Genealogy Chat

Personally, I think 'Hot Matches' are a big waste of time.

If there is a little green tree in the corner of one of my boxes, that is much more interesting and can lead to finding lost relies. That way, I can concentrate on one branch at a time and forget about the non-matched matches.

Thanks everyone for replying to my query about hot matches - made for some very interesting reading one boring lunchtime at work! Very useful.

Mari

Yes its a bind trawling through them and takes ages to do, 8 pages last time. I followed someones tip when absolutely certain I didn't want any more info to add >> at the end of the name, this prevents G.R. from matching them again. I've almost stopped contacting others, let them come to me ! So many people leave their details but don't renew or check messages. I have tried many times to get in touch with a cousin in U.s. who having remarried and reinvented herself,denies all knowledge of her history.even though I know every detail of her life children, grandchildren, all except the colour of her curtains.!!! I feel like a stalker!!! Hot matches should be renamed Luke warm.... !

So I'll never get to find out what this bap thing is all about then?

;-)


M

Hm,

Its time I left GR as I am beginning to sound like them. Sounds as though I have 6 Gotchas "bap" in Whereever!

Oh well, the day may not be too far away for my retirement from GR, as I am doing battle with them at present over my subs. Having joined January 2004 and started by paying £7.50 per year, I left in January 2007 to rejoin in June at a cost of £9.95 for six months, and have now been asked to pay another £9.95 by 13 December for another six months which in my calculation will be costing me £19.90 per year and even my expensive Tipperary Historical Society only charges £16 a year and I get big book with 200 pages in that each year!

So folks, if any of you old hands let your membership lapse for more than 28 days, remember that it will cost you, at present, until the next hike, the grand total of £19.90 a year, much more than their euphemistic £9 95 for six months.

I am not sure how GR can justify their expense, with their ridiculous hot matches and their expensive credits for using their facilities.

Still, I am only ever on here to give help on Tips Board so GR will not miss me.

Janet North London Borders

Janet,

I've seen you mention this '............ bap' fellow before. Is that actually part of his surname or does it stand for something?


M

Hi, I agree with you and I don't pay any attention any more to them. the few people who have contacted me about possible matches have been out by decades or from very different parts of the country.

Sorry, Janet. cant find anybody with the surname Gotcha, in a place called Wherever or anywhere else!
:)
Cant find how to do tongue in cheek
:(
Huia.

From the remarks, many people have found a hot match on here!

All of mine received so far, and there are hundreds, have been for correct name, even correct date, but oh dear certainly not the correct place! If I am looking for a Dennis Gotcha bap Wherever Northants 1827, I am not going to very impressed with a Dennis Gotcha bap 1827 in Queensland Australia. I could live with same county and different town/village, but not the way out places. So far I have 6 that are probable interests, but as I already know about all six and have more info than they all have, it is not very helpful to me anyway.

Janet North London Borders

Sometimes you do find the golden nuggett, the main problem is often that a ot of the supposed matches are really based on shared information from one original tree and these can add little to your knowledge. This is more apparent when the match is for a distant relative of the matching tree owner.

For example one of my surnames is pretty rare on here but appears in around a dozen trees. Each tree has the same errors with dates/places due to the fact that there is only one "original" (and flawed) tree which has been copied about a dozen times.

None of the tree owners can expand on what i know already and a few actively dispute the accuracy of my research, i have all the certs, wills etc but apparently i am still wrong.

In a case like that i just decline the contact further information, they can't prove or disprove anything, don't have documentary evidence etc whereas i have. It takes more than a few census images to prove someone is my ancestor.

Most Hot Matches are anything but. Once in a while though, one hits the bulls eye. Thanks to one hot match I was able to find which of 2 Mary's, baptised on the same day in the same church, was my g g g grandma. Reckon the occasional bit of gold is worth all the dross. If you are reading this Jason, thanks a million.

It's worth the time and trouble- know it's a pain but through the hot matches I found a ggrandson from my ggrandfathers extra marital relationship (what relation are we ?)
Hi Ray!

I broke through what I thought was an unsurmountable brick wall and found my Welsh great grandmother and now have a third cousin I knew nothing about and large numbers of photos and documents for members of my father's family!
Caroline

I found the daughter of my great aunt who was able to fill some missing bits of my tree but I agree there are lots of ones that really shouldn't even be sent to me ie place of birth - not even in the same county!!

Now that I have been doing my tree for more than 12 months, I have learned to ignore hot matches for single hits especially where I have found a bunch of siblings using IGI quite quickly, another person could and would have done the same. My genuine hot matches have almost always suddenly have to come up with 5 or more matches - and then I do get really excited. I don't waste any time on the ones and two's, but then I'm lucky in that I pretty much know my ancestry since 1901 to now, it is extermely unlikely that any close relative will pop up that I do not know about. For people without much idea of their family since 1901 the situation is different and I agree the GR search system is not useful enough...
Good Luck everybody, Hz

They are certainly not a waste of time if you understand the limitations of how they work. I usually find one or two new leads each time, mainly distant connections, but connections all the same. As far as people not responding then this is hardly a Hot Match problem. In my experience about 75% do always respond.

This is what GR says about matching Place of Birth.

"At the moment we just match the name and year of birth. However, we may make changes to the way system works in the future and add in the place of birth as a match. The problem is that members add the place in different way, or it can be mis-spelt. Some might add the town, others the full address. This makes it difficult to match. By keeping the search broad we feel you have a greater chance of a match."

Missing matches because of spelling differences could create even more problems and complaints than it actually solves, so it is probably better as it is now.

After all if you don't want the match just discard it.

And, for those who are still not happy, why bother with them at all? Just do your searching manually.

I have always looked at my hot matches and send out messages to likely matches

I have sent four out this time and received one reply. It is the norm when I contact People on here that they don't reply, some graciously do and I do every time.

I am not renewing at the end of the month Genes Reunited care more about quantity than quality.

Regards
Jill

One hot match allowed me to find a long lost aunty who I never knew I had and put her in touch with my aunty reuniting them after being separated 60 years ago.

Sometimes the little clues work.

Yes, Ivor, that sort of 'match' is really nonsensical, and there must be some way a computer could differentiate between countries. Computers can do so many wonderful things. But I just delete those ones anyway.

Hi gang,
regarding POB matches, Would it not be possible to have the search engine weed out the ones that are not in the same country, at least ? When you get a match from England and Australia, it is taking the mickey...... :-)

Good Hunting,

Ivor Cogdell