Hello all: I received notice from Rootsweb that a merger with Ancestry.com is in the works. For now there will be no change in service provided and Rootsweb will maintain it's presence on the Internet and continue to provide services at no cost. It appears the costs involved in providing Internet services have become too great for Rootsweb to maintain without financial backing. Don't bail out of the lists now - let's see what develops. I imagine we are going to have to consider the benefits of commercial genealogical web sites. At least Ancestry.com is a top quality operation. I think we can expect fair treatment from this venture and perhaps added opportunities for not-too-expensive on-line research. We can all do our part to support the free genealogical services we now enjoy by going to www.rootsweb.com and donating just a few dollars (I think it is $12.00 per year) to help them out. The only reason this merger is taking place is because they could not get enough people to donate to cover the costs of maintaining the thousands of mailing lists, gedcoms, county pages and special Archives projects that we all use. These losses have been coming out of the pockets of the founders of Rootsweb for years. I will be keeping track of developments on this. Should status of the USGenWeb project, which hosts the Pierce County site I run for free now change, I think we as a group will need to discuss what is to be done with the mountain of information that has accumulated on that site since I took it over in November 1997. I would very much like to see it remain free and will NOT be giving it over in any way, shape or form to a pay-for service. I would be happy to maintain the site, but would need help in the way of donations to maintain the web space, which at this point in time would run about $270.00 per year. Something for us all to think about. But don't panic yet, for now we are still free and staying put. Just wanted to give you a heads up on this one. Debbie Barrett County Coordinator Pierce County WIGenWeb Project http://www.rootsweb.com/~wipierce/ http://www.rootsweb.com/~nywashin/