Conference committee published my paper without my consent while it is being reviewed for a different journal.

[Coffee Snob]

I am freaking out and I would really appreciate any suggestion. My manuscript has been published without my permission in a conference proceeding while at the same time, the same paper is being reviewed to be published in a different journal. I did present my research in a small conference in July 2015, which is why they have access to my manuscript. However, I did not submit my paper to be published in the proceeding, and I specifically requested them not to publish my manuscript in their proceeding because I had been planning to submit my full paper to a respectable journal in the field. In October 2015, the conference committee has confirmed by email that they will not publish my paper in their proceeding, which is why I submitted my manuscript to the journal. However, when the conference proceeding was published online in their website in February 2016, I was shocked to find out that my paper is still published in the proceeding. Thinking that they might have made a mistake, I immediately asked them to republish the proceeding without my paper, which they did immediately, and apologized. However, today I found out that somehow my paper is still included in their online proceeding. I am afraid that the journal editors will think that I have violated their publication ethics - worst case I will be blacklisted to publish in their publication. What should I do? This is my first manuscript submission and I already mess it up. I'm trying not to have a panic attack *breathe*

[fuzzylogician]

What field is this? At least in mine, publishing in a non-peer-reviewed conference proceedings doesn't affect your ability to submit the same work (or often, an expanded version of the paper based on the same work) to a journal. 

You should also check exactly what statements you made to the journal when you submitted the paper. Some might ask you to state that the paper hasn't been published in another peer-reviewed publication and isn't currently being reviewed, both of which are still true. If you said something about no version of it appearing anywhere online (which in my field isn't done, but maybe others are different), then best you can do is contact the proceedings organizers again and insist that they remove your paper as soon as possible. I don't think there is much more to do at this point. If anyone brings it up, you say it was published without your consent and removed as soon as you found out. I don't think there should be any repercussions of any kind, since you are being completely upfront and professional. 

[Coffee Snob]

Hello @fuzzylogician, thank you for your comment.

It's in the field of humanities. I am not sure if the proceeding is peer-reviewed, but the proceeding has ISSN and DOI. I did asked the committee to take out my publication right away when I found out the first time, and they did. But about 3 weeks later (which is yesterday), I googled the manuscript title and it was still appearing again in their online proceeding. I have no idea why they did this. I have emailed the committee again for the 2nd time (a very angry email!), asking them to fix this again, but I haven't heard from them yet. I suspect that the committee is being deceitful. First time it might have been an honest mistake. But, the 2nd time? Why? They knew I was already submitting the manuscript to a different journal... 

I will write updates once I've heard from the conference committee. 

[fuzzylogician]

If you didn't get comments from reviewers and make revisions to your manuscript, then it was not peer-reviewed. That much is clear. The fact that there is a ISSN and DOI doesn't mean much more than that it was published with a serial publication and has also appeared online. I would advise against using language that you'll regret later, when you're not this upset. Stay professional. You don't know who is reading your email, and you are in danger of making a bad impression that will cause you a lot more harm than having this paper online for a few more days. I also would not assume bad intent without proof. Incompetence is usually a much safer bet. 

[Coffee Snob]

16 minutes ago, fuzzylogician said:

If you didn't get comments from reviewers and make revisions to your manuscript, then it was not peer-reviewed. That much is clear. The fact that there is a ISSN and DOI doesn't mean much more than that it was published with a serial publication and has also appeared online. I would advise against using language that you'll regret later, when you're not this upset. Stay professional. You don't know who is reading your email, and you are in danger of making a bad impression that will cause you a lot more harm than having this paper online for a few more days. I also would not assume bad intent without proof. Incompetence is usually a much safer bet. 

You are right. I tried my best to stay professional and asked them to take out my paper again. I also expressed that "I am very unhappy" that this is happening, and this "may have caused me trouble" (those are already my 'very angry' expression).