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The preprints on arxiv are read, and responded to, by plenty of peers. The question was what value Elsevier adds; I think the primary value added is just making
by pdonis 2y ago
The preprints on arxiv are read, and responded to, by plenty of peers. The question was what value Elsevier adds; I think the primary value added is just making papers available to anyone who wants to read them. Arxiv does that. (What's more, it does it for everyone, not just academics--as a taxpayer I can go on arxiv and read research that my tax money paid for. I can't do that with Elsevier published journals.) Publication in journals at this point is mainly resume padding and status signaling, not an actual value add.
- anticensor 2y agoPLOS is open-access, as a taxpayer you can read world-class peer-reviewed (more stringent than Elsevier journals in fact) articles in your preferred field's preferred issue.
- pdonis 2y agoAre there any articles on PLOS that I can't find on arxiv.org?
- j_maffe 2y agoIt's not about having access to more articles, it's about the guarantee of peer-review of whatever you read on PLOS. On Arxiv you could be reading the ramblings of a random person on the internet with zero relevance to the real world.
- lelanthran 2y ago> On Arxiv you could be reading the ramblings of a random person on the internet with zero relevance to the real world. The current model for traditional publishing vets each paper that is published; arxive vets each author[1] once, and then their papers can be published. So, sure, you could be reading the ramblings of a random person, but it is quite unlikely. I think what is more valuable is looking at the citations to the work you are reading; unless you are reading something very very new, if it is valuable at all it would be cited. [1] When I last looked at publishing (maybe a decade ago?), arxive was vetting authors, not individual papers.