the hilarious thing is how much phd students and other work-a-day members of academia literally could not get their jobs done without sci-hub, the whole system would just grind to a halt without sci-hub.
Also, university researchers have been sharing their institutes' access to papers for ever. No university subscribes to all journals. 15 years ago it was quick email to your undergrad mate asking if their uni subscribes to a particular journal. I was at a top-10 ranked US eng school and this was the case. 25 years ago it was a call and a fax. Before then a photocopier.
exactly my entire point.
people inside the tower just do not understand, which is why scihub came from someone outside of it
So science marches on but without public access to the full text articles all we have to go on are the usually low quality science journalism press releases.
Science in the rich countries perhaps, anyway. And if you're at a university.