Today, a company called DeepDyve launched the largest online rental service for scientific papers, which allows users to rent any article for just 99 cents. Journal articles currently trend toward the obscene ($30 or more), unless you're the lucky dude with a password for a university library. DeepDyve saw an opening in the market and made deals with major scientific publishers to stock 30 million (and growing) articles of tech, med, and scientific interest.
DeepDyve is part of a greater trend of getting scientific info back to the hardworking taxpayers who funded it. Just last year, the National Institutes of Health decreed that NIH-supported research had to be published free to everyone within a year of journal publication. And although DeepDyve isn't always free, it's improves access.
So far, they seem to be the only major player on the scene. "A fragmented universe of discombobulated, unorganized junk is our competitor," CEO William Park told Popsci.com in an interview.
DeepDyve's unique search algorithm can handle up to 20,000 characters. That means you can plug in a paragraph -- heck, an entire page -- and see what comes up. You can see the first page for free, and rent any article for 99 cents for 24 hours. (Or pay a monthly fee to hold onto them.) The one catch? The Flash interface doesn't allow printing, and makes even taking screenshots difficult.
Curious? Check it out here and let me know what you think.
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Nothing is difficult to screen cap with apple+shift+4.
I am probably going to blow a huge amount of money on this site. It is awesome! Maybe if it easier to get access to studies less people will believe dumb theories about vaccines causing autism, intelligent design, and that climate change isn't real.
Horrible idea. Knowledge should be dispersed equally and without any monetary gain. This world is increasing becoming worse, and a large problem is that knowledge is only attainable by the very limited minority that can afford it. Then take into account that almost 90% of the worlds wealth is owned by 1% of it population. 0nce you take this into account you'll notice systems like this one are actually holding us back. Schooling in America is ridiculously expensive and is contributing to a massively huge number of uneducated individuals, and therefore undesirable individuals for the workplace. Which in turn fuels economic recession. Its a viscous circle we need to break.
Since Deepdyve didn't write any of these article it should not have to right to sell them. Only the person who wrote it should be able to use it for their advantage.
Imagine the possibilities Deepdyve would have to the field of science if it were a free resource. It would promote unprecedented amounts of collaboration with people in respected fields.
They key reason we as a race have developed at an outstanding rate in this last century is due to the availability of communication, and communication in turn promoted collaboration.
Greater access to scientific information is a fine goal, and the DeepDyve service offers just that - better access for medical personnel, museum workers, and the general public who want to read technical articles but who don't otherwise have access to expensive journals.
This service will open doors, not close them.