tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post1838880040994673951..comments2023-04-20T12:46:11.858-06:00Comments on The Ancestry Insider: RootsWeb moved onto Ancestry.comThe Ancestry Insiderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02490682912125335188noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post-88780088512777755302008-03-16T01:29:00.000-06:002008-03-16T01:29:00.000-06:00Rootsweb is nothing but a server without the websi...Rootsweb is nothing but a server without the websites that are managed by volunteers and if they decide enough is enough and pull their records then all Rootsweb is in fact is empty server. Mail lists abound, Yahoo and Google do a far better job than RW. Rootsweb is not the only free hosting available. www.usgennet.org does an outstanding job and offer mail lists and message boards. I think TGN will be asking where oh where have all the volunteers gone.<BR/><BR/>If they are like ME they will be long gone and all the records I transcribe will never go on another RW site. Rootsweb was made possible by the members who donated money every year to offset the costs and were promised advertisement/banner free websites in exchange. TGN has reniged on the deal.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post-27359460990566021202008-03-14T16:02:00.000-06:002008-03-14T16:02:00.000-06:00Insider,Despite the reasons that Mr. Sullivan gave...Insider,<BR/><BR/>Despite the reasons that Mr. Sullivan gave for this change, from what I have read elsewhere the true reason is related to search metrics, but which were not discussed in that PR release. They have to do with the fact that the Rootsweb url consistently pulls in more hits than Ancestry's. Thus by this change, Ancestry will reap all of the hits.<BR/><BR/>Now I do not think that is necessarily a bad thing or a disservice to RW, as after all Ancestry does foot the bill. However as also discussed elsewhere on the net, for reasons of SEO and server load issues, Ancestry might backtrack on its promise to always have redirects for previously linked or bookmarked RW urls.<BR/><BR/>It needs to be noted that Rootsweb has many different constituent parts that comprise the whole. USGenweb is one, mail lists are another, and the combined Ancestry/RW message boards are yet another. However a subcurrent to all of this is the disapproval of many USGenWeb participants to these and other Ancestry branding moves, with the attendant result that many if not all of the state/local GenWeb pages will be moving elsewhere. However since the new hosting arrangements for same will likely be highly fragmented, Ancestry still will not be behind a free genealogy concern in the rankings, even if the new figure for Ancestry is less than the current combined total.<BR/><BR/>MikeAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post-67201490759741522092008-03-13T17:44:00.000-06:002008-03-13T17:44:00.000-06:00Most Ancestry and Rootsweb urls are already very l...Most Ancestry and Rootsweb urls are already very long--so long they cause problems when citing them. <BR/><BR/>So why is TGN moving to make that problem even worse?<BR/><BR/>And won't all the redirects simply cause more loads on servers and Internet traffic and further delay page loading times?<BR/><BR/>Seems like an anti-user move to me.D. C. Russellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00475868388213027780noreply@blogger.com