User fees, unless they are very modest, may tend to make research the exclusive province of those who have grant money. Admittedly, no one is going to indulge a research interest in subatomic physics out of his or her social security check, but there are areas of inquiry that are, at least in principle, open to the public. There are also fields in which academic research is normally conducted on a shoestring, and that seems like a good thing. If there is a trend toward charging for access to collections and other resources, it seems to me that it is a trend toward academic exclusiveness that really serves no one's interests. Craig Sanders [log in to unmask]