engrXiv Blog

Wrap of 2025

Wed, 31 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

This year we have seen a much higher rate of submissions to the server. The number of posted preprints in 2025 increased to nearly 1200, up from about 640 in 2024.

This increase in preprint submissions seems to be due to a couple of factors, increased visibility of the server and a dramatic increase in generative AI-based spam. Somewhere around mid-2025, generative AI tools reached that sweet spot where they could produce technically coherent engineering content. Not necessarily good but coherent enough to pass a casual glance. Suddenly, we were inundated with papers that sounded plausibly technical but contained the academic equivalent of those AI-generated images where people have six fingers on each hand. This has resulted in roughly half of submissions being declined as the moderation team has had to become more aggressive in our evaluation of submitted works. We will be looking to expand our volunteer moderation team in 2026 and also looking to develop tools to assist with handling the increased workflow.

We continue to depend on the Engineering Archive Membership Circle for financial sustainability. Your $500 annual contributions from institutions, libraries, and organizations keep our servers running and our small team operational. Many of our supporting libraries are now in their 8th year of backing the platform, thank you for your continued commitment to open engineering knowledge!

We hope you’ll keep in touch via social media. Find us on the fediverse at our Mastodon account @engrxiv@scicomm.xyz.

Thank you and HAPPY NEW YEAR!

The challenge of AI slop for preprint servers

Tue, 26 Aug 2025 00:00:00 +0000

In the last few months, the problems associated with the explanded use of GPTs and LLMs via services such as ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, and others have come to preprint servers in mass. At Engineering Archive, we’ve seen a dramatic increase in preprints submitted, growing from an average of 60 submissions per month to closer to 200. This increase is submissions has massively increase the moderation workload as it can be difficult to filter the real human-authored work, from the slop. Often these submissions are made by so-called “independent researchers” with no institutional affiliation. They may or may not be real people. In the past, submission spam was often used as a form of citation gaming, attempts to artificially exploit Google Scholar indexing to make ones academic profile look more prestigious than is deserved. However, more recently, this is no longer the case.

As reported in Nature, this wave of AI slop is not limited to engrXiv and is hitting other preprint servers in the same way, overwhelming our volunteer moderators. Unfortunately, this wave of AI slop has real costs associated with it in terms of volunteer burnout and the costs associated with hosting this content and issuing DOIs when it slips through moderation.

At Engineering Archive, we are going to attempt to further crack down on these types of submissions. Submissions that appear as though they may be largely AI generated are going to face further scrutiny. This will slow down the timeline from submission to public posting and unfortunately, some legitimate work will be caught up as well. “Independent researchers” may also be asked to further verify their identity. We are relunctant to restrict the publication of work from authors who currently lack institutional affiliation because we don’t believe that good engineering research can only be performed within academic facilities, but something must be done mitigate the negative impacts of LLM generated content.

End of 2024

Tue, 31 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This year has been a year of growth at Engineering Archive. We have seen a return to the annual submission numbers that we saw prior to the transition to the new hosting platform and greater than a 20% increase over last year! Some of the issues we saw last year with excessive spam submissions have been mitigated with the implementation of new software to catch automated submissions. Of course, that doesn’t stop those who make such submissions manually, but this is where our manual screening process comes in.

We continue to appreciate the support of the Engineering Archive Membership Circle. The Membership Circle creates the opportunity for institutions, libraries, and other organizations to support the sustainability of the server through a $500 annual contribution. Many of our supporting libraries are in their 7th year of keeping the server running!

We hope you’ll keep in touch via social media. Find us on the fediverse at our Mastodon account @engrxiv@scicomm.xyz. Note that we are winding down our usage of Twitter and will shortly stop using that platform altogether.

Thank you and HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Winding down usage of Twitter

Wed, 30 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Since the early days (mid-2016) of Engineering Archive, we have had a presence on Twitter. It was basically the go-to platform for scientific communication and academic discourse. It was actually through Twitter that the initial introductions were made which allowed engrXiv to exist! However, the social media landscape has changed and Twitter today is a shell of what it once was. While good communities may still be found there, the platform itself is a representation of the worst that the online world has to offer.

As a result, Engineering Archive will be sunsetting our presence on Twitter over the coming months. The @engrXiv account at Twitter has been in passive-only mode for the past couple of years, posting only announcements of new preprints through the IFTTT service. However, we have made the decision to cease posting to that platform all-together at the conclusion of our current IFTTT subscription period in May 2025. After that time, the Twitter account for the server will be effectively archived and no long actively announcing new preprints.

Instead, we encourage you to find us on the Fediverse via our Mastodon account, @engrxiv@scicomm.xyz, where we will continue to announce new preprints and other activities relevant to the server. We have decided for now to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past and will not be creating accounts on either Bluesky or Threads. We hope instead that you will join us on the fediverse where you can find our account through Mastodon, Friendica, Lemmy, or any of the other plethora of compatible services. Of course, you can always go old-school and subscribe to our RSS feed! This same RSS feed can be accessed using the Matrix messaging protocol at #engrXiv-new-preprints:matrix.org.

Copyright and Co-Authors

Mon, 21 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

An issue that comes up from time to time with submissions made to the Engineering Archive is what happens if one of the co-authors on a paper finds out later that it was submitted without their knowledge and they don’t approve. There are two ways to approach this issue: 1) professional norms and 2) copyright law.

While it may not be as fun as the underlying engineering work that went into producing a research paper, it’s important for authors to be well-informed about their rights and responsibilities. Having some awareness of copyright law and adhering to best practices, authors can protect their intellectual property and avoid potential disputes with co-authors.

First, it’s generally considered good practice for authors to seek permission from their co-authors before submitting a paper for publication at any venue. Journal publishers typically expect that all authors are aware of and agree to a possible publication of their work (this also influences copyright, discussed further below). As part of the submission process at Engineering Archive, submitting authors are specifically asked if they have obtained permission to post the work from their co-authors. However, this permission is not independently verified by server moderators.

With regards to copyright law*, there are a few considerations. When it comes to a multi-authored work such as a typical research manuscript, each author holds copyright over their specific contributions. This means that if a portion of the work was originally created by a single author, that author has the exclusive right to reproduce, distribute, display, and perform only that specific part of the work. However, it’s not always possible to discern each individual’s contributions to a research paper. If this is the case, then the copyright for the entire work is typically owned by the authors collectively, not individually. Therefore, each author would have the right to reproduce, distribute, display, and perform the entire work, but not just their specific contributions.

As a best practice, authors should consider implementing an authorship agreement in advance of any collaboration. This agreement could address issues such as acceptable future venues for publication (don’t forget to include a preprint server!), authorship order, etc. All authors should agree in advance on these things which may have future implications on the acceptable terms of publication, including the choice of publisher, the license granted to the publisher, and the terms of any agreements regarding royalties or other financial considerations.

Issues related to authorship disputes may be covered in our server’s terms. Most of the time, co-authors should discuss these matters and reach an agreement prior to submitting a work to Engineering Archive. Once the work has been posted to the server, our terms and conditions apply and withdrawal of the work will only be made under conditions of legal obligation.

This is a blog post and not legal advice. It’s always advisable to consult a legal expert or refer to copyright law resources when dealing with copyright matters.

2023 Year-end Update

Mon, 08 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Apologies for being a little late in getting this year-end summary post out there. The year 2023 has been one of stability at Engineering Archive. The server has now settled in to the new software, Open Preprint Systems, and our authors seem to be getting more familiar with the submission workflow. As a result, we have seen some moderate growth in the number of submissions in 2023 as compared with 2022. We currently average around 40 new preprints per month, which garners around 500 preprints annually. This year, we have seen some uptick in the submission of citation spam, which effectively consists of minimal effort papers with an excessive number of self-citations. These are screened manually, although of course some do occasionally slip through the cracks.

This year we were also able to remove one of the pain points in the preprint authoring workflow at OPS, the versioning of posted preprints. With the assistance of a plugin developed by Lepidus Tecnologia, authors can now both create and submit for review new versions of their preprints. This is a drastic improvement over the previous manual method of needing to notify engrXiv moderators when new preprint versions were ready to post. As the plugin is open source, this new workflow is available to all who use Open Preprint systems thanks to the financial support of Open Engineering Inc.

The continued operation of the server and our ability to make improvements such as just described is only possible due to the financial support of the Engineering Archive Membership Circle. The Membership Circle creates the opportunity for institutions, libraries, and other organizations to support the sustainability of the server through a $500 annual contribution. Many of our supporting libraries are in their 6th year of keeping the server running!

We hope you’ll keep in touch via social media. Find us on the fediverse at our Mastodon account @engrxiv@scicomm.xyz. While we still annouce new preprints on Twitter via automated means, that account is no longer actively monitored.

New Versioning Workflow

Thu, 21 Sep 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The workflow for creating a new version of a preprint on Engineering Archive has been a challenge for the last year and a half as there was no mechanism for authors to submit new preprint versions and instead they had to manually notify the server administrator when the new versions were ready to be posted. As of a few weeks ago, this is no longer the case with the development of a new version submission workflow.

Thanks to the work of Lepidus Technologia, funded by Open Engineering, authors can now submit new preprint versions when they are ready for them to be posted. As part of the workflow, authors are also asked to provide a justification for the new version, which will be shared with the server administrator and also displayed publicly on the preprint’s page.

Instructions for following this new workflow can be found on the Submission Editing page.

The Nelson memo

Thu, 08 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The Nelson memo, which was written for the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) in August 2022, outlined several key principles for scholarly publishing and research:

Immediate availability: Papers should be made available as soon as possible after they are accepted for publication.
No fees: There should be no charge to access papers.
No copyright restrictions: Papers should be published under a license that permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction.
Quality assurance: The quality of papers should be maintained through peer review and other quality assurance mechanisms.

engrXiv satisfies all four of these principles. By making papers available immediately, without any fees, and under a Creative Commons license, engrXiv helps to ensure that the benefits of scientific research are shared widely.

Immediate availability: engrXiv makes papers available immediately upon submission, without any embargo period. This allows researchers to share their work with the world as soon as possible, and to benefit from feedback from other researchers early on.
No fees: engrXiv is free to use for both authors and readers. This removes financial barriers to access, and helps to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to participate in the scientific process.
No copyright restrictions: engrXiv papers are published under a Creative Commons license, which allows anyone to read, share, and build upon the research. This promotes collaboration and innovation, and helps to ensure that the benefits of scientific research are shared widely.
Quality assurance: engrXiv enables early review and scritiny of work posted to the server and enables transparency throuh real-time posting of the latest research as it becomes available.

In addition to satisfying the open access principles outlined in the Nelson memo, engrXiv also offers a number of other benefits to researchers. For example, engrXiv provides a forum for researchers to share their work with a wider audience, and to receive feedback from other researchers. engrXiv also helps to increase the visibility of engineering research, and to make it easier for researchers to find and cite relevant papers.

A year of transition

Sat, 31 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

This past year has been a year of change for Engineering Archive. Early in the year, we announced the move to a new hosting provider and a new preprint server software. We are incredibly happy to be partnered with the Public Knowledge Project and to be using Open Preprint Systems as the server’s backend. A major component of this transition has been helping engineering authors who submitted preprints on our previous hosting platform get migrated to the new platform so that they can continue to manage those preprints.

Migration this year has reduced the number of preprints posted by about 25% compared to the previous two years. We anticipated that we would see some reductions this year as folks adapt to the new platform and adjust their workflows. We expect that submission numbers will recover as engineering authors become more comfortable with the new platform. If you are having any difficulty with using the new platform, please reach out over email (director[at]engrxiv.org) or on our Matrix support channel.

Finally, we want to make sure that we acknowledge and show our appreciate for the support of the Engineering Archive Membership Circle. The Membership Circle creates the opportunity for institutions, libraries, and other organizations to support the sustainability of the server through a $500 annual contribution. We are especially grateful to the Universith of Minnesota Libraries who have newly joined in 2022! We cannot forget our sustaining members, some of whom are in their fifth year of provided this vital support for the server!

We hope you’ll keep in touch via social media. Find us on the fediverse at our Mastodon account @engrxiv@scicomm.xyz.

RSS is back!

Fri, 30 Sep 2022 00:00:00 +0000

When Google killed Google Reader back in 2013, many saw it as the beginning of the end for RSS feeds on the web. In many cases, those predictions have come true as most people consume their web content primarily through various private channels such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. But we at engrXiv are not ready to give up on RSS just yet! If you visit the engrXiv homepage today, you’ll see new links in the right column for our RSS feeds. Subscribe to one of these feeds and you can receive and you can receive updates of new preprints posted to engrXiv delivered right to your favorite feed reader. Now that’s convenient!

Of course, if you are no longer regularly using an RSS feed these days, our RSS feeds also provide the backend to all of the other venues you may visit to obtain your regular dose of new engineering research. These options include: Twitter, Facebook, Mastodon, and Matrix.