A paper was submitted to a journal, and now I am thinking of submitting a preprint on ArXiv. However, I wouldn't want to release publicly one of the examples in the paper yet, and would submit the preprint without that particular example (it's probably 5% of the paper). Could this be a problem given the reviewers might check the preprint? Is there any rule on the level of similarity between the preprint and the journal paper, or they are fully independent?
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Are you sure the journal would allow you to publish a preprint? Not all do.– BuffyCommented Sep 15, 2023 at 13:50
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I am sure the journal is okay with this, I did it before and others do it. However, so far the preprint contained the same content as the journal.– Jason BurtonCommented Sep 15, 2023 at 13:54
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2 Answers
I don't see any problem with this. The submitted version and the arXiv version certainly do not need to be exactly the same, although in my experience it is more common the other way around (something in the arXiv version that was omitted from the submission).
A few possible issues this might cause:
- A referee might see that there is an arXiv version and assume it is the same, therefore that everything in the paper is publicly available, not realising you are trying to keep that example under wraps.
- Once the article is accepted, if you want arXiv to count for "green open access" you would need to update the arXiv version to match the accepted version, including the example.
- Seeing the arXiv version might prompt someone else to come up with the same example and write it up (either publicly or just sent to you), assuming you don't know about it.
answered Sep 15, 2023 at 13:57
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Thank you for analysing the possible issues. I will indeed update the ArXiv once the article is accepted. I would say the chance that someone else comes with that example are slim, as they would either need to use my new method in the paper, which would still give me credit, or use a different method, meaning it will have the disadvantages of the existing methods. Commented Sep 16, 2023 at 2:20
I think that most preprints are papers still a bit "in process". Therefore it is natural that they aren't in the same form as the published version, which is likely to be changed on advice of the reviewers in any case.
So, assuming that the journal permits preprints that they don't control themselves, it should be fine. A preprint isn't intended as an alternate publication method (though used that way often enough) but a PRE print: an early version.
Your usage is a bit non-standard, but no one, including reviewers, will likely notice nor care.
In math, for example, preprints are favored so as to give earliest notice of results that might be useful to others, given the somewhat long publication process.
