A Heritage Lost

The last few days have been busier than usual as we watch the Wallow Fire in Eastern Arizona move through the White Mountains. Much of my time as a child, youth, and adult has been spent in the small mountain communities. I remember one Scout outing that I convinced the leaders to take the time to drive to Big Lake and camp. One of the leaders got out of his car and just stood there in the campground looking for a long time and finally said, "This is the most beautiful place I have ever been."

This is also the area where my grandparents, my great-grandparents and some of my great-great-grandparents lived, worked, died and are buried. This beautiful valley, shown above, was the home of my Great-great-grandparents. Almost everything you see above has now been burned in one of the largest fires in the history of Arizona. All we have now are memories.

I won't say that all of my experiences have been positive. Some of the hardest and most difficult times of my life have also been spent in Eastern Arizona and with the people living there. I always like to say that the national sport of Apache County is suing people, but despite the contention, I do love the places. Although, I have lived most of my life in the Arizona Sonora Desert, I feel most at home in the wide open spaces of the Springerville Volcanic District.

I hope we all take time to enjoy those places that mean the most to us. Although we will all pass from this earth eventually, we don't always realize that the earth itself is fragile and can be lost.

What if genealogists were like some of the other professionals?

Receptionist: Hello, Dewey, Searchum and Find, professional genealogists, may I help you?

Client: Hello, my name is James and I am looking for a genealogist to help me with a small research problem.

Receptionist: Thank you let me transfer you to Ms. Find's assistant, please hold.

[Music and advertisements play]

Assistant: Hello, this is Julie, I am Ms. Find's assistant can I help you?

Client: (repeating) Hello, my name is James and I am looking for a genealogist to help me with a small research problem.

Assistant: What is the nature of the problem? Ms. Find's practice is limited to Pennsylvania in the 18th Century and parts of New Jersey.

Client: Well, then I may have to call someone else, my question involves finding my great-grandfather in New York State in the late 1800s.

Assistant: I can transfer you to Mr. Searchum's assistant, he may be able to help you with New York.

[Music and advertisements play]

2nd Assistant:  Hello, this is Mark, I am Mr. Searchum's assistant can I help you?

Client (repeating again):  Hello, my name is James and I am looking for a genealogist to help me with a small research problem.

2nd Assistant: What is the nature of the problem?

Client:  My question involves finding my great-grandfather in New York State in the late 1800s.

Assistant: Do you happen to know the county? 

Client: Actually, no. That is the reason I am calling to talk to a genealogist. I thought I might get some help in finding my ancestor.

2nd Assistant: Yes, yes, of course. Mr. Searchum is very well acquainted with New York in the 1800s and he will certainly be able to help you. Would you like to make an appointment?

Client: Um, can I talk to him on the phone for a few minutes to find out if he can help me?

2nd Assistant: Are you an existing client or new to our office?

Client: Well, I was referred to you by another genealogist who said that they only worked on land cases and she couldn't take the case.

2nd Assistant: We will need to have you fill out our new client profile information sheet first when you come in for an appointment, as a rule Mr. Searchum does not do telephone consultations. You should also be aware that there is a non-refundable $300 consultation fee for the first hour and that Mr. Searchum bills by the hour for any additional time spent. Would you like to make an appointment?

Client: Do you mean I have to pay $300 just to find out if Mr. Searchum can help me with my problem?

2nd Assistant: Mr. Searchum is a highly sought after professional and his time is very valuable. I think that you will find that most professional genealogists are charging the same or higher fees. Would you like to make an appointment?

Client: Well, he does come recommended, I guess I can give it try. When is your first opening?

2nd Assistant: Mr. Searchum's first opening is on August 15th  at 2:00 pm. Would you like to come in then?

Client: That's two months away, do you have anything sooner?

2nd Assistant: I'm afraid not. I could put you on our cancellation list and we would call you if we have an emergency opening. 

Client: How many clients are on that list?

2nd Assistant: I would think there would be about twenty, that is the usual amount. 

Client: OK, put me down for Monday, the 15th of August at 2:00 pm.

[Time passes it is now August 15th]

Client (arriving at office): Hello, I am here to see Mr. Searchum. 

Receptionist: Do you have an appointment?

Client: Yes, I have an appointment at 2:00. 

Receptionist: Please take this clipboard and fill out the form on both sides and sign it at the bottom. Also I need two forms of identification. I will also collect your consultation fee at this time, thank you.

[Time in the office passes, it is now 2:35]

Client: Excuse me, my name is James and I came in about an hour ago for an appointment with Mr. Searchum, is there some problem.

Receptionist: No, not at all, Mr. Searchum is running a little late with other clients. He will be with you shortly.

[More time passes, it is now 3:10]

Client: Look, I have been waiting here for over an hour, do you have any idea when I will get in to see Mr. Searchum?

Receptionist: Let me check, (on telephone), Mr. Searchum is just finishing his last appointment and should be any time now.

[Much more time passes, it is now 3:30]

2nd Assistant at the door to the inner office: Mr. Searchum will see you now. 

Client: Thanks, I was certainly getting tired of those endless Ancestry.com commercials, can't you get any other station on your reception area TV? 

2nd Assistant: I'm sorry but that is a recorded message. Here is Mr. Searchum's conference room.

[Client sits in conference room waiting for Mr. Searchum. Time passes it is now 4:00]

Mr. Searchum: (entering room carrying a stack of papers) I see from your client information sheet that you had a previous consultation with my colleague Ms. Longtime. 

Client: Yes, she referred me to you.

Mr. Searchum: Did you discuss the research with Mr. Longtime?

Client: Well, of course I did. That was my reason for going to see her. She said she couldn't help me. 

Mr. Searchum: Oh, I am so sorry, but I believe I have a conflict of interest. I am on a another 

case with Ms. Longtime and we can't take matters that the other has reviewed.

Client: Why did she refer me to you then? 

Mr. Searchum: I have no idea. But I cannot take your case. I really appreciate your dropping by today however.

Did the client still have to pay the consultation fee? Did he ever find a genealogist to help his with his problem? Did he die first?

I would hope that those genealogists who aspire to be professionals do not take a page from some of the other "professionals" I have visited as a client or patient. Any resemblance between this scenario and actual events is purely intentional. Maybe we don't want to be quite so professional after all?

A radical shift in technology is coming

With consumer electronics we are so used to incremental change that it is sometimes difficult to see long term changes looming on the horizon. As a genealogist, I mostly have a pragmatic and show-me attitude towards claims of radical new technology. But there are an accumulations of changes that indicate to me that there is another major shift in way electronics operate and interact in the workplace that is just around the corner. What is the big change? The wireless integration of handheld and laptop computer systems with traditionally non-computer functions.

Like most other incremental changes this one is approaching a major rift. You saw this first when peripherals like mice and keyboards began to be liberated from their tethers. This was caused by the growth in the Bluetooth technology, a very limited range wireless open technology. Here the operative word is "open." Open technologies mean that no one is claiming ownership or royalties for the development of the technology, anyone can use the development and add to or change it. You also saw this developing with the spread of WiFi devices such as laptops and tablet computers.

Despite computer ads to the contrary, when you buy a new desktop computer your "desktop" soon fills with wires and connectors. The basic revolutionary development of tablet computers, such as the iPad, and the use of iPods and smartphones has eliminated tethered computing to some degree and it appears that the trend will continue to develop.

Why is this a radical shift? Computers have long been associated with a box, a keyboard and a monitor. With the graphic users interface, a mouse or other tracking device was added to the mixture. The advent of laptops foretold the integration of all these separate items into one semi-portable device. Now, the changes have reached the critical point of involving a shift in the way we interact with computers.

A few of the factors going into the shift are as follows:

• The development of increasingly lighter and smaller devices with powerful computer capabilities.  For example, Apple's new MacBook Pro is its most powerful and fastest computer presently available. 
• The move from mouse driven interfaces to hand gesture interfaces. Right now, you probably are not thinking of giving up your mouse, but if you are using a smart phone, an iPad or iPod, you have probably not used a mouse lately.
• The lack of need for a physical wire connection. The explosion of WiFi and Bluetooth devices are quickly eliminating the need for your computer to be physically connected to the network, to printers or to other peripheral devices. 
• The integration of computers with historically non-computing devices such as TV, radio, and movies. When was the last time you watched a movie? Was it downloaded from the Internet? Likely it was.
• The combination of computers with telephone service, movies, still and video cameras, GPS devices and many other functions. It is inevitable that the hand held devices with continue to consolidate functions now done by separate items into one all-purpose device. Right now, you can buy a GPS device that will act as a Bluetooth speaker for your cell phone and also show movies and play music. On the other hand, you can buy a cell phone that will do all the same things.

All of these factors are coming together to create an entirely new way of interacting with computer based devices. How many of us thought we would be storing genealogical data on our telephone? All of these factors will continue to force the computers into new formats and new uses. I realized that the day of the dedicated desktop computer was probably dead when I got my MacBookPro and my wife got a keyboard for her iPad.

Spam, Phishing and Genealogy

Google's security team recently commented on a Phishing campaign aimed at U..S. Government officials. Here is a quote from the Official Google Blog:

Through the strength of our cloud-based security and abuse detection systems*, we recently uncovered a campaign to collect user passwords, likely through phishing. This campaign, which appears to originate from Jinan, China, affected what seem to be the personal Gmail accounts of hundreds of users including, among others, senior U.S. government officials, Chinese political activists, officials in several Asian countries (predominantly South Korea), military personnel and journalists.

The goal of this effort seems to have been to monitor the contents of these users’ emails, with the perpetrators apparently using stolen passwords to change peoples’ forwarding and delegation settings. (Gmail enables you to forward your emails automatically, as well as grant others access to your account.)

The article describes the process as follows:

Bad actors take advantage of the fact that most people aren’t that tech savvy—hijacking accounts by using malware and phishing scams that trick users into sharing their passwords, or by using passwords obtained by hacking other websites. Most account hijackings are not very targeted; they are designed to steal identities, acquire financial data or send spam. But some attacks are targeted at specific individuals.

 In case you do not know, phishing is a way of attempting to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords and credit card details by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication. See Wikipedia.

I have been the target of several phishing attacks through a huge amount of spam, but usually you can look at the URL and see that it is not from the site being represented. Another simple remedy is to delete any e-mail you receive from even a slightly questionable source before opening the message. This is especially true for e-mails from banks or other financial institutions. If you have the slightest doubt that an e-mail is valid, call the sender and ask if an e-mail was sent. Never provide personal information in response to an e-mail without verification of the sender.

I have had to change my e-mail address on occasion for simple reason that I was getting a huge amount of spam which includes a fair amount of phishing. 

Now, as online genealogists we probably send and receive more than the average amount of e-mail. I get messages all the time from banks telling me that there is a problem with my account and to click on the link to get information about the problem. These inquiries always interest me because I usually do not have an account at that particular bank.

Being online is almost a necessity for today's genealogist, but that does not mean that we have to leave our common sense and good judgement behind and pick up on every fake phishing inquiry.

Entering the citation jungle

The fact that anytime you find a source of information and use that information, the source should be attributed seems like one of the most basic concepts of research and cooperative civilized life in general. The purpose for citing sources fall into various categories including:

1. Remembering and keeping track of where the information came from so that you (the researcher) can find it again if you need to do so.
2. Letting others know where the information came from so that they can verify your accuracy in reporting the information and do further research if they care to do so.
3. Validating your research so that others know that you didn't just make up the information.
4. Avoiding copyright and plagiarism claims. If you copy information you run the risk of claims that your work was not original. I will comment on this more fully below.
5. Observing the minimum requirements of good scholarship and research, that is, acknowledging the work of others in supporting your own work.
6. Helping to give credence to any conclusions you derive from your research. It is one thing to claim a family relationship based on your opinion and another to provide documentation that the relationship exists. 

I could go on, of course, there are a lot of other reasons even ones getting into issues of morality and honesty. I realize numbers three and six are very closely related but validation and believability are not the same thing.

Plagiarism is copying someone's work, whether or not it is copyrighted, and failing to provide an attribution, thereby allowing people to believe it is your own creation. Anytime you use an idea or words or pictures or whatever that comes from someone else, you should give credit to the source. To fail to give credit is morally reprehensible and bad scholarship to boot. It is essentially similar to stealing, you may be able to steal for a protracted period of time, but your entire moral and social standing will deteriorate as soon as you are discovered. (Actually, your moral standing goes when you steal, but that is another discussion) I am not talking about discovery of wrong doing, I am talking about individual integrity.

Copying off of the Internet, in today's world, is simply silly. Most schools in the U.S. now have search capabilities to enter student's text into a search that will almost instantly tell the teachers if the students have copied their work. I can do the same thing by copying a portion of a text document and searching for those same words. You can do a Google search on an entire page or paragraph and if you find the same exact words, you can see immediately where the words came from.

Whether or not you attach any moral significance to plagiarism is your problem, but it becomes my problem when you try to establish the work as your own.

Unfortunately, there is a substrata in genealogy that excuses wholesale copying of pedigrees and such. I ofter hear complaints that entire genealogical files, shared with a relative, have been republished without so much as a thank you to the original source. Citation goes way beyond the issue of how to format the attribution, it goes to the essence of creating a trusting and cooperative society. To the extent that the members of the genealogical community fail to provide attribution (i.e. citation to sources), to that extent the ultimate goals of research cooperation will be frustrated.

I also think that the arguments over the style or format of citation is silly. Do I really need an 800+ page book to tell me how to write down the information I need about sources? Well, the answer to that question is in the next post as well as a discussion, again, of the copyright issues. I will also comment more fully on doing Internet searches to determine plagiarism.

The Perfect Citation Storm

Randy Seaver started another round of the citation storm with a post entitled, "Inflaming Source Citation Passions." Never one to shirk a contest, I decided to jump right in with my opinions. Before getting to the meat of my opinions about citations, I think it would be nice to know who we are talking to. Here is a breakdown I call the Citation Awareness Chart, before getting into the battle, you might want to rank yourself and see if you really care: (please understand that I am not going to be very serious about this whole subject, so don't go getting yourself offended).

Level One: Can't read, can't write, can't type, doesn't know what a computer is and has never heard of genealogy.
Level Two: Can read and write, but hasn't ever heard of genealogy and thinks that it means studying rocks and minerals. Can play computer games and watch Netflix movies on a computer.
Level Three: Has read more than books assigned in school. Can copy written material if given time. Has heard of genealogy but cannot spell it. Uses a computer to check the weather and write on Facebook.
Level Four: Has an interest in genealogy and if asked, would know to look the word up before writing it or at least, use the spell checker in a word processing program. Has an e-mail account and can write a complete sentence.
Level Five: Has read several books. Uses the computer for writing checks. Has an active interest in genealogy and has entered names into Personal Ancestral File, but has lost the files several times and does not know how to find them on their own computer.
Level Six: Has graduated from Personal Ancestral File to some other program. Thinks that everything in the family trees online is scripture. Has a vague idea that genealogy involves research, but has just copied a complete line from FamilySearch and thinks the genealogy is all done.
Level Seven: Has realized that some of the information online is not accurate and is frustrated with the inaccuracies. Has a stack of photocopies of documents but doesn't know what to do with them. Has submitted his or her genealogy file to at least six online family trees.
Level Eight: Attends genealogy conferences and classes. Has heard about citations and tried a few but not found them easy to do. Knows that genealogists should use citations but hasn't figured out how to do them in his or her genealogy program.
Level Nine: Has recorded some of source citations for obvious sources but has never heard of Elizabeth Shown Mills and has put all the citations in the Notes section of the genealogy program.
Level Ten: Has listed citations for everything in the genealogy file. Has used the citation forms suggested by the program but doesn't really know or care if they are correct. Has never heard of MLA, Turabian or Chicago Manual of Style.
Level Eleven: Has meticulously listed every book, record, document or paper he or she ever touched and has complete and exhaustive citations to everything. Is worried whether or not the citations are correctly formatted.
Level Twelve: Has personal copies of the Chicago Manual of Style, Mills' books and several others. Stays awake at night worrying about citations.
Level Thirteen: Has all of the above books and is an editor for a genealogical publication and dictates the proper citation style.

OK, so who are really talking to? I would guess that for anyone lower than about Level Six, you are wasting your time. I don't think that it is wise to equate a genealogy file with a doctoral dissertation. If a citation has enough information to find the source, who (except those in Levels Eleven or above) cares if the citation conforms to somebody's idea of correctness. Having been a college professor for many years, I know how to be picky. I can argue periods and commas with the best, but who are we kidding? Do we want the general public involved in genealogy or do we want to turn it into a cult? See Kerry Scott.

Facebook Genealogy?

I understand genealogy to be a highly complex and involved activity. When I began "searching for my ancestors" I quickly discovered a very research oriented and intensively source based community. One of my early activities was going through a pile of letters that constituted years of inquiries posted by my Great-grandmother. These were long letters telling family news and setting out relationships. I also found, rather quickly, that very few (were there any?) members of my immediate family were at all interested in my research. I would constantly try to "update" family members on my progress, but I cannot recall any instances where my interest was reciprocated.

I wish I could say, in this Facebook generation, that all that has changed and that I am now inundated with interest in my family lines. Not. I do get an occasional inquiry, usually about a remote relative about whom I know next to nothing. Since a significant portion of my family lines go back to New England, this is not unusual. Estimates place the number of descendants of my third Great-grandfather, John Tanner, into the hundreds of thousands. I was one of the early contributors to the Pedigree Resource File, an early online family tree program, where I uploaded my research three different times. As far as I know, I am the only person I have every discovered, who documented John Tanner's birth records in Hopkinton, Rhode Island. Do you think one of those hundreds of thousands of descendants might have some interest in John Tanner's actual sources? Apparently not.

My Great-grandmother would painstakingly hand write inquiry after inquiry about her family and gathered literally thousands of names of relatives with pertinent genealogical data. She would wait months and years for replies. So, now that we have Facebook, this should all be happening a warp speed, shouldn't it?

OK, so I go to my venerable Facebook account. I make a search for "John Tanner" genealogy. Given all of his descendants, many of which I know are on Facebook, there should be a lot of genealogical information? Right? I get three responses: an offer for a free Tanner surname search, an advertisement for a book about Tanners and my own reference to my research. Let's try my standard search for "Henry Martin Tanner" my Great-grandfather. I already know he is listed literally thousands of times on the Internet in various sites. Now to the Facebook search. Guess what? Two of my posts and one from my daughter.

Maybe I am missing something. I will just search for genealogy on Facebook. Wow, I hit the jackpot. There is a whole world of Facebook sites dedicated to genealogy. I get tired of clicking to see more results, the list is endless. So maybe I went about this all wrong. I shouldn't be searching for anyone in particular on Facebook, I should be posting my inquiries like a billboard along the Freeway. Something you can read at 65 mph. No time to discuss whether or not the sources for John Tanner are documented, maybe Facebook is just a place to get together, sort of like the Mall in Phoenix in the summer?

Hmm. A little more investigation is in order perhaps. I go down through the Facebook listings. It looks like a lot of people are asking for and offering help with genealogical questions. It also looks like Facebook has taken over the old bulletin boards like RootsWeb and such, where everyone used to post their inquires. It does look like a lot of the "sites" on Facebook are really fronts for commercial businesses. A lot of the sites are republications of blog posts and associated comments. Let's see what happens with a Mayflower family inquiry. Richard Warren ought to have some real discussions going.

I search for Richard Warren and get a cross-reference to Wikipedia from Microsoft's Bing. Now I am confused. If I search on Facebook, I am actually searching on Bing? Apparently. However, there is nothing on Facebook itself.

So what does Facebook offer to me in the way of serious, complicated, source centered, documented, intense genealogical information? I think the jury is still out on this question.