JSTOR doesn&#x27;t lock content away. They make deals with existing journals to take content that is not available online and make it available online. Any access restrictions JSTOR imposes come from the content owners, not JSTOR.<p>JSTOR has also convinced most of these journals, even ones with restrictive access policies, to let JSTOR make their content available for free to the public at many libraries and schools, including ones that do not have subscriptions to the underlying journals. Because of JSTOR, many second tier colleges, community colleges, and even high schools have free access to vast journal libraries that they would not have otherwise had access to. They also do a lot to bring cheap or free access to vast journal libraries to schools and libraries in developing countries.<p>JSTOR has probably expanded free public access to scientific research more than any other group or organization.<p>Sure, it would be nice if everything were open access so you could just legally get it all on the net for free, but many journals aren&#x27;t willing to do that yet, and in the meantime JSTOR provides a way for most of the public to get that content at the cost of having to visit a library or school that offers public JSTOR.