It is part of the fabric of scientific research that findings are shared. Science is overtly collaborative. Every scientists specifically builds on the knowledge of others, and shares what they discover with the world.
Governments and a variety of organizations fund research with the express purpose of discovering new knowledge that ultimately benefits everyone.
That's the WHOLE POINT of publishing a paper. At a fundamental level, scientific publishing is about trying to share the results of your research with the scientific community.
The funding is tied to the act of publishing, having nothing to do with how people consume the papers. Charging people above cost to read the published research is antithetical to the whole idea of how the world does science.
The example I gave above was where you needed the processing power to run your medical startup.
>There is obviously certain types of data that should be provided as a public service to all of society
"Should" what's meant by that? If you want data to be open, you need to fund that, or develop your own and release that freely. Statements of the kind "everyone deserves scarce resource X" really mean "we should tax rich people in order to subsidize X for poor people". Which is a fine thing to argue for, but don't present it as a universal right.
I mean really...I can't believe I have to defend this position.
There is obviously certain types of data that should be provided as a public service to all of society...is this even to be debated?