"Died Young" - grammatically incorrect and therefore intellectually offensive.

I'd like to comment on images.

First, we have found over the past few years that people's reactions to and use of images is very personal and subjective. An image that one person loves is distasteful to another. I have stopped worried too much about images because of this. We are never going to standardize. Images evoke emotion.

I only object to images for shared ancestors and relatives when they are inappropriate or overly generic. By overly generic, I mean using the British flag for everyone who was born in the British Isles. If the person is MY ancestor, I will look for a more unique and individual to that person image, such as an historic manor or house their family lived in and of course ideally a portrait. A gravestone is often the most individual to the person and I use them a lot.

Second, and this is very important, please keep cultural differences in mind. Pam and I came up with a way to reflect Died Young that was specific to Jewish practice, the image used on gravestones of those who died young, of the tree cut down while still growing. In many cultures images of humans or angels for that matter are explicitly prohibited or very foreign and even offensive to that culture.

I respect those who think that an angel is a way to show grief for a life cut short, but I would never personally use one and if someone told me I was forced to comply and put such an image on the profiles of my Jewish ancestors, I would leave Geni.

So please, images are very personal and subjective and tied to our unique upbringing and cultural experience, so be gentle and do not mandate one way for all.

Islam for example does not allow human images which is why their mosques have gorgeous calligraphy in many different styles and geometric designs. That is in more traditional Islam.

Here's an article on images in Jewish belief:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aniconism_in_Judaism

And here is an interesting set of differing explanations as to why images of angels are prominent in Christianity but rarer in Judaism:

http://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/7148/why-are-angelic-ico...

And if you'll forgive me one more tangential remark on death and images, this is an interesting blog on images on Jewish gravestones: http://bloodandfrogs.com/2011/04/jewish-gravestone-symbols.html which illustrates that the use of images tied to the dead and remembering them is very very culture-specific.

I do tend to dramatise, but, maybe parts of the tree, are complete, and therefore, should be preserved. The ID# is important when you want to merge offline.
I was working on a "Profile Manager" software app, to keep track of the ones I manage.
Any way I look at it, with so many variations in names and AKA, the Geni # is the key in the database, and, when it changes, the data is corrupted.

Although I make these images, the tools I use need to be attributed, so, in the projects, there needs to be at the bottom, a space for "Image Attribution".
I am adding my compromise to the Died Young. Can do other versions and languages, but, to put say Arabic on an Angel may be wrong, I am not up with religion at all SO, perhaps message me with image description and text required if wanted?

I have attributed the Brush Tool in my own albums, that should be fine.

Sharyn - for images I use several methods to help ensure attribution.

By the way - great point, and very on point for this "provenance & images" project.

I don't think just in a project is good enough.

I just tried one to provide an example (I don't have a project to share this image yet - perhaps we need to make one!)

http://www.geni.com/photo/view/6000000003942654183?album_type=photo...

The information in the "description" & "title" & "comments" fields will stay with the image no matter where it is "tagged" - to an event, a profile, or a project.

So the provenance should, I believe, be there.

And yes - the photoshop brush tool for the angel designs, attributed in your albums, is good.

I have missed so much of this discussion.

Erica and Agneta thank you for your input related to our project image now way back on a previous page.

Hatte, I believe that our image works well on this project.

Because the symbolism of a tree being cut down before maturity is specific to the Jewish practise, the babies and children who "Died Young" appear in the project as united by their common identity.

We seem to all agree that images which reflect children being deceased while young is very subjective and it is probable that a different photo/image will be selected to represent this symbolism in a future project.

Hatte thank you for the Jewish link. It is really beautiful.
Pam don't you think that images still should be a persons own discretion?
I think people must use what they prefer - again the same old same old - I don't really think it is fair to decribe to people what to do and what to use. "Veral" sorry can't just seem to get that word today, regarding how they would love to regocnise their images/family. It makes it so much easier as well to recognise a user. But please bring on those lovely images ladies and gentleman - I love them.
Have a lovely weekend.

As I catch up with discussion I'm struck by how subjective and diverse our opinions. Since we already have so many different perspectives, I'll give mine as well.

When I read the discussion, I see that these images can serve two purposes. One, they can be a memorial. Two, they can be informative.

Personally (and just for myself) I would never think to upload an image as a memorial, even though that's a beautiful sentiment.

I would only upload an image to communicate information to other users. This person did not live long enough to marry or have children. This person might have another sibling with the same name.

So, the images that attract me are the images that clearly communicate information to other users.

Justin Durand watch out if we ever merge LOL

Private User PS on my software, I plan to have an internal browser, and, when the profile is clicked, the #ID is appended to open that page, for updating and editing.
Just an idea, someone else may be able to make a better one than I can :)

Sharyn, I have no doubt that we'd end up with the best of both worlds :)

I love the idea of Sharyn and Justin's branches merging LOL.

I'm with Justin, but I do very much understand what Sharyn is saying and appreciate it. I miss my husband and mother-in-law terribly still and it's been 10 years and I do look for ways to memorialize them. In fact my participation in Geni began because my mother-in-law was so into family (as was my grandmother) and those were the first two trees I worked on to remember my mother-in-law/husband and my Baba (grandmother).

I also love the link on the symbols on Jewish gravestones. I learned a lot from it and am sorry I did not see it before my trip to Lithuania and Poland where I visited the cemeteries in the towns my 2nd, 3rd, and 4th great grandparents came from.

:)

http://www.gravesecrets.net/headstone-meanings.html

What a wonderful resource, Sharyn. I knew a few of those but I had no idea there were so many!

W: Don't hesitate to go on being both sentimental, romantic and of course a true humanistic genealogist.

I don't know how many languages we have had through all times and how many there are left. I have had guest students from Pakistan and they have hard with the swedish and don't feel very interested to learn swedish, as all books at the univesity level is in english. Until I ask them to say some words in urdu, which is the "indo"-part of indo-european/indo-german languages. Be sure it's fun. These realy important words for life, death, food, water, numbers ... are still almost the very same!!

As computers maily have one "working"-language and do not understand any of the complex values of swedish correct intonation we have to be extremaly short-easy-no-values-no culture-no ... because the computers do not unerstand anything at all. They cannot handle complex things like love-hate, war-peace or remember anthing at all about for instance "OMG" means different Gods all over the world. But that's not a problem genealogist should or are able to solve.

As always W, your questions provoke great discussion. And it was lovely that everyone's view was expressed and listened to with respect.

Symbols used for the deceased is such a fascinating topic.

By the way, as a PhD linguist, we tend to accept living language the way it is, descriptive linguistics versus prescriptive grammar. Lots of languages exhibit "subject drop," especially Verb-Subject-Object languages (VSO). So I see "Died Young" as not really ungrammatical, just a colloquialism. A modifying phrase applied to a noun phase. And I am sure as was mentioned that it comes from a genealogical tradition "died young" d.y. They used a lot of conventions to save time and paper and energy.

Did not die young, age 26. But interesting gravestone. Dona Rebecca Herndon#

I've seen the "Died Young" image in place when there were duplicate names, and a second child was named after the child who "died young." I think it's awesome now that profiles can be MPd so that you can have 1, 2, 3 or 4 kids with the same first and last name and not have them get merged.

Anderson Here in South Africa it is truely so that a child/children with the same names, and surnames are called so. There could even be 50 Jan Petrus Meyer son's of Johan Georg Meyer - Hi 3rd child would get that name, then if he had - and that wasn't really rare - 18 children - and a niece and nephew married you aould for sure get quite at lot of girls with the same name and maiden name. Then the eldest son of each of the 18 children will have the name Jan Petrus Meyer, and there sons's sons will have that. It is like a tree. 1 - going to 18, etc.etc. That is why we have that numerical system called the de Villiers naming system.

In Sweden the naming tradition was a try to honor the grandparents, so every child got a part of the grandmothers or the grandfathers name. A child did not ever get exactly the same name if not the older sibbling had died. But also then it seems as if the parents tried to change a little. Maybe in the spelling or they gave the child an extra name. Instead of a seccon or third Johan Göran it could be Johannes Göran or Jonas Göran or Johan Gunnar or Johan Per Göran. So in Sweden we can be quite sure if two sibblings have the same, or about the same, name the elder of them have died befor the next one is born.

In Sweden we have many immigrants from especially Germany. (We needed welleducated people in all kind of sectors.) I have a feeling they named the children about the same way. I even have the feeling they introduced these traditions in the early medivival times.

As the Date of Death now has the 'Died Before...' option, the requirement for a profile icon or photo seems superfluous (and amateurish in the tree, to be honest)

If, for example, there is another child of the same name, their birth date can become the 'died before' date of the other if the date is not known.

Hopefully, there was a reason for the 'died young' icon - not simply because the genealogist couldn't find any further information.

If I had a dollar for every person who merged two children with the same name in TREE VIEW without paying any attention to their dates of birth or death, I would be a millionaire, so no, it's not actually a bad practice to put the image Died Young with the profile.

I agree that it is good practice to use Died Before date of child with same name when you don't have the dates but that is a separate issue from the use of the Image.

By the way, there are families where there are multiple LIVING children with the same name, even in Anglo-Saxon families. We have to use a lot of devices to prevent them from being merged too.

Hatte that makes 3 of us. You myself and June. It would be nice to be a millionaire so easy.
Lol.

I'm with Hatte on this one. ANYTHING we can do to prevent the merging of similarly named siblings is fine by me. I am not at all offended by the box icon with the script "died young," and prefer it to the cherub. As for grammar, good grief! What passes for grammar today in this age of hash tags is far more annoying than the phrase "Died Young."

William Bliss

Bethia Silsbee, died young

Infant son Silsbee, died young

John Darby

Herev are some