Dear COOKIES, I just learned this and want to let you read it too; Recent acquisitions and mergers in the computer world have left Rootsweb unexpectedly short of funding due to the withdrawl of Palladium sponsorship. Palladium was acquired by The Learning Company which in turn was purchased by Mattel Inc. Here's a letter written by one of the founders of Rootsweb outlining the current situation: << My friends - I generally do not bring you news about RootsWeb, whose servers house some 4000 mail lists, including this one, because I know you all get the RootsWeb Review about once a week, which pretty well covers what is going on within RootsWeb. As most of you know, RootsWeb was created by, and is "owned" by Dr. Brian Leverich and his wife Karen Isaacson, both superb computer people and genealogists. They created RootsWeb and they have funded 90% of it out of their own pockets since its creation. This means that they have a houseful of computer equipment, as well as other equipment in a hub elsewhere, that runs all of these lists, as well as web pages and other items for the USGenWeb - the effort is huge and growing by leaps and bounds. However, their corporate sponsor, Palladium, has disappeared into a merger with another company, and that funding has evaporated. It seems unclear whether any other corporation will step forward to help underwrite these huge costs. In the message which Brian sent to the listowner list, he makes the first mention of danger to the whole RootsWeb concept. He is rarely pessimistic, and if he is concerned, then we all need to be concerned. He finds it particularly depressing that only a small percentage (2%-6%) are helping to support RootsWeb in any way, even though there are literally hundreds of thousands of people regularly using the mail lists and the other web pages and items which RootsWeb hosts. You can see that he has taken out a $25,000 loan just to try to keep the equipment growing with the needs of RootsWeb. The bottom line is that if we, as users of these RootsWeb services, cannot help with a few dollars(and it does not have to be much at all, if we all get involved)in support of this fine group, we are in very real danger of losing these mail lists and literally hundreds of web pages of genealogical material(including the JP Images Page and many, many others)that is today available. Please give this some thought, and see if you can find a few dollars that you could donate to RootsWeb to keep this effort alive. I have long said that Brian and Karen cannot forever continue to incure financial hits in the range of ten of thousands of dollars at a time, and still be able to keep RootsWeb alive. Take a look at: www.rootsweb.com and you can see how to donate if you wish to do so. I urge you to consider it. It is a great investment. Let's see if we can make it a merrier Christmas for Karen and him and for online genealogists everywhere. -B ============================================================ Brian and Karen don't anticipate Rootsweb going under any time soon but they are personally stretched to the limits with their own financial support of the Rootsweb system. Please take the time to visit www.rootsweb.com to examine the magnitude of this wonderful project - the same group who stepped in and rescued the COOK from extinction two years ago - and please consider sending them a few dollars to keep Rootsweb running. Lisa Cleversey Co-List Owner -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Co-List Owner COOK, List Owner BIRD & NYSTEUBE (Steuben Co NY) Heartland/Fields Community Leader -2500-2999 Heartland Genealogy Society & Web Ring Co-Chairman-http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Ranch/2416 cleversey's Home Page-http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Estates/5421 cleversey@geocities.com -Icq #9492621