Elsevier replies about hybrid #openacess; I am appalled about their practices. Breaking licences and having to pay to read “Open Access”

“A week ago I wrote to Elsevier’s Division of Universal Access about their ‘hybrid Open Access’. Put simply, this is where authors pay Author Processing Charges (perhaps 3-5000 USD) to have their article made ‘Open Access’. Because ‘Open Access’ is a poorly defined term I asked Elsevier for information about their ‘hybrid Open Access’. My motivation is that I wish to examine compliance from the side of (a) the publisher (b) the authors, to see whether funder mandates are complied with. There is now increasing emphasis on policing this area, and this needs to be done with robotic tools. Hence I wish to examine: [1] Whether a paper published as Open Access complies with reasonable expectations from the authors and funders [2] Whether funders are getting compliance from their authors/grantees... I therefore wished to get a list of all articles published by Elsevier under the hybrid scheme. Since the authors have paid so much money, I would that their articles would be made accessible (accessible means discoverable and identifiable as hybrid OA). I would expect a competent publisher to have created a public list of such articles. I would also expect the articles to be identified *in the article* as hybrid. If I had spent 3000+ USD for making my article visible I this is the absolute minimum I would expect... The director wrote back by mail and on my blog... I’ll reproduce it in full, but highlight the essential parts and comment (PMR). Please read to the end as it gets worse as you go through... ‘Hi Peter, and thanks for your message. Here are the answers to your 5 questions...’”