tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post8030353743878513894..comments2023-04-20T12:46:11.858-06:00Comments on The Ancestry Insider: Afro-Louisiana History and Genealogy, 1718-1820The Ancestry Insiderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02490682912125335188noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post-62482487859710953432009-06-03T06:34:20.525-06:002009-06-03T06:34:20.525-06:00Thanks for an interesting blog- I have just happen...Thanks for an interesting blog- I have just happened on it<br /><br />One interesting thing which you have not mentioned is the disappearing databases from Recordsearch.<br /><br />First one was Unindexed records from Cheshire in England. This was fantastic but was soon pulled - I heard say for legal reasons.<br /><br />Then the 1916 partial Census for Canada was on, at first with images, then the images disappeared, and then the index.<br /><br />Recently there have been sore Irish BDM records - which have also gone!<br /><br />Is this a pattern?stonechathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07509408087607449346noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post-61633021080003137022009-05-11T12:16:00.000-06:002009-05-11T12:16:00.000-06:00This is from Gwendolyn Midlo Hall about my two dat...This is from Gwendolyn Midlo Hall about my two databases and what happened with Ancestry.com<br />Like much work published online as open source, I did all the work and ancestry.com collected all the money. The original databases were published on CD by LSU Press. Then a front page story appeared about my slave database on the front page of the Sunday New York Times on July 30, 2000. I had to go into hiding from the media. A lot of people bought the CD but almost no one could figure out how to use it. So when ibiblio.org (which is maintained by the University of North Carolina, not in Utah) asked my permission to put my databases on their web site, I agreed provided they created a search engine. They handed it over to a graduate student who evidently thought a female septuagenarian (me)had nothing to contribute. So he created a search engine only for the slave database, not the free database and left out some important fields and created that confusing "General Search" button. But I managed to stop him from removing the "race" field. "Racial designation" had been too long for dBASE for DOS. He insisted that I remove the "race" field because there was no such thing as race. So I changed the title of the field to "racial designation" which fit by then. <br /> Then ancestry.com asked my permission to incorporate both databases into their search engine. I agreed provided they did not charge the public for using it. But at best, they used it as a come-on. They charge a fortune to their users. Their change of name might involve other slave databases they added to mine and broadened the name, but it seems to be restricted to the same place and dates as mine.<br /> I hope others pick up the expansion of slave databases over time and place. There are several projects out there but they can't speak to each other. No one has ever funded me to do it. I was a finalist with the ACLS this year but I didn't get it. NEH didn't even inform me I didn't get their grant, but they announced who got it and I was not included. The technology does not have to be very fast, complicated and expensive, but everybody is in the business of trying to make as much money as possible.<br /> For more than you want to know about me but in a relatively small package, check out my Wikipedia page. My email address is ghall1929@gmail.com Much thanks.<br />Gwendolyn Midlo HallUnknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09110037431533411957noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post-8682718676207426392009-04-28T14:38:00.000-06:002009-04-28T14:38:00.000-06:00Insider,
Very nice post on an important issue, i....Insider,<br /><br />Very nice post on an important issue, i.e. titles. The most important issue though is Ancestry giving customers the ability to determine the individual titles within a broad collection. That way it does not matter as much if the collection title changes, because part of one's citation should also be the actual underlying title.<br /><br />An example of this is Ancestry's title called "Civil War Prisoner of War Records, 1861-1865". This is a mini-collection composed of 3 titles for Confederate prisoners (Union records), and one for Union prisoners (Confederate records).<br /><br />Each of those 4 titles has a description which refers to the underlying NARA publication. And nowadays it even has frame numbers for unpaginated collections. Sounds pretty good right?<br /><br />Well not quite. Because Ancestry's pervasive worst practice of microfilming comes into play where they do not film everything from cover to cover including blank and spoiled pages. So one cannot determine that a title is missing pages many times. Though perhaps that is by design.<br /><br />So two things need to be done:<br /><br />1) give the ability to determine all the underlying titles in a collection;<br /><br />2) microfilm everything in a source from cover to cover *and* don't provide an alternate arrangement that upsets the original ordering (as witness the mess in the census collections).<br /><br />Actually there is another thing:<br /><br />3) Include in the collection description, including for those obtained from other vendors, whether the collection is complete on Ancestry, or rather must be consulted elsewhere to find all the records.<br /><br />Mike<br /><br />today's captcha: esspinMikeFhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16587230319820652536noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post-16958238690322937292009-04-28T10:36:00.000-06:002009-04-28T10:36:00.000-06:00PS. April 26, 2009 Family Tree Magazine was liste...PS. April 26, 2009 Family Tree Magazine was listed on Topix Genealogy Wire whereon March 26th Family Tree Magazine cited the original slave database - not Ancestry.com's version.Louisiana Genealogy Blogshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07232128496424412370noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5512311610334754148.post-67127531543935734602009-04-28T10:22:00.000-06:002009-04-28T10:22:00.000-06:00Thank you for this post. I would skip the slave d...Thank you for this post. I would skip the slave database on Ancestry due to the citation given. The way the citation was formed led me to believe that the database was incomplete and inaccurate on Ancestry.com. I'm glad to see someone else noticed, too. I've opted to go directly to the source, instead of Ancestry for any information available in this database. Thanks again for the post.Louisiana Genealogy Blogshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07232128496424412370noreply@blogger.com