Account Disabled Irish Family History Foundation

[aghadowey]

I think there was another posting a while ago from someone prepared to do lookups and help people.  There was an answer from agadhowy?  I think the person was Julian.  Someone answered that records would be available from 2012 and that the Americans have bought some rights to records which they hope to digitize over the next 18 months.  Mormons?  Cannot remember the total content of the conversation.

Marcie- have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Here's the thread Julian and I posted on-
www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,274775.0.html

[mjb1]

My mantra on this is very simple, all the Birth, Marriage and Death records belong to us, our parents and our children and should be free to look at.

[TF13]

Ger, you aren't the first one to have this happen to them, have a look at this thread;
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,246509.15.html
you'll also notice that the IFHF have made a post at the end in an attempt to "clarify" some points raised in that thread. It was posted over a year ago but it might be of interest. If nothing else the post by them shows that someone at the IFHF is aware of Rootschat and perhaps they MIGHT take heed of the comments made on this thread and "catch themselves on". We live in hope anyway

Tony

and while I'm here...A Happy and Peaceful Christmas to all

[GAJM]

Thanks everyone for the replies i think i have expressed my views which i think is important.

Thanks to the LDS and the National Archieve's and volunteer transcribers for all the great work over the last few years to make a large section of Irish Records free on-line. Amazing what can happen in a few years.

We dont need the IFHF!

Happy Christmas
Ger

[corisande]

Thanks for that link Tony, I had not seen it before. Quite fascinating the reply from IFHF, that starts with

Having viewed the opinions/comments expressed on this forum re IFHF’s Online Research Service, we wish to clarify a number of points; no further replies to comments subsequent to this posting will be made.

An arrogance, if I might say so, that one would only get from a monopoly holder.! They really could not care less about genealogy or genealogists, it is all about profit with records that they have acquired monopoly right over, but are the nation's records.

It is interesting to see that the RootChat user, IFHF,  (who I would concede may not be anything to do with RootsChat, I have no idea whether RootsChat has established that users' credentials) joined on 5 Nov, 3 days before that thread started, and was last online 27th Nov, the day they wrote that post. That is their sole post.

Make what you like out of that!!

[GAJM]

I have watched the videos on you tube a few times that i posted above and he really makes them sound like this great value service that will solve all our family tree's back to 1500's!

Ger

[corisande]

"catch themselves on"

That is a lovely Irish expression that I do not think they use in England!

[marcie dean]

In England we say catch onto.

marcie

[Oaks and Acorns]

So what's the next step?

We seem to be in agreement that the way the IFHF treats its customers is a disgrace. A suggestion was made to write a strongly worded letter but given their attitude, as expressed on RootsChat, I really don't think this will get anywhere.

I'm living in Ireland so I can get to the NLI to view the records for free. It's a bit of a hassle but I can live with that. For researchers outside Ireland and indeed outside Europe, an online option is necessary.

So what are we going to do?

We all agree that the IFHF 5 Euro per view is excessive. But is it only the money? Personally I have no difficulty sending 4 Euro to Roscommon for a BMD cert. Thanks to the LDS site, which is totally free, I can be reasonably sure that the cert I order is the one I want. And for me, the value-added is the photocopy of the actual, hand-written entry from the registration book. Not a transcription that might or might not be accurate.

Ah yeah, but.....

On a conceptual level, I can see how a Government Minister and the Churches might have been taken in by the IFHF. In fairness, it was a good idea for training and experience purposes to have unemployed people keying in Parish Records on a FAS scheme. At the time it happened nobody said no. Unemployment was high and anything that might lead the way out of recession was welcomed. Potentially, somewhere out there in the future, it might lead to an increase in tourism. The Minister bought the story. It sounded good at the time.

Where are we now?

Since then, we have been visited by the Celtic Tiger and for a while we believed that money was heaven-sent. We learned that knocking down the old and building new is the way to bigger profits. We all had loads of money in our pockets and 5 Euro to the IFHF or a drive to the NLI or the NA was the only way to do things. Prosperity is new to Ireland. For the most part it seems that we spent our wealth on building roads. Any old stuff that got in the way could be (and was) bulldozed.

That's the attitude we are up against.

So what are we going to do?

We can chat about it here on RootsChat or other Genealogical sites. We can chat about it amongst ourselves until we get bored with the discussion and move on. Can we do anything to change what we all agree is a bad situation?

What's the next step?

Dara.