Ancestry tree rubbish

[Deirdre784]

It does offer some warnings though.... last night I mistakenly tried to add a grandson to his grandparents (as their son, he was on the census with them), and it warned me that he was born after the mother’s likely child bearing age, did i want to add it (i didn’t!). 

[HughC]

And did you notice that Kingstown (i.e. Dún Laoghaire) has migrated to Co. Fermanagh?

You have to remember that Ancestry is based in the USA where the motto is "anything goes".
Never mind the quality: just feel the thickness.

[Edward Scott]

Surely Ancestry could add a feature which warns you if you try to enter a baptism date that is AFTER the date of death? Just a few extra lines of code would do it...

FTM does give warnings on some date 'errors', people born after their mother died, being buried before you died, etc.

Wasn't FTM originally owned by Ancestry?

Edward

[Edward Scott]

Of course that would be simple, several programs I'm aware of, including Family Search trees, have checking features for illogical dates.
But rather than simply warning someone who clearly isn't interested in reliability, what about Ancestry warning visitors to that tree?  When you click on a public tree they could put up a screen which says something like.

This family tree has been grown by user @iamanidiot, not by Ancestry.  This tree contains 787 names, and appears to feature:
* 4 persons born before their parent(s)
* 3 persons born with parent(s) younger than childbearing age
* 11 persons living to between 125 and 346 years of age
* 3 persons who married aged under 10
* 1 person whose parent is also their child
* 12 families whose children were born on different continents
* 10 families with children born at unlikely intervals (less than 11 months between births)
Ancestry does not rate private trees for accuracy but the above may guide you when reviewing the contents.

Thanks, I really enjoyed this, but if they did warn people of the obvious errors, where would serious researchers get their entertainment?

However you left off the mother being over 100 when a child is born

Edward

[sleepybarb]

Someone whose wife is related to me  has J.B with three children, 2off them called John born in 1842. I did some years ago say I think you have added some extras, but it remains the same and he hasn’t logged in for a year now. So sorry but his mistakes will remai.
Barb

[JohninSussex]

Thanks, I really enjoyed this, but if they did warn people of the obvious errors, where would serious researchers get their entertainment?

However you left off the mother being over 100 when a child is born

Edward

Yes I missed off that one, as well as excessive or negative gap between birth and baptism, or death and burial, and child born after parents dead.

How would we get entertainment?  I expect there would be fewer threads about "Ancestry tree rubbish" and more about "Amusing names found in records". 

And it wouldn't do away with questionable transcriptions, often entertaining, like FindMyP*s* showing off a census entry they'd found where the woman had given her occupation as "Temptress". 

Quite clearly it actually read "Sempstress". 

[clairec666]

Thanks, I really enjoyed this, but if they did warn people of the obvious errors, where would serious researchers get their entertainment?

Admittedly, every time I see a thread on rootschat with a similar title to this one, I have to read it

[Mart 'n' Al]

According to one tree my late father-in-law is a well-known trumpeter.

Martin

[coombs]

It is good to rant about inaccurate Ancestry trees even if this has been discussed a lot on here, I never tire of it.