But the most important is that publishers will charge for access to the same paper again and again. Sci-Net will only do that once when paper is uploaded and after that, it will remain free forever and for everyone -- even users who are not registered on the platform will be able to access it.

I'm unclear on what this means/how it's implemented but it sounds more promising than I initially thought? If this is all just another way to funnel fresh articles that are inaccessible via the old methods into scihub for all to download, fine. At least it's a proof of stake crypto and not burning tons of fossil fuels to accomplish this. I still think its gross, but maybe it could turn out to be practical. And it certainly seems less fraught with legal risk than conducting a bounty system in regular fiat currency

But otoh the fact that it isn't clear to me where the articles go isn't a great sign.

[–] TheSpectreOfGay@hexbear.net 4 points 5 months ago (2 children)

missed that part, thanks for pointing it out

that just makes me confused how it's different than any other archive and how it's not gonna be taken down tbh

[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 8 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

It's not different to any other archive in that regard, it will be targeted for takedown. The goal seems to be solely to monetarily incentivise uploads with a one time reward for doing so, which then becomes a free for all accessible paper? That's how I'm reading it.

If it works then cool. I suspect there will be a few absolutely massive uploaders who scrape and upload for the incentive. Whether that means some things appear that weren't already accessible elsewhere I don't know.

[–] trinicorn@hexbear.net 3 points 5 months ago

yeah I don't quite get it either, something still doesn't add up. The behavior from scihub since 2020 has been puzzling. There was some indian court case and that's why they paused new uploads (weird considering that isn't alexandra's jurisdiction or where the domains are I don't think). Some speculate that they thought they could win that case in india and so stopped uploads as a show of compliance to the court.

But I haven't seen any updates newer than 2022 about what's going on legally... And sci-hub still serving up the huge backlog/archive they had thru 2022, which is weird if she's genuinely in legal trouble...

And now this new site... Says the articles are free without signup, but does require a paid signup? And an invitation? Kinda feels like the legal threat has passed and keeping new uploads paused is an attempt to get critical mass of users on the new service (not necessarily to cash out via crypto, but also out of a genuine belief it might solve some of the issues sci-hub had with access to harder to find materials?)

idk what to think overall, still doesn't sit 100% right with me and the radio silence makes it much harder to assume the best