1911 Census Discuss

[Matari]

I can’t quite put my finger on it but there is something about the release of the 1911 census that I don’t like.

Is it that a national archive has been sold to a third party for profit purposes?  Profit that could have stayed within the establishment. (11.4 million Searches in the first week). Is it that the third party is making this information available on a pay as you view basis and not to subscription? Is it that the information is incomplete? Would it not have been better for all if the launch was deferred until all areas were available? Is it that the third party has sole online publishing rights which seriously disadvantage advanced researchers who are members of other ancestry sites? Is it because the honorary 100 year rule has been disregarded? It is conceivable that there are people alive today that appear in these records.

Perhaps it’s all of these things, but then I suppose no one else is bothered so it’s all right then. Isn’t it?

[Berlin-Bob]

Hi Matari,

Welcome to RootsChat

I think you'll find that most of these points have been discussed here
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,352985.0.html

and on other topics on RootsChat.

regards,
Bob

[Nick29]

Hi Matari, and welcome to Roots Chat.

I'm afraid you have a few misconceptions........

The National Archive has not been sold off.  Whereas all the previous censuses have been microfilmed in the past, the 1911 census has only ever existed on paper, so to make it available online, someone has had to photograph, digitise, transcribe and index the entire collection which takes nearly a mile of shelving to house in physical form.  This operation was beyond the current capabilities of the National Archive, so a company called Brightsolid, which owns (amongst others) the Find My Past website was invited to collaborate with the NA to do this work.  In return, Brightsolid has the rights to operate a Pay As You Go access facility, and it has sole rights to the data for an agreed period.  Later on, other companies will be able to access this data too.  Obviously Brightsolid want to make a profit on the money that it has spent doing a lot of work to make the 1911 census available online.

The "100 year rule" that you refer to was only passed in 1921 with the Census Act, so it does not apply to the 1911 census.  However, certain personal details (like infirmities and disablities) will not be readable until after 2011.

[stanmapstone]

Can I just add that the total number of schedules printed for the 1911 census of England and Wales was 10,064,500, which included 9,146,000 ordinary schedules.

Stan

[carol8353]

Stan

What's an 'Ordinary' schedule?

Carol

[stanmapstone]

An ordinary schedule was a Household Schedule, which had spaces for 15 names,  there were others with spaces for 40 names, and others for 100  names for Institutions, hotels, schools etc. There were apparently 22 different kinds of Schedule provided.

Stan

[carol8353]

Oh right !!!

You learn something new every day- especially on Rootschat 

Thanks Stan,

Carol

[Matari]

Thank you Nick 29 for your comments. If as you say the 1911 census details were acquired by Brightsolid would you be able to tell me on what basis this transaction was conducted. Were other companies invited to tender? Did National Archives receive payment for our records, if so how much? Why couldn’t National Archives do the transcriptions knowing it would be guaranteed to provide more than adequate financial returns? If it was beyond their expertise, which I doubt, could they not have employed a third party to do it for them? At a time of dire economic times I would have thought a little bit of extra revenue would have been appreciated. It’s just the idea of some commercial enterprise acquiring public information and then charging us for the use of it that annoys me. Obviously they want to capitalize on their investment but to make it a pay as you view facility only is a real killer for those like me who would want to research a couple of hundred individuals and others in Scotland where a similar situation exists. I was quite clear in my earlier posting that the 100 year rule was only honorary but is this the only census that has been released in less than 100 years? Why?

[Nick29]

I'm afraid that I have no connection with either Brightsolid or the National Archives, so any questions regarding the arrangement between them must be addressed to them.  You are only being charged to access the 1911 census information online - if you want to go to Kew, you can browse the 1911 census to your heart's content completey free.  It was decided to release the 1911 census information early after several challenges under the Freedom of Information Act.

If you think that the NA had the facilities and expertise to successfully provide the internet access themselves, you obviously were not around to witness the fiasco that surrounded the launch of the 1901 census (which they also had help with !).  At least this time people are able to gain access to the data, albeit at a price that may not be palatable.

P.S. You'll find some answers here