World Digital Library

Pieces of the world's history from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe have come together on a single free Web site. The World digital Library, a collection of documents, photos, maps and art from countries and sultures around the globe. From Family Tree Magazine, September 2009, Page 12

Family History 101

Family History 101 provides excellent basic information for research in several record types, which includes a glossary of terms. Their home page can be found at: http://www.familyhistory101.com/

Granite Mountain Records Vault Videos

Jay Verker, President of FamilySearch, gave the keynote address at the National Genealogical Society Conference last week. As a part of his speech, he showed 3 videos of the Granite Mountain Records Vault. Those can be viewed by going to this URL:
http://www.newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/news-releases-stories/familysearch-shares-plans-to-digitize-billions-of-records-stored-at-granite-mountain-records-vault

FamilySearch Presentations at NGS Syllabi

Most of the syllabi for the FamilySearch employees' presentations at the NGS Conference can be found at: https://wiki.familysearch.org/en/FamilySearch_Presentations_at_NGS_2010

Celebration of Family History

A Celebration of Family History was held in the Conference Center. President Henry B. Eyring and author, David McCullough, spoke; the choir sang and 5 videos were shown. They are online and can be viewed by going to: http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/.

I'm sorry that you all were not able to enjoy it. Over 14,000 did, which is the largest genealogical event ever in the US.

The bagpipe video is humorous and very enjoyable, but what followed that video is the main item of discussion by all attendees. The reason is that as the video was ending, you heard bagpipes playing Amazing Grace. Jared McCloud was one of the pipers. As they finished going through it once, the Tab Choir and Orchestra joined in. The result was incredible - never has that song been performed better. Everyone there would like to have a video of the entire evening, but if they can only have one thing it is that song. It is ironic that the most humorous part of the evening turned into the most memorable and moving.

President Eyring and David McCullough gave excellent remarks, both encouraging collaboration in research. Mr. McCullough also pressed learning the story behind the events and gave several examples of events in the lives of famous people.

While the entire evening was filmed, it is not yet known what will be available for release.

Conference Week Announcements and Updates

The main thrust of the FamilySearch speakers at both the BYU Computerized Family History and Genealogy Conference and the National Genealogy Conference was collaboration and bringing the genealogical community together. It has also been strongly suggested that you should not believe any one source, but a collection of sources from a variety of types of records. Please note below the online lessons on Inferential Genealogy.

FamilySearch announced that they released 300 million new names this week to the Beta site at: http://fsbeta.familysearch.org/. (It is also accessible through the Labs site.) I asked if they were only on the beta site and they said that they were also at Record Search Pilot, but that they had a much better search engine on the beta site. All videos shown and all presentations by FamilySearch people refered to the Beta site.

What is the Beta Site? It is the next incarnation of familysearch.org. It is supposed to be released this summer, but it was supposed to be released last summer also. You might want to check it out since there is a change coming, and it is a big change.

FamilySearch has added several new courses through both familysearch.org and fsbeta.familysearch.org. One of the most remarkable ones is Inferential Genealogy presented by Dr. Thomas W. Jones. It can be found at: http://broadcast.lds.org/elearning/fhd/community/cbig/player.html. We were given a preview at a lunch presentation by Don Anderson, FHL Director among other FS positions. I had not heard of Inferential Genealogy previously, but it is very good.

If you are wondering how inferential relates to genealogy, here are a trio of definitions that may help: 1) of reasoning proceeding from general premises to a necessary and specific conclusion; 2) derived or capable of being derived by inference; 3) based on interpretation; not directly expressed. It is an inter-active presentation.

Wednesday night at an Ancestry event they made three announcements.
1) The search screen is changing -- again! They have found that many people do not enter dates and places so they are simplifying their search screen, but it can be expanded to add as much information as desired.
2) Last month they announced that they had sold their printing business. They announced that they are putting The Source and Red Book online in wiki format which can be accessed at no charge. It is coming "well before the end of the year".
3) They are in the final stages of development of Family Tree Maker for MAC. For all of you Mac users, this may be good news. I asked them if it was going to be possible to transfer all information from PC programs, including sources, images and events. The short answer was "Yes". Please remember that they are not NFS certified and no one is talking about it.

Alan Mann on Person Pages

Person pages are the wave of genealogy future

By Sharon Haddock,Mormon Times,Tuesday, Apr. 27, 2010

SALT LAKE CITY -- New on the genealogy scene right now is the person page -- a feature that ideally would one day include every person who has ever lived on the earth.

Alan Mann, manager of Genealogical Community Services with FamilySearch.com speaking at the Conference on Computerized Family History and Genealogy on April 26 at the Salt Palace, said person pages is the most significant new thing in online family history.

Person pages are different from online pedigrees, he said.

Person pages allow genealogists and website users to link all kinds of information to a basic site -- information such as images of official documents, photographs, histories, government records, and comments from people who may have known the person.

Footnote.com could be easily linked to Ancestry.com, to FamilySearch and a variety of other web pages, saving on duplication of effort and providing a wealth of resources in one place.

Footnote currently has a free person page available, Mann said, that is simple to access and augment.

Footnote has already created a page for every person they have in their existing database and the home page is kept up to date with recent member discoveries and improvements.

Suggestions are made on the home page as to how to refine a search (a typical search brought back 99,570 matches) by place, category, collection, date, etc., expand a search and ideas about what could be added. (Would you like to see a census, add an image or a comment?)

Images and photographs already on a home computer can easily be imported.
Audio and visual images are probably going to be part of the menu in the near future, he said.

While some of the linked sites may require a fee for use, most do not, he said. Those who cannot pay the fees can access the pay-for-use sites through a public library or family history center.

And most records and documents are public records.

"Person pages is where we're headed and where we need to be," Mann said. "The ideal would be a page for everybody who has ever lived."

The Footnote information is not presently Google searchable and living individuals should not have person pages, he said.

Mann said in the future a gatekeeper would probably be needed and to him FamilySearch is the logical choice because FamilySearch is not trying to make money on their resources.