I wish they’d offer an llm free version with no cap on searches. Their products are too expensive and it feels like it is mostly to pay for the llms. I can’t justify paying that much for a product I am never going to use.

Authors don’t get paid for their submissions. As I understand it, a lot of the professional societies are the actual owners of the journals in their respective fields, and have a profit sharing arrangement with publishers. Here is an example of the American Sociological Association, which owns the flagship US sociology journals opposing open science initiatives because they might hurt their bottom line. https://familyinequality.wordpress.com/2019/12/20/asas-letter-against-the-public-interest-and-our-values/