Concerning fees: Here at the Douglas County Museum's research library, there is no fee for customer assistance in person [other than the general museum admission fee]. There is a charge for research time if the inquiry will take more than 15 minutes and the inquiry is made in writing or by phone [this is a reasonable time, since descriptions of our photos and a substantial portion of our manuscript files are indexed on the Argus database system]. For requests in writing, I run a search on the topic and mail a list of citations along with a price list. If the topic looks like there are a lot of cites, I give an estimate of research & copying time, and the person can send payment with their request. This discussion of fees is of course separate from photo charges, which vary according to the type of publication one of our images might appear in [and can become a separate thread of discussion all by itself, w/ copyright & all]. The central question in any fee situation is the democratization of information access: at what point does the fee become so restrictive that it excludes substantial portions of a community from access to the information. Levels of service, I think, are an appropriate way to balance this issue. Everybody receives some level of access to the information available, but additional access - requiring additional labor by museum staff - has to be compensated by the requestor. This also permits more rational allocation of staff labor: if a librarian, for example, spent all their time answering just one question in writing, what is the cost to other users of questions unanswered [or in a small shop, of materials uncataloged and services unperformed]? I'd be interested in any other opinions on the issue of fees for services rendered. -- Fred R. Reenstjerna, Research Librarian - Douglas County Museum Roseburg, Oregon USA - [opinions expressed are my own, and I stand behind every one of them]