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Comment by pksebben | Hacker News Reader

I'd be more on board with this take if it were artists engaging in these lawsuits. Elsevier doesn't elicit the same sympathy, though.

'Stealing' from a company with 2B in profit (much from publicly funded research), LibGen is looking a lot like Robin Hood to Elsevier's Prince John.

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It's the same issue. If writers could meaningfully get an audience who buys their work independently, they wouldn't need a publisher.

Publishers offer support and printing, but ultimately an author needs a publisher to spread reach (i won't say "make money", because authors sure won't make much). Becsuse it's all about being loud and publishers have resources to be loud. Much better odds compared to a grassroots community paying a fair price when the author is ready to release.

The problem is that publishers, being the middleman, take over authors the same way the supermarket network takes over the food producers. Publishers own the shelf and a price label, and being less numerous and more organized, they can effectively own the audience's attention. They can help, they can also shut author down. They're not ultimately interested in maximizing availability, because they profit directly from the gap. That's why they need restrictions and ways around them.

Maybe a billion-dollar company has more money to spend on lawsuits than artists do? Doesn't make them the good guys, but I'm not surprised that it's them doing it.

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