Genealogy Chat

Louise I believe GR is an excellent site for beginners - but of very little use to those who are further on with their research. What Janet is saying - and I agree with her - that the likes of us, the ones who have been researching before the internet was even dreamed of, and have lots of expertise, spend most of our time helping other people to search out information, which many times they could find for themselves with little effort. No Newbie EVER seems to look at the Getting Started Section, which explains how to do many things - how and where to get a certificate, which censuses are available and where, and so on.And many other queries could be answered by reference to a dictionary or an atlas - both on line if you don't possess one at home. We were all beginners once, even me, lol. But I really cannot see any point in me paying to belong to this site, when all I get from it is the ability to answer other people's queries. I have had lots of help in the past, with specific lookups etc. Most of those helpers have now gone elsewhere - and I have gone with them. I am quite sure GR will survive without the likes of me and Janet, and the many other people who have decided not to renew when the time comes. OC

OC A very hearty hear hear!! I have never considered myself indispensible! Far from it. Well, I have now made my decision after this exchange of views and I am actually looking forward in a very few days now, to just reading the boards and letting someone else answer all those queries, wondering how I ever got myself into this mode of trying to solve other people's family history problems on GR. But no, I will not be leaving the Family History arena, as I do already run a Family History Group to which I will continue to give more of my time, so I won't be escaping entirely, and I would not want to escape entirely, it is too addictive! But GR is certainly not stretching my Family History interest. I just wish it would cater for those more experienced Family Historians, but maybe one day......who knows? Janet

I know it isn't a gripe thread but i just have to add this, I would be the first to admit that i did get a lot of help on the boards but i posted questions to help me learn how to search for techniques, a couple of census requests before i got the ancestry sub but never went to the extremes that some people do with the bmd searches. Whilst not everyone can devote lots of time to this hobby what i do find really annoying are some of the bmd lookup requests. And anyway is there a prize for the fastest tree builder? If someone can spend a few minutes typing the post for a pre 1910 lookup, get a reply then post another request (and another one) then they would be better typing the names into freebmd.It is just as easy there as it is here and the results are in full colour along with district descriptions and scans of most of the images. It is almost like a 'can't look, won't look' attitude, Glen

I would echo Olde Crone's sentiments I think genes is a good site for beginners and newbies with computers. It is also useful if you want to make contact with lost family members reuniting genes rather than family history. As an experiment the other day I arranged my tree matches in chronological order and was suprised how recent most of the entries were. I don't think it is indispensible. Tribal pages offers a good free tree building site. If any of your shared tree contacts are willing they could load their gedcom to tribal pages and give you a visitors password. I think rootschat also free has a lot to offer the more experienced family historian. It has a very good section on photo restoration as well as county boards and general discussion boards. Ancestry has now got a good personal tree builder which finds matches with one world tree and other ancestry members and looks for census and other records automatically. I particularly like the timeline for each individual. Finally I would like to put in a plug for family treeforum it has message boards much like here and also a gedcom data base which can be searched by name and place. If you want to keep up with many former and current genes members send a personal message for an invitation to take a look. Anne

hello everyone, I have read this thread tonight with interest. I have only been a member for about 9 months, but my family tree is very well advanced, so I am not really a newbie. I have rarely asked for help as I enjoy searching the net for things myself. I feel that it's not 'my' tree if I haven't tried hard to work it out myself. I got my own ancestry membership to help with those uk census records and I have loved that. I understand the feelings that people have expressed on this thread, but I must say that I will miss knowing the expertise and help that you provide will no longer be there (would love to know where you're going). But the thing I must admit to loving the most about this thread, was that you all took the time and effort to type properly! I find it really difficult reading some of the posts on these boards. If it takes me 2 or 3 times to read it to understand it, I'm not that inclined to go further with it. Thanks to all those people who have have taken the time to help others with their research. It's an addictive, but enjoyable and rewarding hobby. I send my best wishes to those 'oldies' and hope that those elusive ancestors turn up one day. Sharon