ACADEMIC-LIBRARIES, FEE-BASED INFORMATION-SERVICES, AND THE BUSINESS COMMUNITY

The attitude of academic librarians toward external users has been ambivalent. On the one hand, librarians are philosophically committed to freedom of access to information; on the other, practical considerations often force academic libraries to limit access and ser-vices to external users. As a sabbatical project, on-site visits were made to a number of academic libraries in the Southwest to determine how they dealt with local businesspeople, a potentially heavy user group. Most libraries had open access but because of limits in funds and staff time, had to adopt a passive attitude toward business users. Three libraries had fee-based services that allowed them to deal with external users on a business basis. The assessment of fees clashes with some aspects of library philosophy; nevertheless, the experience of the on-site visits suggests that fee-based services offer a means to assist businesspeople who otherwise often lack easy access to research collections.