5 ms·

Why would anyone complaint while sci-hub is there. I know that it is still illegal and people don't talk or encourage this but it is used and a lot. It maybe ju

Why would anyone complaint while sci-hub is there. I know that it is still illegal and people don't talk or encourage this but it is used and a lot. It maybe just a new fact added to unwritten rules in academia. Because I don't think the current situation with publishing industry gets any support inside the community.

siver_john 4y ago
I had this problem a few months ago, but because Sci-Hub doesn't have supporting information currently. Yes, I understand normally that is free anyways on journals but for whatever reason this journal (owned by Elsevier ofc) did not have its SI available without a subscription and my institution did not have access to this journal. So no, just use sci-hub is not a valid alternative as it stands today and because of its legal jeopardy means we probably shouldn't become reliant on it.
agarsev 4y ago
There are many articles not on sci-hub, especially if they are more or less recent or in niche (and not so niche) topics.
- elashri 4y ago
  I get that but they are that much (at least not 2021 papers because of Indian court case). Also for many fields (steam) the papers usually show up in preprinted repositories like arxiv, biorxiv...etc Also there are many places to ask for a paper if you really need it like on reddit ( I don't remember the sub reddit name). people do have groups on Facebook and Twitter to ask and provide pdfs. For really desperate people with rare cases if that all does not work, sending a message to thr author asking for a version never gets no. people like when others are interested in their work.
  - pbhjpbhj 4y ago
    If you get it from the author you've no more idea whether it's infringing copyright (in UK, it's more liberal with Fair Use under the USC) than if you get it from scihub. If we're going to allow authors to do that then we could reduce the workload by uploading all the papers to central servers, like some sort of hub, and just letting people download them. The real problem here is that scientific works are not artistic creations and shouldn't be covered by copyright. Also USA exporting ever longer copyright terms. Limit what counts as an artistic work (or what counts asa derivative, extracting data is not artistically derivative). Limit period of copyright to 20y like for patents. Bosh. Entirely my own personal opinions.
    - elashri 4y ago
      I would be surprised that anyone can claim a copyright violation for an author sharing his paper with someone over private communication.
      - pbhjpbhj 4y ago
        It's not the authors paper if a publisher produced it. That's why authors share preprints. But, I'd be surprised if that wasn't disallowed by their contracts in the UK (no point disallowing it in USA, Fair Use would allow it I feel).
    - ericpauley 4y ago
      While the facts presented in a scientific paper may not be copyrighted, the actual form and content of the paper clearly is, both common-sense and legally. Papers contain prose, artistic representations (figures), potentially photographs, and other stylistic elements that are clearly copyrightable. Whether works funded by government dollars should be copyrightable is of course a different question.
      - pbhjpbhj 4y ago
        >Papers contain prose, artistic representations (figures), potentially photographs, and other stylistic elements that are clearly copyrightable. // In copyright there is already a concept (in UK caselaw at the very least) that things that can only be presented in a limited way are effectively not artistic enough to gain copyright. A scientific paper can have artistic prose and such, but the purpose is to make a factual presentation. I'd be happy to allow people to chose to state that their paper is not a presentation of facts, but such things should not be accepted into scientific corpus and should be excluded when considering if an author has fulfilled a contract to produce a scientific paper, or fulfilled a duty to do scientific research. Photographs which are slavish reproductions---which a photo of apparatus needs to be in order to be scientifically useful---are not artistic works, for example. You can choose puce headings with lilac lines for your table but if it's in a scientific paper the purpose is informational [if that wasn't your purpose then you shouldn't have done it]. Coloured diagrams, sure, if they're used outside the context of the paper, and were manually manipulated, then allow them to be considered artistic works; but in the context of the paper they're presentations of supposed facts. I don't doubt you can lawyer your way into arguing your scientific paper is a trademark, or a registered design, but it seems entirely reasonable to simply prevent such things with ab exclusion clause in the legislation like "scientific papers are not subject to IP laws and can be shared freely". Of course you need to say what a paper is (something published as if it were a paper, or submitted to a journal as it were a paper, or made available publicly as if were a paper).
  - auxym 4y ago
    > Also for many fields (steam) the papers usually show up in preprinted repositories like arxiv, biorxiv...etc To my knowledge preprint repositories are popular in physics, math, CS, bio, but not much elsewhere. I work in research in mechanical engineering and no one uses arxiv or anything like it (unfortunately). That said scihub has not failed me often.
hourago 4y ago
> Why would anyone complaint while sci-hub is there. That is a hack, not a solution. As you noted, it is illegal. Workarounds are good as a fast fix, but sooner at later we need to look at the system and fix what is not working. This not only fixes this problem but it may fix other copyright/publication/papers problems.
- cute_boi 4y ago
  The one who is milking this system doesn't want to change the status quote, this is why a hack is needed. We clearly want a better option, but government & politicians don't seem to care.
- matheusmoreira 4y ago
  Abolishing copyright is the only proper fix. We're dealing with monopolists worth trillions of dollars who have thousands of expensive lobbyists at their employ so this hack might very well be the only effective solution. Essentially it's digital guerrilla warfare.
jks 4y ago
Anecdotally, I know some scientists who prefer Sci-Hub even when their institution has a subscription to the journal. The login procedures (and possibly VPN setups when working from home) are too much work when Sci-Hub is immediate. I'm sure that publishers will try and fight back, just like with music copying.
- Victerius 4y ago
  To paraphrase Bill Wurtz. Open. The journals. Stop. Having them be closed.
  - matheusmoreira 4y ago
    Now we just need huge boats. With guns. Gunboats.
- cute_boi 4y ago
  Exactly, many people prefer convenience over nonsense features in name of protections, copyrights, etc..
- qwezxcrty 4y ago
  I would always prefer to get the PDF in the legit way unless sometimes I encountered journals that my institution do not subscribe to. Only reason for that: to reduce the burden to scihub servers.
blagie 4y ago
Sci-hub breaks down beyond the individual researcher level. A 5-person non-profit, startup, etc. can't rely on it. Research projects which study scholarship can't use it. Being legal makes a difference.
- neuroma 4y ago
  Could you kindly elaborate in why scihub isn't useful beyond individual researchers? This has not been my experience at all.
  - neltnerb 4y ago
    If I were legally responsible for a company's behavior, I would not want to, for instance, use pirated copies of SolidWorks or Office. It's an minor risk I would imagine, compared to the benefits of reading the articles. But paying for the articles you cite or reference in presentations seems like a good decision for the same reason as you don't want some "pirated version" notification popping up while you give a presentation at a conference. The risk is a lot lower, but it's the same logic. Considering the cost of that handful of articles versus the budget for a company's coffee supplies it seems like probably the right decision. I don't think I'd go for an actual journal subscription though, that seems like ridiculous overkill unless you're the size of Google.
    - blagie 4y ago
      It's a minor risk, but with astronomical potential liability. Statutory damages for wilful violation can be up to $150,000 per violation. If your employees download 100 articles, that's a cool $15M. In many cases, these sorts of crackdowns can come long after-the-fact. The statute-of-limitations is short (3 years, I think), but a lot of courts start the clock ticking when the violation is discovered. If your organization pirates for 30 years, and a publisher does an investigation in 2022, and discovers all 30 years of violations, they would likely file in such a venue. In most cases, the liability comes in when a business is failing, and goes into don't-give-an-f territory. If Elsevier / Google / Amazon / Coke / [insert random successful business] starts suing researchers when they're big, they're liabile to be hated for it, which endangers their brand and their existing business. If Elsevier goes into bankruptcy and those copyrights get bought up by parasites, or otherwise starts struggling to survive (as inevitably happens with almost any business eventually) those sorts of retroactive lawsuits often come into play. Most businesses I worked with in the nineties went into owned-by-sleazeballs territory at some point in the forty years since.
neatze 4y ago
Donating to sci-hub is the only valuable use of crypto.
arkades 4y ago
Scihub seems to have stopped updating. I haven’t gotten a recent article out of them in a while.

siver_john 4y ago

I had this problem a few months ago, but because Sci-Hub doesn't have supporting information currently. Yes, I understand normally that is free anyways on journals but for whatever reason this journal (owned by Elsevier ofc) did not have its SI available without a subscription and my institution did not have access to this journal. So no, just use sci-hub is not a valid alternative as it stands today and because of its legal jeopardy means we probably shouldn't become reliant on it.

agarsev 4y ago

There are many articles not on sci-hub, especially if they are more or less recent or in niche (and not so niche) topics.

elashri 4y ago
I get that but they are that much (at least not 2021 papers because of Indian court case). Also for many fields (steam) the papers usually show up in preprinted repositories like arxiv, biorxiv...etc Also there are many places to ask for a paper if you really need it like on reddit ( I don't remember the sub reddit name). people do have groups on Facebook and Twitter to ask and provide pdfs. For really desperate people with rare cases if that all does not work, sending a message to thr author asking for a version never gets no. people like when others are interested in their work.
- pbhjpbhj 4y ago
  If you get it from the author you've no more idea whether it's infringing copyright (in UK, it's more liberal with Fair Use under the USC) than if you get it from scihub. If we're going to allow authors to do that then we could reduce the workload by uploading all the papers to central servers, like some sort of hub, and just letting people download them. The real problem here is that scientific works are not artistic creations and shouldn't be covered by copyright. Also USA exporting ever longer copyright terms. Limit what counts as an artistic work (or what counts asa derivative, extracting data is not artistically derivative). Limit period of copyright to 20y like for patents. Bosh. Entirely my own personal opinions.
  - elashri 4y ago
    I would be surprised that anyone can claim a copyright violation for an author sharing his paper with someone over private communication.
    - pbhjpbhj 4y ago
      It's not the authors paper if a publisher produced it. That's why authors share preprints. But, I'd be surprised if that wasn't disallowed by their contracts in the UK (no point disallowing it in USA, Fair Use would allow it I feel).
  - ericpauley 4y ago
    While the facts presented in a scientific paper may not be copyrighted, the actual form and content of the paper clearly is, both common-sense and legally. Papers contain prose, artistic representations (figures), potentially photographs, and other stylistic elements that are clearly copyrightable. Whether works funded by government dollars should be copyrightable is of course a different question.
    - pbhjpbhj 4y ago
      >Papers contain prose, artistic representations (figures), potentially photographs, and other stylistic elements that are clearly copyrightable. // In copyright there is already a concept (in UK caselaw at the very least) that things that can only be presented in a limited way are effectively not artistic enough to gain copyright. A scientific paper can have artistic prose and such, but the purpose is to make a factual presentation. I'd be happy to allow people to chose to state that their paper is not a presentation of facts, but such things should not be accepted into scientific corpus and should be excluded when considering if an author has fulfilled a contract to produce a scientific paper, or fulfilled a duty to do scientific research. Photographs which are slavish reproductions---which a photo of apparatus needs to be in order to be scientifically useful---are not artistic works, for example. You can choose puce headings with lilac lines for your table but if it's in a scientific paper the purpose is informational [if that wasn't your purpose then you shouldn't have done it]. Coloured diagrams, sure, if they're used outside the context of the paper, and were manually manipulated, then allow them to be considered artistic works; but in the context of the paper they're presentations of supposed facts. I don't doubt you can lawyer your way into arguing your scientific paper is a trademark, or a registered design, but it seems entirely reasonable to simply prevent such things with ab exclusion clause in the legislation like "scientific papers are not subject to IP laws and can be shared freely". Of course you need to say what a paper is (something published as if it were a paper, or submitted to a journal as it were a paper, or made available publicly as if were a paper).
- auxym 4y ago
  > Also for many fields (steam) the papers usually show up in preprinted repositories like arxiv, biorxiv...etc To my knowledge preprint repositories are popular in physics, math, CS, bio, but not much elsewhere. I work in research in mechanical engineering and no one uses arxiv or anything like it (unfortunately). That said scihub has not failed me often.

hourago 4y ago

> Why would anyone complaint while sci-hub is there. That is a hack, not a solution. As you noted, it is illegal. Workarounds are good as a fast fix, but sooner at later we need to look at the system and fix what is not working. This not only fixes this problem but it may fix other copyright/publication/papers problems.

cute_boi 4y ago
The one who is milking this system doesn't want to change the status quote, this is why a hack is needed. We clearly want a better option, but government & politicians don't seem to care.
matheusmoreira 4y ago
Abolishing copyright is the only proper fix. We're dealing with monopolists worth trillions of dollars who have thousands of expensive lobbyists at their employ so this hack might very well be the only effective solution. Essentially it's digital guerrilla warfare.

jks 4y ago

Anecdotally, I know some scientists who prefer Sci-Hub even when their institution has a subscription to the journal. The login procedures (and possibly VPN setups when working from home) are too much work when Sci-Hub is immediate. I'm sure that publishers will try and fight back, just like with music copying.

Victerius 4y ago
To paraphrase Bill Wurtz. Open. The journals. Stop. Having them be closed.
- matheusmoreira 4y ago
  Now we just need huge boats. With guns. Gunboats.
cute_boi 4y ago
Exactly, many people prefer convenience over nonsense features in name of protections, copyrights, etc..
qwezxcrty 4y ago
I would always prefer to get the PDF in the legit way unless sometimes I encountered journals that my institution do not subscribe to. Only reason for that: to reduce the burden to scihub servers.

blagie 4y ago

Sci-hub breaks down beyond the individual researcher level. A 5-person non-profit, startup, etc. can't rely on it. Research projects which study scholarship can't use it. Being legal makes a difference.

neuroma 4y ago
Could you kindly elaborate in why scihub isn't useful beyond individual researchers? This has not been my experience at all.
- neltnerb 4y ago
  If I were legally responsible for a company's behavior, I would not want to, for instance, use pirated copies of SolidWorks or Office. It's an minor risk I would imagine, compared to the benefits of reading the articles. But paying for the articles you cite or reference in presentations seems like a good decision for the same reason as you don't want some "pirated version" notification popping up while you give a presentation at a conference. The risk is a lot lower, but it's the same logic. Considering the cost of that handful of articles versus the budget for a company's coffee supplies it seems like probably the right decision. I don't think I'd go for an actual journal subscription though, that seems like ridiculous overkill unless you're the size of Google.
  - blagie 4y ago
    It's a minor risk, but with astronomical potential liability. Statutory damages for wilful violation can be up to $150,000 per violation. If your employees download 100 articles, that's a cool $15M. In many cases, these sorts of crackdowns can come long after-the-fact. The statute-of-limitations is short (3 years, I think), but a lot of courts start the clock ticking when the violation is discovered. If your organization pirates for 30 years, and a publisher does an investigation in 2022, and discovers all 30 years of violations, they would likely file in such a venue. In most cases, the liability comes in when a business is failing, and goes into don't-give-an-f territory. If Elsevier / Google / Amazon / Coke / [insert random successful business] starts suing researchers when they're big, they're liabile to be hated for it, which endangers their brand and their existing business. If Elsevier goes into bankruptcy and those copyrights get bought up by parasites, or otherwise starts struggling to survive (as inevitably happens with almost any business eventually) those sorts of retroactive lawsuits often come into play. Most businesses I worked with in the nineties went into owned-by-sleazeballs territory at some point in the forty years since.

neatze 4y ago

Donating to sci-hub is the only valuable use of crypto.

arkades 4y ago

Scihub seems to have stopped updating. I haven’t gotten a recent article out of them in a while.