The arXiv moderation system
arXiv is a forum for professional members of the scientific community. While arXiv prides itself on maintaining a permanent collection of scientific work that is made available to the public quickly and without cost to users, submissions to arXiv do require some minimal amount of moderation.
Why does arXiv moderate submissions?
arXiv is distinct from the web as a whole, because arXiv contains exclusively scientific research content. Although arXiv is open to submissions from the scientific communities, our team has worked behind the scenes for a long time to ensure the quality of our content. Our policy is:
arXiv is an openly accessible, moderated repository for scholarly papers in specific scientific disciplines. Material submitted to arXiv is expected to be of interest, relevance, and value to those disciplines. arXiv reserves the right to reject or reclassify any submission.
Moderation helps to ensure that arXiv content is relevant to current research at much lower cost than conventional peer-reviewed journals, so we can continue to offer free access to the scientific community and the general public. Although our system may be imperfect, submissions that are determined to be inappropriate for arXiv may be still be posted on other sites or submitted to peer-reviewed journals.
What suggestions do moderators make?
The arXiv moderators are experts in their fields and in the types of submissions that are appropriate for their subject classifications. They evaluate based on the content of the submission and the policies of arXiv.
arXiv moderators may recommend reclassification or removal of a submission. Reclassification is frequently suggested for subject classifications that are highly similar, in order to make sure that submissions are posted first to the most appropriate archive. Cross-lists may then be suggested for other archives that are also appropriate classifications. A submission that is cross-listed to another archive will still be announced in the mailings to the alternative archive.
arXiv moderators will suggest the removal of a submission that violates arXiv policies in some way. Potential reasons for removal are:
- Inappropriate format. arXiv accepts only submissions in the form of an article that would be refereeable by a conventional publication venue. This excludes abstract-only submissions, submissions without references, book announcements or reviews, reports that do not contain original or substantive research, papers that contain inflammatory or fictitious content, papers that use highly dramatic and mis-representative titles/abstracts/introductions, or papers in need of significant review and revision.
- Inappropriate topic. While arXiv serves a variety of scientific communities, not all subjects are currently covered. Submissions that do not fit well into our current classification scheme may be removed and, where possible, redirected to a more appropriate repository.
- Duplicated content. If a moderator notices that a user has made many very similar submissions in a short amount of time, or that a new submission is really a revision of a recent submission, the moderator may request that the user consolidate the new submission into a replacement of the previous submission. This helps ensure that arXiv is as useful as possible for all of the various communities publishing here, and it can often help the author present a more unified body of research.
- Submission of copyrighted material. Authors must hold copyright over the entirety of the submission when the files are uploaded to arXiv. arXiv cannot accept PDFs that have been downloaded from a publisher's website and contain a copyright statement or papers that contain material written by someone who has not authorized that content to be distributed on arXiv (including comments by referees and, of course, plagiarized material).
- Excessive submission rate. Articles submitted to arXiv must be of refereeable quality, and there is a practical limit to the rate at which appropriate, independent submissions can be produced by any one person. Moderators may request that a particular author limit his or her submission rate if this author has a history of many submissions to inappropriate areas or of doubtful refereeability.
Can I appeal a moderation decision?
If you disagree with a moderation decision, you should submit an appeal that explains clearly and succinctly what your arguments are.
- Send a precise email, including all relevant details (especially paper ids, former correspondence, submission summaries, etc.) to moderation@arxiv.org.
- If you receive an automated response to your email, please read all
instructions carefully.
If there is no other identifying information in your message (e.g. paper id or rejection id), you may need to address your email with "Dear arXiv-moderation," to bypass our SPAM filter. - The moderators are not referees and do not provide detailed feedback on submissions. Administrators thus cannot provide detailed feedback regarding submissions deemed inappropriate, and will not enter into extended discussion regarding submissions.
- Please be patient, as moderation appeals are complicated and may take some time.
The appeals process allows moderators additional time to reconsider a submission, but repeated appeals with no additional information cannot be considered. If you send an appeal and the moderators reach the same decision as they did initially, no further appeal should be submitted. Extreme cases may be addressed to the appropriate advisory committee chair only.
Who are the arXiv moderators?
arXiv moderators are volunteer subject specialists who have been approved by their discipline-level advisory committees and by arXiv staff.
Although the moderators may be publicly acknowledged, it is very inappropriate to contact any moderator directly regarding your submission. All communication about moderation decisions should be addressed to moderation@arxiv.org or, in extreme cases, the appropriate advisory committee chair. Moderators are encouraged not to reply to personal correspondence regarding arXiv submissions.
