Mr. Brad Argent:

I will deal with how we use family history records and how the free aspect of it plays into it from a commercial perspective. One of the great things about free material is that it gives people an experience of what it is like to see a record. It it that scopic experience of seeing history come alive. It is wonderful to have that outside the paid wall because it can help them get over the paid wall and understand the journey they are going on. Over time what happens with particular types of material, not all of it, is that it becomes commodified. Once it is out there behind a number of paid walls after a period of time one can bring that out and make it free because one is always filling the pipeline at the back-end with more material. In broad terms that is how one can make that kind of commercial arrangement. There needs to be a very strong balance between what is behind the paid wall and what is free. I feel very strongly that one needs to be able to provide access to the material for those who are not only economically disadvantaged but technically disadvantaged, so that people can walk into a local library, without the need to have any money and sit down and have the same kind of experience that you or I might choose to pay for and do in the comfort of our own homes. There needs to be a balance and an addressing of that dichotomy in the family history community.