SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
from the on-the-one-hand-information-wants-to-be-expensive…on-the-other-hand,-information-wants-to-be-free dept.
Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984
Despite two lost legal battles in the US, domain name seizures, and millions of dollars in damage claims, Sci-Hub continues to offer unauthorized access to academic papers. The site's founder says that she would rather operate legally, but copyright gets in the way. Sci-Hub is not the problem she argues, it's a solution, something many academics appear to agree with.
Sci-Hub has often been referred to as "The Pirate Bay of Science," but that description really sells the site short.
While both sites are helping the public to access copyrighted content without permission, Sci-Hub has also become a crucial tool that arguably helps the progress of science.
The site allows researchers to bypass expensive paywalls so they can read articles written by their fellow colleagues. The information in these 'pirated' articles is then used to provide the foundation for future research.
What the site does is illegal, according to the law, but Sci-Hub is praised by thousands of researchers and academics around the world. In particular, those who don't have direct access to the expensive journals but aspire to excel in their academic field.
Source: https://torrentfreak.com/sci-hub-proves-that-piracy-can-be-dangerously-useful-180804/
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 14 2018, @06:52PM (3 children)
Good question. Why don't they?
Generally the researchers (not necessarily academics) have 100% of their copyright and are free to publish the work on their own websites. Until they sign a publishing contract which cedes those rights to a publisher. (And such a contract may be signed before the researcher actually does the work, which is immaterial).
Answer why they would do that and you will understand why the system is the way it is. And why what Sci-Hub does is wrong.
(By the way, did you know that many journal contracts these days only cede those exclusive publishing rights for a limited amount of time? After a period the rights return to the author(s) who are then free to publish it themselves or sell the rights to someone else. But Sci-Hub comes along and says the authors shouldn't have those rights, either.)
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 14 2018, @07:37PM (2 children)
"Answer why they would do that and you will understand why the system is the way it is."
We do that because the bureaucrat idiots who control our pay and promotions need an easy-to-understand metric to "evaluate" our performance. A few decades ago it was different, but now that is literally the only reason left.
"And why what Sci-Hub does is wrong."
Speaking as an academic, from the bottom of my heart: fuck you.
"But Sci-Hub comes along and says the authors shouldn't have those rights, either."
I have yet to meet an academic who doesn't want their work available to everyone, for free.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 14 2018, @07:53PM
It has been that way at least since the 1940s.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 15 2018, @10:24PM
Even if you were right, which I don't believe is true, it neverthess would be a choice YOU made by being employed at a place where you feel compelled to play along with the system.
Again, you are perfectly free to make your own website and make all your original work available for free. But you'd get in trouble, so you don't. You wouldn't be noticed academically, so you don't. And you'd rather eat, same as all of us who do things we'd rather do for free but we have to eat. Entropy is a bitch, huh?
As for fucking me, no thanks, you're not my type. Besides, it's clear your upset because you fucked yourself.