7 ms·

Imagine working this hard to track down people sharing ideas, that you didn't work to produce or fund in the first place, in order to punish them for not giving

by hcrean 2y ago

Imagine working this hard to track down people sharing ideas, that you didn't work to produce or fund in the first place, in order to punish them for not giving you a financial cut... Companies like this are just holding humanity back.

dandanua 2y ago
It's not actually hard, but I agree with the point. BTW, they also charge authors ridiculous amount of money for additional services, e.g. printing colored images. In a far (and optimistic) future such companies will be studied as examples of social parasites in schools and universities.
- giancarlostoro 2y ago
  Starting with Oracle I am sure.
- geysersam 2y ago
  Printing colored images! What does a single issue of their printed editions cost? Hundreds of dollars? The color printing cost is a rounding error.
- qup 2y ago
  I think the universities themselves will be studied as social parasites, too.
  - vsuperpower2020 2y ago
    I think they'll be studied as universal basic income. There's so many college graduates with no skills who basically unemployable, but are still collecting a decent salary to teach things that no one wants to pay for in the first place. Our economy can evidently support a lot of people who aren't working.
- LastTrain 2y ago
  It already is studied and there is even a term for it: rent seeking. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent-seeking https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent-seeking
codedokode 2y ago
As I understand, it is not Elsevier's fault, it is the government that allocates funding and gives promotion based on number of publications made in Elsevier journals.
- red_admiral 2y ago
  Some of those governments, in Europe, are also starting to mandate open access though. In practice, for maths papers I look on arXiv, for crypto papers on iacr and so on - academics generally want their work to be read (and cited) so they're usually happy to make it available for free. There's even tricks you can play like uploading an "author version" or "preprint" if you're forced to use a commercial publisher for a conference.
  - goosedragons 2y ago
    Open access is its own ridiculous racket. It usually costs the author literally thousands to publish as open access.
    - red_admiral 2y ago
      If you're funded by a Horizon/EU grant, you can cost the article publication charges into your grant application in most cases. It ends up being the funder, not the author, who pays. That also means that if the whole racket is revisited at some point, then Elsevier will get to pick on someone their own size if not bigger - and will hopefully come off worse in that fight.
      - goosedragons 2y ago
        Is that the best use of grant funds though really? Yes, it's not the author directly out of pocket but that money could be used towards new equipment, boosting grad student/post-doc pay, etc.
        red_admiral 2y ago
grishka 2y ago
The companies themselves aren't the problem, they are a symptom. The real problem is governments, especially the US government, that happily use their monopoly on the use of force to help such companies enforce such business models.
- hiddencost 2y ago
  Ludicrous
- amomchilov 2y ago
  Taken a step further, why does the US government help enforce such business models?
  - grishka 2y ago
    Because the it's the most powerful government in the world and is the only one among the most powerful ones that legally allows bribes.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - amomchilov 2y ago
      And who do those bribes come from? Companies. They come from companies, which are how greedy business models manifest in the real world.
- ngcazz 2y ago
  So is your point that companies are put in a position where they _have_ to take advantage of government's use of force? Elsevier could well come up with a business model that isn't purely based on extraction, rent-seeking and legal intimidation, but the problem is that governments possess legal resources that have good-faith use cases?
  - grishka 2y ago
fallingknife 2y ago
Funny how when Elsevier tries to enforce its copyright, HN acts like they're the devil, but when the AI training data is the subject turns into the strictest IP rights warriors I have ever seen.
- dopp0 2y ago
  it's not funny when you compare "profits over other's knowledge" to "share knowledge without profits", it doesn't make sense at all. potatoes and oranges
- Netcob 2y ago
  That HN guy, amirite? Such an inconsistent individual.
- __rito__ 2y ago
  They get papers for free, that were funded by the public, or other entities. Then they charge people obscene amount of money to let them download the PDF. This is dictionary definition of "parasite". Nobody funds most artists. Buying artwork isn't funding. They produce art from their own funding. Then a company leeches them off and trains models without compensating them. I am okay at training models on arXiv papers. The authors consented to spread the knowledge publicly. With such dumb-logic comments, you make it hard to take your point-of-view seriously. Edit: The copyright of the paper _authors_ isn't being protected. They are being blood-sucked. And, before the Hub, if you emailed an author for a free PDF, if you couldn't afford it, most, if not all emailed you a free PDF. Harvard famously said that they couldn't afford Elsevier anymore. [0] [0]: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/apr/24/harvard-university-journal-publishers-prices https://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/apr/24/harvard-univ...
- bayindirh 2y ago
  They are completely different things. I send my research to Elsevier for free, and surrender all my publishing rights & copyright to Elsevier to be able to publish it. When/if it's published, I have a paltry "author's copy" in return, which I have to be very diligent while giving copies of it away, otherwise Elsevier might punish me. At the end, it's a paper which bears my name, but I have none of the rights attached to it, and Elsevier gets literally millions of dollars from each country which licenses its publications. Their expenses are a mere rounding error for what they charge, and they are doing this to protect their income, not my research. Copyright infringement / ethical issues in AI is something else: Crawlers reap & providers sell my data without my consent, and I get nothing in return, except the ability to poorly imitate my writing/art style, making my work, blood, sweat and tears I shed over these years to create that style worthless. Both parties earn exorbitant amount of money with my work, for free, and suck me dry in the process. One at least gives me a paltry PDF file and maybe some recognition, and the other one threatens my livelihood while raising hype and applauding degeneration of human achievement and reducing it to a mere set of numbers. Both are cutting the tree they're living on, though.
xhkkffbf 2y ago
Huh? Imagine working this hard to write a book. Some authors work for years. Many work for at least a year. Some academics work several years on one article. Elsevier is very much a partner to producing and funding this work. The people who work there edit, format and distribute the work. The authors are very much partners in this endeavor and they're often paid royalties by Elsevier. And then scummy people rationalize their piracy with lots of different stilted rationales. If you see a poor author, you can be sure the piracy is cutting into the ability to support themselves by selling their writing. But, yeah, imagine that it's Elsevier that's holding humanity back, not pirate scum.
- RBerenguel 2y ago
  Edit and format? I don't remember getting any formatting or editing help from any research journal ever, aside from getting some LaTeX style file.
  - xhkkffbf 2y ago
    Believe me, the publisher still hasn't to reconcile the work and tweak it when it comes in. Have you ever tried to edit a book from N authors? Even if they're using the exact same style file, there are always issues. But again, go start your own free journal. People have been trying it since the Internet began and the best we get are some glorfied FTP server. Yes, this is all that some branches of science need, but there's a reason why Elsevier is still in business.
- paulmd 2y ago
  elsevier isn’t paying authors a dime lmao, the authors are the ones paying here. A publisher would never deign to pay an academic. They get “paid in exposure”, and again, actually they have to pay for that exposure in the first place. Elsevier sits in the middle and skims the authors when they publish and the readers when they read. Peer reviewers, of course, work for free. Nice work if you can get it - billions of dollars a year for running a static website and providing a latex template. You could run the whole thing off a single server and cloudflare with some http basic auth lol. (and if you’re asking “why don’t you start your own journal then”… that’s why arxiv and others are taking off like crazy over the past 15 years.)

by hcrean 2y ago

dandanua 2y ago

It's not actually hard, but I agree with the point. BTW, they also charge authors ridiculous amount of money for additional services, e.g. printing colored images. In a far (and optimistic) future such companies will be studied as examples of social parasites in schools and universities.

giancarlostoro 2y ago
Starting with Oracle I am sure.
geysersam 2y ago
Printing colored images! What does a single issue of their printed editions cost? Hundreds of dollars? The color printing cost is a rounding error.
qup 2y ago
I think the universities themselves will be studied as social parasites, too.
- vsuperpower2020 2y ago
  I think they'll be studied as universal basic income. There's so many college graduates with no skills who basically unemployable, but are still collecting a decent salary to teach things that no one wants to pay for in the first place. Our economy can evidently support a lot of people who aren't working.
LastTrain 2y ago
It already is studied and there is even a term for it: rent seeking. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent-seeking https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent-seeking

codedokode 2y ago

As I understand, it is not Elsevier's fault, it is the government that allocates funding and gives promotion based on number of publications made in Elsevier journals.

red_admiral 2y ago
Some of those governments, in Europe, are also starting to mandate open access though. In practice, for maths papers I look on arXiv, for crypto papers on iacr and so on - academics generally want their work to be read (and cited) so they're usually happy to make it available for free. There's even tricks you can play like uploading an "author version" or "preprint" if you're forced to use a commercial publisher for a conference.
- goosedragons 2y ago
  Open access is its own ridiculous racket. It usually costs the author literally thousands to publish as open access.
  - red_admiral 2y ago
    If you're funded by a Horizon/EU grant, you can cost the article publication charges into your grant application in most cases. It ends up being the funder, not the author, who pays. That also means that if the whole racket is revisited at some point, then Elsevier will get to pick on someone their own size if not bigger - and will hopefully come off worse in that fight.
    - goosedragons 2y ago
      Is that the best use of grant funds though really? Yes, it's not the author directly out of pocket but that money could be used towards new equipment, boosting grad student/post-doc pay, etc.
      - red_admiral 2y ago

grishka 2y ago

The companies themselves aren't the problem, they are a symptom. The real problem is governments, especially the US government, that happily use their monopoly on the use of force to help such companies enforce such business models.

hiddencost 2y ago
Ludicrous
amomchilov 2y ago
Taken a step further, why does the US government help enforce such business models?
- grishka 2y ago
  Because the it's the most powerful government in the world and is the only one among the most powerful ones that legally allows bribes.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - amomchilov 2y ago
    And who do those bribes come from? Companies. They come from companies, which are how greedy business models manifest in the real world.
ngcazz 2y ago
So is your point that companies are put in a position where they _have_ to take advantage of government's use of force? Elsevier could well come up with a business model that isn't purely based on extraction, rent-seeking and legal intimidation, but the problem is that governments possess legal resources that have good-faith use cases?
- grishka 2y ago

fallingknife 2y ago

Funny how when Elsevier tries to enforce its copyright, HN acts like they're the devil, but when the AI training data is the subject turns into the strictest IP rights warriors I have ever seen.

dopp0 2y ago
it's not funny when you compare "profits over other's knowledge" to "share knowledge without profits", it doesn't make sense at all. potatoes and oranges
Netcob 2y ago
That HN guy, amirite? Such an inconsistent individual.
__rito__ 2y ago
They get papers for free, that were funded by the public, or other entities. Then they charge people obscene amount of money to let them download the PDF. This is dictionary definition of "parasite". Nobody funds most artists. Buying artwork isn't funding. They produce art from their own funding. Then a company leeches them off and trains models without compensating them. I am okay at training models on arXiv papers. The authors consented to spread the knowledge publicly. With such dumb-logic comments, you make it hard to take your point-of-view seriously. Edit: The copyright of the paper _authors_ isn't being protected. They are being blood-sucked. And, before the Hub, if you emailed an author for a free PDF, if you couldn't afford it, most, if not all emailed you a free PDF. Harvard famously said that they couldn't afford Elsevier anymore. [0] [0]: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/apr/24/harvard-university-journal-publishers-prices https://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/apr/24/harvard-univ...
bayindirh 2y ago
They are completely different things. I send my research to Elsevier for free, and surrender all my publishing rights & copyright to Elsevier to be able to publish it. When/if it's published, I have a paltry "author's copy" in return, which I have to be very diligent while giving copies of it away, otherwise Elsevier might punish me. At the end, it's a paper which bears my name, but I have none of the rights attached to it, and Elsevier gets literally millions of dollars from each country which licenses its publications. Their expenses are a mere rounding error for what they charge, and they are doing this to protect their income, not my research. Copyright infringement / ethical issues in AI is something else: Crawlers reap & providers sell my data without my consent, and I get nothing in return, except the ability to poorly imitate my writing/art style, making my work, blood, sweat and tears I shed over these years to create that style worthless. Both parties earn exorbitant amount of money with my work, for free, and suck me dry in the process. One at least gives me a paltry PDF file and maybe some recognition, and the other one threatens my livelihood while raising hype and applauding degeneration of human achievement and reducing it to a mere set of numbers. Both are cutting the tree they're living on, though.

xhkkffbf 2y ago

Huh? Imagine working this hard to write a book. Some authors work for years. Many work for at least a year. Some academics work several years on one article. Elsevier is very much a partner to producing and funding this work. The people who work there edit, format and distribute the work. The authors are very much partners in this endeavor and they're often paid royalties by Elsevier. And then scummy people rationalize their piracy with lots of different stilted rationales. If you see a poor author, you can be sure the piracy is cutting into the ability to support themselves by selling their writing. But, yeah, imagine that it's Elsevier that's holding humanity back, not pirate scum.

RBerenguel 2y ago
Edit and format? I don't remember getting any formatting or editing help from any research journal ever, aside from getting some LaTeX style file.
- xhkkffbf 2y ago
  Believe me, the publisher still hasn't to reconcile the work and tweak it when it comes in. Have you ever tried to edit a book from N authors? Even if they're using the exact same style file, there are always issues. But again, go start your own free journal. People have been trying it since the Internet began and the best we get are some glorfied FTP server. Yes, this is all that some branches of science need, but there's a reason why Elsevier is still in business.
paulmd 2y ago
elsevier isn’t paying authors a dime lmao, the authors are the ones paying here. A publisher would never deign to pay an academic. They get “paid in exposure”, and again, actually they have to pay for that exposure in the first place. Elsevier sits in the middle and skims the authors when they publish and the readers when they read. Peer reviewers, of course, work for free. Nice work if you can get it - billions of dollars a year for running a static website and providing a latex template. You could run the whole thing off a single server and cloudflare with some http basic auth lol. (and if you’re asking “why don’t you start your own journal then”… that’s why arxiv and others are taking off like crazy over the past 15 years.)