It’s insensitive. And behind the times. Google Scholar, I mean. They send me emails telling me that people can’t read my research because I don’t have a verified email. When I sign on and enter my email, it tells me to enter an institutional email instead. I don’t have one. So it sends an error message implying I’m not really a scholar after all. Like hundreds, perhaps thousands, of academics, I had to settle for a job in the corporate sector. Unlike some of my colleagues, I still research and write and try to maintain a web presence so I can be found. Compared to non-academics those of us who’ve been through the system are few. Even so, this can be an exclusive lot.
There are quite a few academic websites these days. I’m not sure which is the biggest or best regarded—I’m not verified, after all. I have an active account on Academia.edu, and recently, to gain access to an article I needed, I joined Research Gate (dot net). Academia is after me every day to upgrade—they follow the “free cookie” model. It’s free but if you really want to be discovered you can pay a modest fee for an upgrade. I suspect Research Gate is the same. And Google Scholar. These websites aren’t out simply to promote you for your own benefit. Of course, real scholars can be naive. I’ve been in the business world long enough to be suspicious. There’s no such thing as a free account.
What such websites don’t take into account is that academia is a harsh and punishing place. Institutions are almost always run by businessmen these days and professors are deemed too expensive to maintain. (Nobody’s talking about how university president salaries are too high, I notice, but they’re verified.) To push knowledge forward we get rid of those who’ve dedicated their lives to study. Those departments that bring in money—greed is not an academic field—thrive. The academy was founded to further religious knowledge. Soon study of the law was added, but law was considered something handed down from on high. Some of us, and not a few, were naive and unverified enough to believe that fields that had been around for a millennia or so would be around for at least long enough to get us through to retirement. Instead, learning has shifted online. And to be part of that club, you must be verified. At least according to Google Scholar.