I work at a small academic database as a developer. We charge a pittance compared to what a lot of the larger players in this market do. And I'm conflicted. We

I work at a small academic database as a developer. We charge a pittance compared to what a lot of the larger players in this market do. And I'm conflicted. We are a registered non profit, and are actively losing money. Developer costs, of which there are only two. Building costs--I also shovel snow!, marketing costs, hosting costs, and much more. We have the workload where we would benefit from a staff 3 times the size. Currently we are at 12. Years ago we had a fully functional publishing operation too. But here is the thing. These open access places often are pay to publish. This is built into many grants today. Publishing costs. But not so much in the field I'm in. The social sciences. So sure, the result of that work should be open access. I just cannot help thinking this takes away from what you could be paying one more lab or research assistant. a lot of these pay walled sites are struggling to survive as library budgets dwindle. Maybe there isn't much room left for the little players. Many are bought up or have folded over the last 20 years.