Update on the newly added features to FamilySearch

About once a month, FamilySearch updates the additions to the FamilySearch.org website. March, 2016 is no exception but the updates did come on almost the last day of the month (sort of like home teaching). Here is an overview of the new features from the blog post.

Oral Genealogies

FamilySearch describes the newly added oral genealogies as follows:

A new collection of unique and high-quality data is being added to the Genealogies search. Oral genealogies consist of large lineage-linked trees constructed from the memories of tribal, clan, or family leaders in Africa, Tonga, and other locations. Most trees come with attached audio, PDF, and image artifacts documenting the interviewee and the recorded family history from which the tree was generated. These represent the only family history that will likely be obtained from these locations and are believed to be highly accurate.

Updated Person Card

The person card is the popup card you get when you do a Find or search for a person. Here is an example of the updated card that appears when you click on a name for further information. It took me a while to figure out what they were talking about.

 

First Time Guide

This is a card that explains how to get started. You can order copies or print your own from a supplied PDF file. We have been using these for a while and they are a good orientation to Find, Take, Teach.

You can still print Ordinance Cards at the Temple

Click on the link above for the complete instructions.

FamilySearch Wiki Updated

I will be writing a lot more about this in the near future.

When you change information, how many users will be notified?

I heard this was coming. Here is the explanation from FamilySearch.

Soon, when you edit a person’s information in Family Tree, like birth or occupation, the system will display the number of users who are watching that person. Watching means that users have asked the system to let them know when any changes or additions are made to the person’s information in Family Tree. So when you change the information, that’s how many people will be notified by the system.

This will let you know how many messages you might get if you aren't careful with your changes. Good idea. Long overdue.

The Family History Guide has recently announced that the program is now available on the FamilySearch Portal in all of the English-speaking Family History Centers world-wide. It is also available in the FamilySearch.org Learning Center.

We have been using The Family History Guide for some time now to train all the new missionaries serving in the Brigham Young University Family History Library. If you need help with your family history or if you are responsible for teaching family history, I suggest you take advantage of this wonderful, free program. Take a minute or two to watch the introductory video and then get going and get learning.

Why is the FamilySearch.org Family Tree public?

From time to time, I get into discussions about the public vs. private issue with online family trees. From my own standpoint, creating a "private" family tree verges on being downright silly. Although taking that position almost immediately elicits a variety of responses, some of which are rather vocal and emotionally laden. For example, I could go online and freely obtain a copy of my own father's birth certificate. However, today, the Arizona State Genealogy website is no longer functioning and all the links to the website are broken. In most states of the United States, there are time limitations on the access to such records. Arizona, for example, limits the availability of birth records to those more than 75 years old and death records to those more than 50 years old.

The explanation for this comes from the Arizona Department of Health Services website which states:

Arizona is a "closed record" state. That means that vital records are not public record. Arizona law restricts the public's access to vital records as follows to protect the confidentiality rights of our citizens. A.A.C. R9-19-403 specifies that only the following may receive a certified copy of a birth certificate:

The eligibility list is as follows;

• Registrant (self)
• Parents
• Spouse
• Grandparent
• Adult Child
• Adult Brother or Sister
• Guardian Having Legal Custody or Control of a Minor Child
• Foster Parents
• Attorney Representing the Registrant
• Attorney Representing the Biological Parent(s) in an Adoption Proceeding
• Attorney Representing the Adoptive Parent(s) in an Adoption Proceeding
• Adoption Agencies Representing Adoptive or Biological Parents
• Persons or Agencies Empowered by Statute or Appointed by a Court to Act on the Registrant's Behalf
• Genealogical

The Genealogical exemption is explained as follows:

A genealogist is eligible for a certificate that is NOT public record if all of the following criteria are met:

• The applicant establishes a blood or current marital relationship to the individual whose record they are requesting.
• Acceptable types of credible documentation to establish relationship: Birth certificate, Death certificate, Marriage certificate.
• Non-acceptable types of documentation to establish relationship:
• Pedigrees, Lineage charts, Family trees.
• The applicant submits a signed application.
• The applicant provides valid government issued identification or notarized signature on the application.
• The application submits the appropriate fee(s). 

A genealogist requesting a certificate that IS public record does not need to establish relationship to the individual whose record they are requesting but must submit the following:

• A signed application
• The applicant provides valid government issued identification or notarized signature on the application
• The appropriate fee(s).

The "Registrant" is the person named on the document. Obviously, the registrant is not going to apply for a death certificate.

What motivates the governments to restrict access to vital records for a period of years? The main reason is the word "fee." This is a money making enterprise for governments. Oh, you say, what about privacy? This is perhaps the reason why the formerly free access to these records has now been taken off line?

Privacy is a complex issue and one that is ill-defined by codified law or court decisions. It is very commonly stated that dead people do not have any sort of claim to privacy. But even this is a disputed area. Here is a good summary of the issues of which rights survive death.

Smolensky, Kirsten Rabe. “Rights of the Dead.” SSRN Scholarly Paper. Rochester, NY: Social Science Research Network, March 9, 2009. http://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=924499. See also http://law.hofstra.edu/pdf/academics/journals/lawreview/lrv_issues_v37n03_cc4_smolensky_final.pdf

Knowingly or unknowingly, genealogists intrude on these legal issues on a regular basis. Now, I can return to the topic raised by the title to this post. Why is the FamilySearch.org Family Tree public? The simple answer is that only those portions of the family tree dealing with dead people are public and therefore, with some limited exceptions, the entire issue is avoided. Genealogy is inherently a "public" inquiry. No one has exclusive "rights" or ownership of their ancestors. Big or small, we all have a cloud of relatives who share our relationship.

There may be a host of personal justifications for withholding historical data and profit may be one of the most common, but from a realistic historical standpoint, history is history and we should report it as completely and accurately as possible. If we withhold historical facts because of our own current prejudices, we are in reality and in fact trying to re-write history. This is why the Family Tree must be public. If it is to be at all accurate, it must contain an accurate representation of history. Anything less than this is fantasy.

Who is talking to the FamilySearch.org Family Tree?

The question in this post's title came up as a result of a series of classes I taught recently at the Brigham Young University (BYU) Family History Library. One of the participants expressed real concern over the "public" nature of the FamilySearch.org Family Tree. As far as its publicly available content is concerned, the Family Tree is a unified, wiki-based, program open to all registered users. The only public/private division is between those people who are living and only viewable in each user's private space and those who are dead who are viewable by all. If you need more information about "Private Spaces" on the Family Tree, see the Help Center article, "Understanding Private Spaces."

As I have observed several times before, the fact that any registered user can edit, modify, add data, delete and change any of the entries is undoubtedly the biggest perceived problem with the Family Tree. It also happens to be its greatest attraction and strength. But rather than write about the reasons why it is important to the future of family history that such a unified family tree exists, I am going to address the question in the title. The answer is simple, anyone who manages to convince FamilySearch that they have a reasonable and viable program or app. Right now there are over 100 apps listed in the FamilySearch.org App Gallery.

Most of these programs have some connection to either read and/or write data to and from the Family Tree. In short, users of the Family Tree should have absolutely no expectation that any information put on the Family Tree or in the memories section of the program will be private. All of the information is very public and the items put in the Memories section of the Family Tree, except those un-tagged or containing only living people, are entirely searchable by a Google search.

I will be following up this post with another entitled, "Why is the FamilySearch Family Tree public?"

More Information About Additional Green Icons in the FamilySearch Family Tree

I did get a number of responses to my post concerning the disconcerting appearance of a number of "green icons" indicated available Temple sealing ordinances for children and others who were "Born In the Covenant (BIC)" or had otherwise had all of their Temple work done. This included my wife's sister who died as an infant.

Essentially, the problem is one of series of issues caused by the continued movement of information from the new.FamilySearch.org program into the FamilySearch.org Family Tree. Apparently, information concerning the ordinance status was, in some cases, user contributed and the official membership records and official Temple records. So, if you or your family members submitted family group records or other genealogical information to FamilySearch or the Church and for any reason, the information was never added to the membership or Temple records, then with this latest development in the Family Tree, the ordinances will show up as needing to be done.

There are apparently three things that you can do if you happen to find any of these "green icons" where you know the ordinance work has been done.

1. You can send a Feedback Message to FamilySearch from the link at the bottom almost every page of the website and supply them with documentation that the work has already been done and then wait for them to make the change.
2. You can go ahead and re-do the ordinance.
3. You can do nothing and just wait and see what happens next. 

I suggest the third option is not really an option, if you do not charge of the situation and resolve the missing ordinances, then someone else will. 

There is also a possibility that the "green icon" you are seeing is qualified by the 110 year rule and you must be the closest living relative as defined by the rule or have permission from a close relative to do the ordinance. 

As a side note, there is a default position that if you do not know whether or not the person was BIC then you should go ahead and do the ordinance. 

I appreciate any corrections or comments.

Massive Sealing Duplication Shows Up on FamilySearch Family Tree

[Please Note: There are quite a few valuable comments to this post. You should take some time to read them.]

Today, 24 March 2016, a massive number of duplicate child to sealing green Temple icons showed up on the FamilySearch.org Family Tree. These are almost uniformly duplicate ordinance "opportunities" that are for children who died young and were "born in the covenant." This is one of the strangest duplications that have occurred so far with the Family Tree. I suggest that those who recognize that these children do not need duplicate ordinances quickly reserve the ordinance of sealing so the sealings are not done for those who do not legitimately need them.

You might was to pass this along to any interested members.

Nine new videos added to the BYU Family History Library YouTube Channel

Review of FamilySearch Partners by Rayanne Melick

Nine new informative videos have been added to the Brigham Young University (BYU) Family History Library YouTube Channel in the last day or so bringing the total number of videos added in the last week alone to 16. The webinar videos may also be viewed on the BYU Family History Library Website. The BYU Family History Library has the support of the entire Harold B. Lee Library on the campus of Brigham Young University. It also has around 130 Church Service missionaries serving to support patrons in their family history research. You might notice that I have produced more than fifty such videos in the past year or so, reaching my goal of doing one video a week.

As you can imagine, producing all those videos takes time and effort and may affect the frequency and length of the content of some of my posts on my blogs. You may wish to subscribe to the BYU Family History Library YouTube Channel and watch a few of the informative videos. Think of these as long or short classes in the fundamentals of family history. If you have any suggestions for future subjects, please leave comments. I note that the Channel has just over a thousand subscribers and cumulatively over 50,000 views. Please share any of the videos you view on Facebook and other social media.