Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Free St. George Expo Tickets!

[As I am writing this article, the Family History Expo website is down. The links to the website may not be working yet when you read this article. If not, try again later.]

Click to go to the St. George Family History Expo website #FHExpos is the Twitter tag for the St. George Family History Expo this weekend. But I’ve painted myself into a conflict of interest corner and I need your help ASAP to get me out! I accepted an invitation from Holly Hansen to be a Blogger of Honor at this weekend’s conference.

Holly’s wonderful. Her marketing for Family History Expos draws people to genealogy conferences that are new to conference attendance and perhaps new to genealogy. We all benefit when others join the community. So it shouldn’t surprise me that she is leveraging bloggers so effectively to promote her Expos. It’s something I’ve always been happy to do. This time around, however, three factors have given me pause.

New Social Networking Policy

Last week Holly informed me of a new Social Networking Policy (Google Cache) that outlaws my trademark comprehensive conference coverage. In part the policy reads,

Family History Expos encourages the use of Twitter at Expos. Please tweet the highlights of classes attended; however, it is not appropriate to give full details of class materials presented.

Copyright to all class presentations, recordings, and syllabus materials belong to Family History Expos and its presenters by agreement of said parties.

© Family History Expos, Inc. 2010. All rights reserved.

Since Family History Expos doesn’t pay presenters, their remuneration comes through exposure. They generally welcome the additional exposure I give. The real issue here is the interests of Family History Expos. Producing conferences is a risky business and Holly does so on a shoestring. I am honored to do what I can to help Holly help the genealogy community. And if that means I have to change my conference reporting style, I am happy (and sad!) to do so.

Conflict of Conferences

Long ago I made the decision to support FamilySearch’s efforts to encourage all of you to attend the 2010 National Genealogical Society Family History Conference. I have made my honest opinion clear: if you attend only one conference this year, it should be the NGS Conference. In fact, if you only attend one national conference for the rest of your life, this is the one you should attend.

At the time I accepted the Blogger of Honor distinction from Family History Expos, I didn’t think through the conflict. How can I encourage you to attend NGS and the St. George Expo, knowing that your decision to attend one may mean you won’t attend the other. Don’t hate me, Holly! But…

If you attend only two conferences this year, besides attending the NGS 2010 Family History Conference you will want to take a strong look at the St. George Family History Expo. See my earlier article, “See You at the St. George Family History Expo.”

Free St. George Family History Expo Tickets

To make the St. George Expo more attractive, I have the privilege of awarding two free tickets. Forgive me if you feel this is too commercial, but I need to fulfill my obligation to Holly. I am offering the tickets as a contest prize. Here are the contest rules:

  1. The two submitters that follow all these rules and receive the greatest number of points will each be declared a winner. The name, address, and e-mail of the winners will be submitted to Family History Expos. If it is not too late, Family History Expos will award each winner a free pre-registration to the St. George Family History Expo. Points may be earned in three ways, as explained below.
  2. Submit one or more stories of serendipity in genealogy.
    - The story must be true.
    - The serendipity must have happened to you; third-party stories are notoriously exaggerated.
    - The story must be non-denominational. That is, it should be of interest to more than the members of one particular church or system of beliefs.
    - The Ancestry Insider will award 100 points to each story he judges to be usable.
    - When possible, include a digitized image that adds interest to the story. Images make a story more usable.
  3. Submit one or more record anomalies. (I’m planning on a future series of columns.)
    - A record anomaly is a record that contains one or more errors, such as wrong gender, wrong name, wrong information, enumerator error, death certificate for a live person, etc.
    - You must include a digital scan of the record.
    - You must explain what is wrong with the record.
    - You must include digital scans of other records used as evidence to prove the first record is wrong.
    - The Ancestry Insider will award from 1 to 10 points to each record he judges to be usable.
    - The more reliable the type of record usually is, the higher the point value. Thus, an image copy of an original birth certificate will be given more points than an image of a census record.
    - Indexing, transcription, and publication errors are not generally usable unless the mistake is especially entertaining and the mistake was published by Ancestry.com or FamilySearch. The same is true for compiled genealogies.
  4. One hundred points will be awarded to the first submission (and only the first submission) that correctly identifies the most recent Ancestry Insider article written in chiastic structure. To qualify, the submission must show the chiastic structure of the article.
  5. Your submissions:
    - must be included in a single e-mail,
    - must include your name, address, and e-mail address,
    - must be e-mailed to AncestryInsider@gmail.com ,
    - must use the e-mail subject: EXPO CONTEST ,
    - must be received by Wednesday, 24 February 2010, 5:00 AM Mountain Standard Time, and
    - must include a statement giving the Ancestry Insider permission to publish and otherwise use the submissions.
  6. You may submit only one e-mail, but you may submit multiple stories, records, and chiastic article identification in the e-mail. The score for each e-mail will be determined by adding up the scores for all the submissions included in the e-mail. In the event of a tie, the Ancestry Insider reserves the right to break the tie using any method. The Ancestry Insider will be the one and only judge of the usability of submissions and reserves the right to later use submissions judged not usable during this contest. The Ancestry Insider is not responsible for lost or misdirected e-mails.

I would be delighted to receive story and record submissions even if you’re not entering the content. Send each story or record separately with e-mail subjects SERENDIPITY STORY or ANOMALOUS RECORD, respectively. Thanks!

1 comment:

  1. Maybe you should add one more category: "Humor in the databases." For example, while searching English parish birth records, I came across an illegitimate child born in 1765 whom the mother decided to name, "Freelove."

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