> Sci-Hub ... an out and out copyright pirate

Arrr! Shiver me timbers.

> papers harvested (illegally)

illegaly? Maybe, in some world states; but not in others.

Also, the illegality is temporary. Think of Marijuana in the US (and many other places). A significant fraction of the population uses it. It took them a good number of decades, but they're gradually legalizing it. With scientific publications - Sci-Hub and Lib-gen are are making copyright law unenforceable for scientific material; and I'm pretty certain this will erode that part of copyright law to decriminalization and legalization eventually.

> in China Sci-Hub is banned

(Jaw drops.) This is really surprising! I wonder why it's banned there.