My RootsTech Highlights

I don't know where to start!  What a fabulous conference we just had.  I'm so full of gratitude, to our clients, our friends, to this wonderful community that I get to work with and to the organizers at FamilySearch and FGS.  I just said to myself over and over "This is what a genealogy conference should be like."  Yea!  Finally!  Here are my favorite parts in no particular order:

 
My Family Was There.  Both my aunt and uncle on my Dad's side came to the conference with their spouses, as well as my parents, my children and of course Kim.  That is what it is all about isn't it?  It was so fantastic to have my family there with me at a family history conference.  One of the major highlights for me was all of the DNA kits we purchased.  Between all of us, let's just say we took home a good portion of the 15,000 kits Ancestry sold.  Yes, I'm on the cusp of a DNA overdose.  I can't wait.  Likewise, so many other genealogists were able to bring their family too.  It was fun to meet Mothers and Fathers and kids of other genealogists.  That's what it should be like.

Endorsements.  The very first day, we had a very popular genealogy figure come tell us she was ready to endorse us.  She has been careful to be fair and slow to endorse particular companies so that made my day.  I respect her opinion and we are pleased to have gained her trust.  We also had several other well-respected and well established organizations come to us about partnerships and help with printing and design.  We take the trust we have with genealogy companies and other genealogy entities very seriously so we were thrilled with all of the new endorsements we gained last week.  We can't wait to solidify them and tell you about them soon.

Our FANTASTIC Family ChartMasters Team.  We thought we were incredibly overstaffed but we were entirely understaffed.  Our new employees, Christine Fazulyanov, and Michelle Phillips were incredible troopers and worked so hard.  Erin Roudabush and Lara Orchard who have been with us for years were amazing as always.  And Susan McGhie, our new sales help was great--she knew all about our processes because we recently did a fantastic chart for her--she even found some new cousins by showing it off.  We even pressed Mom and Dad into service and they were a great support again.  Everyone worked non-stop and we were able to help lots of people with charts and with Zap ideas for their youth.  Just what we came to do.  We haven't seen anything but growth over the last several years so we are confident we are delivering a good product.  We always want to hear what you think about how we can do better.  Let us know.  We really want to help you create amazing charts.

Busy, Busy Busy!  From what I heard, the numbers were at 22,000.  Finally, the rest of the world is
catching on to how wonderful family history is.  A hearty thank you to FamilySearch for being able to spend the money to be able to grow this audience.  We are so pleased to have a conference that is starting to look like Comic Con.  Family History is that cool.  I'm so thrilled that the rest of the world is finally figuring that out.  The constant crowds of people were awesome. 

Friends In Real Life.  So this part was great and also not so great.  We honestly have a family in the genealogy world.  I really care about these friends I see at conferences and online.  We've become close.  So I love to see them in real life and catch up with what is going on in their lives.  So many hugs.  This time, several of my friends had been through huge challenges that you wouldn't share in social networking.  It was heartbreaking to hear about these challenges, but I'm so glad to know the whole truth.  I'm hoping I can find some small ways to help.  I really appreciate that they felt they could be honest with me and hope the hugs helped a little.

My Neighbors Were There.  One of my great joys was having many of my neighbors, and other friends who live in Salt Lake City show up.  It was so wonderful to see people that I don't usually see at a genealogy conference being curious.  I'm so excited that RootsTech has been able to reach that far.  I hope the next step is to take it on the road to other parts of the country. 

The RootsTech Program.  I didn't catch much of it but the parts I caught were phenomenal.  If the rest of the conference was as wonderful as the sessions I was in the whole thing was amazing.  Great content.  My favorite part was the new song and video from David Archuleta for FamilySearch and Ancestry's big move into Mexico.  The video still hasn't been released here but one of the attendees posted David's second performance of the song on YouTube.  Love It!

Can't wait until Studio C releases the video they played Friday night too.  Great stuff.  Fun to introduce my Genealogy friends to Studio C too.  As if the 17,000 excited people in the room weren't enough to be happy about. 
 
The Kids.  There has been a little bit of online banter about whether or not all the kids who descended on RootsTech Saturday were actually all that interested.  They may not be interested yet, but if we can make RootsTech fun, offer swag and some bags of candy, a little Studio C, hopefully they'll come along.  Count me in to do everything I can to help make this their first step.  Hopefully they'll progress towards the strong identities, resilience and self esteem they'll find as they learn more about family history. Again, this is absolutely what a family history conference should be like.  We need this next generation desperately.  It should be a family endeavor.  If, as a genealogy vendor you felt like this wasn't your market, you need to make it your market.  New market is good.  Let's grow!  RootsTech has delivered this next generation to us and we all need to do everything we can to make sure they love family history.  I'm all in.

The one thing I wasn't thrilled about was my lectures.  Even though I was really well prepared, after days of go go go, I don't think I was at the top of my game.  I really appreciate the people who came up afterward and said they liked what I had to say.  They taped the "6 Steps to Choreograph Your Research Across The Internet" but I'm not sure when it will be available.  If you want to see the lecture, a better option would probably be to sign up for the SCGS webinar on this coming Wednesday where I am giving it again.  I will have had more sleep so I think there won't be as many "ums"  Either way though, I hope the lectures helped some people organize their research more.


Another drawback was that there just wasn't enough time to really talk to our friends and partners enough.  We did more of our great Outside the Box sessions with Lisa Louise Cooke, Maureen Taylor, and Family Tree Magazine.  (Another Highlight)
But I hardly got to see them--we were all going 10 different directions.  Thanks to Family Tree Magazine for the great dinner we had, and for everyone who we got to eat with at other times during the conference.  It was so good to have time to chat.  That is always a favorite part of any genealogy conference. 

All in all, I think our Ancestors are pleased.  The genealogy community is stronger and our family relationships are tighter.  All is good in the world.

FamilySearch Blogger Dinner part II

So I promised to tell you about the rest of the blogger dinner.  They had some really interesting things to say about searching on FamilySearch

First Mark Gowan talked about the Record Hints.  They've been there for a while, but they are making things slicker with three new icons.  1) A gold icon for Record Hints.  These are places where indexing has uncovered a document that FamilySearch has been able to determine fits into your tree.  This is the same as the "Record Hints" that were previously on the right hand screen.  But the cute little magnifying class icon fits into other parts of the user experience--the pedigree chart, the descendancy view, etc.  That will help lead alot of the beginner users to the sources more effectively.  A good step in the right direction.  Other icons include 2) a blue icon for Research Suggestions and 3) a red icon for Data Problems.  These weren't really explained, but I'm excited to explore these more.  Anything that brings real research skills closer to the beginner is a good thing.

The power behind these icons is what is important though.  According to Robert Kehrer, FamilySearch has developed a really good algorithm that brings back good hints--not just hints-- an all important distinction.  Robert explained that the algorithm collects all of the person's data, and then collects all of the person's relatives and their data.  They take that whole cloud and compare it with the documents that have been indexed.  Then Robert showed us the new functionality that shows the whole family in that record and puts them on one side of the screen and shows the family from the tree on the other side of the screen.  Seeing those relationships helps a new researcher to make better decisions.  They can then go through and attach the source to each person in the tree.   This is a vast improvement over the previous user interface where you had to attach everyone separately through several steps. 

I applaud the movement toward source centricity and FamilySearch's continued efforts to make it easy for the beginner researcher to get into the documents easily.  This is a great step toward making it easier for newbies to play together with more advanced researchers.  FamilySearch will always need to work more on "newbie proofing"  One of FamilySearch's main agendas is to attract the 90%+ members of the LDS faith to genealogy.  Every step towards making it easy for newbies to focus on documents is a step in the right direction.  And as I've said many times before, that new person may have a box in the attic that solves all of your issues.  We have to love newbies if we are going to thrive as a community. But most of these screens work best with simple documents like the censuses.  Once you get into more complicated documents, it gets a little trickier.

There were the typical concerns in the room about the common tree aspect of FamilySearch.  What about the sources that are hard to interpret?  Once you get out of the censuses it gets trickier.  Judy Russell mentioned a source where her Uncle is listed as Bertie and is listed as a girl when his real name was Bert.  The regular criticism of creating a common tree rather than having individual trees like Ancestry and MyHeritage is that the records aren't clean enough to come to a common consensus.  Robert and Mark had the best answer I've heard yet about FamilySearch's position on that.  He said they are "Idealists" that they believe most of the disputes will come to a consensus.  Lots of people think they are too optimistic.  While there will be some unending disputes, we can hope that they are right.  Time will tell.  I personally love that they ask for a reason when adding a source to the tree and give us a place for discussions.  While that won't help in some sticky situations with ongoing cousin wars, at least they are providing an avenue to capture that all important document *analysis* that most databases have overlooked in the past.  I remember talking to Ransom Love and others about this in our affiliate meetings years before new.familysearch was launched.  Even back then, one could see that the person with the most time to track the database is going to win the dispute--not necessarily the person with the most knowledge.  FamilySearch has always had that optimism.  In a couple more years, it will be interesting to see if the breakdown is 98% settled vs. 2% disputed, or 80% settled vs. 20% disputed, or 30% settled and 70% disputed. One can hope.

It was also good to hear the clearest explanation I've heard yet about copyright issues related to uploading images to the database.  FamilySearch is not policing copyright upfront--they don't require you to click a button to state that you have copyright permission (like we do at familychartmasters.com)  Their approach has been to state in the Terms of Use that the user is responsible for copyright and then deal with any complaints and problems that arise.  Hopefully the users will respect the copyrights of the record holders.  I know I have found some really great stuff that I'd love to add to the database, but really can't--I can only write good source citations that will point people in the right direction.  It was good to hear what the official policy and plan of attack FamilySearch is working with on that.

Finally, the best part of the night was when Robert went to attach a source to a person on the tree and lightning struck outside at that exact moment.  Considering that FamilySearch is sponsored by the LDS church, does that mean that your genealogy research can come with Divine approval?  Now there is something to really hope for. I only wish it could all be that correct.

Report from the FamilySearch Blogger Dinner Part I

I got to go to the blogger dinner last night to catch up on everything that FamilySearch is doing.  It was great seeing everyone and getting a chance to listen to the FamilySearch presenters and have some time to talk to them.  Lots of exciting new things going on.

David Rencher started out by talking about how they are ramping up the camera teams.  They are hoping to have 500 teams around the world doing digitization by next year.  He also said there are 10 images created for every one image that is indexed.  So we are in great need of more indexing.  That's still a great problem to have though.

He also said they are getting better at tracking what is going on in the Family Tree.  They are tracking people with multiple parents (especially many sets of parents--obviously a problem) and that number is starting to go down.  We are making progress on cleaning up the data that was brought in from the myriad of FamilySearch databases when Family Tree was created.  And we are getting better at putting in good data.  So that is good news too.

Then Dan Call spoke about the upcoming RootsTech conference.  I'm really excited about the two lectures they accepted of mine, "Family History Adhesive: The Science of Why History Binds Families and the Simple Tech of How to Do It" and "6 Steps to Choreograph Your Research Across the Internet" (More to come on that in a bit) The theme is "Who Inspires You?"  I don't remember seeing that theme in the call for papers. I wish I had known about it because I might have submitted entirely different stuff.  I'm always talking about being inspired by your family history (for example here and here--besides my books).  I think I have alot to say about that.

One statistic that caught my eye was that in 2013 there were 5250 paying attendees of RootsTech.  And in 2014 there were 5500.  I thought that was interesting that the profitable part of the conference only increased by 250 people.  Yet the exhibitors jumped from 140 to 170.  I think the size of the non-paying attendees (Family Discovery Day, etc.) has made this look like a profitable industry and encouraged new companies to enter the waters, but in reality, the market really hasn't grown that much.  It is disconcerting to me that the expo hall has doubled each year, and is going to double in size next year, and yet the financially vested attendees has not.  This, combined with the fact that a select few RootsTech talks have been broadcast far and wide and spawned a multitude of smaller family history fairs--without vendors--has the potential to affect the industry adversely. 

Next, Bryce Roper talked about the FamilySearch Mobile App that is now available on iOS and Android.  It is looking really good.  It can help you discover something new, add stories and links to the database, quickly add photos of sources with your device's camera, and --coolest part-- create and upload a recording.  Bryce said the recordings can be up to 15 meg (about 30 minutes).  Such a great tool for people to do interviews with.  Soon you'll be able to edit vital statistics and add people to the tree.  I'm excited to see this development as I think it will attract a whole new demographic.  We had seen FamilySearch affiliates try to create a commercial app without success--again disconcerting--but I'm glad the job is getting done.  I wish a commercial app had been a viable option because we need a stronger genealogy industry.  The Memories app is also helping to capture stories and pictures etc but according to Bryce is only available in iOS so far and is not connecting those things to the tree yet.  So more to watch for there.  This is big for youth--of course one of my passions.  I think apps for mobile devices is a game changer for anyone under 30.  It is going to be alot easier to work on this with my kids now. 

We're heading out this morning to get set up for the conference.  Mark Gowan and Robert Kehrer also had some really interesting things to say about searching.  I'll cover that in FamilySearch Blogger dinner part II shortly.  In the meantime, what do you think about these issues? 

I Am Thankful, Part 4

To sum up my journey of "big genealogy business" gratitude, I need to mention FamilySearch.  Of course they bring a lot to the genealogy community.  First and foremost, FamilySearch brings in a huge influx of money into genealogy. Because profitability isn't the end goal for them, FamilySearch can take risks. Which, when you think about it, is pretty exciting.  Rootstech, among other conferences, is a great example of the good that comes from having deep pockets and no need to make a profit.  I think we can all agree that we're pretty grateful for programs like that, not to mention all of the Family History Libraries that anyone can access. A steady income, with only a minor focus on margins, makes a big difference for the rest of us.

As a quick side note to that, I feel like I should mention why it doesn't particularly bother me that members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints get free access to companies like MyHeritage.com, Ancestry.com, and FindMyPast.com as a result of FamilySearch's partnerships with these companies. I know it doesn't seem fair to everyone else in the genealogical community.  However, you may not realize that LDS church members already give 10% of their income to their church, which helps fund FamilySearch, among other things.  So, they already have a financial stake (in addition to their own volunteer time) in FamilySearch's partnerships.  As a result, I can see why they are able to benefit from that for their own personal family history research and work. That makes me wonder, though,  if anyone would be willing to donate 10% of their income to Family ChartMasters in exchange for some partnership benefits? We wouldn't mind experimenting with some deeper pockets of our own. ;)

All kidding aside and back to my gratitude for FamilySearch... I truly appreciate the volunteerism and work ethic coming from its users.  It's quite simply a given for FamilySearch contributors that family history work is important and something that we all need to do.  The volunteer effort put in by people who index and work on records collection and preservation is pretty astounding.  These folks do it because they know it's important and they don't expect anything in return.  That's the real spirit of family history work right there: helping others find the missing links in their own histories because it's the right thing to do.  I have some real love for that.

In the end, FamilySearch (along with the MyHeritage and Ancestry) brings a lot to the table for all of us.  Sometimes as a small business owner it can feel a bit daunting to work alongside these giants; but there are so many things to be thankful for.  I have learned lots in my business and personal dealings with these companies, I love working alongside the good people who work for them and I truly am thankful for the roles they play in my company's success.  I am thankful everyday that I get to work in this industry and love the work I do so much.  I hope you'll be able to look around and find some things you are thankful for too.  There is lots to be grateful for when you look for it. 

I've recovered from RootsTech--finally.

2014 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved

Reprinted from my post on the Visit Salt Lake Blog:

It has taken me three weeks to recover.  What a party.  If you missed it, you'll want to catch the video archive and mark your calendars for next year.  RootsTech has become the biggest family history conference in the world.

2014 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved

Over the past 10 years, I have traveled with my company, Family ChartMasters, to conferences across North America and Europe.  To date, the largest family history conference has been Who Do You Think You Are Live in London, England.  But this year, with the online streaming attendees, and record registrations, Salt Lake City was the host for what has become the largest Family History event in the world.   RootsTech was held at the Salt Palace and was sponsored by FamilySearch.  Attendees traveled from 49 states (if you are in South Dakota you need to come next year) and 32 countries.

2014 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved

Speakers presented workshops on a wide range of family history topics including social networking and archiving photos, DNA and storytelling and etc, and etc,.  The presentations included a wide range of beginner to more advanced topics.  Computer labs gave attendees hands on experience with the latest technologies.  And the keynote presentations each morning came from a wide range of popular presenters.  My favorite lecture was the keynote Friday with Judy Russell.  She is a crowd-pleasing genealogy speaker who talked about how quickly family history information is lost and how important it is to effectively pass it down.  Follow the link to listen to her inspiring presentation. 

2014 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved

On top of the great classes, the vendor's hall was the biggest I've ever seen--and so much fun.  With a demo theater, free giveaways and lots of hands on exhibits, you could spend the whole day in the vendors hall and learn enough to keep you busy throughout the next year.  Experts from genealogy companies around the world were on hand to solve your family history problems and help you learn more about your ancestors.

RootsTech continues to grow and improve each year and I'm sure next year will be even better.  Mark your calendars for February 12-14th 2015 and plan to join us and have lots of fun learning about who you are and where you came from.  You'll be able to register this fall at rootstech.org.  I'll see you there.

Thanks to Paul Nauta at FamilySearch for the great pictures.  I was so busy I only got a few.  It was such a whirlwind I was only able to post to facebook a little.  It was so fun to see everyone and we never get enough time to talk during the short three days.  But it is so much excitement packed into such a short amount of time I don't know that I could do it for much longer.  For more info on my lecture and my son's lecture see my post over on my Zap The Grandma Gap Blog. We had a great time.