Glanzel and Schoepflin argue that the field of scientometrics is in a crisis. They base their argument on the prevailing confusing terminology, expressed doubts about the substance of citations and the preference for applied rather than basic research in the field. I would argue that the answer is: maybe yes, maybe not; but the field is not in a crisis on the basis of its terminology, questions related to substance of a citation and the preference for applied rather than basic research. Moreover, I would suggest that scientometricians should not be scientific about everything but scientometrics itself. If we wish to indicate that the field of scientometrics is in a crisis, we should be able to develop appropriate indicators that would indicate so. Declining number of publications, shrinking size of the invisible college, declining support by the funders etc., maybe some such indicators. However, before I will advance my line of argument I should emphasise that this does not detract from the beneficial role that Gl/inzel's and Schoepflin's recommendations could have in the field if there was a way for their suggestions to be implemented. The first issue of importance is that scientometrics is a wide-ranging field with vague boundaries. Scientometrics can be defined as the system of knowledge which endeavours to study the scientific system with the use of definite methods: observation, measurement, comparison, classification, generalisation and explanation. To use a parallel, scientometrics is for science what economics is for the economy. Both disciplines attempt to study social phenomena with the rigour provided by the scientific methods. However, this does not ameliorate the fact that every method used in the social