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Elsevier and others represent a massive and punishing private tax on the basic operation of science and academia. It's a scam but it's so ingrained in academic

Elsevier and others represent a massive and punishing private tax on the basic operation of science and academia. It's a scam but it's so ingrained in academic culture that very few groups of scholars seem willing or able to break away from it. They basically steal copyright from the authors of these papers, they don't compensate the authors or the peer reviewers, but they collect outrageous prices from libraries and individuals for access to already-publically-subsidized research. It's utterly depressing that they continue to exist.

Jugurtha 9y ago
> they don't compensate the authors or the peer reviewers, I suffered reading peer reviewed articles on Elsevier or IEEE with unremarkable results at best, irreproducible results at worst. The title goes "Novel Way of Breaking a Glass", an abstract that describes the methodology as "dropping a file cabinet on it", and the talent (yes, talent) to come to the conclusion that "file cabinets could prove useful in breaking trees or pierce underground bunkers in the future". Are you kidding me, Dr Bozo et al? I've had to wade through hundreds of insipid articles which made my feeling of being stupid more bearable but diminished my respect for many things shrouded with a veneer that come at $35 a pop.