Y'know, a two-paragraph summary in calm tones, followed by the text of the tax notice, would have been more effecitve; breathless hyperbole turns some people off. In any event, I see no reference to retroactivity. At worst, if someone paid an annual fee, tax is owed only on the prorated portion of services to be rendered after September 1. That is, if someone paid $30 on January 1 for one year's service, tax is owed only on the "unused" $10 covering Sept 1 through December 31. This is relatively clear from the wording regarding "service to be rendered after...". Yes, it's monumentally stupid. You think you got it bad? I can't believe the brokerage houses on Wall Street let this one go; NYSE ticker feeds are covered by this, as are all generic reuseable information feeds, which means transmission of credit reports and the like. This is gonna jack up most things related to the US finance industry, especially NYSE and large arbitrage. I left New York State years ago; seems the state's IQ really *did* get stupider after I left. :-) Jason