Elsevier Complaint Shuts Down Sci-Hub Domain Name(torrentfreak.com)
torrentfreak.com
Elsevier Complaint Shuts Down Sci-Hub Domain Name
https://torrentfreak.com/elsevier-complaint-shuts-down-sci-hub-domain-name-160504/
236 comments
> You are entitled to read work from Sci-Hub, as your taxes funded the researchers who created the work.
Am I entitled to a joy ride in an F-15, as my taxes funded its purchase?
Am I entitled to a joy ride in an F-15, as my taxes funded its purchase?
Yes, you are. You only have to fulfill the requirements to make sure you don't destroy it within a few seconds and aren't a danger to others. It may take a few years but you can get a fully tax-funded education on flying an F-15.
No you are not.
Only a tiny subset of people who want to fly fighter jets get to do that, even if they select the Air Force as a career. The superset of people who are excluded from flying fighter jets includes a large number of people who are safety-qualified to fly them.
The opportunity to fly fighter jets is approximately as difficult to obtain as admission to an Ivy League school. Zero is the number of reasonable people would say that anyone is "entitled" to admission at a selective college.
Only a tiny subset of people who want to fly fighter jets get to do that, even if they select the Air Force as a career. The superset of people who are excluded from flying fighter jets includes a large number of people who are safety-qualified to fly them.
The opportunity to fly fighter jets is approximately as difficult to obtain as admission to an Ivy League school. Zero is the number of reasonable people would say that anyone is "entitled" to admission at a selective college.
Is this argument valid internationally?
My canadian taxes didn't pay for american research, should I still be able to access those papers?
My canadian taxes didn't pay for american research, should I still be able to access those papers?
Researchers regularly make use of work from other countries, the scientific community is international. Even if one could make an argument for not allowing Canadians to access US research without payment, it doesn't follow that Elsevier and friends are the ones who should be paid.
Research done by government employees is legally required to be public domain. I see no reason we shouldn't extend that to researchers who take government funding.
Research done by government employees is legally required to be public domain. I see no reason we shouldn't extend that to researchers who take government funding.
I'm in the U.S. and enjoy a few Canada-based journals that detail work funded by Canada. Fair trade, eh?
Sure. Same way that if you were to drive down for a weekend and not pay taxes on the roads you specifically used across the border.
Until thousands of Canadians come down every weekend just so they can use American roads and then go back home to fill up on gas, we won't worry about it.
Until thousands of Canadians come down every weekend just so they can use American roads and then go back home to fill up on gas, we won't worry about it.
Although i agree, that's an extremely odd statement. Also, does it make sense for scientists to ask the public to fix the situation for them? Literally save them from themselves?
"We wish to set back society, because we want to make more money".
I use Sci-Hub all the time. I can access all papers via my library subscriptions so I actually DO have paid access to everything, but searching with and authenticating against my university library's services is slow and tedious and not feasible if I want to download many papers quickly.
I use Sci-Hub all the time. I can access all papers via my library subscriptions so I actually DO have paid access to everything, but searching with and authenticating against my university library's services is slow and tedious and not feasible if I want to download many papers quickly.
Plus multiple times sciencedirect was down for me.
Recently shared this here: http://www.thebookseller.com/news/elsevier-defends-its-value... (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11614926) which I'm guessing is the precursor to this debacle.
Reading what Elsevier have to say, you'd think they're either completely delusional (I doubt so), or know full well that they're rapidly becoming irrelevant/abhorred and are adopting a bully position, all the while pretending to be innocent and blameless victims of this situation.
Don't count on me to shed a tear when Elsevier go under.
Reading what Elsevier have to say, you'd think they're either completely delusional (I doubt so), or know full well that they're rapidly becoming irrelevant/abhorred and are adopting a bully position, all the while pretending to be innocent and blameless victims of this situation.
Don't count on me to shed a tear when Elsevier go under.
Just saw Elsevier retweeted this:
"Science is better and more accurate when it's inclusive." (https://twitter.com/ElsevierConnect/status/72821552586887578...)
I realize this is about gender, but I can't help but feel a bit of irony in there...
"Science is better and more accurate when it's inclusive." (https://twitter.com/ElsevierConnect/status/72821552586887578...)
I realize this is about gender, but I can't help but feel a bit of irony in there...
Great observation. They're calling their own BS indirectly. Whoever is involved in SciHub with strong presence on social media should immediately start using that quote to push SciHub. :)
Yet again, please don't mention other sites here or in reddit etc. Being in the spotlight is not good for them. What they are doing is morally fine in my book, but infringes the law and you are contributing to their demise. Keep it low profile, the more you blab about them the sooner they are gone. And until the next platform makes it -if it does, you can't guarantee it will- it is going to cause a lot of damage to many careers out there, because there are many people that have no choice but this one. If this is a war, it is a war of attrition, it can't be won by pointing out the targets.
I wonder if there is a way of distributing a signed file that contains the IP address of sci-hub over a distributed medium?
Someone else would just need to write a small script that copied it into the system's host file - but make it generic enough that it works for anything. That would help non-technical users.
This would stop courts from going after centralised name servers.
There really needs to be a way of decentralising name servers.
Someone else would just need to write a small script that copied it into the system's host file - but make it generic enough that it works for anything. That would help non-technical users.
This would stop courts from going after centralised name servers.
There really needs to be a way of decentralising name servers.
It's possible in principle. Just use public-key cryptography (perhaps the SSL cert of the website), grep and ed. You could have it update once a day from the sites listed, or perhaps create some type of dht backend.
P.S. This dht-based P2P dns project might interest you. https://github.com/mwarning/KadNode
P.S. This dht-based P2P dns project might interest you. https://github.com/mwarning/KadNode
What about distributing it? Is there a way of decentralizing that?
I notice there is Tahoe lafs...
https://www.tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe-lafs
I notice there is Tahoe lafs...
https://www.tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe-lafs
And of course, ipfs. Still trying to get my head around how it actually works!
Namecoin fits the bill.
As much as I completely support freedom of information there is a problem with not respecting the law that seems to be growing...
I might disagree with the law. I might break it intentionally, but I do my due diligence and do it knowingly.
When i get caught I hold up my hands and face the consequences because I entered into that knowingly. I have actually done this irl. This is why I have no respect for this, or for Uber, Aaron Schwartz or this entire ridiculous movement of subversion instead of facing up to the challenge and taking it extremely seriously and tackling it up front and openly with some pride and courage.
I'm glad people are fighting to keep this alive anyway. That imo is part of the right approach, to defeat the law by showing its futility in the face of reality when it is very far into the wrong. But ffs, don't hide from what you have done like some kind of child. Face up to your responsiblity and take it on the chin... and let people be angry about that, because that is an actual, serious wrong.
"Words are wind."
I might disagree with the law. I might break it intentionally, but I do my due diligence and do it knowingly.
When i get caught I hold up my hands and face the consequences because I entered into that knowingly. I have actually done this irl. This is why I have no respect for this, or for Uber, Aaron Schwartz or this entire ridiculous movement of subversion instead of facing up to the challenge and taking it extremely seriously and tackling it up front and openly with some pride and courage.
I'm glad people are fighting to keep this alive anyway. That imo is part of the right approach, to defeat the law by showing its futility in the face of reality when it is very far into the wrong. But ffs, don't hide from what you have done like some kind of child. Face up to your responsiblity and take it on the chin... and let people be angry about that, because that is an actual, serious wrong.
"Words are wind."
echo "93.174.95.27 elsevier.com" >> /etc/hosts
Are people working on a better system to replace DNS? This little game is quickly becoming tiring.
GNUnet has the GNU name system:
https://www.gnunet.org/gns
https://www.gnunet.org/gns
Tks for tip. Never heard of it.
namecoin, Tor adresses...
How big is the sci-hub database?
Are there full/partial mirrors published anywhere?
Are there full/partial mirrors published anywhere?
We can see here, over 50mil papers. http://libgen.io/scimag/repository_torrent_notforall/
As you can see here, they have three mirrors. One Moscow, one Ocean(ia?), and one Cyber(ia?). Libgen also has a mirror.
As for BookSC, they seem to be quite a bit out of date, or something.
As you can see here, they have three mirrors. One Moscow, one Ocean(ia?), and one Cyber(ia?). Libgen also has a mirror.
As for BookSC, they seem to be quite a bit out of date, or something.
[deleted]
why not set it up as a tor hidden service?
yeah but where's the torrent?
Looking forward to watching the Streisand Effect play out.
On the bright side, this will give some much-needed publicity to Tor Browser. Sci-hub is still available at http://scihub22266oqcxt.onion/
Does using Tor puts you on some kind of list? It would be tragic if someone used Tor to read a scientific article but then got charged with aiding terrorism or looking for child pornography.
> Does using Tor puts you on some kind of list? It would be tragic if someone used Tor to read a scientific article but then got charged with aiding terrorism or looking for child pornography.
If it does, it becomes an ethical maxim to use Tor. If it doesn't, then you can simply use Tor. So by case analysis you should use Tor.
If it does, it becomes an ethical maxim to use Tor. If it doesn't, then you can simply use Tor. So by case analysis you should use Tor.
> If it does, it becomes an ethical maxim to use Tor.
This is one of the reasons I use Tor. If there is such a list, I want it to be full of people doing ordinary stuff. In effect, I want the list to be useless.
This is one of the reasons I use Tor. If there is such a list, I want it to be full of people doing ordinary stuff. In effect, I want the list to be useless.
Indeed, this is the main reason I'm using Signal (and badgering my friends into using it). I want to increase the volume of encrypted non-sensitive stuff, so that the "list" doesn't have predictive value.
Having metadata (i.e. who communicates with who at which time etc.) still has lots of value for the three-letter agencies (some even say it's even more important then the content of the messages itself). As far as I know Signal does nothing to avoid this kind of metadata (but please correct me if I'm wrong).
The fact that using Tor puts you on some kind of list makes it essential that you do in fact use it for innocuous purposes occasionally.
Seeking privacy should never be a crime.
Seeking privacy should never be a crime.
The fact that you even have to think this suggests that you should use Tor so that they don't win in self-censoring the citizens.
Not sure why everyone is downvoting. You may not go on a list, but you could be targeted by the FBI if they can produce "probable cause"
http://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/constitutional-rights...
http://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/constitutional-rights...
We re all in lists. In fact, the more lists we're in, the less traceable we are.
nope.
tor is anonymizing software used by many thousands of people.
if you're really concerned use a VPN first, and download the tor browser using VPN.
unnecessary IMO, but if you're concerned then this will give you an extra layer of protection.
> tor is anonymizing software used by many thousands of people.
Many thousands of people out of several billion (I assume …) Internet users is a small enough percentage that it's probably worth someone's while to make a list out of it. A sibling comment has claimed that the NSA specifically notes Tor use (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11637635).
Many thousands of people out of several billion (I assume …) Internet users is a small enough percentage that it's probably worth someone's while to make a list out of it. A sibling comment has claimed that the NSA specifically notes Tor use (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11637635).
There's a good chance you'll end up on a list if you're an exit node, but if you're just using Tor I think you should be good.
Using Tor does put you on some kind of list, but you aren't going to get charged with aiding terrorism or looking for child pornography because of it. Unless you use it for those things, I guess, and get caught.
> you aren't going to get charged
What is this based on? If it's rationality, that doesn't always apply to legal and political matters, to the very human human beings who make those decisions, or to the politial situation around them.
What is this based on? If it's rationality, that doesn't always apply to legal and political matters, to the very human human beings who make those decisions, or to the politial situation around them.
Using Tor isn't a crime, but the NSA targets people who use or even search about Tor or VPN services for collection through the XKEYSCORE program. So his post is exactly right - using Tor does "put you on a list", but that alone isn't sufficient to be arrested. The NSA documents further state that Tor is relatively difficult to attack and the best they can do is deanonymize a small (and importantly, random) fraction of users some of the time.
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-07/04/nsa-targeting...
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-07/04/nsa-targeting...
I'm familiar with that theory, but do you have any data to support it? For example, maybe they will find another reason to arrest you; maybe they will cite your Tor usage to the judge, jury and public as evidence of your criminal nature.
"As a result of the legal battle the site (sci-hub.io) just lost one of its latest domain names. However, the site has no intentions of backing down, and will continue its fight to keep access to scientific knowledge free and open."
Does this not enrage people? Elsevier and closed-access journals like them, are doing all they can to impede human progress while leaching off of tax-payer dollars to do so. Something should be done to make what Elsevier and the like do illegal, are there any groups/political parties/etc going after them?
Does this not enrage people? Elsevier and closed-access journals like them, are doing all they can to impede human progress while leaching off of tax-payer dollars to do so. Something should be done to make what Elsevier and the like do illegal, are there any groups/political parties/etc going after them?
"Does this not enrage people?"
I think I have rage-fatigue, with all the swindles, con-jobs and injustices I've seen. But I do recognize this as utter bullshit. Though unfortunately every other effort to take from the commons, charge money for it, and build a private fortune, throughout history, has also been bullshit; hence the rage-fatigue.
This and things like it, do enrage people, and that's why in the US they gravitate toward Sanders, Trump, nihilism, and crime.
I think I have rage-fatigue, with all the swindles, con-jobs and injustices I've seen. But I do recognize this as utter bullshit. Though unfortunately every other effort to take from the commons, charge money for it, and build a private fortune, throughout history, has also been bullshit; hence the rage-fatigue.
This and things like it, do enrage people, and that's why in the US they gravitate toward Sanders, Trump, nihilism, and crime.
Rage-fatigue is a fantastic way to describe it. People have so many things to worry about already. Their jobs, their families, their college loans, their retirement... Frankly, some publisher charging for access to scientific papers paid for by taxpayers is going to be pretty low on their list of priorities.
I'm fascinated by this. Because we all feel the same, but no efficient solution emerges from this tensions. Or only rarely. We should study this and learn how to make catalysts to trigger change.
Are you refering to things like change.org? I am not sure what's the success rate of those models but on the surface they seem quite ineffective to bring any substantial change.
change.org is just petitions right ?
I meant something more tangible. A way to assess issues, classify, organize, root them in the economical context and try to find a better organization to resolve tensions.
I meant something more tangible. A way to assess issues, classify, organize, root them in the economical context and try to find a better organization to resolve tensions.
The problem is that for any such systems to operate, you need experts. If you democratize too much, you end up risking with ignorant and inefficient long term solutions (like Trump). And with experts, there will always be some scope of corruption. Unless we are talking AI experts that are similar to IBM's Watson.
Very good point. I was hoping for a middle ground where people would reach a better understanding and solve their issues by communicating. But maybe that's unnatural and just a pipe dream.
[deleted]
>>Does this not enrage people? Elsevier and closed-access journals like them, are doing all they can to impede human progress while leaching off of tax-payer dollars to do so. Something should be done to make what Elsevier and the like do illegal, are there any groups/political parties/etc going after them?
This does enrage many people, but one feels somewhat helpless here. But we can surely raise a hue and cry over the internet/emails/whatsapp/social media etc. Let more and more of the scientific community know about the existence of sci-hub and let these scum publishers bleed to death. Political parties may not want to disturb their money-givers though.
This does enrage many people, but one feels somewhat helpless here. But we can surely raise a hue and cry over the internet/emails/whatsapp/social media etc. Let more and more of the scientific community know about the existence of sci-hub and let these scum publishers bleed to death. Political parties may not want to disturb their money-givers though.
It is my opinion that any research behind a paywall does not exist. If I told you that I have research that showed some effect X, but there was no way for me to make that accessible to the public, no one would put any weight at all behind it (well except for those who really want X to be true). Does it matter if it is a pay wall or if I promise it exists and my girlfriend up in Canada, the one who only visits when you aren't here, has it? No, not really.
This is a case of badly screwed-up incentives. No individual has incentives to fix the system, so they keep optimizing for how they're actually rewarded [academics --> tenure / prestige, journals --> make money, govt --> get lobbied].
You are missing a case for academics. Even after tenure, we have to continue publishing in these venues or our students wont be able to find work.
So basically the Bystander Effect. Who should be singled out?
The onus is on the scientists. Elsevier does its job. If you were given a golden ring as a gift every day, I bet you would end up opening a jewelry shop as well. Even if scientists want to use alternative open access publishers, it's a game of who blinks first. They won't do it because their colleagues don't.
> The onus is on the scientists. Elsevier does its job. If you were given a golden ring as a gift every day, I bet you would end up opening a jewelry shop as well.
The idea that Elsevier is somehow not responsible for their actions because they're just doing their job is abhorrent, and I entirely reject it. If what you do is actively harmful to society, the onus is on you to fix it. Yes, the onus is also on scientists, too, to not enable Elsevier's bad behavior, but they're not the ones choosing Elsevier's access policies; they only have indirect control.
The idea that Elsevier is somehow not responsible for their actions because they're just doing their job is abhorrent, and I entirely reject it. If what you do is actively harmful to society, the onus is on you to fix it. Yes, the onus is also on scientists, too, to not enable Elsevier's bad behavior, but they're not the ones choosing Elsevier's access policies; they only have indirect control.
I disagree. They have a choice, yet they choose them instead of the alternatives, and they knowingly accept all the access policies, even checking the "accept the terms" checkbox. TBH this whole thing seems like a simple problem to me - publishing is not the purpose of science. Elsevier can't fix the problem that scientists don't have a way to assess the quality of other scientists' work.
> Elsevier can't fix the problem that scientists don't have a way to assess the quality of other scientists' work.
You are aware, I hope, that Elsevier curates the content of its journals by literally sending the papers to other scientists and asking their opinion, right? And that the scientists don't get paid for this work, they do it our of goodwill to the scientific community. That's peer-review, and its one of the most preposterous things for any for-profit entity to have a hand in.
You are aware, I hope, that Elsevier curates the content of its journals by literally sending the papers to other scientists and asking their opinion, right? And that the scientists don't get paid for this work, they do it our of goodwill to the scientific community. That's peer-review, and its one of the most preposterous things for any for-profit entity to have a hand in.
While I support open science and Sci-Hub is great, I also can see publisher's side.
Imagine the same site with pirated high quality scientific books. (There are some, but in darker corners of the Internet). Would open access to these books be advantageous for humanity? Most definitely. Will publishers get mad about it? Even more definitely. Should publisher's work be free? I think not.
However, you can't get both sides of the coin at once. Either authors are paying publishers to get their papers peer reviewed and published (they do now), or publishers may collect payments from readers and libraries. Not both ways.
Imagine the same site with pirated high quality scientific books. (There are some, but in darker corners of the Internet). Would open access to these books be advantageous for humanity? Most definitely. Will publishers get mad about it? Even more definitely. Should publisher's work be free? I think not.
However, you can't get both sides of the coin at once. Either authors are paying publishers to get their papers peer reviewed and published (they do now), or publishers may collect payments from readers and libraries. Not both ways.
With the advent of the internet, the marginal cost of producing and distributing such content has dropped by orders of magnitude since the 1990's. One would expect in a competitive, healthy economic system, some of this productivity gain would fall to customers in lower prices. This has not happened. While piracy is not the ultimate answer, it may be necessary to force the hand of the businesses and government to restructure. I don't know how/how much publishers should be compensated, but they will not give up their current rent-seeking status unless it is ripped from their cold dead hands. Information production/distribution has become a commodity, and should be priced only to support the value add of peer-review, etc.
Meanwhile should authors be compensated? Yes, As an observation from the corner of science that i inhabit: authorship of 'high quality scientific books' is a 'secondary profession' with most authors having primary commitments to academic positions--which are very much enriched by authorship. I believe authors will continue to be compensated both directly and indirectly, as they are providing most of the value in the product.
> Imagine the same site with pirated high quality scientific books. (There are some, but in darker corners of the Internet).
Library genesis isn't that dark of a corner these days.
http://gen.lib.rus.ec/
http://golibgen.io/
Library genesis isn't that dark of a corner these days.
http://gen.lib.rus.ec/
http://golibgen.io/
The book example is not very helpful for a few reasons.
Firstly, the authors of books do get paid—writing books is not a pure tax imposed by academia.
Secondly, books are not typically at the frontier of scientific knowledge (these days). They're interesting and helpful, but accessing them is not a necessity for keeping up to date. Put simply, books do not have a monopoly on knowledge.
Finally, and most importantly, books are not funded by the public. Research is. If the public is paying for something, they should have access to it.
Firstly, the authors of books do get paid—writing books is not a pure tax imposed by academia.
Secondly, books are not typically at the frontier of scientific knowledge (these days). They're interesting and helpful, but accessing them is not a necessity for keeping up to date. Put simply, books do not have a monopoly on knowledge.
Finally, and most importantly, books are not funded by the public. Research is. If the public is paying for something, they should have access to it.
> Should publisher's work be free? I think not.
What value does the publisher's work add to the work the author generated?
What value does the publisher's work add to the work the author generated?
> What value does the publisher's work add to the work the author generated?
- organizing peer review - spell-checking and fixing layout problems - making sure that the paper stays available for a long time - handling complaints and retracting fraudulent papers - providing a single point of contact for people who would like to reuse published material (e.g., using illustrations in a textbook).
Sure, many publishers don't do a very good job for the money they are taking. Sure, there might be better approaches for disseminating knowledge than the current one. However, in the world as it is now, publishers can and do provide some value.
- organizing peer review - spell-checking and fixing layout problems - making sure that the paper stays available for a long time - handling complaints and retracting fraudulent papers - providing a single point of contact for people who would like to reuse published material (e.g., using illustrations in a textbook).
Sure, many publishers don't do a very good job for the money they are taking. Sure, there might be better approaches for disseminating knowledge than the current one. However, in the world as it is now, publishers can and do provide some value.
- At least in computer science, it's generally professors who organise the peer review (the Program Commitee)
- I've heard from several collegues that the editor introduced spelling mistakes. Sure, overall they might get some errors out, but a spellcheck is not needed.
- Well yes. But there is no need for that to be expensive.
- Do we need them for this? If there really is fraud, previous cases show it's their university that starts an investigation. I'm not sure if the effect of retracting a paper is that significant..
- If all papers were public in the first place, there is no need to contact someone if it's okay to reuse material.
Anyway publishers might provide some value, but not enough to demand we pay for every single paper, or pay costly subscriptions. They need to die already or adept.
- I've heard from several collegues that the editor introduced spelling mistakes. Sure, overall they might get some errors out, but a spellcheck is not needed.
- Well yes. But there is no need for that to be expensive.
- Do we need them for this? If there really is fraud, previous cases show it's their university that starts an investigation. I'm not sure if the effect of retracting a paper is that significant..
- If all papers were public in the first place, there is no need to contact someone if it's okay to reuse material.
Anyway publishers might provide some value, but not enough to demand we pay for every single paper, or pay costly subscriptions. They need to die already or adept.
I agree with your general perspective. (I have publicly vowed to never act as a reviewer for Elsevier, for example.)
However, ignoring the traditional role of publishers does not help our case. Regarding your individual points:
- Peer review for CS conferences is usually organized by volunteers, yes. However, this is not true for other, journal-focused disciplines, where there are paid assistants
- One might argue that spelling/layout checks are not really necessary. I personally appreciate them. In any case, these _are_ services that publishers usually offer.
- I was not trying to argue that the typical publisher does a good or cheap job. What I wanted to say is that publishers can and do add value.
- Universities usually try to handle scientific fraud discretely (for PR, HR, and legal reasons). They are usually not interested in disseminating bad news widely.
- Sure, if we could retroactively bring all previously published works into the public domain, things would be much easier. However, in the copyright system we live in right now, publishers provide a useful service by taking care of author's rights and facilitating reuse.
However, ignoring the traditional role of publishers does not help our case. Regarding your individual points:
- Peer review for CS conferences is usually organized by volunteers, yes. However, this is not true for other, journal-focused disciplines, where there are paid assistants
- One might argue that spelling/layout checks are not really necessary. I personally appreciate them. In any case, these _are_ services that publishers usually offer.
- I was not trying to argue that the typical publisher does a good or cheap job. What I wanted to say is that publishers can and do add value.
- Universities usually try to handle scientific fraud discretely (for PR, HR, and legal reasons). They are usually not interested in disseminating bad news widely.
- Sure, if we could retroactively bring all previously published works into the public domain, things would be much easier. However, in the copyright system we live in right now, publishers provide a useful service by taking care of author's rights and facilitating reuse.
- Journals are also often volunteer based, at least in the sciences.
- Publishers really don't do much for spelling/layout. They give you a format to fit in, and then put up an automated system for you to check against.
- Fraud is handled by the community (See: Retraction Watch) much more effectively than by journals.
- Publishers really don't do much for spelling/layout. They give you a format to fit in, and then put up an automated system for you to check against.
- Fraud is handled by the community (See: Retraction Watch) much more effectively than by journals.
I was once tangentially involved in the preparation of a journal. All those things you listed were done for free by professors and grad students.
About fifteen years ago I was working on a venture to make an open-content journal publishing system. It didn't pan out for various reasons, but the general argument we were making this. Here are various services, and who (or what) handles them:
- Peer review and top-level decision-making. This is handled entirely by the editorial board.
- Typesetting. We have a free system for this: it's called LaTeX.
- Copy-editing and typeset-checking. This is handled by the publisher.
- Publishing and archiving. This is handled by the publisher.
- Famous Name. This is controlled by the publisher and is pure rent-seeking.
It used to be that the publisher handled much more than this. But with a decent online publishing, workflow, and archiving system, and with a near-zero cost in publishing and archiving online nowadays, essentially the only useful service the publisher provides is copy-editing. That is very minor.
If a free online business model can figure out how to fund copy-editing and automatic standards enforcement (for example, people make awful bibtex entries, including Springer's auto-generation system), and a university institution willing to host the journal's archives, the entire utility of a publisher disappears.
The big problem is not computer science, I think, which is rapidly moving to an online model. The big problem is that non-CS fields have no typesetting facility -- they submit articles in Word, which Elsevier/Springer then hands off to typesetters in India, who typically reset the whole thing, including bibtex entries, in LaTeX for publication. These entire fields are still reliant on copy editors and typesetters, and thus are stuck with rent-seeking.
I think the right approach is for a journal to require that authors have their papers certified by one of several "copy-editing / typesetting certification agencies" (a concept I made up). It's up to the authors to pay for that. This would almost completely eliminate the value of a publisher, and as there are multiple certification agencies vying, the cost would drop to a reasonable amount.
- Peer review and top-level decision-making. This is handled entirely by the editorial board.
- Typesetting. We have a free system for this: it's called LaTeX.
- Copy-editing and typeset-checking. This is handled by the publisher.
- Publishing and archiving. This is handled by the publisher.
- Famous Name. This is controlled by the publisher and is pure rent-seeking.
It used to be that the publisher handled much more than this. But with a decent online publishing, workflow, and archiving system, and with a near-zero cost in publishing and archiving online nowadays, essentially the only useful service the publisher provides is copy-editing. That is very minor.
If a free online business model can figure out how to fund copy-editing and automatic standards enforcement (for example, people make awful bibtex entries, including Springer's auto-generation system), and a university institution willing to host the journal's archives, the entire utility of a publisher disappears.
The big problem is not computer science, I think, which is rapidly moving to an online model. The big problem is that non-CS fields have no typesetting facility -- they submit articles in Word, which Elsevier/Springer then hands off to typesetters in India, who typically reset the whole thing, including bibtex entries, in LaTeX for publication. These entire fields are still reliant on copy editors and typesetters, and thus are stuck with rent-seeking.
I think the right approach is for a journal to require that authors have their papers certified by one of several "copy-editing / typesetting certification agencies" (a concept I made up). It's up to the authors to pay for that. This would almost completely eliminate the value of a publisher, and as there are multiple certification agencies vying, the cost would drop to a reasonable amount.
Thinking in terms of for-profit sounds like the wrong way to do it. You need to setup a 503c Foundation, much like the WMF.
Edit: it occurs to me that the Wikimedia Foundation is actually in the best position to do this! If you tried this before and still have the old infrastructure or business plan, have you considered approaching the WMF Board?
Edit: it occurs to me that the Wikimedia Foundation is actually in the best position to do this! If you tried this before and still have the old infrastructure or business plan, have you considered approaching the WMF Board?
By "venture" I don't mean for-profit: absolutely nothing we were building was going to be for-profit. It'd be all open content.
I abandoned the project well before the infrastructure was ready for prime time: the tenure clock beckoned.
I abandoned the project well before the infrastructure was ready for prime time: the tenure clock beckoned.
I totally understand :-)
What do you think of Wikiversity's Journal of Medicine? It's a decent stab at a reputable open journal:
http://www.wijoumed.org/
What do you think of Wikiversity's Journal of Medicine? It's a decent stab at a reputable open journal:
http://www.wijoumed.org/
It looks interesting but a bit spooky. A real editorial board would have dozens of action editors. They only require a single review, and it's not entirely clear what the process is. They also permit rubriq, which has ill-defined measures for review quality and payment, kind of amazing given that it's wading into an area of very problematic ethics.
This doesn't feel like a major player yet, but what do I know, I'm not in medicine. In my field, reputable open journals would be things like PLOS One, JMLR, and JAIR.
This doesn't feel like a major player yet, but what do I know, I'm not in medicine. In my field, reputable open journals would be things like PLOS One, JMLR, and JAIR.
> making sure that the paper stays available for a long time
It's something that could actually be handled much better (and cheaper) by an inter-university p2p network (like BitTorrent). Such a network would double as an on-site, offline-available library of papers.
It's something that could actually be handled much better (and cheaper) by an inter-university p2p network (like BitTorrent). Such a network would double as an on-site, offline-available library of papers.
Sure, there are other ways. Arxiv is certainly an option. However, someone still needs to develop and organize this (and pay for that). There is no free lunch - either you are paying a publisher for this service, or a university library to do the same.
(Of course, one might argue that other entities might be able to do the same thing cheaper - but this was not the topic of my argument)
(Actually, there already is some sort of "inter-university p2p network": http://www.lockss.org/ )
(Of course, one might argue that other entities might be able to do the same thing cheaper - but this was not the topic of my argument)
(Actually, there already is some sort of "inter-university p2p network": http://www.lockss.org/ )
Presumably the value in a journal publisher is:
a) it's name, being accepted to certain journals is an indicator of quality
b) to readers who are guaranteed published works have been peer reviewed
That being said I'm not a massive fan and I believe there is probably a model whereby you can get these value-adds without the closed down subscription system. Publicly funded research should be publicly available.
That being said I'm not a massive fan and I believe there is probably a model whereby you can get these value-adds without the closed down subscription system. Publicly funded research should be publicly available.
Sorry but its name!
Billions, man. They're making billions per year in profit. 'Should publisher's work be free?' is not the right question. Their service is so far from free it's indecent.
> They're making billions per year in profit. 'Should publisher's work be free?' is not the right question.
I don't understand the logic. We shouldn't ask if the work of people making billions should be free? That seems like exactly the sort of people of whom we should be asking it.
I don't understand the logic. We shouldn't ask if the work of people making billions should be free? That seems like exactly the sort of people of whom we should be asking it.
>>Should publisher's work be free? I think not.
What exact work these publishers are doing? How much are they demanding for that? Who is funding the research? Who is doing the work?
These publishers are just mean middlemen who are trying to extract as much money as they can/want from both the authors and the readers. Now is the time to get rid of them.
What exact work these publishers are doing? How much are they demanding for that? Who is funding the research? Who is doing the work?
These publishers are just mean middlemen who are trying to extract as much money as they can/want from both the authors and the readers. Now is the time to get rid of them.
What exact work these publishers are doing?
Typesetting, third party review, offering visibility in a high quality journal?
The point is nothing is stopping scientists from publishing in other, open source journals. But they don't. That means these journals offer something of value to them.
Typesetting, third party review, offering visibility in a high quality journal?
The point is nothing is stopping scientists from publishing in other, open source journals. But they don't. That means these journals offer something of value to them.
> That means these journals offer something of value to them.
Prestige, obviously.
The other services are marginally valuable. Honestly, I wish a big foundation would agree to simply underwrite any such costs (to remove these as an objection).
The whole value of publishers is in their accumulated brand value. A brand value which they did not build themselves but instead gathered from decades of harvesting public resources.
Prestige, obviously.
The other services are marginally valuable. Honestly, I wish a big foundation would agree to simply underwrite any such costs (to remove these as an objection).
The whole value of publishers is in their accumulated brand value. A brand value which they did not build themselves but instead gathered from decades of harvesting public resources.
Public resources? How do you figure? Not all research public is a public resource. Pharmaceutical companies publish, as do private foundations. Anyways, if the research was funded through public money, it gets published for free anyways.
> Anyways, if the research was funded through public money, it gets published for free anyways.
It does? I'm genuinely curious. The vast majority of research is funded with public money (to some extent).
Where is all this publicly-funded research published?
It does? I'm genuinely curious. The vast majority of research is funded with public money (to some extent).
Where is all this publicly-funded research published?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed
Now, there is a delay (1 year?) between when it's published in a journal and when it's freely released, which I can understand bothers people, but it does eventually make it's way out to the public domain.
Now, there is a delay (1 year?) between when it's published in a journal and when it's freely released, which I can understand bothers people, but it does eventually make it's way out to the public domain.
This seems to be only NIH-funded medical research. While it's nice to see, that's far from the only federally funded research.
It was expanded back in 2013 to all federal organizations that spend more than $100M in research.
That was just an example link.
That was just an example link.
It was not expanded. i think you're referring to the FASTR bill that has not yet (but hopefully will soon be) passed.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Access_to_Science_and_T...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Access_to_Science_and_T...
>>It was expanded back in 2013 to all federal organizations that spend more than $100M in research.
Why some arbitrary figure like $100M? why not $1M or $1K or for that matter even $1?
It should be other way round, if any research gets any funding (even $1 or 1 cent) then also the papers coming out of that research should be immediately released to public else they should not accept that grant/funding. The journals should not get a free ride for 1 year or so.
Why some arbitrary figure like $100M? why not $1M or $1K or for that matter even $1?
It should be other way round, if any research gets any funding (even $1 or 1 cent) then also the papers coming out of that research should be immediately released to public else they should not accept that grant/funding. The journals should not get a free ride for 1 year or so.
Typesetting by publisher is not valuable at this age.
Elsevier seems keen to not have third parties review the publications.
And visibility, same thing. They try to prevent it.
Yes, scientists should publish elsewhere; the contracts currently prevent them as Elsevier has power to stop them through their entrenched legacy position.
Elsevier seems keen to not have third parties review the publications.
And visibility, same thing. They try to prevent it.
Yes, scientists should publish elsewhere; the contracts currently prevent them as Elsevier has power to stop them through their entrenched legacy position.
What prevents a group of scientists from setting up doingscience.io or whatever, and publishing their results to a big shared blog? Do the contracts stipulate that their findings can only be published in specific paid journals?
Money. Research grants are given mostly by amount of publications in well known journals. If they just start a blog then they won't get further grants and have to change careers.
The effect of Impact Factor (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_factor) in academic grants is ridiculously high.
So in the end it's not the scientists who can make the switch. It's the people who pay the scientists.
The effect of Impact Factor (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_factor) in academic grants is ridiculously high.
So in the end it's not the scientists who can make the switch. It's the people who pay the scientists.
Who are these people and how can people contact them?
These are mainly the administrators (read clerks) who are in the charge of the funding purse(s). You can contact them via your senators and other elected members.
Tell your representatives the following: The clerks that you have put in charge of funding our tax-money-filled purses for scientific research are just a bunch of uneducated or worse yet ill-educated fellows who do not understand even an iota of academics especially in the STEM areas. So they just rely on a bunch of very coarse proxy numbers (e.g. shitty impact factors) to decide funding. So please remove these clerks from these positions. We can and must install a better and more open system for reviewing where well known scientists/academicians can be invited to participate in the decision making process. Open access journals is one such great way to start. See what is being done by great academicians like Prof. Sir Timothy Gowers and Prof. Donald Knuth are doing for this cause [1], [2]. You may contact these people and get their advice in this matter.
Signed.
Your fellow citizen, a concerned taxpayer and a voter of USA.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Gowers#Elsevier_boycot...
[2] http://thecostofknowledge.com/#list
Tell your representatives the following: The clerks that you have put in charge of funding our tax-money-filled purses for scientific research are just a bunch of uneducated or worse yet ill-educated fellows who do not understand even an iota of academics especially in the STEM areas. So they just rely on a bunch of very coarse proxy numbers (e.g. shitty impact factors) to decide funding. So please remove these clerks from these positions. We can and must install a better and more open system for reviewing where well known scientists/academicians can be invited to participate in the decision making process. Open access journals is one such great way to start. See what is being done by great academicians like Prof. Sir Timothy Gowers and Prof. Donald Knuth are doing for this cause [1], [2]. You may contact these people and get their advice in this matter.
Signed.
Your fellow citizen, a concerned taxpayer and a voter of USA.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Gowers#Elsevier_boycot...
[2] http://thecostofknowledge.com/#list
Usually one must assign to the journal a more or less restrictive copyright to one's paper before being able to publish it. For math, this usually includes a stipulation that it be published nowhere else (except that many specifically allow posting to the arXiv, because—hurrah for the big guy being in the right!—it seems that no journal is big enough to fight the community consensus behind the arXiv).
My experience in publishing (in CS) is that the publisher does not offer assistance in typesetting. Additionally reviewers are not paid for their effort, and are not affiliated with the publisher--they do it out of a sense of duty / professional advancement.
The journals offer something of value because they provide high-quality taxpayer-funded research. The publisher is nothing more than a middleman, who should be cut out of the equation.
The journals offer something of value because they provide high-quality taxpayer-funded research. The publisher is nothing more than a middleman, who should be cut out of the equation.
Not sure why you're being downvoted, what you say is similar for applied math. Since a couple of years ago some publishers are asking the LaTeX source and the figures to avoid their own typesetting (save for the journal's LaTeX style).
Journals do publish a lot of work by academicians, many of them funded, in the US, by NSF grants (taxpayer money).
Journals do publish a lot of work by academicians, many of them funded, in the US, by NSF grants (taxpayer money).
Not all of them are taxpayer funded. That's a blatent lie.
>Typesetting
Trivial
>third party review
Trivial, and happens just fine without publisher "help"
>offering visibility in a high quality journal?
Most journals are not "high quality." They're often very niche efforts, sometimes started and run as an easy way to get publication credits outside the handful of prestige publications.
Ambitious academics know that one way to raise your profile is to organise your own conference - and ask a publisher to collect and print the proceedings for you.
Trivial
>third party review
Trivial, and happens just fine without publisher "help"
>offering visibility in a high quality journal?
Most journals are not "high quality." They're often very niche efforts, sometimes started and run as an easy way to get publication credits outside the handful of prestige publications.
Ambitious academics know that one way to raise your profile is to organise your own conference - and ask a publisher to collect and print the proceedings for you.
Trivial
Obviously that's your opinion, but since when does the effort it takes to create something matter about the price? It's pretty trivial to move product from a factory to a retail store, yet people have no problem paying for that.
And again, if it's trivial, then there is nothing stopping anyone from starting their own journal. But amazingly, nobody has done that.
What's the saying about "find out why the fence is there before you tear it down"?
Most journals are not "high quality.
Who cares about most journals? Nobody reads them anyways. I'm talking Nature, Science, etc.
Obviously that's your opinion, but since when does the effort it takes to create something matter about the price? It's pretty trivial to move product from a factory to a retail store, yet people have no problem paying for that.
And again, if it's trivial, then there is nothing stopping anyone from starting their own journal. But amazingly, nobody has done that.
What's the saying about "find out why the fence is there before you tear it down"?
Most journals are not "high quality.
Who cares about most journals? Nobody reads them anyways. I'm talking Nature, Science, etc.
The effort to create something has always factored into the price. It's not the only factor, but it's there. Additionally, I take the main point of the response of "trivial" (in the case of typesetting it's often just providing a bundle of extra tex files to recompile your paper with) as less a remark on the price, and more a remark on the work. The question you answered was what work the publishers are doing, with the underlying qualifier of [to justify/correlate with their price] and the direct followup you didn't speculate on asking about what they charge for each item of work. It's like answering "what do doctors do to command such a high price?" with "scribble on a piece of paper". OK, let's assume that's really a good description of the work they provide, how much specifically do they charge for it? The full fee? Great, this exercise wasn't helpful at all. Can we break the work down into smaller units and try to estimate costs for each, whether those costs are "reasonable" or "unreasonable"? When I pay $30 for a single paper, what parts of the work endeavor does each dollar go to? We can even take into account fuzzy second-order fees like "well you're really paying back into the massive amount of work they did beforehand so they can scribble the right things now" when we're out of other ideas, but I can't imagine much of that $30 going specifically to the work of "typesetting" because it's so trivial.
The effort to create something has always factored into the price.
Absolutely not and there are plenty of examples. If I buy land and find oil underneath, it's zero effort for me to rake in the dollars. If I come up with a super complex device that takes me 1 year to build, the price is zero if no one wants it.
Price is driven by supply and demand.
Absolutely not and there are plenty of examples. If I buy land and find oil underneath, it's zero effort for me to rake in the dollars. If I come up with a super complex device that takes me 1 year to build, the price is zero if no one wants it.
Price is driven by supply and demand.
Nature, Science, etc.
You should know they are sometimes called "Tabloid journals" for a reason. Actual 'high-quality' or 'flagship' journals are most the most part unknown outside their discipline.
You should know they are sometimes called "Tabloid journals" for a reason. Actual 'high-quality' or 'flagship' journals are most the most part unknown outside their discipline.
Some of the arguments I've read against publishers are along the lines that they take papers that were funded with public money, and thus in theory are in the public domain, yet they charge an arm and a leg for that information while at the same time preventing anyone else from distributing the free versions.
So how is it that they are entitled to be payed for something they didn't create or even own for that matter? Maybe if they did actually offered an added value service, then the freebie version would be inferior and would be no need to block them from being distributed, since people would just pick their own enhanced (curated?) versions.
As far as I understand it, Elsevier should only have a say on content they actually own the copyright for, which could be a lot of papers, but if I understand correctly SciHub was publishing papers that were funded with public money, is it not? or are they also hosting papers for which the copyright is actually owned by someone else?
So how is it that they are entitled to be payed for something they didn't create or even own for that matter? Maybe if they did actually offered an added value service, then the freebie version would be inferior and would be no need to block them from being distributed, since people would just pick their own enhanced (curated?) versions.
As far as I understand it, Elsevier should only have a say on content they actually own the copyright for, which could be a lot of papers, but if I understand correctly SciHub was publishing papers that were funded with public money, is it not? or are they also hosting papers for which the copyright is actually owned by someone else?
> Should publisher's work be free?
Publishers work is not needed, it can be distributed among authors who can do it at a negligible cost.
Publishers work is not needed, it can be distributed among authors who can do it at a negligible cost.
>Imagine the same site with pirated high quality scientific books.
Imagine if publishers went and banned libraries, because only those who can afford books should be allowed to read them.
Imagine if publishers went and banned libraries, because only those who can afford books should be allowed to read them.
Libraries pay for their books, which is why they have the legal right to lend them.
A pirated book likely came from a purchased original.
Yes, a pirated book is often a illegal copy of a legal original. But every copy in a library is legally paid for - and they expect you to return the copies you borrow when you're done with them, because they would have to buy more otherwise. Libraries don't undermine copyright law, they depend on it for their survival.
But the damages are still done. By having a library where people can get a book for free instead of buying it, even though there is some throughput limits, they still make it so that the media is no longer consumed.
Imagine a pirating service which ensures that a given file is only being consumed by one machine at a time. So if I want to watch the newest blockbuster, I have to wait my turn, and once watched, I cannot watch it again (without getting in line). In effect, the movie is checked out a single instance at a time, just like how a library checks out a single book at a time.
Imagine a pirating service which ensures that a given file is only being consumed by one machine at a time. So if I want to watch the newest blockbuster, I have to wait my turn, and once watched, I cannot watch it again (without getting in line). In effect, the movie is checked out a single instance at a time, just like how a library checks out a single book at a time.
The real damage from piracy comes from distribution, rather than consumption. Lending might do a small amount of damage, but as long as the inventory publishers have has been paid for somehow, they don't really care. They would care if libraries started running printing presses in the back and gave away extra copies for free, which were indistinguishable from the original, which is essentially the piracy model.
IANAL but I'm honestly not even certain that the piracy service you describe would actually be illegal, or at least that it couldn't be done legally.
IANAL but I'm honestly not even certain that the piracy service you describe would actually be illegal, or at least that it couldn't be done legally.
Is there a donate location of sorts that we can pay into to support the efforts that the sci-hub person/team/organization is doing?
This is a another good cause that I would find worthy to donate to.
Edit. Ok, found it:
http://www.sci-hub.cc/donate
Apparently, only bitcoin donations are possible at the moment. BitCoint Wallet for donations: 1K4t2vSBSS2xFjZ6PofYnbgZewjeqbG1TM
This is a another good cause that I would find worthy to donate to.
Edit. Ok, found it:
http://www.sci-hub.cc/donate
Apparently, only bitcoin donations are possible at the moment. BitCoint Wallet for donations: 1K4t2vSBSS2xFjZ6PofYnbgZewjeqbG1TM
I see a different Bitcoin address. I recommend people visit the site and not use the address random commenters on the internet post. Not saying the parent comment is up to something, sci-hub may have rotated the address for whatever reason. The one I see starts with 14ghuGKD
EDIT: Ah, interestingly, the 1K4t2v address appears on the scihub.cc homepage, but not the donate page that was linked
EDIT: Ah, interestingly, the 1K4t2v address appears on the scihub.cc homepage, but not the donate page that was linked
I thought about not posting it as well. When I did, I double-checked myself twice to make sure I didn't post the wrong one.
Accessing the ip posted in the article it shows the bitcoin address posted by the OP.
I even switch over to https to make sure the request is not modified.
I even switch over to https to make sure the request is not modified.
>switching to https
They don't even have a valid certificate for that domain.
BUT interestingly, on a US (DO NYC) server or my house (US/Comcast):
They don't even have a valid certificate for that domain.
BUT interestingly, on a US (DO NYC) server or my house (US/Comcast):
$ curl http://sci-hub.cc/donate
<p>Please donate to Bitcoin: 14ghuGKDAPdEcUQN4zuzGwBUrhQgACwAyA</p>%
$ curl http://sci-hub.cc/donate
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
{cut for brevity, a fair amount of HTML here}
<p>Please send donations to bitcoin wallet: 1K4t2vSBSS2xFjZ6PofYnbgZewjeqbG1TM</p>
{more HTML}
Tested from US university IP, I also get the 1K4t wallet address. Maybe a caching issue with the CDN (assuming they use one)?
I am getting the same thing. Midwest US ISP is getting 14ghu and french (free.fr) server is getting 1K4t2v
Appears to be some sort of caching issue. Archive.org shows sci-hub.org with 1K4t2v from 2015[0]
[0]: https://web.archive.org/web/20150810074804/http://www.sci-hu...
Appears to be some sort of caching issue. Archive.org shows sci-hub.org with 1K4t2v from 2015[0]
[0]: https://web.archive.org/web/20150810074804/http://www.sci-hu...
Is it legal to donate?
I think that asking a question like this says a lot about your country.
Why exactly was a New York court able to issue an injunction for a ".io" domain?
It is a British Territory extension being managed by "Internet Computer Bureau Ltd" based in the United Kingdom.
It is a British Territory extension being managed by "Internet Computer Bureau Ltd" based in the United Kingdom.
[deleted]
I would love to learn more why Elsevier _only_ reports a profit of 37%?
I've read here on HN and elsewhere multiple times, that most of the work done is outsourced to third party labor, which is done essentially for free:
- writing papers
- organising reviews
- reviewing papers
I've read here on HN and elsewhere multiple times, that most of the work done is outsourced to third party labor, which is done essentially for free:
- writing papers
- organising reviews
- reviewing papers
I worked as a contractor for MacMillan (they publish nature) and it's hard to believe how much money they spend for no results. The project I was on had been running for a year when I joined. I noped out after three months and I heard it was shut down a few months after I left with nothing to show.
That was 4-6 people full time and my entire floor of 80 people was full of projects like that - projects you never heard of.
The weird thing is that everyone I worked with directly was very smart, and went on to do cool stuff.
Summary: If I had to guess the remaining profit is wasted on silly projects and high manager salaries.
That was 4-6 people full time and my entire floor of 80 people was full of projects like that - projects you never heard of.
The weird thing is that everyone I worked with directly was very smart, and went on to do cool stuff.
Summary: If I had to guess the remaining profit is wasted on silly projects and high manager salaries.
(Thanks for daveguy: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11593881)
https://31.184.194.81/ (sci-hub.io cert)
https://sci-hub.cc (same ip as above, sci-hub.io cert)
https://sci-hub.ac (same ip as above, sci-hub.io cert)
https://sci-hub.bz (uses a separate certificate and ip address -- 104.28.20.155)
And a tor site: scihub22266oqcxt.onion
https://31.184.194.81/ (sci-hub.io cert)
https://sci-hub.cc (same ip as above, sci-hub.io cert)
https://sci-hub.ac (same ip as above, sci-hub.io cert)
https://sci-hub.bz (uses a separate certificate and ip address -- 104.28.20.155)
And a tor site: scihub22266oqcxt.onion
You're welcome! Thanks for reposting to keep the info active. One thing to add to that:
https://www.facebook.com/sci.hub.org
Their original domain was sci-hub.org, which got shut down a while back. Occasionally they post updated information to the facebook page.
Also, @fuxy. You can change your /etc/hosts file on a linux or BSD box to include the line:
31.184.194.81 sci-hub.io
That will override the DNS and go straight to the site.
Windows has a similar file located here (at least for win7):
C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts
A perfectly reasonable location for a hosts file.
https://www.facebook.com/sci.hub.org
Their original domain was sci-hub.org, which got shut down a while back. Occasionally they post updated information to the facebook page.
Also, @fuxy. You can change your /etc/hosts file on a linux or BSD box to include the line:
31.184.194.81 sci-hub.io
That will override the DNS and go straight to the site.
Windows has a similar file located here (at least for win7):
C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts
A perfectly reasonable location for a hosts file.
Guys, I have a question. If it's this simple to put a server into the onion, why are people not doing this with torrent trackers? I'm thinking specifically about thepiratebay.org which is still banned in the UK (at the ISP level, I believe). Then mirrors appear and then the mirrors get banned?
Why not just put it into the onion? Put it there once, problem solved.
Why not just put it into the onion? Put it there once, problem solved.
Perhaps the primary reason is accessibility. Onion addresses are not easily memorized. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zooko%27s_triangle
I believe this inconvenience is minor, however.
I believe this inconvenience is minor, however.
Incidentally, is there any fundamental reason why onion addresses are always so cryptic?
The answers are correct, but a less cryptographically-related answer:
When you go to a website on the regular internet, the name you type into your URL bar doesn't contain any location information. Instead, you go to a Dynamic Name Server (DNS) server (often run by your ISP) and and get the IP address, which tells your browser where to go.
With Tor, the hashes you see are analogous to the IP in regular internet: they tell your browser where to go. But there's no DNS for Tor, so you can't hide address behind a name.
Incidentally, this story is about SciHub being blocked at the DNS level, meaning that the domain https://sci-hub.io/ was removed from the DNS servers. But it's still available at the IP level at https://31.184.194.81/
This story demonstrates the need for DNS to be decentralized. ICANN has far too much control and is now using it for censorship that holds back the progress of all of humanity.
When you go to a website on the regular internet, the name you type into your URL bar doesn't contain any location information. Instead, you go to a Dynamic Name Server (DNS) server (often run by your ISP) and and get the IP address, which tells your browser where to go.
With Tor, the hashes you see are analogous to the IP in regular internet: they tell your browser where to go. But there's no DNS for Tor, so you can't hide address behind a name.
Incidentally, this story is about SciHub being blocked at the DNS level, meaning that the domain https://sci-hub.io/ was removed from the DNS servers. But it's still available at the IP level at https://31.184.194.81/
This story demonstrates the need for DNS to be decentralized. ICANN has far too much control and is now using it for censorship that holds back the progress of all of humanity.
It's not ICANN censoring them but their registrar which has pulled the domain. I agree that the ICANN monopoly is a bad thing, but the above statement is somewhat misleading.
So would a sort of decentralized DNS be possible?
Though even if we decentralize DNS, ICANN controls all of the underlying IP addresses.
> Though even if we decentralize DNS, ICANN controls all of the underlying IP addresses.
IANA would have to un-delegate a whole range from RIPE.
I don't see that happening unless they want to fracture the network.
Perhaps Elsevier will be able to force ISPs to blacklist that particular IP, but nothing more.
I also suspect they will move the domain under a ccTLD, not subject to the whims of ICANN.
IANA would have to un-delegate a whole range from RIPE.
I don't see that happening unless they want to fracture the network.
Perhaps Elsevier will be able to force ISPs to blacklist that particular IP, but nothing more.
I also suspect they will move the domain under a ccTLD, not subject to the whims of ICANN.
check out namecoin. they are attempting that, afaik.
They don't have to be cryptic, but it takes a lot of brute-forcing to get a memorable one.
Facebook managed to get https://facebookcorewwwi.onion/
Facebook managed to get https://facebookcorewwwi.onion/
I get that, my point is why do they have to be brute forced? Why can't you just pick one?
They're hashes. If you don't have the number that hashes to and address, you can't run a server at that address.
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Hashes are easy to run forwards and hard to run backwards.
Crypto noob here. Why is that? are the hashes generated from an input randomly?
A hash verifies an input, but you can not reproduce the input from a hash.
A simplified version: X % 2 = H
If I give you the formula, and a H of 1, can you, with certainty, tell me that my input was 1029? Cryptographic hashes have a similar property, just with a very large collision space - for Tor only 1 in 36^16 inputs will produce a given hash; yet you still can't guarantee that an input that produces that hash is the original input (and just guessing the possible inputs will take you a very long time).
The downside of our hash above is that it gives you a pretty good clue of what the original input was: if you get an H of 1029 from the forumla X % 10000000 = H, you'll have a pretty good idea of what the X was. Cryptographic hashes do not share this weakness - they will stretch the input, and ensure that there are no clues left as to what the original input was.
A simplified version: X % 2 = H
If I give you the formula, and a H of 1, can you, with certainty, tell me that my input was 1029? Cryptographic hashes have a similar property, just with a very large collision space - for Tor only 1 in 36^16 inputs will produce a given hash; yet you still can't guarantee that an input that produces that hash is the original input (and just guessing the possible inputs will take you a very long time).
The downside of our hash above is that it gives you a pretty good clue of what the original input was: if you get an H of 1029 from the forumla X % 10000000 = H, you'll have a pretty good idea of what the X was. Cryptographic hashes do not share this weakness - they will stretch the input, and ensure that there are no clues left as to what the original input was.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptographic_hash_function
TLDR: they are designed to behave that way. Their alternative name is "one-way hash function".
TLDR: they are designed to behave that way. Their alternative name is "one-way hash function".
The hash is generated from the onion services's private key.
Edit: I'm wrong. It's based on the hash of the public key. But it's rather confusing. After you create an onion service, you get a private key and an onion address. You don't actually get a public key, just the hostname based on it. I suspect that the public key could be found somehow. But it's not used for anything, that I know of.
Edit: I'm wrong. It's based on the hash of the public key. But it's rather confusing. After you create an onion service, you get a private key and an onion address. You don't actually get a public key, just the hostname based on it. I suspect that the public key could be found somehow. But it's not used for anything, that I know of.
Perhaps more intuitive, 11*17 is pretty easy to do in your head, but factoring 187 is much harder
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They are cryptographically generated.
The answer to that is in the Zooko's Triangle link, give it a read.
But, in short: for a name to be useful in a global context, it has to be unambiguous or unique. If there isn't a centralized naming authority / registry, then that means that you can't be able to pick an arbitrary name. (If you could, you could just decide to use the same name as someone else, and now there's no way to figure out which one of you the name indicates.)
But, in short: for a name to be useful in a global context, it has to be unambiguous or unique. If there isn't a centralized naming authority / registry, then that means that you can't be able to pick an arbitrary name. (If you could, you could just decide to use the same name as someone else, and now there's no way to figure out which one of you the name indicates.)
They are a hash generated from the service's public key.
No, from its private key! The same key that's used to sign outgoing content, authenticating to the Tor network.
Edit: I'm wrong. It's based on the hash of the public key.
Edit: I'm wrong. It's based on the hash of the public key.
How can anyone verify a hash of the private key without having it? Anyway, see https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/HiddenServ...
I don't know the details. But basically, a Tor relay provides some token to the onion server. The onion server signs that token with its private key, and returns the output to the Tor relay. Then the Tor relay verifies that the token was signed by the private key corresponding to the onion hostname.
What about blockchain based DNS solutions like namecoin?
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They do: http://uj3wazyk5u4hnvtk.onion/
But most people don't run tor often or at all.
But most people don't run tor often or at all.
If you're lazy and aren't looking for any strong degree of privacy for this kind of thing, you can run an onion transparent proxy on your router fairly easily, so then you can just navigate to .onion domains in any browser and browse away.
Of course, the privacy implications of this are pretty bad if you're just going to load most websites via direct connection. A simple image embed can deanonymize you. But it's probably good enough if you're just going to browse TPB or similar sites and are mostly just looking for a bypass without the privacy concern.
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/Transparen...
Of course, the privacy implications of this are pretty bad if you're just going to load most websites via direct connection. A simple image embed can deanonymize you. But it's probably good enough if you're just going to browse TPB or similar sites and are mostly just looking for a bypass without the privacy concern.
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/Transparen...
Anybody know a linux script/software that would 'lock' a domain down to am IP regardless what the registrar does.
Maybe have even a out of band way of updating it without the registrars involvement.
I guess what I'm looking for would be P2P DNS server although making sure the data is not fake would be difficult without some kind of signing.
Wonder if it could use the bitcoin ledger as a kind of key server?
Edit: I know /etc/hosts does the job it's just lacking if the server changes IP
Maybe have even a out of band way of updating it without the registrars involvement.
I guess what I'm looking for would be P2P DNS server although making sure the data is not fake would be difficult without some kind of signing.
Wonder if it could use the bitcoin ledger as a kind of key server?
Edit: I know /etc/hosts does the job it's just lacking if the server changes IP
Sibling posts are accurate about hard coding /etc/hosts, although Sci Hub needs to move to IPFS [1].
[1] https://ipfs.io/
[1] https://ipfs.io/
I'd like to point out that Sci-Hub not only stores scientific papers, but it will retrieve official pdf's through an institutions proxy if it can and if necessary. It could perhaps store stuff there, but it could not provide that service there (yet).
Until then, torrents of all the files that sci-hub has retrieved (and all files uploaded into libgens scimag section) can be downloaded here. http://libgen.io/scimag/repository_torrent_notforall/
Anyone can torrent these then host them on IPFS without sci-hub's involvement. However, I suspect you'll have a hard time getting any duplicity for all of this. It's over 50mil files!
Until then, torrents of all the files that sci-hub has retrieved (and all files uploaded into libgens scimag section) can be downloaded here. http://libgen.io/scimag/repository_torrent_notforall/
Anyone can torrent these then host them on IPFS without sci-hub's involvement. However, I suspect you'll have a hard time getting any duplicity for all of this. It's over 50mil files!
Thank you so much. My hope is that IPFS can serve as the underlying distributed object storage, and then work up from there to have an indexed distributed search system on top of that (Elasticsearch within a docker container using versioned ES index backups in IPFS? With documents referenced by their IPFS content hash for de-duplication?).
Does anybody know the total size of the repository?
Not AFAIK, but you good get a good idea by downloading all the torrent files, and extracting the torrent size from the metadata. Or maybe just download 1 torrent (since there's over 500 of them, one per 100k files), and multiply the average size per file.
~50TB
They should partition the papers into fields and sub-fields so that each person could easily host and mirror their field of interest.
This has the additional benefit of having the papers locally for easy indexing and searching.
This has the additional benefit of having the papers locally for easy indexing and searching.
I agree such meta data should be captured, but if the papers are converted to IPFS, it'll be easier to copy, ship, and then re-serve the data at end points.
Think of it as a [sneaker|dark]net CDN enabled by content addressable storage.
Think of it as a [sneaker|dark]net CDN enabled by content addressable storage.
/etc/hosts ?
For the locking feature I'm not sure, but there are alternative DNS networks such as https://www.opennicproject.org
echo "google.com 127.0.0.1" >> /etc/hosts
Yeah, I recommend against this particular example :)
Do this on your friends and families computers, and change the world.
There's a couple of comments showing hostname followed by IP address. Are commenters really putting entries in this format into their HOSTS file? And it works? The correct format, at least on BSD UNIX and Windows, is IP address followed by hostname.
Would need to be www.google.com to be effective, this just breaks the redirect.
duckduckgo it
echo "google.com 54.215.176.19" >> /etc/hosts
echo "google.com 54.215.176.19" >> /etc/hosts
twitter: https://twitter.com/sci_hub
vkontakte: http://vk.com/sci_hub
vkontakte: http://vk.com/sci_hub
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trivial but handy bookmarklet link for scihub:
javascript:window.location='http://sci-hub.bz/'+window.locationLong live Aaron Swartz
I feel a little tingle of excitement seeing my own papers on Sci-Hub. I mean I get that they're trying to index all publications so it's not a "stamp or approval" or anything... but it does mean that people can actually access the knowledge I tried to throw into the world, which was kind of the whole point in doing it.
I'd update my academic website to link my papers to their sci-hub URLs if I didn't think I'd catch a world of flak for it.
I'd update my academic website to link my papers to their sci-hub URLs if I didn't think I'd catch a world of flak for it.
IEEE and IEEE Explore have been actively going after professors and forcing them to take down links to their own papers. In the past, many professors hosted pdf's on their websites for their papers -- this has only stopped because IEEE has been forcing them off. Just wanted to add this for those who think professors have 'suddenly become stingy' -- no, they aren't - they were forced to.
Interestingly, it's gone the other way in mathematics. It used to be that lots of journals required authors to sign some sort of statement saying that they wouldn't post PDFs on their web pages. (I remember one professor who had a page essentially saying "Here's the PDFs. Sue me, Elsevier!" Unfortunately, I don't remember who it was) Eventually, I think in response to the massive, overwhelming popularity of the arXiv, which I think most mathematicians would choose over journals if forced to choose, the big publishers decided, slowly, piecemeal, and behind the times as always [0], to go with the times and stop fighting something that was going to happen anyway.
[0] With an exception for the AMS, which has always (as long as I have cared, and checked, anyway) had publication policies that are as author- and reader-friendly as one can probably expect in the real world.
[0] With an exception for the AMS, which has always (as long as I have cared, and checked, anyway) had publication policies that are as author- and reader-friendly as one can probably expect in the real world.
Citation needed. I have been hosting various IEEE papers on my websites for years and have never heard from IEEE.
My understanding is that CS publishers tolerate researchers hosting their own papers, but I'm very interested in evidence suggesting otherwise.
My understanding is that CS publishers tolerate researchers hosting their own papers, but I'm very interested in evidence suggesting otherwise.
Really? I haven't seen this happening yet. I still self-host copies of my publications. I'm not sure how I (or others in the same position) would respond to a request to remove them from IEEE.
i haven't heard this, this is interesting any links with more info?
Academia is probably keeping quiet since most of EE, CS, CE is heavily dependent on IEEE publications for reputation and career advancement and paper-reputation.
There would be complaints somewhere you can link to. I have a collection of over 15,000 papers. Many I got off of IEEE/ACM. However, many others I got by typing the name into Google and/or CiteSeerx to find same file. I still can usually get any file I think of and many are still on academics sites. Those are high-profile, too.
So, where's your evidence that IEEE can or is forcing PDF's off the net?
So, where's your evidence that IEEE can or is forcing PDF's off the net?
I felt that tingle too! I saw a book I co-edited on SciHub on the same day the publishers sent me a royalty statement reminding me that absolutely zero people want to pay 120GBP to read what I (my co-editors and contributors) put together through a whole lot of unpaid effort.
Why wouldn't they price at a rate that would generate some sales? Given that nearly all of the costs associated with the book would have already been paid?
I'm genuinely curious who you think would give you flak. Publishers? Your department faculty? The librarian at your university? Your peers?
(reason I'm interested: I'm on the board of Sage and have a board meeting tomorrow where I hope we'll be discussing sci-hub)
(reason I'm interested: I'm on the board of Sage and have a board meeting tomorrow where I hope we'll be discussing sci-hub)
I'm mostly concerned about what my department would do under pressure from publishers and/or the government. Being part of a state university, publicly endorsing illegal actions is unwise on my part. Especially if they undermine the establishment that the school serves.
Thanks for the insight. I'm curious to follow it through and try to understand what you think practical repercussions would be. So say you have your CV up online with sci-hub links, and a publisher does somehow complain to the university. Wouldn't the worst that happens be you change it and say sorry? Or do you think there would be more serious consequences? Is being seen as "pro piracy" a black mark that would stay with you somehow?
I don't think there would be any real repercussions. But this close to the end, it seems foolish to bet the last six years of my life on a mildly amusing act of civil disobedience.
While I have complete faith in my department not being staffed with idiots and zealots, I have no similar faith in our government. Being a state school, that's ultimately who we answer to. The whole Aaron Schwartz debacle evaporated any faith I might have had in our government's ability to deal with this sort of thing like grownups.
While I have complete faith in my department not being staffed with idiots and zealots, I have no similar faith in our government. Being a state school, that's ultimately who we answer to. The whole Aaron Schwartz debacle evaporated any faith I might have had in our government's ability to deal with this sort of thing like grownups.
SAGE Publications' busts of the peer review and citation ring back in 2014 was great work.
Might it be possible for you to expand on SAGE's position of Sci-Hub?
Might it be possible for you to expand on SAGE's position of Sci-Hub?
There's no official position. It's a messy issue, with what I'm sure are lots of conflicting opinions among various people at Sage. I don't see perfectly eye to eye on this with other board members (one of whom is my father) or upper management. That's not a bad thing. The issue of paywalls and piracy is a really complicated thing, even though most HN commenters would make it seem like a black and white good vs bad issue.
Sage is in a particularly interesting position because we serve so much of the humanities and social sciences (HSS). In STM you can make the legit argument that all published research should be open access and the cost of that should come out of the same funding that funded the research (ie NIH or private funding agencies). But in the social sciences there isn't the same funding picture.
So even if we decided we were going to be super ambitious and flip all of our journals tomorrow to author-pays OA, it's hard to imagine that working in HSS. What would end up happening? Hard to say, but my guess is that a lot of our journals would collapse for lack of submissions and the vast majority of the content would go to our competitors' paywall journals. And remember that a lot of our journals are academic society journals and the societies rely on the journal revenue to operate. So it would also meant the implosion of significant societies that currently serve their members (well, in reality it would just mean they'd migrate their journals to another paywall publisher).
The whole thing is super messy and complicated. The competing interests of societies, academics, universities, funding bodies, tenure committees, etc all make it a big complicated mess (particularly when focusing on HSS). I wish we could have some of these debates in forums like HN in an intelligent way, but that's pretty hard to do given how quickly the pitchforks come out.
Sage is in a particularly interesting position because we serve so much of the humanities and social sciences (HSS). In STM you can make the legit argument that all published research should be open access and the cost of that should come out of the same funding that funded the research (ie NIH or private funding agencies). But in the social sciences there isn't the same funding picture.
So even if we decided we were going to be super ambitious and flip all of our journals tomorrow to author-pays OA, it's hard to imagine that working in HSS. What would end up happening? Hard to say, but my guess is that a lot of our journals would collapse for lack of submissions and the vast majority of the content would go to our competitors' paywall journals. And remember that a lot of our journals are academic society journals and the societies rely on the journal revenue to operate. So it would also meant the implosion of significant societies that currently serve their members (well, in reality it would just mean they'd migrate their journals to another paywall publisher).
The whole thing is super messy and complicated. The competing interests of societies, academics, universities, funding bodies, tenure committees, etc all make it a big complicated mess (particularly when focusing on HSS). I wish we could have some of these debates in forums like HN in an intelligent way, but that's pretty hard to do given how quickly the pitchforks come out.
> In STM you can make the legit argument that all published research should be open access and the cost of that should come out of the same funding that funded the research.
There is no cost of publishing your/my papers as open access. Just follow these easy steps:
1. Write paper, send to journal
2. Do the peer review hokey pokey until paper is accepted
3. Upload preprint version to preprint server (arXiv etc.), with link to journal version
If you're brave, you can do step 3 before step 2.
This whole concept of paying for open access is ridiculous and should go die in a fire.
There is no cost of publishing your/my papers as open access. Just follow these easy steps:
1. Write paper, send to journal
2. Do the peer review hokey pokey until paper is accepted
3. Upload preprint version to preprint server (arXiv etc.), with link to journal version
If you're brave, you can do step 3 before step 2.
This whole concept of paying for open access is ridiculous and should go die in a fire.
That hokey pokey you refer to does cost money. So yes, you can use a system that has costs associated with it, then attempt to ensure those costs can't be recouped. But if that's successful the system will collapse. I assume you'd think that would be good in this case. But I find it funny reasoning to say you should opt-in to publisher-facilitated peer review while trying to tear it down. Wouldn't avoiding publishers altogether be the more ideologically consistent method?
Yes, it costs money, but it's not being paid for by Elsevier. Referees receive zero money, editors receive zero (or perhaps a nominal fee). The copyediting costs a bit, but it is low-skill labor and can mostly be optimised away (many journals already accept camera-ready copies directly from the authors).
What I see publishers mainly providing is ranking and filtering (and branding to some extent). ACS has their top level journal (JACS) and several subfield-specific journals, and usually there are ACS journals with different prestige in each subfield. ACS, APS and other non-profit science organisations do a fairly good job at it IMO.
Forbidding for-profit publishers would be my preferred option.
What I see publishers mainly providing is ranking and filtering (and branding to some extent). ACS has their top level journal (JACS) and several subfield-specific journals, and usually there are ACS journals with different prestige in each subfield. ACS, APS and other non-profit science organisations do a fairly good job at it IMO.
Forbidding for-profit publishers would be my preferred option.
If the collapsing part of the system is the one containing middlemen who earn millions taking advantage of free labor from academicians, it will be a success. The only current effect of sci-hub is that research is really open.
SciHub is costing around $50k a year to host 50 million papers for free. Elselvier makes a 37% profit margin on 2.07 billion pounds a year. Funny enough, SciHub shows Elselvier could host all scientific knowledge for under 1% of 1% of its revenue while making an operating profit. I'm sure we can find a better trade between widespread access and profitable management of that access than Elselvier. ;)
But no publisher is arguing that the hosting of PDFs is the expensive part of their business. If it was then you're right and researchers should just send their finished PDFs straight to sci-hub for hosting. But hosting a PDF is only a tiny, and as you've identified, an inconsequential part of the equation.
The other critical parts still don't result in a 37% net margin as it's basically labor. Most of it is low-skilled labor that should have plenty competition. The peer reviews of specific fields is high-skilled labor with decent to uncommon competition depending on size of field.
My claim still applies even if those costs are factored in. A yearly fee should be enough to cover everything. Charging $10-30 per article and such is just profiteering.
My claim still applies even if those costs are factored in. A yearly fee should be enough to cover everything. Charging $10-30 per article and such is just profiteering.
Understand, thank you for everything you're doing - keep up the good work.
This reminds me of that old Steve Martin movie, The Jerk, where the protagonist finds out that he's in the phone book.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7aIf1YnbbU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7aIf1YnbbU
Felt similar seeing my name on https://haveibeenpwned.com/
Quote" I'm in the phone book! Things are going to start happening for me now!"
I know what you mean, it's great to feel like you've contributed to the sum total of humanity's knowledge like that.
And now my ego demands that I go check to see whether the one paper I've published is up on there! :D
And now my ego demands that I go check to see whether the one paper I've published is up on there! :D
These days you can just post the dois and mention scihub somewhere innocuous. The readers will figure it out and I'd love to see the publishers win when there is no direct link to the papers.
> it does mean that people can actually access the knowledge I tried to throw into the world, which was kind of the whole point in doing it.
I mean obviously it wasn't the whole point if you didn't publish them freely in the first place.
I mean obviously it wasn't the whole point if you didn't publish them freely in the first place.
Domain names should not, in principle, be subject to the arbitrary edicts of governments. I hope that, in the future, we switch to a decentralised and cryptographically incorruptible system a la Namecoin.
Being free would also be nice. But of course, we also need a way to disincentive squatting.
Maybe this is an opportune time to bring up a related concern. It's crucial that any system for disseminating scientific work be reliable and persist indefinitely. I don't like the current system, but I wonder how this will be achieved otherwise.
I agree. I don't want papers to dissapear indefinitely due to an IT mistake, and I'm sure there are many researchers that don't save previous papers locally. That, and being able to access cited works is also important.
Just like with music and file sharing, this will not hurt the large corporations. It will only hurt the researchers that depend on these papers for funding and make it more difficult for them to make a living in the future.
It will also push companies to keep research more private and proprietary. Why would I spend millions of dollars on research, only to have it freely distributed to everyone, including my potential competitors?
I've never witnesses a time where more people fight to give up more and more of their own power and hand it over to governments and large corporations on a silver platter...and then complain when it's all gone.
It will also push companies to keep research more private and proprietary. Why would I spend millions of dollars on research, only to have it freely distributed to everyone, including my potential competitors?
I've never witnesses a time where more people fight to give up more and more of their own power and hand it over to governments and large corporations on a silver platter...and then complain when it's all gone.
Are you aware that unlike musicians, academic researchers don't get paid royalties on their publications? A list of prestigious publications on one's cv leads to funding and job opportunities regardless of whether anyone pays to read them.
Lots of academics are collecting royalties on books.
Typically not large royalties, but they are collecting them.
Typically not large royalties, but they are collecting them.
Of the 100 academicians I know (applied math), only a dozen published books and collect royalties. Some of them joke about getting the occasional check of a few dollars every year. These are senior US professors whose salary is good enough that they can joke about the royalties.
Yes, that's a fair point. I was thinking only of journal articles and conference proceedings. One way of making money off textbooks is to be a professor in an institution with a large number of students and make them a requirement for the course. It also helps to make a few small changes every year and call it a new edition, so each year the next class of students has to buy new ones instead of used copies from the previous year's class. I question whether this practice is worth defending.
> Yes, that's a fair point. I was thinking only of journal articles and conference proceedings. One way of making money off textbooks is to be a professor in an institution with a large number of students
Yeah that behaviour is detestable. Absolutely utterly unethical and everyone who engages in this type of behaviour should take a long look in the mirror and realize that there's an Evil person looking back.
I've lost so much money to f*ckers like this and I have no recourse, it makes me so mad I can spit.
Yeah that behaviour is detestable. Absolutely utterly unethical and everyone who engages in this type of behaviour should take a long look in the mirror and realize that there's an Evil person looking back.
I've lost so much money to f*ckers like this and I have no recourse, it makes me so mad I can spit.
The professors don't actually make much money. The publisher takes a huge commission. I've heard 5-10% royalties in some cases. Usually if they use the book for their own course they'll waive even that to avoid having the appearance of a conflict of interest.
They could make a ton of money doing it this way: Physics textbooks can sell for hundreds. But many don't.
Using your own book for a course(separate from the money) has its benefits: The book has exactly the content that you want to teach off of, and you can also choose good problems.
When I took a Differential Geometry course in college, the professor had a translated version of some paper from a Russian mathematician back in the 1950s that he taught off of. It was cheaper to get copies from Kinko's, and it's not like the math changes. The old pioneers can sometimes give better intuition too.
They could make a ton of money doing it this way: Physics textbooks can sell for hundreds. But many don't.
Using your own book for a course(separate from the money) has its benefits: The book has exactly the content that you want to teach off of, and you can also choose good problems.
When I took a Differential Geometry course in college, the professor had a translated version of some paper from a Russian mathematician back in the 1950s that he taught off of. It was cheaper to get copies from Kinko's, and it's not like the math changes. The old pioneers can sometimes give better intuition too.
On books, not papers. I've searched for books on sci-hub, but have never found one. I'm pretty sure it's all papers, which researchers make no money on.
Use Library Genesis (http://gen.lib.rus.ec/) for books.
I realize readers of torrentfreak.com have a different relationship with the word "pirate" but--
This is not piracy. You are entitled to read work from Sci-Hub, as your taxes funded the researchers who created the work. We academics want you to read our work, we do not benefit in any way from publisher paywalls. We continue to publish in these venues because it is necessary for career advancement (whether for us, or for our students).
Please continue to "pirate" our work, and please spread the word about this problem.