Recently, an email signed as the “Document Information Center” of the Chinese Academy of Sciences circulated on the Internet.The email accused CNKI of nearly “tens of millions” of renewal fees and “harsh” renewal conditions, and stated that CNKI had now suspended the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ access to the CNKI database due to the inability to reach an agreement through negotiations.
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The Chinese Academy of Sciences responded to the suspension of CNKI: It is true, consider replacing it with Wanfang and VIP…
Text / Shi Zhanpu
Afterwards, topics such as the topic #网传Chinese Academy of Sciences suspends CNKI### Chinese Academy of Sciences responds to suspending CNKI# and other topics appeared on Weibo hot search, triggering a big discussion among netizens.
It is understood that the Chinese Academy of Sciences is a public institution directly under the State Council. It was established in November 1949. It is the country’s highest academic institution for natural sciences, the highest consulting institution for science and technology, and a comprehensive research and development center for natural sciences and high technology. A national strategic scientific and technological force integrating educational institutions.
The hospital has 11 branches, more than 100 scientific research institutes, 3 universities, etc., with more than 69,000 formal employees and more than 79,000 graduate students.
HowNet is again involved in the “astronomical subscription fee” storm
The online email mentioned, “In 2021, the total subscription cost of CNKI database of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Group will reach the level of tens of millions, and it has become a ‘big Mac’ in the introduction of resources of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Group. After many rounds of arduous negotiations, CNKI still insisted on the renewal fee of nearly 10 million yuan, and the group group plan it gave was quite harsh in terms of the number of members and the price of a single company.”
Subsequently, on April 15, the Chinese Academy of Sciences Library issued a “Notice on the Imminent Deactivation of CNKI China Knowledge Network” to all users of the institute. No consensus was reached on the CNKI plan, “the hospital-wide access to the CNKI database will stop on April 21.”
On April 17, a teacher from the Chinese Academy of Sciences who was responsible for the implementation of the matter confirmed to reporters that the Internet rumored “tens of millions” of renewal fees and the suspension of CNKI access are true. As for whether access to HowNet will be resumed in the future, the teacher said, “It’s hard to say now, at least there should be no such plan this year.”
According to the above-mentioned teachers, the Institute of Chinese Academy of Sciences has opened Wanfang database (enhanced version) and VIP database, which form an alternative guarantee for CNKI database.
On April 14, the Chinese Academy of Sciences issued a notice on the trial of Wanfang Database in 2022
However, according to Sino-Singapore Jingwei report, “HowNet’s response was suspended by the Chinese Academy of Sciences: not true.”
According to the report, CNKI responded to Sino-Singapore Jingwei that the above news was “untrue”. In addition, Sino-Singapore Jingwei called the official websites of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Documentation and Information Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences respectively, and their staff said they were not aware of the matter and were not responsible for related business.
In recent years, CNKI has been boycotted by colleges and universities for many times due to frequent price increases. During the ten years from 2012 to 2021, at least 6 colleges and universities issued announcements to suspend the use of CNKI, all of which were due to the excessive increase of CNKI.
In January 2016, Wuhan University of Technology issued a notice of the suspension of CNKI, saying that “due to the outrageous increase in the renewal price, the negotiation between our school and CNKI Company was unsuccessful. Over the years, CNKI Company has raised prices too much. This behavior has been resisted by many colleges and universities across the country, including many well-known 985 colleges and universities.”
In March of the same year, Peking University also posted a notice that it was about to suspend HowNet, saying that it “will not easily compromise with the excessive price increases of merchants.”
In an interview with the media, the relevant person in charge of the Peking University Library said that the price increase of CNKI’s purchase price is too high, which has exceeded the budget limit of the library.
In December 2018, the library of Taiyuan University of Technology announced that due to the lack of agreement with CNKI on the renewal price and usage method, after research and decision, access to CNKI database will be suspended from January 1, 2019.
In 2021, Jimei University Library announced that due to the continuous increase in the price of CNKI database resources and budgetary reasons, the school has adjusted the ordering plan.
In addition to being boycotted by colleges and universities due to frequent price increases, CNKI has also received attention for being sued by paper authors.
Professor Zhao Dexin, a well-known economic historian, once told the net that “HowNet included more than 100 of his articles without authorization”, and finally HowNet was sentenced to a total of more than 700,000 yuan in compensation.
Under the high profit, the author has a meager income
When it comes to HowNet, many people’s first reaction is two words—thesis. From the undergraduate level, students need to read a large number of papers on related topics in order to write courses or dissertations, and do literature reviews. Browsing and downloading papers on CNKI is an inescapable part of the process of data collection.
However, the vast majority of college teachers and students do not feel that CNKI’s “paid download of papers” is not obvious. This is not because CNKI did not charge them, but that universities and research institutes directly paid CNKI subscription fees for packages.
It is reported that CNKI was initiated by Tsinghua University and Tsinghua Tongfang and was established in June 1999. It is an information construction project aiming at realizing the dissemination, sharing and value-added utilization of knowledge resources in the whole society.
According to Tianyancha, the subsidiary company of the CNKI project is Tongfang Knowledge Network (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Tongfang Knowledge Network”), which was established in November 2004 and is 100% owned by Tongfang, an A-share listed company. .
Tongfang’s financial report shows that Tongfang Knowledge Network is mainly engaged in Internet publishing and service business, and has formed a “China Knowledge Network” (CNKI) portal, providing users with a series of products such as “China Academic Journal Database” and “China Ph.D. Master Thesis Database” .
In 2020 alone, Tongfang Zhiwang’s main business income was 1.168 billion yuan, with a gross profit margin of 53.93%; in the first half of 2021, the company’s main business income was 496 million yuan, with a gross profit margin of 51.30%.
Screenshot of the 2020 annual report published by Tongfang Co., Ltd.
But in stark contrast to the high profitability is the meager income of the author. According to Xinhua Daily Telegraph, the author can only receive a maximum of 100 yuan in cash and a search card with a face value of 400 yuan as remuneration for doctoral dissertations and master thesis published on CNKI. And every time the author’s paper is downloaded on CNKI, the platform will charge 15 yuan/book or even 25 yuan/book.
Is CNKI suspected of an industry monopoly? According to media reports, on March 9, the Anti-monopoly Division I of the State Administration for Market Regulation replied to reporters online saying: “The State Administration for Market Regulation is verifying and studying.”
Sun Jin, a professor at the Law School of Wuhan University, said in an interview that the Anti-Monopoly Law is a very professional and important law. Only anti-monopoly law enforcement agencies or judicial authorities can determine whether CNKI constitutes a monopoly. Law enforcement or judicial authorities have to follow three steps when determining: the first step is to define the relevant market; the second step is to determine whether it has a dominant market position; the third step is to determine whether it has abused its dominant market position.
Another expert introduced: “Having a dominant market position is legal, and only the abuse of this position may violate the Anti-Monopoly Law.” Whether CNKI is suspected of an industry monopoly will generally take a long time to investigate.