Scihub is being sued in Indian courts by the journal industry. There are some people worried about it. But it is funny how our knowledge system works. Take this tweet for example:
Scientific publishing sure is rigged & broken. But hoping that the very bandicoots that are getting fat from the status quo will take hints and improve the system is beyond naive. The telling lack of collective resistance from scientists too enables this perverse model to thrive. https://t.co/ye9SuxlYQM
— M D Madhusudan (@mdmadhusudan) December 24, 2020
The reason why journals charge exorbitantly and still get away with it is because almost all academicians publish only in those journals. And why do academicians publish in those journals? Here comes the greatest hypocrisy/logical fallacy of academicians.
They think that publishing in "prestigious" journals bring "prestige". They even have a way of measuring prestige without making it sound like it's an emotional thing - impact factor. It is all part of the same logical fallacy - argument from authority. A cognitive bias that makes humans think that "authority" is right.
The only purpose of journals in the internet age is to exude authority.
The same purpose of universities.
If scientists step down from their pedestals and start looking at the world without bringing in their cognitive biases (like every scientist should be doing), there can be a world where knowledge is produced and consumed with lesser hurdles.
There definitely is a side to this where the omnipresent, omnipotent "system" is oppressing academicians and forcing them to continue with this prestige based publication. After all, scientists are humans who would rather give in to the way the world works than stand up against anything.
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