RootsChat.Com
General => The Common Room => The Lighter Side => Topic started by: ankerdine on Friday 05 March 21 17:03 GMT (UK)
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I suspect this has been mentioned before - maybe many times.
During lockdown my local library has allowed online access to Ancestry Library Edition. I've not bothered with A much before, always preferring FindMyPast. Noticing a family tree with my members in it I was shocked to see all the errors the person had quoted. Also, nowhere could I find how they linked these into their tree anyway. Just saddened to realised this person must have accessed my tree somehow and scrambled it all up! I didn't delve too deeply into it in case I also featured therein too!
Why do people do this.? The family tree was called Cobham Family Tree and I've never heard of anyone with that name on my tree.
Judy
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Unfortunately there are a lot of people who are just name collectors rather than true family historians. This is one of the reasons why I have never put any of my family trees on the internet.
Not very pleasant to find that someone has lifted your research and plonked it willy nilly into theirs with no checks whatsoever. :(
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I agree... it’s very frustrating to find that everything you put in your tree is filched by someone without a by your leave...
I’ve had one particular person who has copied everything I’ve put despite me trying to say ‘it’s not yours’... in the end I made my tree private just to stop him doing it...
I flinch when I see people who have thousands of names in their trees...
Not sure how you can sort it ankerdine it just makes your blood boil!
Caroline
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You're not alone & unfortunately there's nothing we can do about it.
I've sent messages in the past, been thanked for pointing out the error but they're still there years later!
One of those has a marriage cert. attached to my relative who happened to have the same name & surname born circa the same year & same area as her chap who clearly has 2 different parents, visible on his marriage cert. yet the parents of my chap have been added along with his siblings, further generations et al ::)
"Chobham" is in Surrey, England
Annie
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Annie and all other kind contributors
As you can see I made an error in copying the name! Ha Ha, we must be all guilty of a little mistake but this family tree business is intriguing.
It seems this person added this tree quite recently, during the past few months, and in his gallery of ancestor's connections there is a painting of Robert the Bruce. Wow, to think I might be related to him! Pity, I should have preferred Mary Queen of Scots but maybe she is there somewhere too?
At the end of the day it's just so sad to read your deceased brother's details along with other deceased close family members, when this person does not have my permission or even know me. I noticed that this part of his family tree had been imported from a Boyd family tree so he must be collecting trees, as has been stated before.
Judy
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I been using the ancestry library edition and noticed how many trees there are that are wrong. I think though that it's just that people start it and pick up bits from other trees and then put 2 and 2 together and get 5. I also think this as got my dna done and there lots of through lines that just dont add up. Someone had a supposed shared 5 times great grandmother linked to my tree that they had put photo of gypsy caravan next to but looking at their tree and mine there was nothing linking that person to me or that they were a gypsy.
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I've sent messages too with correct information and received short shrift for doing it which is very sad.
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Milliepede, that's so sad and annoying._
Creasegirl, I DO have gypsies (tinklers) in my tree but that hasn't popped up yet!
I'm so glad I've never paid for Ancestry subscription and never will do now after hearing about the cheats out there.
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I really don't let it bother me unless it is a case of living relatives being added to trees.
I really don't care if others have incorrect trees - I do my own research anyway. The effect it has on thrulines though is frustrating and I have contacted people in this scenario, usually with advantageous results.
I really don't consider people who just add details directly from hints or copying portions of trees as genealogists.
Pheno
PS Sorry, an awful lot of 'I really don't's there on re-reading.
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There is at least one living relative mentioned in the other person's tree which is a pity.
Pheno, I really don't mind about you using "I really don't" so often. ;) ;)
I'm sure we've chatted in the past on RC.
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I think that PHENO is getting closer to the current reality of social and very public media and the current drift towards instant gratification. Lots of people add to their tree regardless of accuracy and avoiding any hard graft of solid researching of reliable sources.
Please remember that a PUBLIC tree is available to every member of the PUBLIC just as much as BMD and Census records [which also contain considerable mistakes] are all recorded for us PUBLIC to use freely.
No problem with having a PRIVATE tree but I resent people asking for all my research of a person that interests them but with no intention of sharing or reciprocity.
So, on balance I stay with my large public tree [mistakes and all] that, as a PUBLIC service, tries to follow all wives and daughters that have so often been marginalized in the patriarchal past.
I am so grateful to all the generous people that have helped me over many decades.
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Milliepede, that's so sad and annoying._
Creasegirl, I DO have gypsies (tinklers) in my tree but that hasn't popped up yet!
I'm so glad I've never paid for Ancestry subscription and never will do now after hearing about the cheats out there.
I feel very sorry for you by not using as many of the online sites as possible you are depriving yourself of finding digitised images of parish registers, electoral registers, census images and a thousand and one different original records such sites hold.
The trees are just a tiny part of the sites easily ignored but not using the sites is like cutting off your nose to spite your face.
I did of course say you mention you have "never paid for Ancestry subscription" which could mean you use the free weekends etc. many of the online sites provide.
If not may I please suggest you take advantage of such offers as they all have original records unique to themselves.
I would also suggest to everyone to download any original register image such as grave registers etc. as many councils and archives are licencing such images for limited periods and what is available on one site today may not be on that site next month or next year.
Cheers
Guy
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I agree with Guy re using a variety of the online sources and records.
I keep a private tree and a public tree. My private tree has far more detail and precision, and always up to date. I just use the private tree to allow genuine exchange and learning about other, possibly important connections and I'll update it occasionally (especially if I later spot a misstep).
I give the wilfully false no time and the blind the occasional pointer - the joy and satisfaction after all is in the detective work and the realisation that x and y are connected!
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I changed my trees to private simply because of this problem. I am happy to share information with genuine requests where, between us, we can agree that it is the same person/family. However, I got my own back once: when my tree was public, I entered a 'branch' that, in the end, turned out to be totally wrong. Someone who had downloaded masses of my information is still left researching an entirely 'fictitious' family since I turned my tree private and pruned the whole branch out.
The funniest thing I ever had was someone had my rellie living and dying in Melbourne, Australia, despite having downloaded all the pertinent (English) censuses etc. off my tree. When I pointed out the fact that we were talking about Derbyshire and I had, in fact, visited the cemetery where they were both buried, she wrote back and said I had to be wrong as she was correct and I should just look at her census forms in regard to this rellie!! Words fail me!