[HN Gopher] UC's termination of Elsevier contract has had limite...
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       UC's termination of Elsevier contract has had limited negative
       impact
        
       Author : ColinWright
       Score  : 21 points
       Date   : 2021-03-07 21:29 UTC (1 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (dailybruin.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (dailybruin.com)
        
       | tokai wrote:
       | Elsevier knows this. We have just finish negotiating a new
       | national contract with them, and to our surprise did they agreed
       | to all of our demands. They know which way the wind is blowing
       | and are trying to pivot as quickly as an old lumbering giant can.
        
       | spzb wrote:
       | Article is from February 2020 although not much seems to have
       | changed since https://osc.universityofcalifornia.edu/uc-
       | publisher-relation...
        
       | ramraj07 wrote:
       | This brings an interesting anecdote from when I suddenly had this
       | question of how my seniors working in the 80s and 90s in a small
       | Indian lab managed to get the literature they want (when their
       | small lab was still one of the most advanced institutions in the
       | state). My senior said they'd pretty much have to write up a
       | literature request letter, attach a cheque and mail it to the
       | main library in New Delhi, and they would typically hear back
       | from them after a month or two either with a copy of the article
       | or saying they can't get it (roughly half the time). They still
       | did good research, arguably even better than what crap gets
       | spewed out now!
       | 
       | Just like Wikipedia and the internet didn't change everyone's
       | ability to know things in any meaningful way (actually it made it
       | worse), free access to arbitrary literature was not exactly the
       | limiting step in anyone's research career in my experience. It's
       | definitely annoying but once you're up to speed in a field you
       | are typically happy with just the abstract and if it's an
       | important enough paper you find a way to get it one way or
       | another. Especially with a good supportive library and ILL system
       | it's typically a snap.
        
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       (page generated 2021-03-07 23:01 UTC)