"Paywall: The business of scholarship" - a free-to-stream movie "exposing a scandal"

[Sasha]

Just read about this movie in a praise-showering review in New Scientist mag, and it does sound really good:

Movie review Paywall: The business of scholarship – exposing a scandal

Expect to feel righteous anger and astonishment as the film Paywall exposes the dull-sounding science journal industry, hard at work pocketing your tax money

Paywall shows how publicly funded research is turned into private profit
paywallthemovie.com

Paywall: The business of scholarship, directed by Jason Schmitt, can be viewed at paywallthemovie.com

TWO minutes into this riveting documentary, there’s a moment of cinematic genius. Just as the story is getting into its stride, THUD – down comes a paywall and a voice says: “We are sorry, you do not have the credentials to access this documentary. Please see payment options below.”

You’re going to have to shell out $39.95 to keep watching. Of course, you don’t. The paywall is fake and, after a few agonising seconds, the film rolls on. But its impact …

https://www.newscientist.com/articl...e-business-of-scholarship-exposing-a-scandal/​

The rest of the review is paywalled, but under the circs, that seems fair enough.

 

[ladycatlover]

Oooo, going to watch that! Have sub to New Scientist so am able to tell you...

And the film ends with a real bang as we meet Alexandra Elbakyan, the “pirate queen” of scientific publishing, who runs Sci-Hub. This website makes around 70 million paywalled research papers freely and easily available. Elbakyan has been sued by Elsevier and others, and is a fugitive from justice so her interview was a real coup. When Schmitt asks her opinion of Elsevier (Sci-Hub’s most pirated publisher), she delivers the film’s coup de grâce with her arch reply: “I like their slogan ‘making uncommon knowledge common’ very much, but as far as I can tell, Elsevier has not mastered this job well. Sci-Hub is helping them to fulfil their mission.”

 

[ladycatlover]

Just watched the film. Interesting, though I did feel that it could have been edited better - prob to about half the length. If any of you just want to catch the stuff about Sci-Hub it starts just before the 55 minute mark.

Basically it was too long for the amount of info in my view. At least for "ordinary" people. Suspect the whole thing would be absolutely riveting for University Librarians!