Thoughts of a relative newcomer

As a relative newcomer to blogging and considering my background, it is quite evident that not only are my opinions in the minority, but I am certainly not in the pecking order to have any opinions at all. Far be it for me to rattle the cages of the lions of the genealogical community!

I may be a newcomer to genealogy blogging, but I started my technological experience back in the 1960s working on producing an electronic English/Shoshoni Shoshoni/English dictionary on the University of Utah main frame computer. This was when entering data was done on punch cards. I suppose that I do have a somewhat skewed view of the genealogical community since I, as a newcomer to genealogical research, I only started 33 years ago. Of course, at the time I started, I had only been frequenting libraries regularly since 1953. Likewise, my exposure to technology is limited since I only started an immersive involvement with micro-computers in 1975. My years owning a retail computer store and providing technical support to school systems and business hardly matter in this new world of the genealogical community. Of course, I have a limited experience also with the Internet since it already had 6 websites by the time I began using it extensively.

Of course, as a practicing trial attorney for 39 years, I had little contact with either opinions or technology. Oh, I forgot for the last 35 years we operated a computer-based graphics design and computer support business. But the fact that we produced everything from books to display advertising probably doesn't really give me any insight into technological changes even though I probably owned one of the first laser printers in Arizona and began programming in PostScript.

It is also evident that I am severely limited in the number of blogs I follow, so once again, my viewpoint is skewed and I am not yet in a position to have an opinion. Again as a newcomer, even though I realize that my opinions carry no weight, I return to my mantra: Some people eat, sleep and chew gum, I do genealogy and write.

Well, where would we be if we didn't have different opinions on a variety of subjects? Every day that I got up and went to court, I knew with a certainty, that whatever I said would be vigorously opposed by either the opposing counsel or the court. I am more than used to being told I am wrong and I am further more than used to getting up the next day and doing it all over again.

Stay tuned.