quote
How far is the boundary of scientific freedom today? How much is the scientific debate biased by academic gurus and corporate interests? Are there unspeakable hypotheses and established truths that cannot be questioned? Are there visionary scientists scared to propose and pursue their intuitions? This essay poses a serious criticism about scientific communication in the Internet era, in view of the advent of Artificial Intelligence. We analyze the arXiv moderation system and its contrast with the very essence of the scientific method according to which “the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual” [Galileo (1610)].
end of quote

To cut to the chase I will go straight to the HAIRBALL.

I have tangled with ARXIV repeatedly and do not like them . However, I view ARXIV as having a selection process favoring elite universities, which at times DOES have a hard kernel of truth to it. Case in point, in Cosmology, with rare exceptions, sees most of its breakthroughs in places like HARVARD, MIT, and CALTECH. And of course the top ten universities in China, EU and the UK, as well

If one wants to nit pick, what I can say is this "bias" does reflect where the action is in terms of most scientific breakthroughs.

I view it as OBNOXIOUS at times, but it is undeniable that there is SOME truth to it.

Does this mean I like what ARXIV does ? NOPE, but if one wants to curate impactful research, what they do is
not wrong

Its painful, but even in its present iteration, I understand the system. Does not mean I like it, but if one wants high impact articles in say Cosmology, Quantum Gravity and the like one does have a sure fire way to find them

So ARXIV with all of its problems is a quick source to hit upon.

That it is at times unfair is yet another issue entirely.

    Andrew Beckwith

    Andrew Beckwith Its painful, but even in its present iteration, I understand the system.

    I would have nothing to say if we were talking about business and predominant positions here. But we are talking about science here, and the subject is very different. In science "the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual [Galileo 1610]".

    It is clear that the most influential universities are those that contribute most to the scientific debate but these universities rarely deal with controversial ideas or ideas that are not in line with the mainstream ideas that they themselves have defined. On the contrary, IMHO, important breakthroughs in science could come from marginal universities, in a totally unexpected way and also in contrast with the interests of large institutions.

    At the bottom, there is the very important problem, which emerged on many occasions in this forum, that arXiv reclassifies peer-reviewed articles. How dare they question months of peer-review with a superficial moderation system of a few days? The most puzzling thing is that arXiv NEVER gives reasons. The ""The arXiv moderation process is not a peer-review process. arXiv staff and moderators do not evaluate the validity of the scientific process and cannot give feedback on the submission. " [arXiv blog].

    "arXiv moderation actually resembles an inquisition process where authors do not know what they are accused
    of, some selected authors are allegedly blacklisted, authors cannot defend themselves at any stage, much less on objective grounds and on the merit of scientific facts, authors do not know what criteria are adopted, the stated policies are unabashedly obscure, it is not known who judges authors or if there are “hidden” members in the management, they do not seem to recognize the authority of any other scientific institution and are not judged by anyone. Furthermore, for “selected” cases, i.e. for those controversial preprints that should be evaluated with the most scientific rigor, the final decision seems to be taken by authority from the "the founder and some leaders" even in opposition to the opinion expressed by the moderators themselves, as was confidentially reported to me by an insider whose identity I cannot disclose. “Sometimes” the verdict seems to be already written before the process
    starts. One wonders how all this could have happened. Who gave such a monopoly of scientific information and the consequent power to condition science into the hands of a single institution with such unscientific policies?"

    So to speak, ArXiv instills in the author's head the doubt that his results, certified by reviewers and editors, are wrong without saying how and why? The author of an article published in a journal has the right to know if his article is correct or not, at least to withdraw or correct it, and to prevent others from producing wrong publications on it. Doesn't the question seem paradoxical to you?

    If you want to keep an idea secret, post it on physics:gen-ph. You will be sure that no one will ever take it seriously.

    This evidently violates the very essence of the scientific method, is unacceptable and is blocking the free flow of ideas in science. Ideas that may turn out to be wrong but surely can be inspiring for someone if they have passed peer-review. Science is also made up of (apparently or truly) wrong ideas, it wouldn't be a shame if one of these ideas should unfortunately pass through arXiv. I attribute a large part of the crisis of theoretical physics, foundations of quantum mechanics, partly also in cosmology and other disciplines not closely linked to experimental results, to the policies of arXiv. As far as I can see, arXiv bears great responsibility for the sterility of the current scientific debate.

    "“It is just an ordinary day at the headquarters of the physics preprint archive. The operators
    are going through their daily routine and are discussing what to do about recent emails:
    arXiv moderator: Some 'reader complaints' have come in regarding preprints posted to the
    archive by Drs. Einstein and Yang. Dr. Einstein, who is not even an academic, claims to have
    shown in his preprint that mass and energy are equivalent, while Professor Yang is
    suggesting, on the basis of an argument I find completely unconvincing, that parity is not
    conserved in weak interactions. What action shall I take?
    arXiv advisory board: Abject nonsense! Just call up their records and set their 'barred'
    flags to TRUE.
    arXiv moderator: And here's a letter from one 'Hans Bethe' supporting an author whose
    paper we deleted from the archive as being 'inappropriate'.
    arXiv advisory board: Please don't bother me with all these day to day matters! Prof. Bethe
    is not in the relevant 'field of expertise', so by rule 23(ii) we simply ignore anything he says.
    Just delete his email and send him rejection letter #5.
    The first portion of the above exchange is fictional of course, but might well have happened
    had Einstein and Yang had dealings with the physics preprint archive arXiv.org, administered
    by Cornell University, today. The second part is not fictional.”" [Nobel Laureate Brian Josephson]

        Ulla Mattfolk It is just a word with a certain meaning, and that meaning is useable here, are you aware of it or not... Sorry.

          the points i remember and appreciate reading after a few days of reading are -

          • is the social media of the 90'- internet of the scientists
          • there is an alternate place for posting papers called with vixira
          • if a paper has more authors this imply at least certain dialogue between them (chimeric writing)
          • there is potential for change in the way is moderated to accept scientific writings ( altough irelevant im curious ,i dont know can someone send papers, article by post / delivery email?)
            offtopic- i remember reading an other satire essay concerning more or less automatic paper submission by a certain category of people (also there was an issue concerning how many people reads the content )

          maybe there should be some directed (person A call / write points /to B C D E )recommendation assignments with checkpoints , or some sort of connection between the readers and the authors that would slow down certain aspects and accelerate other objectives . Or an other idea for famous authors a certain number of followers/ slots /

          not considering myself a positive example , still i have the concern that people produce write read watch, consume ,they mirror and give back less and less . or use a simple , not clear or explicit, format /communication protocol to give back

          I am in ,my own way INFURIATED by Arxiv. Infuriated. However, I also find them useful. Finding them demeaning and worse does not mean that I can not learn something from their output I do.

          What I am amazed at though is why they favor MAJOR Universities, and the exclusion of others. I.e. those in the Top tier do get in, without too much difficulty

          Let me make this plain. I admire some of their OUTPUT. I.e. a broken clock is right 2 times a day. Could they do better ? Absolutely

          However, UNLIKE JOURNALS, there is NO paywall

          Its free to access their OUTPUT

          A. Big THANK you for the output being more or less free. I wish the JOURNALS would do that
          B. Why they go KOOK hunting, or put people on lists, is well mystifying to me, They do

          Very good experience from Arxiv, and a big thank you for the free access
          A whopping F grade for their ideas as to whom should be allowed IN their output roster

          In a word they entertain, educate me, and at the same piss me off.

          Well done though, as a commendatory for information sake

          If they are worried about budget and computer access I am certain a rich donor could
          give them a major upgrade as far as computer work and facilities

            Christian Corda

            Dear Christian, I'm curious if you've broken the record of 20 publications systematically reclassified to the same author on the same idea. Many of these papers were published in peer-reviewed journals even before submission to arXiv, others were conference papers.

            My feeling is that the phenomenon of reclassification or rejection is much bigger than one might imagine. No one can know for sure how frequent this practice is also because some papers are then reclassified on the main lists. It is impossible to keep track of what happened.

            Incredibly, the reclassification back to the desired list is done by arXiv even the day after the announcement of the reclassified paper on physics:gen-ph. I know for sure (documented) the case of a reclassification that occurred only on the single day of the announcement. The day after the paper was spontaneously readmitted in hep-th with the motivation of a "late replay of one of the moderators". This paper was published in a prestigious letter physics journal before submission. Of course, while this was an admitted arXiv mistake, the article was not subsequently re-announced in hep-th to remedy the mistake. The fact is that with this machination the article has left no trace of the extemporaneous reclassification that took place and has not been noticed by any theoretical physicist, that is, by none of the reference target audience for the paper.

            Does it seem to you that people who do science, after obtaining a PhD, after having a research grant in a prestigious institute, after waiting for their article to be published in a prestigious peer-reviewed journal, can be treated in this way? That is, to be censored with such brazen machinations without even knowing what criticisms are raised and without the possibility of defending oneself on the scientific merit of the evidence (certified by publication) brought?

            This type of behavior goes not only against science but also against basic human rights.

              Andrew Beckwith

              I would like to say clearly that I am not against arXiv. Mine is a harsh criticism but aimed at its improvement.

              I use it on a daily basis and could not work without it. For example, I now urgently need to read the paper "N.D. Birrell and L.H. Ford (Phys. Rev. D 22, 330 (1980))" (suggested by a referee for new comments in forthcoming papers) but my institution is not registered and it is a big problem for me (if anyone could send it to me by mail I would be immensely grateful)

              The fact that arXiv is free just doesn't mean it doesn't cost anything. “If you're not paying for the product, you are the product”. This line was originally said by Mr. Steve Jobs (Founder of Apple Inc).

              As an indirect consequence of arXiv policies academic journals have started to apply the "open choice" (if you don't see the link read my essay): "This copyright attribution
              conflict has generated a silent war between arXiv and the academic publishing companies
              from which the latter have evidently emerged defeated. Scientific journals have devised a
              form of “open access” publishing in an attempt to compete with arXiv by making journal
              papers freely accessible to everyone directly from the journal's website. However, authors
              must pay thousands of dollars per article to obtain this option as compensation for lost
              revenue and in support of the publication expenses. Evidently all this causes a serious issue of
              free access to research as there are few researchers or institutions which have the economic
              means to face such an expense for each article published"

              More and more journals are becoming purely "open access", and more journals will migrate to this choice in the future , until only the most prestigious ones will resist, the ones that mainly accept publications from the established researchers which can guarantee a large number of citations at very low risk.

              Even though arXiv is free, it will end up with the authors themselves paying for peer-review and publication costs, on the order of thousands of dollars per paper. After thirty years of experimenting with arXiv and similar repositories, is it really worth it?

              This is a huge problem for the future of science and I don't see a straightforward solution.

              In any case, everything would be more acceptable if arXiv would provide the reasons for their decisions giving the authors the right of defense, at least in the most controversial cases and in cases in which the papers havepassed serious peer reviews. At least in this arXiv should respect academic journals, since it is also thanks to their work that they can exist and thanks to their (often tacit) concession on copyright that they can continue to give free access to papers.

                A very interesting essay and dialog.
                I would like to zoom out a bit and take a wider perspective than just arXiv, with a couple items for consideration:
                (One) Nowhere do I see the importance or impact of the shear volume of papers and article being submitted to peer-reviewered journals, to arXiv, uploaded to alternate discussion forums, etc. To some degree, the discussion around 'automated processes' by arXiv appears to be a response to this shear volume challenge (which arXiv appears to have some significant negative impacts).
                I do not see how peer-reviewed journals, with the (relatively) long time frames for review can hope to address this volume challenge. At the same time the importance of peer-reviewing, verifiable results, and Q&A with authors seems critical for scientific progress. How to address this volume challenge and respect for the scientific method?
                ('Taking time for review' seems to believe we can walk backward in time, when many fewer ideas were proposed.)
                So we need new ideas on how to manage the increasing volume of information. While I have many reservations about AI, as a tool in support of human knowledge, I think it can be uniquely useful here - if used appropriately ("in support of" not "in place of" human knowledge).

                (Two) Another consideration is addressing not simply 'fringe science' but intentionally malicious information aimed at dis-information, sowing chaos, or wrecking a person's or institution's reputation. A couple of the arXiv experiences seem to lean toward this latter concern. This issue gets magnified by the volume challenge.
                A few years ago this very organization (FQXi) had such an issue with the essay contests, where people were intentionally downgrading essays to elevate others - so this is neither theoretical nor in some unknown arena (even if the FQXi example is less impactful than truly malicious efforts to malign reputations).
                This is a much wider concern today than, say, 50 years ago, again partly due to the volume challenge.
                If we want many more ideas to be put forward (more ideas are being put forward whether we want them or not), then this concern needs to be addressed.
                Definitely connected to the volume challenge, this concern cannot be addressed via manual 'peer-reviewed' methods. Things are moving too fast and alternate pathways will be found - even if the alternatives are not adequate to the task (which is the real problem today and maybe could be said of arXiv).

                I hear the issues of arXiv and those of peer-reviewed journals - however times are a-changin and solutions that can address (at least) these two considerations will require the use of new tools.

                  Donald Palmer

                  The issue is far bigger than arXiv and these concerns can be extended to the entire internet and the "media age" we are experiencing. With the advent of the internet, as with arXiv, the volume of information circulating has increased dramatically, much more than a human being can absorb. But is all this information circulating on the internet necessary? Just think of the news, whose flow has significantly increased with the internet, but are we really better informed? Personally I don't feel informed if I only access the news on the net. Considering that print newspapers are disappearing, this poses a serious problem. Among the various fake news, the type of "non-peer-reviewed" information of the internet puts flat earthers and scientific luminaries on the same level. As I say in my essay, on the internet everyone talks but nobody listens, so that important news and those who have something serious to say are covered by the chatter of the mob and isolated in a hidden corner of the net where no one will ever go looking.

                  Using AI to discriminate between scientific ideas would be the end of science. As I write in the essay, a natural selection would take place among scientists until only clones remain like Sheldon Cooper from the TV show The Big Bang Theory. This task cannot be delegated to AI at least until it is itself able to develop the next scientific revolution. If and when this happens I don't know exactly what the purpose of the human being will be, without the possibility of seeking answers about one's own existence.

                  But the scientific community is also a social experiment which in many cases anticipates the common society and as such we must be the first to face this problem for two reasons: we were the first to experience it and science is made up of facts (2+2= 4) for which it is possible to discriminate between what is correct and what is rubbish.
                  From my point of view, peer review is currently irreplaceable albeit painful, and we must not give in to the temptation and pressure of institutions such as arXiv that try to bypass it.

                  The Internet and arXiv have lived a 30-year honeymoon in which everything was granted to them: copyright theft, uncontrolled fake news, privacy theft, economic scams, manipulation of political information, illicit trafficking and all sorts of contents indecorous.

                  But the scientific community is also a social experiment which in many cases anticipates the common society and as such we must be the first to face this problem for two reasons: we were the first to experience it and science is made up of facts (2+2= 4) for which it is possible to discriminate between what is correct and what is rubbish.
                  From my point of view, peer review is currently irreplaceable albeit painful, and we must not give in to the temptation and pressure of institutions such as arXiv that try to bypass it.

                  The Internet has lived a 30-year honeymoon in which everything was granted to them without limits: copyright theft, uncontrolled fake news, privacy theft, economic scams, manipulation of political information, illicit trafficking and all sorts of content indecorous.

                  As far as science is concerned, it would be enough if arXiv would declare a limit a little narrower than the omnipotence it enjoys (see also the essay "A Robust Community-Based Credit System to Enhance Peer Review in Scientific Research" present in this competition). It would be enough if it would respect the result of the peer-review done by scientific journals in controversial cases of ideas not in line with the mainstream. Unfortunately, this does not happen, so publications in which nothing new is said are proliferating. Like Wile E. Coyote, already extremely inflated theories are patched by creating increasingly complex and bizarre constructions, but without new ideas compared to those that have not worked for decades, the Road Runner will always manage to escape. For example, in theoretical physics there are hundreds of preprints a week but in the last decades there has rarely been any progress or new actual ideas. The volume of information proliferates because by now publishing in scientific journals has become secondary to publication on arXiv. Scientists, like the mass media, consider arXiv publications as a sort of scientific certification that does not actually exist as the moderation system does not provide feedback. And posting on arXiv is simple, just don't say anything new but say it in a way that it seems like there is something new. One can easily produce infinite papers in this way. Academics are familiar with this game of the fine-tunings and of the dark/hidden/super/M/extra/black/spooky/conjecture/etc sectors. It only takes one paper to demonstrate a new paradigm of science, you don't need thousands of papers. That is just the kind of paper that probably won't pass the arXiv censorship because it will make thousands of papers look outdated.

                  Re-establish the role of scientific publications, primarily by ensuring that arXiv or similar institutions do not denigrate, reject or reclassify (censorship) articles that have passed peer-review in highly ranked academic journals, and also the number of useless publications will decrease.

                    I am glad we agree on the challenge of huge volumes of information (useful or not). This challenge needs to be addressed - both in the wider world and in the scientific community. The last several years, in general, and Mr. Musk’s attempts with Twitter, in particluar, show this to be a difficult problem. A key aspect of this challenge is my second point - mis-information, which is also an increasing problem in the wider internet.

                    If we did not have the volume challenge, then moving back to peer-reviewed solutions might solve the issue. You comment: the scientific community “in many cases anticipates the common society and as such we must be the first to face this problem”. Personally I do not think scientists are the first to face these challenges - and I agree the scientific community should address them. However both challenges need to be addressed - volume and mis-information.

                    Peer-review seems to me like staying with spreadsheets (manual compilation of information), when analyzing information works only in small scale situations. As has been shown with the use of ‘big data’ sets and even Large Language Models (LLM - like ChatGPT), huge volumes cannot be addressed by manual spreadsheet-like solutions. Entirely new tools are needed. Automated or semi-automated solutions are required (not simply desired). The question is not whether to use them, but how to use them and to use them effectively. So I disagree that “Using AI to discriminate between scientific ideas would be the end of science.” I think we have to use tools that can address the volume challenge, such as AI. The question then becomes how to use the tools such that they are effective - in particular that they can address the mis-information challenge.

                    Simply putting AI ‘in charge’ of identifying what is correct and what is mis-information has already failed in the past several years (and likely would lead to the end of science). The many forms of AI have to be governed, managed, taught how to properly address the challenge(s). A general purpose AI tool is unlikely to achieve this, especially in the scientific community. It is an as-yet unformed (or uninformed) tool that needs to be properly designed for the appropriate purpose. A number of AI companies are building special purpose AI tools that enhance what a human can do (not replace an intelligent human). This is what is needed to process massive numbers of preprints and publications - through enhancing human capabilities.

                    I read (and commented on) the essay "A Robust Community-Based Credit System to Enhance Peer Review in Scientific Research”. The proposal lacks a means of ensuring fairness, which goes to the point above about the mis-information challenge (a free market economy still needs the governmental structures to enforce laws and ensure fairness). It does attempt to introduce appropriate incentives that could reduce the proliferation of essentially the same articles and increase the chance of gaining really new ideas. The proposal does seem to address the mis-information challenge (if there is an enforcement structure behind it), however it does not directly address the volume challenge.

                    I will suggest both need to be addressed and wonder how you recommend addressing enforcement of rules (especially to ensure qualified people are in charge of the systems). Also do you think the reduction of useless publications would bring the numbers of them needing to be peer-reviewed to spreadsheet like level that can be handled ‘manually’?

                      13 days later

                      Donald Palmer

                      Let us put it in this way. There are things AI can do and things it can't do. AI is a powerful tool like the internet and in both cases, the limits of what can be achieved through them should be established. I use AI for reporting and drafting projects because I feel that AI makes claims that are strictly average of all similar claims that can be found on the net. So it's very useful for writing things that must not "disturb" those who will read them, while often remaining banal. The AI could therefore be used as a filter to screen technical articles or papers that do not claim to propose new ideas, which are the vast majority of published papers in which already widely debated ideas are extended in small steps.

                      However, scientific progress often comes from research that breaks established ideas, in a completely unpredictable way. Visionaries are people who place themselves outside any statistical cataloguing. The works of Leonardo da Vinci or Michelangelo cannot be indexed by any bibliographic or meritocratic criteria. Thus in science, contributions by great thinkers such as Einstein (from his patent office in Switzerland) or de Broglie (in his doctoral thesis) would escape any cataloging system such as the one proposed for example in "A Robust Community-Based Credit System to Enhance Peer Review in Scientific Research”. Queste mosche bianche non possono essere valutate da strumenti automatici come la AI o un "Community-Based Credit System". In questi casi controversi almeno è necessario utilizzare il vecchio peer-review fatto da essere umani, in quanto l'elemento umano imprevedibile e creativo, è essenziale. But how can AI evaluate the "beauty" in a paper? Besides the technical aspects, science is also creativity, and there is nothing wrong if a scientist pursues (mathematical or logical) "beauty".

                          Popularized science with an emphasis on getting attention with catchy headings seem to be the sensation on the internet, that is if we let it dominate the scene. Certainly AI in the form of algorithms has done so in social media, forsaking human being interface, all this for profit. In "Global externalities" my emphasis is on the corporate culture which dominates scientific endeavors and infiltrates science for profit, leading ultimately to a dying planet. a censorship, as you mentioned is instituted by corporate power and money which dominates global culture, largely orchestrated thru American dominance. Groundbreaking new ideas, as you mention, do not get the attention of the established like dark energy and dark matter being new particles. Our contest time gets short, so on with rating.

                          IT WILL HAPPEN AGAIN!

                          ARXIV WILL SET UP AN INQUISITION TRIAL TO CENSORE A NEW PAPER ALREADY ACCEPTED FOR PUBLICATION IN A HIGH-IMPACT ACADEMIC JOURNAL, PROBABLY VERY SOON.

                          If possible I will report here all the correspondence with the arXiv moderators so that you can follow the story in real time.

                          It is a paper that has received positive feedback and appreciation, besides the confirmation of absolute mathematical correctness in the proof of its thesis, from three reviewers in a Q1 journal. It is now in the revision stage and hopefully the editor will decide on publication in the next few days. The author has been systematically censured by arXiv for his previous 20 papers for his challenging idea. The paper is manifestly about theoretical physics (hep-th). All the past 20 papers are published in scientific journals. Many have been peer-reviewed in leading scientific journals. Many, like the upcoming one, were already published upon submission to arXiv. As with the previous 20 times, it is to be expected that arXiv will censor the idea once again.

                          It is very important that the story is followed up and debated in this forum.

                          Your support is very important.

                          Thank you!

                          Donatello Dolce
                          I think we are not too different in our thinking. I consider AI a tool to assist humans - not something that replaces humans. In a few AI/ML applications I have seen, the application provides a measure or rating of confidence in its results (e.g., 75% or 90% accuracy) Then humans review the results - filtering out the extreme values either to remove them or to focus in on them. Having AI consider "beauty" in a paper would first require defining characteristics of "beauty" in a paper - or allowing the system to learn what a human finds as beauty in a paper (with a human filtering in what s/he finds beautiful or filtering out what is not beautiful).

                              Donald Palmer

                              Ok, in all of this we must always bear in mind that there is an element of unpredictability that characterizes the form in which scientific revolutions materialize (sometimes also, I would say, of healthy "anarchy" and "contest") which could hardly pass the AI filter.

                                I counted 114 reclassified papers on the physics:gen-ph junk list since the beginning of the year.

                                At least 30 of these are published in peer-reviewed journals, many in q1 journals (excluding conference papers or similar).

                                EVERY DAY THE HARD WORK OF A SCIENTIST IS TRAMPLED WITHOUT EXPLANATION.

                                How many good ideas, surely stimulating for the scientific debate, are thrown in the bin?

                                How could science be different?

                                400 years after Galileo my question is: is this science?

                                I gave this Essay a 10 because I find it complementary to mine. In my essay I discuss the dependence of science on "politics" and economic interests. In this Essay the Author focuses the same problem by denouncing the shameful conduct of arXiv and its censorship on new ideas which, despite being rigorously defined, developed via rigorous mathematics and often consistent with experiments and observations, are against the "sacred protocols" of the dominant orthodoxy. I am well aware of this problem because I too am on the arXiv "blacklist" because in my work I often try to go beyond the "sacred protocols"
                                The Author shows a lot of courage, as if his Essay were to be awarded in this Essay Contest, he would risk having serious problems from the very powerful defenders of mainstream physics, who will tend to defend their power, their fame and their money often based on lies, of which arXiv is a faithful servant.

                                  Christian Corda

                                  My deepest gratitude to you, especially for your words of encouragement in this difficult exposé of arXiv's anti-scientific policies. Sincere thanks.

                                    A couple of citations from Nobel Prize Laureate Brian Josephson:

                                    “It is just an ordinary day at the headquarters of the physics preprint archive. The operators
                                    are going through their daily routine and are discussing what to do about recent emails:
                                    arXiv moderator: Some 'reader complaints' have come in regarding preprints posted to the
                                    archive by Drs. Einstein and Yang. Dr. Einstein, who is not even an academic, claims to have
                                    shown in his preprint that mass and energy are equivalent, while Professor Yang is
                                    suggesting, on the basis of an argument I find completely unconvincing, that parity is not
                                    conserved in weak interactions. What action shall I take?
                                    arXiv advisory board: Abject nonsense! Just call up their records and set their 'barred'
                                    flags to TRUE.
                                    arXiv moderator: And here's a letter from one 'Hans Bethe' supporting an author whose
                                    paper we deleted from the archive as being 'inappropriate'.
                                    arXiv advisory board: Please don't bother me with all these day to day matters! Prof. Bethe
                                    is not in the relevant 'field of expertise', so by rule 23(ii) we simply ignore anything he says.
                                    Just delete his email and send him rejection letter #5.
                                    The first portion of the above exchange is fictional of course, but might well have happened
                                    had Einstein and Yang had dealings with the physics preprint archive arXiv.org, administered
                                    by Cornell University, today. The second part is not fictional.”
                                    Brian Josephson (Nobel Prize Laureate), [archivefreedom.org]

                                    and, just for fun, ....

                                    "The revolution will not be brought to you by arXiv
                                    ’cos arXiv deems revolutionary ideas ‘inappropriate’.
                                    As obstructive as any censor
                                    Cross readers veto cross listing
                                    ‘Reader complaints’ win the day.

                                    The revolution won’t find you through arXiv
                                    So go tune in another way."
                                    Brian Josephson (Nobel Prize Laureate)
                                    [

                                    23 days later

                                    My new paper has been finally published in a Highly Ranked physics journal (Q1), after three out of three positive referee reports.

                                    Now the really difficult task will begin, that is the fight against arXiv to get my paper announced on the hep-th list as it rightfully deserves, according to the journal classification.

                                    Due to its revolutionary content, this is the kind of paper that will not pass arXiv censorship, despite the journal publication.

                                    As proposed in my essay, arXiv MUST RESPECT the classification given by well-regarded academic journals. arXiv moderators cannot pretend to be more effective and accurate than journal peer-reviewers. This way, blacklisted authors have the option to wait until journal publication if they want to avoid censorship. Also, arXiv moderators can avoid wasting their precious time on something done with more scientific rigor by academic journals.

                                    With arXiv moderator it is not possible to enter into the scientific merits of the paper, contrary to peer review and to any good scientific practice. This concerns me a lot because. Despite being absolutely sure of my findings, I cannot use any scientific argument to defend them against the often superficial arXiv moderators.

                                    As soon as the anonymous part of this contest will be ended I WILL REPORT HERE THE CORRESPONDENCE WITH ARXIV SO THAT EVERYONE HERE CAN EXPERIENCE THE ARXIV UNSCIENTIFIC POLICIES.

                                    Your support will be very important.

                                    Thank you,

                                    MauvePanther