Hacker Goes Snowden On Academia, Releases Millions Of Research Papers

A hacker from Kazakhstan has protested the skyrocketing prices of scientific journals by releasing millions of research studies free on her site, Sci-Hub. The Internet is a “global brain,” and the paywalls that journal publishers erect inhibit the free flow of information, preventing humanity from being fully “conscious,” Alexandra Elbakyan told the New York Times. Journal publishers earned $10 billion last year, mostly from research libraries, which pay up to $35,000 per title. Publishing firm Elsevier filed a lawsuit against Elbakyan, saying their prices are justified because they curate the research, select the most worthy studies for publication, and orchestrate the vetting, editing and archiving of articles. In a letter to the judge, Elbakyan wrote that journal publishers pay nothing to acquire researchers’ studies, do not pay volunteer peer reviewers or editors, and charge the same researchers, reviewers and editors – as well as the public – to read the results. “That is very different from the music or movie industry, where creators receive money from each copy sold,” Elbakyan wrote. “I would like to also mention that we never received any complaints from authors or researchers.”