5 ms·

It's not that complicated. The author seems to think that academic journals were somehow high-quality products that were co-opted by privacy. The music industry

It's not that complicated. The author seems to think that academic journals were somehow high-quality products that were co-opted by privacy. The music industry also, once upon a time, thought that offering disks in record stores was a high-quality offering. Music pirates forced the music industry to realize that they were charging too much for user-hostile formats. Publishing pirates ought to force the publishing industry to realize that they are charging too much for user-hostile formats, too. The music industry started to win back market-share from pirates when they understood that they had to compete with pirate offerings and offer a better, higher-quality product. The results were iTunes, then Spotify and similar competitors (Google Music etc.). The publishing industry ought to be no exception.

trothamel 9y ago
I'm not sure the academic publishing industry is going to get what little goodwill the music industry has. With iTunes and so on, there's at least the idea that some small fraction of the money spent is going back to the artists. That doesn't seem to be the case with academic publishing, where you have these purely rent-seeking corporations. Why would I want to give Elsevier my money, when the authors of the paper don't get any of it? That's the problem academic publishing has, making it hard to recognize sci-hub as illegitimate. (One of my happiest academic publishing experiences was when I wrote a paper while working for the US government, which meant there was no copyright for the publisher to insist on stealing from me.)
- rjsw 9y ago
  I would prefer to see the reviewers of a paper getting paid than the authors. I was a founder of a startup in the 80s that was part funded by Elsevier. I spent a fair bit of time discussing the possible impact of computer networks and graphical displays on their business model with their then CTO.
  - majewsky 9y ago
    Please go on. Your anecdote stopped before any of the interesting parts. Did the then-CTO not see any of this coming, or did he/she just think that they couldn't change anything one way or the other?
boramalper 9y ago
Some people might disagree but I also believe that piracy has played a huge role in leading to those better and higher-quality results such as iTunes, (and especially) Spotify. I can clearly remember that the cost of a single album on CD was (and still is) equal to the amount of money I pay to Spotify each month for completely unlimited use. Since Spotify (and other similar services) are still alive, I think you can still make some decent amount of money without being too much greedy.
- jorams 9y ago
  Regarding your last sentence: Spotify may still be alive, but it's losing massive amounts of money. One example article about this: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-15/spotify-losses-widen-after-music-site-flags-accounting-errors https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-15/spotify-l...
SolarNet 9y ago
I think you are almost right. Today they aren't a high quality product, however 30 years ago they were. The journals just did rent-seeking behavior, cutting staff that made the journals high quality. Piracy didn't ruin them though I agree there.
mirimir 9y ago
> The author seems to think that academic journals were somehow high-quality products that were co-opted by privacy. Indeed. And indeed, academic journals used to be high-quality products, that were run on a not-for-profit (or nearly so) basis. Then they were co-opted by rent-seeking corporations. Who have been gutting substance -- careful peer review, editing, proofreading, typesetting, and quality printing -- and focused on over-the-top squeezing of the academic sector. It's arguable that they are the pirates. Or maybe slavers.
fsloth 9y ago
"they understood that they had to compete with pirate offerings and offer a better, higher-quality product." They (music industry) 'understood' once Jobs had used all of his negotiating skills to convince labels to join iTunes and they saw the money the service raked in. There was zero innovation coming from the publishers. The first response to napster was not to develop a better distribution method but to go to courts and add DRM to their music CD:s by injecting a rootkit to the users computer! Oh the shitstorm the Sony's audio CD DRM raised... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_roo...
alexasmyths 9y ago
"Music pirates forced the music industry to realize that they were charging too much for user-hostile formats. " No, it's simply a matter of people being able to take something for free and not pay for it. 'Any cost' is too much if someone can grab it for free. The format was never the issue in terms of price, given IP protections. But the 'new' format implied weak IP protections, ergo a new price point of zero. The music industry is not winning back market share, they're just adapting to other forms of revenue - and it has nothing to do with a 'higher quality product' - at least not in terms of the file/audio formats themselves.
Vinnl 9y ago
The author is asking how we'd be able to make Open Access happen through legal means - and yes, that's complicated [1], otherwise it'd been solved already. [1] https://medium.com/flockademic/the-vicious-cycle-of-scholarly-publishing-eef794937c9c https://medium.com/flockademic/the-vicious-cycle-of-scholarl...

trothamel 9y ago

I'm not sure the academic publishing industry is going to get what little goodwill the music industry has. With iTunes and so on, there's at least the idea that some small fraction of the money spent is going back to the artists. That doesn't seem to be the case with academic publishing, where you have these purely rent-seeking corporations. Why would I want to give Elsevier my money, when the authors of the paper don't get any of it? That's the problem academic publishing has, making it hard to recognize sci-hub as illegitimate. (One of my happiest academic publishing experiences was when I wrote a paper while working for the US government, which meant there was no copyright for the publisher to insist on stealing from me.)

rjsw 9y ago
I would prefer to see the reviewers of a paper getting paid than the authors. I was a founder of a startup in the 80s that was part funded by Elsevier. I spent a fair bit of time discussing the possible impact of computer networks and graphical displays on their business model with their then CTO.
- majewsky 9y ago
  Please go on. Your anecdote stopped before any of the interesting parts. Did the then-CTO not see any of this coming, or did he/she just think that they couldn't change anything one way or the other?

boramalper 9y ago

Some people might disagree but I also believe that piracy has played a huge role in leading to those better and higher-quality results such as iTunes, (and especially) Spotify. I can clearly remember that the cost of a single album on CD was (and still is) equal to the amount of money I pay to Spotify each month for completely unlimited use. Since Spotify (and other similar services) are still alive, I think you can still make some decent amount of money without being too much greedy.

jorams 9y ago
Regarding your last sentence: Spotify may still be alive, but it's losing massive amounts of money. One example article about this: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-15/spotify-losses-widen-after-music-site-flags-accounting-errors https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-15/spotify-l...

SolarNet 9y ago

I think you are almost right. Today they aren't a high quality product, however 30 years ago they were. The journals just did rent-seeking behavior, cutting staff that made the journals high quality. Piracy didn't ruin them though I agree there.

mirimir 9y ago

> The author seems to think that academic journals were somehow high-quality products that were co-opted by privacy. Indeed. And indeed, academic journals used to be high-quality products, that were run on a not-for-profit (or nearly so) basis. Then they were co-opted by rent-seeking corporations. Who have been gutting substance -- careful peer review, editing, proofreading, typesetting, and quality printing -- and focused on over-the-top squeezing of the academic sector. It's arguable that they are the pirates. Or maybe slavers.

fsloth 9y ago

"they understood that they had to compete with pirate offerings and offer a better, higher-quality product." They (music industry) 'understood' once Jobs had used all of his negotiating skills to convince labels to join iTunes and they saw the money the service raked in. There was zero innovation coming from the publishers. The first response to napster was not to develop a better distribution method but to go to courts and add DRM to their music CD:s by injecting a rootkit to the users computer! Oh the shitstorm the Sony's audio CD DRM raised... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_roo...

alexasmyths 9y ago

"Music pirates forced the music industry to realize that they were charging too much for user-hostile formats. " No, it's simply a matter of people being able to take something for free and not pay for it. 'Any cost' is too much if someone can grab it for free. The format was never the issue in terms of price, given IP protections. But the 'new' format implied weak IP protections, ergo a new price point of zero. The music industry is not winning back market share, they're just adapting to other forms of revenue - and it has nothing to do with a 'higher quality product' - at least not in terms of the file/audio formats themselves.

Vinnl 9y ago

The author is asking how we'd be able to make Open Access happen through legal means - and yes, that's complicated [1], otherwise it'd been solved already. [1] https://medium.com/flockademic/the-vicious-cycle-of-scholarly-publishing-eef794937c9c https://medium.com/flockademic/the-vicious-cycle-of-scholarl...