This comes up every time there's an article about academic publishing. Yes peer reviewers do the reviewing, but it's the long-term infrastructure and coordination that the journal provides.
AirBnB's content is generated by users, but AirBnB itself requires software development, legal, customer support, HR, program managers, quality control, etc. Same with publishers.
Note that this journal now has a publishing fee for authors to cover these costs, rather than a fee for the reader as before. The 2022 fee for each author is $1,705 according to the FAQ. So moving to open access it not about removing the costs (which many people on Hacker News seems to always assume), but changing who pays for it.
AirBnB's content is generated by users, but AirBnB itself requires software development, legal, customer support, HR, program managers, quality control, etc. Same with publishers.
Note that this journal now has a publishing fee for authors to cover these costs, rather than a fee for the reader as before. The 2022 fee for each author is $1,705 according to the FAQ. So moving to open access it not about removing the costs (which many people on Hacker News seems to always assume), but changing who pays for it.