An ircworld post a few months ago referred to Kevin Kelly's article about the virtues of getting a New York Public Library card and - for CA residents - a SFPL card. I've since learned that anyone anywhere in the world can be the proud holder of an NYPL card - mine just arrived in the mail today! For the $100 annual fee, anyone anywhere can get full access to approximately 85 databases - this is something you might like to mention to academic and library contacts wherever you are!