This article explores the ethical challenges faced by the Revista Internacional de Educación Musical (RIEM), a Spanish-language journal dedicated to music education research in the Ibero-American region. Established in 2013, RIEM encountered several ethical dilemmas during its first decade, including: creating a journal from scratch, managing Author Processing Charges versus free open access, navigating journal indexing, addressing language barriers, and grappling with the concept of science. These issues stem from economic pressures in academic publishing and the tension between acknowledging diversity and ensuring knowledge dissemination. The article concludes with political, economic, and personal reflections on academic journal management, highlighting broader concerns about equitable access to research dissemination and the complexities of navigating the global academic landscape.