How does the Family Tree Work? Digging Into the entire FamilySearch.org website, Part Eight

One possible title for this post was "How does the FamilySearch.org Family Tree work or not work?" but I decided on a shorter title. The FamilySearch Family Tree is unique in many ways. It is ultimately a service provided by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a major, international church headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah. The website was developed and is maintained by FamilySearch, a non-profit corporation owned by the Church. FamilySearch is the trade name of the Genealogical Society of Utah, an organization dating back to 1894. Because of deeply religious beliefs, the Church has spent a huge amount of time and expended significant resources in gathering and preserving historic, genealogically important records. Ultimately, these records are preserved and stored in a huge granite vault built into the side of a canyon in the mountains east of Salt Lake City, Utah. The online records of the FamilySearch website are backed up daily on huge commercial server farms around the country and I suppose around the world. For these reasons alone, the FamilySearch.org website is unique and in my opinion, an international treasure. The website is also free and can be accessed by anyone interested in discovering their own ancestral heritage. 

The FamilySearch.org Family Tree (I will continue referring to to this part of the website as just the "Family Tree.) is based on a wiki design. Years ago, the concept of an online wike was controversial. You can read about the history of wikis in detail in this Wikipedia article: History of wikis. One of the hallmarks of a wiki is the preservation of the history of every change to the database. The Family Tree, from the beginning has preserved the history of all the changes to each entry. You can click and see the history from any page. The history of the entries in an integral part of the operation of the Family Tree and one of its most important features. 

At this point in this post, I am going to recommend that anyone who does not understand how the Family Tree works take the time to learn from The Family History Guide instructions on how the website works. If you are at all frustrated, discouraged, or otherwise unhappy with the Family Tree, I suggest you learn more about how it works. Knowledge is power and those who know extensively how the Family Tree does work are the only ones in a real position to question the parts that do not seem to work. Believe me, there is an active group of people who are beyond the term experts in the Family Tree that work on entering data every day of the year and are extremely accurate in pointing out deficiencies and problems with the website and do so on a regular basis directly to FamilySearch. 

Here, I repeat my commonly written statement about the Family Tree. The FamilySearch.org Family Tree works extremely well. Almost all of the "problems" people have with the Family Tree arise from the data entered not the function of the Family Tree itself. However, I must add that the Family Tree is evolving and changing as it grows and becomes more inclusive. It is a wiki and if the data in the Family Tree is wrong, you can change it. Over time, I have seen the Family Tree become a vast storehouse of valuable, very accurate, family history information. It will outlast the critics. 

Why does it work? Because wikis, by their nature and because they depend on human nature, tend to get more accurate over time. The Family Tree has millions of sources added each year. Despite the undercurrent of dissatisfaction because "people add wrong information" most of the tree is stable. As I have mentioned many times, I follow almost 400 people on the Family Tree and I am notified every week about any changes to any of the people I am following. Granted, I get over 100 changes every week except that nearly all these changes are always to the same half a dozen or so people all of whom are Mayflower passengers or descendants of the passengers. 

The Family Tree works because it is designed to work. Users enter the information as they know it to be and more frequently now with source in the form of a historical genealogical record. You can think of the parts of the Family Tree that don't have supporting sources as wishful thinking or imagination but these parts flourish when someone comes along and starts adding sources. The core part of my own part of the Family Tree hasn't changed in years. When some of the lines get back into the 1700s and 1600s, they begin to have more changes, although some of the lines back that far haven't changed in years also. 

Some of us view correcting and adding to the Family Tree to be the main activity of our personal genealogical research efforts. Of course, I spend a huge amount of time finding, searching, and evaluating historical documents, but sometimes those documents are easily accessed and searched using all the digital files online. I can usually add many sources to families in the 1800s without spending any time in a library or archive. 

When does the Family Tree not work? The answer is when someone thinks that they own their ancestors and forget that we are all related and have the same claim. Those people I talk to about their issues with the Family Tree are usually somehow deluded by the idea that they personally should control the information added and that they personally have all the right answers about their family. In some cases, frustration about the Family Tree comes from not understanding its basic function. Of course, there are also people who just do not have the computer skills or researching skills to understand how the Family Tree works. These people can be helped and educated. 

Now, is there a reason to back up your own work on the Family Tree? Yes, I find it helpful to have a separate copy of the information on the Family Tree and to keep working on one or two other trees so I can have an easy reference when any information is lost or changed. So, even if you don't want to spend your time working on the Family Tree, I suggest that you might want to have your information preserved and this will best be done by having a copy of your work on the Family Tree. Don't think about the Family Tree as something for your own generation. I am already seeing my children and grandchildren working on the Family Tree and they know a lot about computers, wikis, and all the rest. 

Here are the previous posts in what is going to be a very long series. 

Part One: https://genealogysstar.blogspot.com/2021/10/digging-into-entire-familysearchorg.html
Part Two: https://genealogysstar.blogspot.com/2021/10/digging-into-entire-familysearchorg_29.html

Part Three: https://genealogysstar.blogspot.com/2021/11/digging-into-entire-familysearchorg.html

Part Four: https://genealogysstar.blogspot.com/2021/11/digging-into-entire-familysearchorg_5.html

Part Five: https://genealogysstar.blogspot.com/2021/11/digging-into-entire-familysearchorg_9.html

Part Six: https://genealogysstar.blogspot.com/2021/11/digging-into-entire-familysearchorg_12.html

Part Seven: https://genealogysstar.blogspot.com/2021/11/digging-into-entire-familysearchorg_25.html