And he should be. Laird is editor of the journal Organic Process Research & Development and in his editorial (DOI) he complains that too many articles are titled something like 'Scale-Up of the Synthesis of an XYZ Antagonist' (5 articles in fact are titled that way in the current issue). How about something more descriptive?. Complaint number two: article summaries that pose as article summaries but in fact are not, advertisements at the most. Even more complaints: keywords like 'efficient' or 'green' are not always substantiated.
This blog cannot agree more. And it is not just OPRD. Lets have a brief look at what the other journals have to offer in terms of ineffective titles and irrelevant summaries.
From Angewandte Chemie the title The Effect of an Active Guest on the Spin Crossover Phenomenon (DOI) - what is the effect? and from the abstract A new strategy for regulating spin crossover (SCO) properties by the control of an active guest molecule is proposed - Yeah? just what is the strategy?.
From Organic Letters the title "Exploring the Unique Reactivity of Diazoesters: An Efficient Approach to Chiral Amino Acids" (doi) and from the abstract "The development of a "..." is described.". And the graphical abstract: no trace of an amino acid.
From Tetrahedron letters the title "A practical method for the regeneration of Kaiser-oxime resin" (DOI) and from the would-be abstract "We report here a simple procedure for the regeneration of the Kaiser-oxime resin". In the meanwhile the reader remains clueless about what the "practical method" is all about.
Of course Trevor Laird and his colleagues should just assume control over their shops and simply demand relevant titles and abstracts. The are the boss after all. Right?