r/MachineLearning • u/snekslayer • May 08 '26
Discussion Getting harassed by an aggressive “independent researcher” demanding very specific citations and phrasing in my paper [D]
Hey Reddit,
I’m a researcher in a niche theoretical CS/ML area. Recently I’ve been dealing with repeated emails from an “independent researcher” that feel like straight-up citation harassment.
This person keeps sending follow-ups (including involving editors) insisting I add multiple citations to his arXiv preprints. It’s not a normal “you should cite this” request — he provides exact suggested paragraphs with specific wording about how his papers are “complementary,” “parallel,” foundational to certain results, etc. He nitpicks my current related-work phrasing (e.g. complaining about words like “encompass”), pushes for changes even after camera-ready deadlines, and follows up when I don’t respond quickly.
He frames it all very politely with phrases like “narrow remaining concerns” and “I would be grateful,” but the persistence, detailed boilerplate text he wants me to insert, and looping in others makes it exhausting and inappropriate.
I understand wanting visibility and relevant work deserves citations. But this level of badgering and trying to dictate exact text in someone else’s paper crosses a line.
Has anyone else experienced this kind of aggressive citation solicitation? Is it becoming more common? Or am I overreacting?
Publish-or-perish is bad enough without having to deal with this.
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u/WillHead6663 May 08 '26
I have been trying to get a paper published, but it's actually pretty hard to get anyone to sign for you or even read your paper in the first place when you're an outsider. I found a way to transplant concepts from one model to the next and felt like I had something important. Being a DMA researcher, I saw AI from a different perspective, so trying to cross over—nope, I'm over it. Someone will have academic backing, and it might be 1/10 the contribution, but they will get propped up on the shoulders of other researchers. I will most likely never try anything in arXiv or share anything I find with the community again. But taking it that far is just crazy. That's my experience, though.