There was a session at the 1998 AAM Annual Meeting that began discussing
this topic (including loan fees).  Contacting the participants (or getting
the tape) may offer some insight.  It was chaired by Robin Toulouse at the
Children's Museum of Indianapolis.


Janice Klein
Registrar, The Field Museum
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At 09:20 AM 6/22/1998 -0400, you wrote:
>> We are beginning to generate requests from people, usually by phone
>> or email, for some substantial research on our part to answer their
>> question.
>
>        I have heard that some libraries are now charging a fee for
>answering substantial questions (I don't know which libraries, but I could
>ask since our own history center is receiving all sorts of substantial
>queries and is looking into ways to answer them). This way you either
>get paid for your time or you get the inquirers to get off their lazy butts
>and  actually do the research themselves.
>        The department I did my graduate work in got a lot of letters and
>calls "from the public" which  were meted out to the graduate students,
>which we answered as we saw fit. Some took a lot of time in answering
>all questions, suggested places to look for answers, while others were
>politely told that perhaps if they took a few more physics classes they'd
>realize that their theory was completely in error and that is why no one
>would publish it (it was an astronomy department and everyone has their
>theory on the universe). So perhaps  if you have access to graduate
>students of some form, you might try using them - it gives them practice
>in researching and explaining topics on which they are not working.
>
>
>        Just a few ideas.
>
>                                                Angela Putney
>                                                American Institute of Physics
>                                                [log in to unmask]
>
>