Scientific journals serve to sell stuff they get for free to libraries at a substantial price. At one time this made sense, since paper copies of journals played an important role in communicating scientific information. Since the advent of the internet, these journals are dinosaurs, much like the music industry. Like the music industry, they are not fading quietly into the good night. Here, via James Dow, is an amusing example:
If you click here, you will find a website offering you a chance to buy a book review. The six page book review can be downloaded in exchange for $42 plus tax. If you click here you can buy the 320 page book: for $17.19. (Or, still for less than the price of the book review, they'll throw in Daron Acemoglu's latest book.)