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The combination of multiple choice responses (see Appendix B) and the extensive and thoughtful open text comments pinpointed areas that need to be upgraded and enhanced. Improving the search function emerged as a top priority as the users expressed a great deal of frustration with the limited search capabilities currently available, especially in author searches. Providing better support for submitting and linking research data, code, slides and other materials associated with papers emerged as another important service to expand. Regardless of their subject area, users were in agreement about the importance of continuing to implement quality control measures, such as checking for text overlap, correct classification of submissions, rejection of papers without much scientific value, and asking authors to fix format-related problems. Several users commented on the need to randomize the order of new papers in announcements and mailings. There were several useful remarks about the need to improve the endorsement system and provide more information about the moderation process and policies.
In regard to arXiv’s role in scientific publishing, some users encouraged the arXiv team to think boldly and further advance open access (and new forms of publishing) by adding features such as peer review and encouraging overlay journals. On the other hand, many users strongly emphasized the importance of sticking to the main mission and not getting side-tracked into formal publishing. There was a similar divergence of opinion about encouraging an open review process by adding rating and annotation features. When it comes to adding new features to arXiv to facilitate open science, the prevailing opinion was that any such features need to be implemented very carefully and systematically, and without jeopardizing arXiv’s core values. Link to principles?
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