Those depressed about the social status of category theory might be cheered up by a look at Math Overflow, http://mathoverflow.net . This is a website where you can ask and answer questions about any part of mathematics. You might expect that for a site with this problem-solving format, category theory wouldn't be much in evidence. But according to the site's own statistics, it's the 3rd most popular topic for questions. The site's been up only a few months but has been enormously successful, with some extremely clever and knowledgeable people contributing regularly. It really doesn't seem like a pro-category niche group. But I've seen little or no anti-category sniping there. The kind of cynicism that most of us have experienced just isn't in evidence. A particular reason to find this cheering is that the demographic of the contributors is skewed towards the young, the American, and the algebraic geometers. (Young American algebraic geometers are a definite minority, though - there's quite a wide spread.) Why might that be particularly cheering? "Young" because it suggests a bright future, "American" because, as I gather, the NSF has historically been loath to support category theory, and "algebraic geometers" because it suggests that the anti-category theory backlash in that influential subject may be nearing an end. Best wishes, Tom [For admin and other information see: http://www.mta.ca/~cat-dist/ ] Status: RO