Moderator Guide

Moderator Guide for OSF Preprints Members

Moderation Policy

For OSF Preprints services, each moderator community determines its own moderation policies. COS staff do not modify content on these services unless they violate the OSF Terms of Use. COS staff will communicate with moderators in these cases, and removal may need to occur quickly.

It is recommended that you refer moderators to this Guide so that any changes or new features will be reflected. You can also include a link to your preprint’s moderation policies in Member Moderation Policies section.

Moderation Setup

For new OSF Preprint members, several moderation options will be configured by an administrator.

Moderation Type - There are two types of moderation: pre-acceptance moderation and post-acceptance moderation.
- Pre-moderation - All preprints are placed in a queue for a moderator to accept or reject. Preprints are displayed publicly only after approval.
- Post-moderation - All preprints are displayed publicly immediately upon submission. Preprints also appear in a queue for a moderator to accept or withdraw. If withdrawn, only a metadata tombstone of the preprint is displayed publicly.
Comment Visibility - Moderators can add comments when making a decision about a submission. This option toggles who can see these comments.
- Moderators - Comments will be visible to moderators NOT contributors on the submission.
- Moderators and Contributors - Comments will be visible to moderators AND contributors on the submission.

Moderator Comments - If moderators' comments are visible to contributors, the moderator's name can be displayed or hidden from the contributors.
- Anonymized Comments - All comments will be visible to the contributors of the submission, but the moderator's name will not be displayed.
- Named Comments - All comments will be visible to the contributors of the submission and the moderator's OSF profile name will be displayed.

An OSF Preprints member can alter these choices by contacting OSF Support.

Moderator Management

There are two roles available for community members that are maintaining the preprint content.

Moderator - A moderator has access to the preprint moderation dashboard, and has the ability to view, accept, reject, and withdraw submitted preprints. For pre-moderation services, pending content is not public until the preprint is accepted.
Administrator - An administrator has the same features as the moderator, and can also add or remove new moderators and modify their permissions (moving moderators to admins or vice versa). The first administrator for a preprint service will be added by COS staff based on member direction.
- To add a moderator, navigate to the ‘Moderators’ tab of your dashboard and click the ‘Add’ button.

A field will appear on the bottom of the moderator list. You can add new moderators in two ways:
- Search for an OSF user by name. The user must already have an OSF account.
- Invite a moderator by email. The user does not need a pre-existing OSF account to be invited, but will need to register for an account to participate in moderation.

Moderators will determine the shape of preprint content based on member moderation policies, and should reference Preprint Moderator Guide to orient themselves if possible.

Accessing Moderator Dashboard

Moderators will navigate to the OSF Preprints discovery page, and then click on the “My Reviewing” tab to access the dashboard. You can also access the dashboard at https://osf.io/reviews/.

The moderator dashboard shows each of the preprint services that you moderate with links to features within each service on the right column, and recent activity within each service on the left column.
Click on one of the service features to access the dashboard for that service.

Moderator Dashboard Features

Moderators can follow the status of content submitted to the service within each OSF Preprints Member Dashboard. Each dashboard includes several tabs.

Submissions - All preprints submitted to the service, segmented into four different statuses
- Pending - Preprints that have been submitted by users, but no action has been taken by moderators
- Accepted - Preprints that have been submitted by users and accepted for publications by moderators
- Rejected - Preprints that have been submitted by users and have been rejected by moderators
- Withdrawn - Preprints that have been withdrawn by users or moderators
Withdrawal requests - Preprints that have had a contributor request to withdraw
- Pending - Contributor has requested a withdrawal, but no action has been taken by moderators
- Approved - Contributor has requested a withdrawal, and the request has been accepted by a moderator
- Declined - Contributor has requested a withdrawal, and the request has been declined by a moderator
Moderators - A list of all moderators and administrators for the service
- Only administrators can modify, add, and remove moderators
- See the Moderator Management section for more information
Notifications - Change the frequency that you receive email notifications for service-specific activity
- New Pending Submissions - Receive notifications instantly, daily, or never
Settings - Settings that affect service-wide activity
- See the Moderation Setup section for more information

Moderator Decisions

Moderators make moderation decisions by navigating to each submitted preprint.

Navigate to a pending or submitted preprint.
Click the “Make Decision” button. A dropdown will appear.
Select “Accept submission” or “Reject submission”
Include comments for the contributors. This can refer to a reason for acceptance or rejection, as well as suggestions for revisions. Users will receive an email from OSF including moderator comments upon acceptance or rejection.

Moderators can withdraw a preprint by user request or if it does not conform to your service moderation policy.

To withdraw a preprint, select the preprint from your moderator dashboard.
Click the “Modify Decision” button. A dropdown will appear.
Select “Withdraw submission” and include comments for the contributors. This can refer to a reason for withdrawal.

Preprint Versions, Deletions, and Withdrawals

OSF users can edit their preprint by updating its title, subject, license, abstract, DOI, and authors. Users can also submit a new version of the preprint, however, old versions will still be available for download.
To preserve the integrity and transparency of the research process, OSF does not delete preprints unless there are legal or safety implications, or other exigent circumstances. These are reviewed on a case by case basis. Please contact OSF Support at support@osf.io and provide as much detail as you can if you encounter one of these cases.
Users who wish to remove their preprint from OSF can request a withdrawal. Withdrawing a preprint will remove content but leave behind basic metadata including title, authors, and the reason for withdrawal, if the author chooses to provide it. It is advised that users consider other resources that they would like to route consumers to within that reason statement, including parallel preprints or resulting publication. The reason statement cannot be modified once a withdrawal request is submitted, so they should have any links needed before submitting.
- In some cases, users who request a withdrawal should be redirected to edit their preprint instead.
- For example, users who request a withdrawal because they want to update the contents of their preprint should upload a new version instead, or metadata fields like adding a publication link for a related paper can be updated without withdraws or version changes.

Member Moderation Policies

AfricArXiv - Submission Moderation Checklist and text templates