Physical journals have value because, to many, a shelf full of reference work is easier to navigate than online bookmarks and tags, which are arbitrary depending on the mood and the day.

For people who don’t think journals are necessary, you could all form a coalition, a common site, where everyone posts their work and it can be found with a search function.

We have that at sb with general science and once you get a hundred writers or so the value to people doing the searching goes up a lot because they can find the answers in one location.

When mathematicians allowed ownership of these brands to pass into the hands of the publishers, they were suckers. Rubes. Marks who got scammed. They let the one thing of irreplaceable value to get away.

I agree completely. Here’s the big question: how can us suckers get it back, now that we’ve wised up?

The arXiv was a good move. What’s next?