arXiv and the Information Explosion
Nowadays, it has become more and more common to publish on arXiv before peer-review. There are several (good) reasons for that: (1) Academic publishing takes too much time, and even then, (2) your paper often ends up behind a paywall. In over-hyped fields, the state of the art may change every month (or sometimes, week!), so it is a good way to “plant the flag” on your research idea. But what are the consequences of that?