For your information and hopefully future action: look at the National Archives in the UK which has just put up an electronic version of the Domesday book but charges for downloading individual pages. http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/domesday/?source=domesday_fd_1 For instance: I searched for 'Cambridge' as city, clicked on the first search result and got a typed-in synopsis of the page. I would then have had to pay 3.50 pounds (about $6.50 or Euro 5.18) if I wanted to download the page. From images available elsewhere on their website, it appears as if the synopsis (free of charge) is not equivalent to its down-loadable image. This is a regrettable development in my mind: to charge for making national documents available, and thereby claiming private property rights to documents that were not 'owned' by anyone but an amorphous public until recently. The Geneaological Society of Utah, a private organization, is trying to do the same: to get access to public registry records all over the world and have organizations and institutions sign agreements which allow the GSU to charge for value added records put online at some point in time in the future. -- Susanne Belovari Archivist for Reference and Collections DCA Tufts University 35 Professors Row Tisch Library Building Medford, MA 02155 tel: 617-627-3631 fax: 617-627-4650 [log in to unmask] http.//dca.tufts.edu/ A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List sponsored by the Society of American Archivists, www.archivists.org. For the terms of participation, please refer to http://www.archivists.org/listservs/arch_listserv_terms.asp. To subscribe or unsubscribe, send e-mail to [log in to unmask] In body of message: SUB ARCHIVES firstname lastname *or*: UNSUB ARCHIVES To post a message, send e-mail to [log in to unmask] Or to do *anything* (and enjoy doing it!), use the web interface at http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/archives.html Problems? Send e-mail to Robert F Schmidt <[log in to unmask]>