The individual work has commercial value. Competing news services cover the same event to provide their unique, and marketable slant on what has happened. The ability to control access is critical to these businesses and to the creators who are rewarded for their contributions, even if there are multiple reports. Because scientific data is different from all other kinds of data that is being collected into proprietary databases. The progress of science depends on the integrity of the whole scientific database, be it in print or in on the Web.
Discovery is attributed to the first researcher to report on a critical result.
Future developments and discoveries are based on the combined observations of all researchers in a field. Unless the full scholarly record is accessible to all researchers, researchers will be forced to repeat the exercises of their predecessors. Furthermore, because the potential economic value of new scientific knowledge is usually distant and not predictable, it has little near-term economic value. That is why basic scientific research generally must be supported by governmental or philanthropic funding. Hence the marketplace that may manipulate and control access for commercial purposes cannot be expected to also subsidize the generation of duplicate scientific results like it does in the case of news reporting, and in entertainment.