Why are you researching your relatives, ancestry, pedigree or doing genealogy?

@Remi Pedersen

Remi, agree, strongly agree

I have researched the genealogy approx. 25 years. In my archive I have 13,000 which I am related. Here on GENI, I have 1731 relatives.
I read the old church books, searching for birth, baptism, confirmation, marriage, death. I search the census back from the start and take photo or photocopy of all the facts.

And so I search at the National Archives, State archives and has here been lucky to find two books on my family with complete pedigree charts.

On GENI I put pictures from church records or of my ancestors or from other sources.
But doubts have been with me long if I should continue on GENI and buy Pro GENI, since I think there are too many who only put names into GENI without having researched them and puts facts into pedigree breeding

I am also sad when I set appropriate name into the GENI with relevant information from church records and censuses or other sources that they will be deleted by others. They could instead use the merge function and if they can not figure it out, so could at least ask how to do it.

So in my considerations included whether I should stop update on GENI and find another place where others can use my ancestor research. Without that I have deleted some of my work when I do not want to spend my time on an ancestor research page how much is frivolous and, currently, I do not want to pay for GENI and become PRO member.

But am glad that I have back up of all the facts.

Sincerely,
Gerdt Boss

Remi.

It sounds like you and I share exactly the same philosophy regarding keeping our primary research in a seperate database at home. I wish EVERYONE did that.

I love the idea of Geni providing a globally-accessible database for the world's genealogists to stitch together their research and create one, giant comprehensive tree. From the start, I considered Geni to be a multi-year (or perhaps multi-decade) project to record research that has been already done.

But here's the rub: Geni is a FOR PROFIT enterprise who must, by definition, find a way to maximize its paying customers. And like it or not, serious, careful geneolgists fall into a clear minority in that paying group. To maximize profit, Geni has to try to strike a careful balance between keeping it fun and engaging to the casual user while simultaneously keeping the frustration down to acceptable levels for the folks who are passionately supportive of the Big Tree project. After all, if it wasn't for us serious genealogists, the rest of Geni's users would have nothing at all to work with. But although the pendulum has swung both ways over the past couple of years, I personally feel that Geni has done a pretty good job of keeping a balance by only scaring off a fringe minority of purists/perfectionists.

I consider Geni to be a DOCUMENTATION project, and not a research project. The biggest challenge is that the activities of Geni users are not all following a common master plan. But by careful release of tools and structures, Geni can (and does, for the most part) at least guide things in the right general direction over time.

From my perspective as a professional Project Manager, Geni took a little too long to put the brakes on the wild west free-for-all of unchecked GEDCOM uploads. That caused a whole lot of damage, confusion and frustration for many of us. But now that the damage has already been done and Geni has seen the light, we once again have a shot of eventually reaching the ultimate goal. But to get there, we've got to temporarily put the DOCUMENTATION project on hold and focus on the REPAIR project first. There are hundreds of thousands of things to fix in the basic structure of the tree (i.e., the connections between profiles). In my mind, obsessing over individual profile details (like naming conventions and providing sources for every claimed fact), while very important for the end product, is completely premature at this point in time. That's like rushing to work on your tax return on your kitchen table while your house is burning down around you. The priorities of the moment are all screwed up.

Good Project Management requires a pragmatic approach. The priority at the moment should be getting the basic structure of the Big Tree correct, with exactly one profile, in the correct location, for each person represented in the tree. Once we're 90% or more toward achieving that milestone, then we've got the rest of our lives to enter the details of the research into the individual profiles and do the relatively minor repairs to make the structure of the tree agree with the research. Thats the DOCUMENTATION part- and where the Big Tree begins to truly be useful to the world. But obsessing over the details when the very next merge could destroy the integrity of the information is just not a prudent use of resources at this point in the project.

Let's finish building/repairing the house before we start arguing about what color to paint it.

Dave K.

Including sources on the Geni entries for a given person is one way to let all judge veracity for themselves.

I concur that it is better, especially for relatives in the past hundred years, to hold to a high standard of evidence. GEDCOMs ought not to be imported thoughtlessly; indeed, the tree that I uploaded to GENI was hand-built, for which I am proud.

Yet I argue it is better to allow poorly-verified entries into our tree and mark them, clearly and distinctly, as such, preferably with a link to well-defined and justified master profiles (a concept already starting to emerge). It may make the tree ugly, with physically impossible (at present) multiplicities of parents, but there are good structural and logical reasons to keep the existing system.

Structurally, some entries will always be proven wrong after they are made, and the process of removing them will cause damage to the tree. It is better to mark them "disproved." An electrical analogy: in an active circuit, it's better to bypass a faulty component than to cut it. Don't leave dangling currents -- they're like downed power lines. Similarly, we want to keep everyone who is entered anchored to their trees.

Logically, it's hard to judge certainty and credibility, especially for amateur researchers. What does "66-75 % certainty" from one person to the next? We should prefer to have sources in hand, to judge that certainty for ourselves. Again, new evidence may arise, which may raise or lower our certainty. We may also discover, from seeing the sources, that the definitions of "ancestor" or "relative" from what we expect. In many times and places -- China, Rome, & others -- adoption counts for more than it has in the West; people may be called "son" or "heir" without any biological connection. Some people will inevitably upload trees with different definitions and conventions. We cannot get around that by requiring any level of certainty -- people may be absolutely certain that one person is the child of another is ever culturally and legally meaningful sense, is just may be that "child" means something to them than to many of us. The only way to circumvent this problem is to require sources, which should include definitions.

All said, while I think sources and perhaps a verifiabil-o-meter would be a better way to implement it, I agree with your concern for the accuracy of the tree. I wish that we could know how much confidence to place in it, and I hope that we find a way to improve it soon.

David: Very well said - and explained :-)

I research my tree outside Geni...archives, BMD records and other resources. Only when I'm sure of somebody's genealogy do I enter them in my tree, and if on the rare occasion I find a mistake, I rectify this as I go. I am very wary of other people's transcripts of old records, and prefer to double-check these, as the similarity between letters in some of the old documents can lead to errors. e.g., on one site, my 3rd great-grandfather's name was given as being "Saurett" rather than "Laurett". I'm not a professional genealogist, but I am an historian and have done some genealogical research for others (i.e., for TV programs), and in the course of my writing about the Anglo-Indian community. I can't see the sense in not striving to be as accurate as possible, when it comes to researching family history. Although having said that, we are but human are we not? Consequently, we sometimes inadvertantly make mistakes. Still, I must say that the mixups between Elizabeth Plantagenet and Elizabeth Plantagent of York drove me crazy with frustration!!

I am going back to Remi Pedersen`s question "Why are you researching your relatives, ancestry, pedigree or doing genealogy ? "

- 1) I am curious about where I comes from. Who are my ancestors and where did they comes from ?

- 2) For this purpose I have this hobby genealogy and try to make a proper ancestry tree.

- 3) I am not interesting in kings or "big" persons. Because this "kings etc." takes away the focus of my main question "where do I comes from ?" . "kings etc." is for me a mock way in genealogy.

- 4) After having researched my family since 1976 this is a some of my experiences.

- 5) About www.geni.com : I use this netbased program because it is easy to put researched material into, and it is too easy to get it ahead wherever I am in the world if there is an internet line.

- 6) I also use another net based program www.genebase.com for the same purpose.

Remi, I fear that we, who are "serious" about our Genealogy work, are in the Minority. (More than 10-years of research..)
I have my "records" on paper. Geni was my first attempt to put any of it on the computer, because (1) our son signed us up, and (2) I did find it easy to enter the information; and (3) two of my 2nd cousins were on Geni!
Since then, I have found some more family (ancestors), much of it with the help of these cousins, and some others on the Geni site - as well as using the Digitalarkivet for more church/probate records & asking questions.
But it is frustrating to have found that if you Do go "back to the kings" from your own research, and you do Not want to go back any further, say to mythology - but if you join the "Big Tree", right now that is where you will end up.
And the purported goal of Geni is that we should "all" be connected -- but connected to what?
So, it makes a person like me Very hesitant about joining the Big Tree.
And I don't think your question will be "of interest" to very many Geni users. (But I hope I am wrong about that.)

Hei Remi,

jeg har nevnt dette før, at Geni ikke er for seriøse genealogiker.
Hvor mange er det som ser på about me som forklarer kilde og samenheng med foreldre og barn. ???

Geni etter min mening kan kun brukes som suplement til det man har i sin egen database og ikke noe annet.

I'm translating what Stein Djupmork has written in norwegian:

"Hi Remi

I have mentioned this before, that Geni isn't for serious genealogists. How many are looking at the About me that explains sources and the context between parents and children ???

Geni, in my opinion, can only be used as a supplement to the information you have in your own database and nothing else."

Gerdt: Good to see that there are more that think like I do. I know we have a job ahead of us to get the majority of users on Geni to think like we do, but I'm not giving up.

David: Of course I have my main genealogical database on my own computers. In fact me and my wife (who are as much interested as I am) have 3 computers and we have updated backups on all of our databases on each of them, and we are sending backups several times a month to servers outside our house, in case of fire, we are not going to loose our genealogical information. And I must say, those that only uses Geni as their genealogical database tool, are not thinking very smartly. What if Geni goes bankrupt, do you think you can get your genealogical information back, I think not. "I have a Gedcom-file as backup", someone will say. My answer is "good for you", but the information in a gedcom-file is hardly enough to call it a backup. The information in a gedcom-file is way too little to be called a backup of a genealogical database.

Talking about gedcom-files. I wish there would be a stop in gedcom-imports until the mess already on Geni is taken care of. More imports isn't making the clean-up job easier.

David, you say: "To maximize profit, Geni has to try to strike a careful balance between keeping it fun and engaging to the casual user while simultaneously keeping the frustration down to acceptable levels for the folks who are passionately supportive of the Big Tree project." Is it fun and engaging to publish familytrees that maybe are full of errors? I have always thougt that if I'm going to show my familytree to someone, I should at least try to get it as correct as possible. And I'm not passionately supportive of the big tree, just because there are far too much error in it or in the family-lines to get to the big tree. The most difficult timeperiod to get through is 1600-1200, and many familytrees going through that timeperiod is full of errors which have been published on the internet. Folks, a lot of the familytrees on the internet, specially those without sources, are so full of errors that you all should keep your hands off.
David, at the moment I agree with you on the Repair project. But if gedcom-imports are not temporarilly stopped, I think we will not get over to the Documentation part at all.

Grant: I agree with you on the sources. This is one of the major things lacking a good function in the Geni program so far. And I have never understood why Geni didn't implement sourcing a lot earlier. Isn't this supposed to be a genealogy program, don't they know sources are the first and last thing we look at in our genealogical work. I can also in part agree with with you on the "it is better to allow poorly-verified entries into our tree and mark them, clearly and distinctly, as such, preferably with a link to well-defined and justified master profiles" but profiles that are proven to be wrong should not stay linked anymore. Yes it will cause damage to the tree, but if the profiles stay there, they will only make more confusion. And if the result is that someone is loosing a line back, so be it. I prefer to have a correct line than a fantasyproduct, and mark a profile "disproved" is not enough, the link must be severed.
Credibilty is hard to judge, but still, all of us experienced genealogists do it everytime we read a source. We judge how trustworthy the source is. Every person reading a source and copying the information in to their own genealogy should try to do the same.

Bob: I hope that since Geni is your only genealogical database on a computer, you still have all the information on paper. Geni is not good enough to be the only place to have your genealogical information. You should try to get a genealogical computerprogram that you can keep locally on your computer.

And Stein: I don't agree with you. Geni is for everybody and we that have a lot of knowledge about genealogy should try to teach the less serious ones "the right way" to get their genealogical information, how to avoid the traps, and what not to do. But I'm in total agreement with your statement about Geni being a supplement to your own database on your personal computer. Noone should use Geni as their only form of genealogical database. That's too risky.

I like the way that both Remi and Arnfred have put the question. I do this to learn more about where I come from, and to look at the specific history of our direct ancestors, which for me helps history to come alive. When I was a student in school, I did not find history at all interesting, but when I relate certain events to having direct ancestors involved, the events become much more interesting to me personally. I read history with a whole new perspective.
Also, building my own family tree and then connecting it to the "Big tree" begins to show that we really are all connected at some level, which is by itself a significant goal.
Additionally, working on the branches of the tree and helping with the task of sorting and merging is like working a puzzle, and can be extremely entertaining on that level.
Several people mentioned sources and accuracy, which is very important, and will be a place where we spend much work, but getting the tree cleaned up has to come first, so that the supporting data is not lost or confused.

I do genealogy to know my roots. I am from a dysfunctional family. I didn't know I had so many relatives that I was not meeting as a child. I am constantly amazed at what I learn. I always thought I was Irish Catholic and Austro-Hungarian. I have learned that I am also English Quaker, Cherokee, Huguenot, Serbian, French and so much more. I don't look for celebrity links or royal links, but I am so thrilled when I stumble across one in my tree.

My cousin got me started. She sent me a paper copy of what she had done. I chose Geni because (a) I am comfortable on the web; (b) because I was out of work and could't afford a "for pay" program, on or off the web and (c) the ease of getting started. Once my financial status improved, I went Geni Pro. I am now one of Geni's Curators.

My cousin and I share everything we learn. She has Ancestry. She's half a continent away. We both keep our own paper files plus i have digital files. I use mainly Geni but I have put some of my data on the LDS site. We are each other's back up servers.

I was concerned at first about the "big tree" concept but have come to embrace it whole-heartedly. I enjoy being a Curator. I am looking forward to being a resource to other Geni-holics.

I put loads of stuff in the "about me" and I am learning to use time lines and sources. I am disappointed when I see so many profiles with nothing more than a name and a date. How can I learn about your ancestor or our shared ancestor if all you have told me is their names and dates of birth?

As a Curator, I am striving to put some of the basic information at the top of the "About Me," so that anyone opening the profile can learn something about this person. I have very few character spaces for my message when i create a Master Profile ("MP") so I am careful to put useful data there. Now, if only I could get the average user to read the notes before making merges.

I could go on for pages, but I think I have given you the gist of why I am a "Geni-holic."

Happy ancestor hunting, everyone!

Good to hear from you, James.

I think all of us started with what you say. Learn more about where I come from, and to find the history of my ancestors.

Then I wander where all of these gedcom-files uploaded to Geni, with no substance are coming from?

Have anyone of you read a genealogy-book about a family where the only information was birthdate and -place, baptismdate and -place, weddingdate, to whom he/she married and -place, how many children, their birthdates and -places, deathdate and -place and buriladate and -place. Was it an intersteing book for you. I have read such a book, or at least tried to, after like 20 pages with nothing but dry facts, I was so bored that I almost haven't opened the book again.

My point is that James has a very important point when he says: "... to look at the specific history of our direct ancestors, which for me helps history come alive."This is an important point to all of us. Try to get the history of the people in your genealogical database. Birth, wedding, children and death is not telling you anything about the persons behind the dates and places. Genealogy is about getting the history of the persons in your database. A book with only names and dry facts doesn't interest anyone.

James, my wife didn't like history in her youth either. In fact she hated it in school and didn't excel in it. Now our vacations go a lot to historical places like churches, castles, museums and old part of towns. Mainly because of her interest in genealogy and where her relatives have been. And when, in a church, you suddenly find a painting of one of the people in your database, you're as happy as if you've won the lottery.

We have experienced several times, when on our vacations, that people are looking strangely at us, because we are "running" between the headstone with a camera. A lot of them are asking us what we are doing. When we say that we are taking pictures of the headstones of our familymembers, they ususally say that it is a good idea, and they wish they could do the same. Of course we plan ort holiday so this is possible, and we usually check out own database for what/who to look for during the next day. When 4 weeks of vacation is over, we have like 3000 pictures of headstones of people in our database or of people we think are or are going to be in our database. Thank god for digital cameras. The first year we did this, our picturedeveloper looked strangely at us because of 500 pictures of different headstones. But we got good genealogical information.

Good to hear your experience, Maria.

But you or your cousin (preferably both) should really get yourself a geanalogical database program to keep on your own local computer. There are several out there, and some of them are cheap and you can use them for a while for free. Like this one: http://www.bkwin.org/

Geni, Ancestry and LDS site is hardly good enough to be a backup of your genealogical data. Trust me, I know what I'm talking about. Your main genealogical database should always be on your own home computer with backups on other home computers. Internet sites are never a good place to keep your only genealogical database or your only backup.

Remi,
I agree with you in principal about details and accuracy. But it important to note that while what you say IS relevant for MOST of North America and Europe, it is NOT true for all people, everywhere.

I could spend years looking for "official" records for my ancestors, and not find them, simply because they do not exist! Most countries only started recording Jews as "citizens" in the middle of the 19th century, and even then only partially. Even in Germany, who are renown for their record-keeping, you will not find any mention of the father. This is because they did not recognize Jewish weddings. As such, children are listed as "out of marriage" children of the mother, under her MAIDEN name.

I'm not talking about "ancient" history either. Half of my great-grandparents (born ~ 1900) were "stateless", i.e. NOT citizens of ANY country. Try finding them... My own GRANDMOTHER was not a citizen of Romania (her birthplace) until a few years after leaving it (~1950!). So the primary source for my tree is... oral.

As to the Biblical-Tree, yes as elsewhere, there is a LOT of crap out there, and the vast majority of links of medieval Royalty to it are self-aggrandizement and wishful thinking. But if I were to remove these links, people would get very upset. Never mind that the next GEDCOM would just add them right back in... Back when I started working on the Biblical Tree, about three years ago, one of my pre-conditions was that I would respect the work of others, unless I explicitly knew it was wrong. As such I DO try and document all profiles, with references to the actual bible-quote. Of course, many will argue that the Bible itself is not a valid *historical* source (this CAN be said about most "sources" from before ~1850). I actually AGREE with that, because it was never written as history. But still, I try to keep the tree in line with two thousand years of traditional commentary on the Bible. As such I'll only take "responsibility" for profiles before ~30 CE.

Personally, I'm into genealogy because I want to know my history, as fragmentary as that is with the constant flight from persecution. I work on biblical genealogy, because I enjoy that too, and in fact, this is what got me hooked on Genealogy in the first place, some 30 years ago.

Even in Norway the oral tradition about relationships is strong and should not be discriminated/censored by "serious" genealogists that only accept hard copy proofs.

Private User

I have always had nack for research since my late teen years. So much I now have a degree in it. The reason why I started to research is my family has had such a disconnect due to various family issues. I don't know who my cousins are and would like to find them all if they are alive or why folks died. Get to know them and perhaps one day have a family reunion. Which is in the works as I speak.

Next, I never thought genealogy could be not just be so much fun, but extremely interesting. I spend HOURS uncovering one piece after another. The other day I found someone related and living in the same town! I do document every fact that I can. I have not finished uploading documents to geni. I still have a lot of work to do. I'm happy that Geni keeps expanding its drop down options for labeling documents, and other expanding options for timelines.I think GENI needs to connect such options so it will automatically allow someone to link the documents to the sources of someone's profile since they don't do that now.

I know in my research if I don't have an exact date I don't hesitate to let folks know. If another member wants to merge I take the careful time to go back and make sure my info is correct & check the member who wants to merge is correct. Just because not one person can have it all. Working together will get you to have it all. I like to document everything & make notes if need be to who ever is looking. So if someone can help me out that would be awesome!

I work with a ton of direct databases themselves from marriages, deaths, immigration, etc. What makes it difficult is back in the 1600-1700's folks barely knew how to read and write property. The forms didn't have questions like how you were related to the head of house hold. In those cases i take how old the individual is. The challenge & hunt begins for verification for the estimated facts. I love doing immigration research and currently working on international research. Sharpening my skills in these areas. I hope one day I can call myself the expert. in these areas.

I have allways been interested in who my ancestors was, and I never put something into Geni that I`m not sure of. I`m not so found of all of these kings and so on that have been connected to my tree, because there so much different information and duplicates. So I`m on Geni, but I also have another program.

@David--I absolutely love what you wrote, and you explained well the delicate balance that we (and Geni.com) face in trying to create something for the public good but within the structure of a for-profit company. This inherent tension between the commercial and noncommercial, the personal vs institutional uses of the internet for historical archiving reflects the larger issues in society about the use of the internet as a true public sphere versus another corporate-controlled mass medium. I do think Geni is trying to find a way to accommodate this, and this is the reason I support Geni.

Respectfully, I only take issue with your dismissal of the "obsessing over the details" like documenting sources and developing naming conventions. Yes, we absolutely need to prioritize getting the merges in place to solidify the structure--this is a top priority. But we must have some guidelines in place now, rather than later, about those fine points because there's a lot of information that gets selected (or de-selected) along the way, and we need to have the end results in mind as we are doing the merging. It's not all or nothing--the data are not just add-on information (like the color of a house) but are deeply implicated in the structure of the tree itself.

I am doing this (1) out of personal curiosity, (2) in order to honor several deceased relatives for whom family was very important, (3) to preserve and discover family information for all the family but particularly the younger generation and (4) to find and bring together via email, Facebook,and in person cousins dispersed around the globe.

I started with Ancestry and JewishGen. I subscribe to Landsmen (Suwalk-Lomza Interest Group) and am a member of the Litvak SIG and of the Kalwarija Google group. I use Google, Facebook, genealogy sites, Intelius, other records search services, the Reunion program on my Mac. I am as interested in finding and reuniting living branches as researching the past.

In my case, I have been lucky due to the tremendous work done by others: for the Jewish agricultural communities in the Southern Ukraine, for the Jews from that area who Baron Hirsch brought to Argentina. for specific Argentinian settlements (Moises Villa and Basovilbaso), for my Margolis family and related rabbinical families by various researchers, for the Mayflower and other early American families, by my Margolis, Myszkowsky, and Williams cousins and older family members.

I do care about sources and do care about getting the facts correct. That is less of an issue for the well documented parts of my family. I have hit walls with some branches and have to wait until more information is available from Ukraine and Lithuania.

I like the idea of curators. There is a lot of power in connecting with other trees but the further back you go, the more errors there are and the bigger mess there is if you merge.

I have learned an enormous amount from the 18 months I have been doing this and I have met many many family members either online or in person and have brought together lost branches of several families. I have a background in languages and linguistics and have had fun learning much more about Eastern European Jewish names over history, about name variants in Eastern Europe, of immigrants to the U.S. and other countries. Not surprisingly, it is helpful to understand linguistics and have an analytical background when you do genealogy.

Remi I started researching my family tree seriously around 1989. I had dabbled in it earlier as did my mother and uncle and grandfather. I started with Parker and cookson and then a friend and a local ranger who was also interested in the subject took a look at what i had and pointed me in the direction of the Taylor Family. i made a call to NHG in Boston and the gentlemen I spoke to asked me I understand you are looking for the Royal ancesrty of James Taylor. Well I told I didn't know there was a Royal Ancestry alto my grandfather did tell the family were were related to William the Conqueror,which as it turns out we are. Anyway at that point this man rattled off about 10 gen and suggested I come into NHG,which I did.a couple of times. he showed me what books I needed and how to use them. By the time I left there I was way back in time.At that time I didn't know he was writing a book with another gentleman I found on Roots,who sent me 70 pages of the book. The book they were compliling was the latest copy of Plantagunet Ancestry. A very nice book if you get a chance to pick it in library.It's also for sale but I don't have the money for it right now.Anyway he nicely credit me for my very small input in it,one line.I was stunned that he did that! That's how I ended up researching Europe. Every other line just happened as I found them. I mostly go to vitals,town halls,graveyard,family records,all kinds of books. I have looked Roots but I always double check everything. Most everything I found on Roots i already had but it was nice to know I had done it correctly. Geni I only started because it was offered at our local library and at that time I didn't have a computer.it was a learning experience,the computer,I mean. I still only sort of know what I am doing on the computer. I figured it would be nice to type everything up. Just the charts was all i wanted. Then I got entangled in sharing. Still not sure if this is for me but here I am and here I stay. I think it's fun seeing how my ancestors lived and died good and bad alike.
It's a little more difficult for me because I am dyslexic and spelling is not my thing. thank God for spell check,
I am more interested in the US end of it. I keep finding more people. More lines.This is what keeps me going. But I am still interested in Europian lines. Judy

Bjorn, you wrote: "Even in Norway the oral tradition about relationships is strong and should not be discriminated/censored by "serious" genealogists that only accept hard copy proofs". I tend to agree with this for one very good reason...long before anybody in my family had been researching the family's genealogy, my mother very accurately related the family history to us. No documents or whatever, but in the end, she has been proven to have been deadly accurate with her version of the family history. The reason I check and double-check is because I don't have her prodigious memory when it comes to all this. :))

We had a situation where a "serious" genealogist insisted to remove a child connection to king Oscar 1(?) because it was not listed in any official records.

I started digging into it and found out that unofficially there was stories about several illegitimate children where one of the descendants admitted that the only "proof" was that it was his great grandmother had said so, and at the loft of his grandparents house they had a chest with king Oscar's monogram which the pregnant mother of the child got when she got "deported" to Norway.

Personally...I joined Geni because, although my Dad worked on the Family Trees for over 50 yrs...and I have researched for almost 25 yrs....my Trees looked more like telephone poles with a few limbs and not very many leaves.

I majored in history on college but...as some people have stated...dates and names don't really give you a FEEL for the past. I now know what the (or a) meaning of 'punk' is; how the post office got it's name (it is NOT, as a young neighbor of mine said...because it was named after the guy who invented Post-its); the origin of "bounty hunter" (during The War of the Rebellion and other conflicts...Federal Gov't or State would offer a 'reward' or BOUNTY to men who would enlist....but many would enlist and receive their 'bounty', then desert and go to another town and 'enlist' again....etc...the men deputised to find and punish those men were;you guessed it...bounty jumper hunters.....

Now it is FUN...

I have found cousins and learned more about my own family than I ever knew and makes me feel more CONNECTED.

Like many others I USE the web but don't take everything that is said as FACT...in fact....if I don't have more than one source or if a source cannot be confirmed....I shelve the info.

I have paper backup for everything but need to get an internal site. Have a brother that has a program but that is very confusing to me. I need a tree that looks like a tree.....not a seismograph printout.

If I'm related somehow to someone famous...well, so be it. LIKE the farmers,weavers,stonemasons, carpenters etc . that I'm finding . And some of them were quite the characters.

Wish the masters would oversee a BLOCK of trees and work to make sure they are good trees rather than just be required to jump in and resolve problems that occur...to me; it seems like trying to build a house with studs and a roof and then trying to add walls..

Feel like alot of good PROS are being wasted in their efforts. Believe me, if you get a good one to guide you and help you build YOUR building block strongely....it's like having a guide thru the forest......It's much easier to fit a block into the pyramid if the block is solid.

Wow, what a great conversation. One of the more interesting and respectful that I have seen in a while.

Personally, I was added by my sister, took a look around, met a 3rd cousin, took out my family history books, added a bunch of profiles, connected to other people, read some great stories ...

From the big picture, for me, it isn't about the "precision of records" but what the totality of the records tell me about a point in history, relationships between families, etc. With that said, I understand that the documentation, et al, do matter. I share the frustration of professional genealogists with the newbies (like me), you do a lot of hard work and it's easy to have it trashed.

Geni certainly has it's plusses and minuses. But they are making positive efforts in the right direction. They stopped allowing the big GEDCOMs, now they have launched the Curator project to get the tree to a point where it will be usable. Part of the curator discussion is whether locking profiles is a good or bad thing. Locking is bad because it restricts most people from editing a profile or it's relationships, it's good for the same reason. With time we will have more tools and come to a good middle ground.

For those who are more serious genealogists, I suggest that you sit back and watch how the big tree cleans up over the next months and then decide if it's the place for you. Suggestions are always appreciated.

WOW to your answer...!

I liked history since I had an English teacher who dressed up in costumes and played the lute and talked about the food, the type of housing and the political climate and how it all applied to the language. He showed connections...and why such things as "let them eat cake" would have infuriated the common folk...
But after that it seems the only 'History' taught was of dates and places. COLUMBUS SAILED THE OCEAN BLUE IN 1492) etc.
I now read Town histories and find facts and relationships and the hows and whys or things. Found that a couple of my tree people (in all 3 trees I'm actively working actually were among the ones that established whole towns..
Personally, in the short time I've been working on Geni I've SEEN improvements in feed-back from people. Maybe people are just getting nicer about answering questions rather than the "my way or the highway" attitude I encountered at first.
But the tweeks that have been added HAVE improved the quality of the whole tree process...and I look forward to more.
As my grandfather would say (he built houses) to his assistant."Tain't plumb but it stands right fine." Thats what I'd like...solid base and durable
and able to stand the weight of anything you put atop it.

http://www.geni.com/people/%D8%A7%D8%AD%D9%85%D8%AF/600000000247316...

How can we help you with the Sultan's profile? Which, by the way, is very interesting, thank you for sharing it.

Bjørn, I agree that oral tradition about relationships should not be discarded just because it's oral. But at the same time if an oral source and a written primary source is in conflict, most of the time the written primary source should win and be the most trusted one.

I know, Bjørn, you look upon me as a "serious" genealogist, and I know you know what I stand for. I also know that you understand that my intentions with this discussion is to promote quality in our genealogy instead of quantity.

To all of you, I really enjoy reading how you started with your genealogical interest, what your experiences are, what you think about the way we and Geni should go, and a lot more. I'm really enjoying this, keep it coming.

Fay, I really liked your comparison with telephone poles, limbs and leaves. I call it meat on the bones, where bones are the dry facts, and the meat are the real story about a person and/or family. Of course, we all need the dry facts, and they are ususally easy to get hold of after 1600-1700, but the meat, ohh, that's the job......

Gene, you say that "for me, it isn't about the "precision of records" but what the totality of the records tell me about a point in history, relationships between families, etc." I more or less agree with you, but the most important thing we do when researching our ancestry/family/relatives (and we are researching wether we are newbees or have a master degree in genealogy) is the principle of truth. Isn't it that what we are looking for? I think both you, me and Bjørn want our ancestral tree to be as correct as possible. At least to me, it isn't any fun presenting a link between two persons and more or less thinking that this link could be wrong because the sources are too vague. That's why a say quality, before quantity. To me precision as you call it, Gene, is a vital principle regarding family relationship between people. If the sources I'm using isn't good enough to convince me that a relationship is correct, then I don't write it down as such. And, yes, I know judging how much you can trust a source, is a very difficult thing to do, but that will also come with more genealogical experience. Or the "newbees" can ask the more experienced about how much they should trust a specific source.

To me the most important thing is to try to get a tree that is as correct as possible, and when the tree is about to go into heresay, it should stop there.

OK But Remi,

What do you do about those records that may never be revealed? Don't you use logic to say "The most likely scenario is that Abijah Ross lll is a son or nephew or grandson of Abijah Ross ll, as Abijah Ross ll is a proven and documented nephew of Abijah Ross l, and there are no other Abijah Rosses to be found outside of these three after several years of looking by several family researchers who are not without resources. The dates fit, the DNA fits, and the lack of a birth record can be explained in several ways, the most simple being war time destruction of records."

Isn't there a time when you go forward with most likely scenario?