International Collaboration

Last month I wrote of my intention to join the Familysearch Worldwide Indexing Event, this is a followup post. 

“Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much” - Helen Keller. 

I am rather proud of the new badge (right) that my personal blog is wearing. Although I am pleased to have made a small contribution to the Familysearch Worldwide Indexing Event I am proud because the Worldwide event highlighted the benefits of collaboration in the genealogy and family history sphere. Just as our blog Worldwide Genealogy brings together genealogists from around the world whose individual contributions combine to produce this blog as a resource for the Worldwide genealogy community the Worldwide Indexing Event brought together genealogists from around the workd to index digital resources from Familysearch.

The Familysearch blog reports that 66,511 indexers collaborated in this event and "While the focus for this challenge was on the total number of participants, a tremendous amount of indexing and arbitration work was accomplished as well. Here are the results for the number of records indexed and arbitrated.

Indexed: 4,682,746

Arbitrated: 941,932

Total Records Processed: 5.7 million"

If you have ever trawled through pages of unindexed Familysearch digital images you will appreciate the value of having more than 5 million new records indexed.

What made this event even more special for me was another collaborative effort, a Google Hangout on Air - GeneaSleepOver: Worldwide Indexing Event,  spearheaded by DearMyrtle and her Cousin Russ Worthington. (I will add links to the four Youtube videos from this event to the bottom of this post.)

I listened to and chatted to the hosts Myrt and Russ and other panelists from the US and UK while I indexed my few batches, at one stage the camera was directed to my computer screen as I worked on indexing one of my batches. That was quite a challenge for a newbie indexer. Myrt had also asked me to join and talk aboout a topic of my choosing, I elected to chat about Australian Royalty - those people who have and are proud of their convict ancestry. 

I watched and listened to the Hangout for around 8 hours of the 24, I was on the panel at the beginning and rejoined for the end. I was thrilled to chat with fellow Worldwide Genealogy bloggers, young Australian genealogist and new indexing volunteer Caitlin Gow and Hilary Gadsby from Wales who has blogged about her indexing experience.

 In Australia we talk about the Tyranny of Distance, being able to participate in the Hangout while participating in the Worldwide Indexing Event broke down the barrier of isolation we sometimes feel in Australia. Thanks to Myrt and Russ for organising this event.

GeneaSleepOver: Worldwide Indexing Event - Video (a):



GeneaSleepOver: Worldwide Indexing Event - Video (b):


GeneaSleepOver: Worldwide Indexing Event - Video (c):



GeneaSleepOver: Worldwide Indexing Event - Video (d):

Croeso i'r Blog Worldwide Achyddiaeth o Gymru

or Welcome to the Worldwide Genealogy Blog from Wales

Although I have lived in Wales for almost 21 years I do not speak the language. I used Google translate for the title phrase.
I know this is a tool that genealogists have used when researching in countries which do not use their native tongue. They have found it an asset as it is much cheaper than getting a translator for the records. It is not infallible but for most genealogists it has opened up the records they can use especially now more of them are becoming available online.

A bit more about me. My name is Hilary Gadsby and the title of my blog is The Edge of Snowdonia which pretty much describes where I live in North Wales. My research areas are all in England which is where I was born, Hampshire, Dorset and Wiltshire for my family and Lincolnshire, Rutland, Leicestershire and Norfolk for my husband's family. We have one or two people from other areas in our direct lines but the majority of the family have stayed in a small geographic area for centuries.
I started researching when the only internet we had available was using a dial up modem and you paid for each minute you were online, at this time or a little later I signed up for some rootsweb mailing lists in order to connect with other family historians, I also started with a free genealogy program which did little more than record basic details.
Over the years I have used various websites to connect to others with a shared interest  http://www.genesreunited.co.uk/, http://home.ancestry.co.uk/, http://www.lostcousins.com, http://tribalpages.com and http://www.wikitree.com being the main ones. 
I also use social networking websites such as  www.facebook.com and plus.google.com to connect with friends family and fellow genealogists. These are great if you want to connect with other researchers but what if you want to share with your own family and in a way that they can get involved as much or as little as they want. Most of these have varying amounts of privacy but none are totally private.

Famberry is different from most family history sites in that in order to be able to access the tree and any accompanying images you must be invited and a member of the family. Access is granted by the tree owner and can be restricted, the owner may also choose to grant access to the entire tree. So here is a place where you can share and collaborate without everyone having access. This makes it an ideal place for photographs and announcements, including living members of the family. To access the website go to http://famberry.com/ 

We discussed this website with the developer on last week's Mondays with Myrt which can be viewed on YouTube at 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXTRg5UDeM8&list=UUZlX5znu6d7CCz6xobwMXOA&feature=c4-overview
you may have to subscribe in order to view the video.

There are many ways in which we genealogists or family historians (whichever term which wish to use) can share and collaborate you may have others which I have overlooked. Please feel free to share them with us as collaboration is what we aim to foster with this blog.