors. The conference volume will evaluate any case of potential plagiarism or duplicate/redundant publication and may request a thorough analysis made by the institution or other relevant bodies.

Duties of the Reviewers

Contribution to editorial decisions

Reviewers cooperate with the editor in making editorial choices and may also cooperate with the author regarding the enhancement of the paper, by reviewing the paper impartially. A reviewer’s activity has to be based on the academic communication and scientific method.

Promptness

If a referee feels unable to promptly review the research of a conference paper, he/she should announce the editor.

Confidentiality

The manuscripts involved in the review process are confidential and must not be revealed to others without the editor’s authorization. The reviewer has to respect the confidentiality of the information provided by the editor or author and is not allowed to retain or to copy the paper.

Standards of objectivity

Reviews should be managed impartially, through a transparent and argued perspective, without any personal critique of the author.

Acknowledgement of sources

Reviewers should establish which are the proper published papers that the author has not quoted. They should also alert the editor regarding any significant resemblance or overlap between the conference paper involved in the review process and other published paper.

Disclosure and conflict of interest

Privileged information collected after the peer review represents confidential information and must not be used for personal advantage. If the reviewer has conflicts of interest with any of the authors, companies or institutions involved in a paper, he should avoid himself from considering the paper.

Reviewer misconduct

Editors will actively consider reviewer malpractice and pursue any accusation of violation of privacy, concealing of conflicts of (non)financial interest, improper usage of private material or postponement of peer review in order to obtain competitive advantages. Accusations of significant reviewer malpractice, like plagiarism, will be led to the institutional level.

DISCLAIMER

The editors and the editorial board are not guilty for authors’ declared ideas, perspectives and contents of the published papers in the conference volume. The individual author is the one responsible for the originality, analysis and errors of the paper. All papers proposed for review and publication in the Proceedings of the International Conference on Virtual Learning will be subject to double-blind reviews for authenticity, problems of ethics and convenient contributions. The only medium for publication in the conference volume is represented by the reviewers’ final verdicts.