Your Genealogy Matters

Earlier this week, AncestryDNA launched the newest feature to its DNA web portal, " Genetic Communities ". Ancestry deserves praise for this new feature.  While they could be happy selling kits and posting have to evolve and give customers a reason to continue to buy your products and trust your decisions to grow your platforms. Without evolution in product and services, you become a moribund hulk that is dying.  So let's encourage Ancestry to continue to fine tune and launch new products. Since "Genetic Communities" is technically still in "beta" form, it's a bit like April the Giraffe - we know Ancestry is giving birth, but we don't know when the final product is going to be delivered. Before I give you my read on this roll out and product, you need to know that in my former professional field, I have worked in a free trade association, for a software developer, and in management in one industry's outlets.  This gives me th

We live in Baltimore, Maryland these days, but we are from Ohio, and my expertise is in Ohio.  Since I am a former President of the local historical society, I still hear from folks back home when they have local history questions.  Sometimes they like what I find, other times, they don't want to hear what I have to say. Take "Georgia" (not her real name) who wrote me the other day and asked me if I would review her application for First Families of Marion County, Ohio, before she mailed it in. I looked and then she and I had the talk about standards of proof needed to join an organization based on a tree.  She did not want to hear what I had to say, but she needed to hear it so we could get her research back on track. First of all, the application needed a lot of work.  Secondly, the reason why it needed work was that "Georgia" based all of her research using two types of "research", census records and the four and a half county histories wr

Welcome!  Come on in and set a spell.  This is the new blog that supersedes " That genealogy blog, again ". For those of you who read the previous blog, glad you found us. For anyone new, make yourself at home. New content is coming in the week to come.  The blogger format makes it easier for me to post, and easier to administrate the blog. The first thing you have noticed is that we have a new name and a new look. Simply stated, what I once thought was "cheeky" was in fact a turn off to a number of people.  When you have a smart ass name, you cannot be taken very seriously when you mean to be. YOUR GENEALOGY MATTERS was chosen as a title for a variety of reasons: Your Genealogy Matters means that your projects, questions and concerns make a difference to me.  In the other blog, it was all about me.  In this blog, it really is about you.  Your Genealogy Matters means that genealogy is the focus of the blog.  Your Genealogy Matters is a bit mo