6 ms·

And they pay for it multiple times over. They pay once for the researchers carrying out the work, and then they pay again for the reviewers, who provide their p

And they pay for it multiple times over. They pay once for the researchers carrying out the work, and then they pay again for the reviewers, who provide their peer review services for free (i.e., not paid by the journal). Then, they pay for it a third time when universities (the government-funded ones, at least) have to pay exorbitant subscription fees to access the research.

mc32 6y ago
I think there’s some commingling in this argument. When an institution subscribed they are getting access to research done by _other_ institutions. Presumably they have their own records of their own research.
- 0xdde 6y ago
  There isn't. He is pointing out that publicly funded research is then not freely available to the public.
- madhadron 6y ago
  Not really. Sure, you could go get the paper from the guy down the hall, but most universities don't have their own hub for publications that is accessible to their faculty.
  - ChrisLomont 6y ago
    So there's some value in a central hub, which I assume also costs money to set up and run?
    - sooheon 6y ago
      Which scihub provides. Journals are their own silos and require multiple exorbitant subscriptions.
      - ChrisLomont 6y ago
        Sci hub benefits from having journals enforce standards, have editors, reviewers, and a ton of value added that they didn't pay for. I like Sci Hub, but it didn't create a lot of the value it provides - it does that on the $ of a lot of other actors. Even arxiv was getting flooded with crap and had to do some gatekeeping. Sci hub gets a huge benefit from the publishing industry at keeping out a flood of crap and pseudo science nonsense that floods most places that don't have such a process.
        anigbrowl 6y ago
        Journals don't pay reviewers either, as has been explained above.
        ChrisLomont 6y ago
        >Journals don't pay reviewers either, Some do. And I am aware of that most don't, having published enough papers, reviewed papers, and been asked by journals to review for them. However, I never claimed reviewers were paid. I did state Sci Hub is getting benefits they didn't pay for, like keeping out crap, the value from being reviewed, uniform quality from known journals, etc. If I, having published academic papers, and in many cases keeping my own copyrights as I always try to negotiate that (and a surprising amount of journals will let you if you ask), want scihub to not publish my work, funded by me, and published by journals I selected, will they remove it? No? Then they are stealing the same as others. It's just their theft is popular since it lets people access stuff for free.
        madhadron 6y ago
        > I did state Sci Hub is getting benefits they didn't pay for, like keeping out crap, the value from being reviewed, uniform quality from known journals, etc. A few journal pay editors and reviewers, but the vast majority do not, so Sci-Hub is paying the same as anyone else. > will they remove it? Last time I checked, Sci-Hub doesn't host, it proxies, so your license to the journal to distribute the paper is still what applies. The journal has standing, but you don't. And the idea of uniform quality from known journals is laughable.
- armoredkitten 6y ago
  Some, but not all, universities do have institutional repositories for their own work. But they are at best inconsistently used. Some academics also (when allowed by the licensing agreement of the journal) put their own research on a personal/lab website. But again, this is inconsistent, and really relies on secondary solutions like Google Scholar to be usable (unless you already know exactly which paper you're looking for and navigate directly to the author's website). The bottom line is that in most cases, academics rely on journals even for access to research from other folks in their own university. Things get passed around informally. And there are changing trends, such as preprint archives (like ArXiv), in some fields. But the majority of research is still paywalled. Edit: To return to your point, yes, I was sort of discussing some Platonic ideal of "The Taxpayer". Obviously, if you live in the US, your taxes don't pay for research in Europe (only for universities' access to that research). And we could be talking about federal taxes for federal grants, but state taxes for state-run schools. But in general, the point is that the journals make exorbitant profits from labour paid with public funds.
leobakerhytch 6y ago
And a fourth time on a per-article basis if you, as an individual, non-academic taxpayer, would like you read the very research your taxes have funded.
- hctaw 6y ago
  Has anyone ever paid the individual price for an article? And setting aside the principle for a second - how many non-academic taxpayers are trying to read articles that don't have institutional access through their employer or local public library?
  - pixelface 6y ago
    I'm a non-academic taxpayer trying to read articles and don't have access through my employer or public library. I know other people in the same situation. Emailing the authors directly to request a copy is a known legitimate workaround, but in cases where I'm trying to read a paper on fungal propagation from 1971 (most recent example, from last week) the options are limited. I would also imagine that if these things were more readily available people would be more likely to use them.
  - Dan_JiuJitsu 6y ago
    I frequently read research I do not have institutional access to. I'm in this situation fairly frequently, tbh.
  - dorfsmay 6y ago
    Isn't the amount of traffic to sci-hub the answer to that question?
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
  - enriquto 6y ago
    > Has anyone ever paid the individual price for an article? Before the existence of sci-hub, I spent several hundred taxpayer euros to download taxpayer-funded research from journals that my library was not subscribed to. I was not aware that asking the library for a single pdf cost about 30 or 40 EUR, until the librarian told me. Then I stopped because it was obviously ridiculous.
matheusmoreira 6y ago
Peer review is the whole point of a journal and yet they do not get paid for their invaluable work. They should just form their own group so they can review academic works independently and publish online. There is no reason to have "journals" anymore.
36r7r7ddyd 6y ago
It seems like open access doesn't really solve the problem of paying more than necessary though. Open access means that if a country funds a particular piece of research then they're funding that piece for the entire world. Why shouldn't the information be at least limited enough that the society ('societies' if it's a partnership) funding the research is the one to take the profits?

mc32 6y ago

I think there’s some commingling in this argument. When an institution subscribed they are getting access to research done by _other_ institutions. Presumably they have their own records of their own research.

0xdde 6y ago
There isn't. He is pointing out that publicly funded research is then not freely available to the public.
madhadron 6y ago
Not really. Sure, you could go get the paper from the guy down the hall, but most universities don't have their own hub for publications that is accessible to their faculty.
- ChrisLomont 6y ago
  So there's some value in a central hub, which I assume also costs money to set up and run?
  - sooheon 6y ago
    Which scihub provides. Journals are their own silos and require multiple exorbitant subscriptions.
    - ChrisLomont 6y ago
      Sci hub benefits from having journals enforce standards, have editors, reviewers, and a ton of value added that they didn't pay for. I like Sci Hub, but it didn't create a lot of the value it provides - it does that on the $ of a lot of other actors. Even arxiv was getting flooded with crap and had to do some gatekeeping. Sci hub gets a huge benefit from the publishing industry at keeping out a flood of crap and pseudo science nonsense that floods most places that don't have such a process.
      - anigbrowl 6y ago
        Journals don't pay reviewers either, as has been explained above.
        ChrisLomont 6y ago
        >Journals don't pay reviewers either, Some do. And I am aware of that most don't, having published enough papers, reviewed papers, and been asked by journals to review for them. However, I never claimed reviewers were paid. I did state Sci Hub is getting benefits they didn't pay for, like keeping out crap, the value from being reviewed, uniform quality from known journals, etc. If I, having published academic papers, and in many cases keeping my own copyrights as I always try to negotiate that (and a surprising amount of journals will let you if you ask), want scihub to not publish my work, funded by me, and published by journals I selected, will they remove it? No? Then they are stealing the same as others. It's just their theft is popular since it lets people access stuff for free.
        madhadron 6y ago
        > I did state Sci Hub is getting benefits they didn't pay for, like keeping out crap, the value from being reviewed, uniform quality from known journals, etc. A few journal pay editors and reviewers, but the vast majority do not, so Sci-Hub is paying the same as anyone else. > will they remove it? Last time I checked, Sci-Hub doesn't host, it proxies, so your license to the journal to distribute the paper is still what applies. The journal has standing, but you don't. And the idea of uniform quality from known journals is laughable.
armoredkitten 6y ago
Some, but not all, universities do have institutional repositories for their own work. But they are at best inconsistently used. Some academics also (when allowed by the licensing agreement of the journal) put their own research on a personal/lab website. But again, this is inconsistent, and really relies on secondary solutions like Google Scholar to be usable (unless you already know exactly which paper you're looking for and navigate directly to the author's website). The bottom line is that in most cases, academics rely on journals even for access to research from other folks in their own university. Things get passed around informally. And there are changing trends, such as preprint archives (like ArXiv), in some fields. But the majority of research is still paywalled. Edit: To return to your point, yes, I was sort of discussing some Platonic ideal of "The Taxpayer". Obviously, if you live in the US, your taxes don't pay for research in Europe (only for universities' access to that research). And we could be talking about federal taxes for federal grants, but state taxes for state-run schools. But in general, the point is that the journals make exorbitant profits from labour paid with public funds.

leobakerhytch 6y ago

And a fourth time on a per-article basis if you, as an individual, non-academic taxpayer, would like you read the very research your taxes have funded.

hctaw 6y ago
Has anyone ever paid the individual price for an article? And setting aside the principle for a second - how many non-academic taxpayers are trying to read articles that don't have institutional access through their employer or local public library?
- pixelface 6y ago
  I'm a non-academic taxpayer trying to read articles and don't have access through my employer or public library. I know other people in the same situation. Emailing the authors directly to request a copy is a known legitimate workaround, but in cases where I'm trying to read a paper on fungal propagation from 1971 (most recent example, from last week) the options are limited. I would also imagine that if these things were more readily available people would be more likely to use them.
- Dan_JiuJitsu 6y ago
  I frequently read research I do not have institutional access to. I'm in this situation fairly frequently, tbh.
- dorfsmay 6y ago
  Isn't the amount of traffic to sci-hub the answer to that question?
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- enriquto 6y ago
  > Has anyone ever paid the individual price for an article? Before the existence of sci-hub, I spent several hundred taxpayer euros to download taxpayer-funded research from journals that my library was not subscribed to. I was not aware that asking the library for a single pdf cost about 30 or 40 EUR, until the librarian told me. Then I stopped because it was obviously ridiculous.

matheusmoreira 6y ago

Peer review is the whole point of a journal and yet they do not get paid for their invaluable work. They should just form their own group so they can review academic works independently and publish online. There is no reason to have "journals" anymore.

36r7r7ddyd 6y ago

It seems like open access doesn't really solve the problem of paying more than necessary though. Open access means that if a country funds a particular piece of research then they're funding that piece for the entire world. Why shouldn't the information be at least limited enough that the society ('societies' if it's a partnership) funding the research is the one to take the profits?