Paywall: The Business of Scholarship

by Jason Schmitt, Russell Stone, Zach Brunelle, Emma Atkinson, Alex Hill, Lorraine Harper, Amoge Okolie, John Bohannon, Martin Eve · 2018
https://paywallthemovie.com/

Paywall: The Business of Scholarship is a documentary which focuses on the need for open access to research and science. The film questions the rationale behind the $25.2 billion a year that flows into for-profit academic publishers, examines the 35-40% profit margin associated with the top academic publisher, Elsevier, and looks at how that profit margin is often greater than some of the most profitable tech companies such as Apple, Facebook, and Google.

Excerpts

Universities are about educating humans, and there is literally no reason to keep information from people. There is nothing gained other than money and power. As people, we should want to push up against.

— Aria Chernik, Director of OSPRI, Duke University