Ancestry.com did this last year as well and offered free access. It can be very difficult at times to get into their databases because there may be too many people hitting the site. You can be looking through a database and suddenly get a message telling you it is not available when you want to look at the next page, so you have to watch for that and remember all you have to do is go back and begin again and you may get through whatever you were looking at. They don't have an awful lot of Irish material, but it is possible to find locations of Irish surnames so for those of you searching for records of people in your own country, then this is a good place to check. When they open it to the general public, then is a good time to check - and - if you are really eager then you work out what time of the day or night you think there will be the fewewst people on line looking for information :-) For me, in Ireland, the best time was always about 7 or 8 am. Jane ------------------------------------ -- Free Access to All Ancestry.com Subscriber Databases through December 21 ============================================================ FREE ACCESS TO ALL ANCESTRY.COM SUBSCRIBER DATABASES ============================================================ Here's the opportunity you've been waiting for! Ancestry.com is offering free access to all of its databases through December 21. This is your chance to see why more than 270,000 researchers have chosen to subscribe to Ancestry.com in their quest to discover their family's history. Sign up for free access today at: http://www.ancestry.com/home/celebrate/freeaccess.htm?sourcecode=674