If User Services is to participate in decisions about computing acquisitions - both hardware and software - the following questions represent concerns that must be addressed. It is asserted that vendors do not traditionally pay as much heed to these issues as they do to the “hardware aspects” of their products. Yet with decreasing hardware costs and rising people (and related) costs, these issues must receive attention. Two points are being made: User Services personnel had better learn to pursue these issues during times of acquisition andvendors must learn to sell their products to the User Services staff as well as others within the Computer Center.