We do the writing. We do the editing. We do the reviewing. We do the formatting (we typeset everything in LaTeX). We do the proofreading. We correct the mistakes introduced by proofreaders.
What do publishers do? They make us sign silly copyright forms, stamp their logo on our papers, and then proceed to charge *us* (either as authors or readers) ridiculous amounts.
People think academics/scientists are clever. We might be. But we are also stupid. And vain.
@jorgeapenas I completely agree. Yet, there are relatively few independent, non-profit Open Access journals around as an alternative. In my field, Sociological Science is one of the few.
@RenseC It is high time for scientific societies to leave for-profit publishers and convince governments to fund their diamond open-access journals. And it is high time for national agencies to stop burning public money into funding scientists funding greedy golden open-access publishers. This kafkaesque dystopic world of academic publishing needs to stop, quickly.
@jorgeapenas @RenseC absolutely. Public funding should require public publishing.
@Brendanjones @jorgeapenas Exactly. Still, it is surprisingly rare. Of course, starting and running a journal, even online, is still quite an investment. Perhaps there is a lack of adequate funding structures for that?
@Brendanjones @jorgeapenas Some nice tools for running a journal are already available, such as OJS: https://pkp.sfu.ca/software/ojs/. Apart from that, I guess all you need is a server and the labor of editors and some support staff. Servers are cheap, but the labor is not. It would be nice if there were specific grants for that, or at least to cover the startup effort, but I don't think we have them in NL.
@Brendanjones @jorgeapenas @RenseC It's a bit of a charade by now... Those of us without access will just use Sci-hub even though we shouldn't.
It feels like having 2nd class full on the train, 1st class empty.