We were pleased to read your article "Building an Evo-Bank"1 in the Feb. 24th issue. Since 1999, we have been proposing the opening of electronic archives for fossil and modern hominoids in professional journals, in scientific meetings, and by distributing E-data of hominid fossils.2 We called this idea a "Glasnost for paleoanthropology" because we thought not enough effort was being directed toward establishing cooperative networks in our field of science. Reactions to this idea varied widely,3,4 of course, with most colleagues agreeing with the idea but mistrusting its feasibility. The origin of humankind and our physical relationship to other extant and extinct creatures should be important enough to participate in programs like those.
However, there is the danger that anthropology could miss this opportunity, if too many of us continue to fight for sinecures. We need to protect the warrantable rights of discoverers, but we also need to ban irrational ...
