Is it me or is Ancestry.com becoming more and more a gimmiky commercial
enterprise rather that a serious research site?
What with "2 stage log-ins through Google", "back stories", "My
family stories", "Pet's DNA" It used to be a decent research site.
It still is I suppose, if you you can get through the tangled web it
has weaved.

Or of course perhaps it's just me, a grumpy old man sounding off.
p.s. I hope the hyphen is in the right place!! Re. previous remarks

On 08/12/2023 10:03, Geoff wrote:
> Is it me or is Ancestry.com becoming more and more a gimmiky commercial
> enterprise rather that a serious research site?
> What with "2 stage log-ins through Google", "back stories", "My
> family stories", "Pet's DNA" It used to be a decent research site.
> It still is I suppose, if you you can get through the tangled web it
> has weaved.
>
> Or of course perhaps it's just me, a grumpy old man sounding off.
> p.s. I hope the hyphen is in the right place!! Re. previous remarks

One of the more annoying aspects for me has always been that it appears
to be aimed at the American market. However, it is what other people I
know use, so I stay with it in order that we can share trees with each
other and help each other with research.

I have always ignored their story lines, but I think that pet DNA has to
be the silliest idea yet.

--
Colin Bignell

On 12/08/2023 5:15 AM, Colin Bignell wrote:
> On 08/12/2023 10:03, Geoff wrote:
>> Is it me or is Ancestry.com becoming more and more a gimmiky commercial
>> enterprise rather that a serious research site?
>> What with "2 stage log-ins through Google", "back stories",   "My
>> family stories",  "Pet's DNA"  It used to be a decent research site.
>> It still is I suppose, if you you can get through the tangled web it
>> has weaved.
>>
>> Or of course perhaps it's just me, a grumpy old man sounding off.
>> p.s.  I hope the hyphen is in the right place!!  Re. previous remarks
>
> One of the more annoying aspects for me has always been that it appears
> to be aimed at the American market. However, it is what other people I
> know use, so I stay with it in order that we can share trees with each
> other and help each other with research.
>
> I have always ignored their story lines, but I think that pet DNA has to
> be the silliest idea yet.
>
The 2 stage login stinks. I had been working on Ancestry yesterday,
and left it for a couple of hours. I think was running out of time
and wanted to quickly check something. Could not because of the
Ancestry 2 step.
As you say, my Ancestry subscription is become less and less valuable,
and is quick reaching the point where it is more bother that good.

In message <ukuv4r$1nkf0$1@dont-email.me> at Fri, 8 Dec 2023 06:36:58,
knuttle <keith_nuttle@yahoo.com> writes
[]
>The 2 stage login stinks. I had been working on Ancestry yesterday,
>and left it for a couple of hours. I think was running out of time
>and wanted to quickly check something. Could not because of the
>Ancestry 2 step.

I selected email as the delivery method, and it never arrived, despite
several "resend" attempts.
>
>As you say, my Ancestry subscription is become less and less valuable,
>and is quick reaching the point where it is more bother that good.

I've let mine lapse until they have a good offer: last renewal would
have been more than twice what I paid last year, so they can stuff that!
I much prefer FindMyPast's search anyway, with the on-screen hit counter
making it very easy to adjust what you're specifying.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Radio 4 is one of the reasons being British is good. It's not a subset of
Britain - it's almost as if Britain is a subset of Radio 4. - Stephen Fry, in
Radio Times, 7-13 June, 2003.

On Fri, 8 Dec 2023 10:03:04 -0000 (UTC), "Geoff"
<onlyme101@btinternet.com> wrote:

>Is it me or is Ancestry.com becoming more and more a gimmiky commercial
>enterprise rather that a serious research site?

It's never been a 'serious research site.' You can tell that because
it assumes that every user is researching their own family.
And you can tell that its focus is the US market by the way that it
incorporates US place names in the database of UK placenames, despite
knowing that UK users are not in the US.
Having said that, I have got used to its search quirks over the years
and can get more out of it now than used to be the case.
I don't like the way that FMP works although I do make use of it
occasionally, for things not on Ancestry.

Geoff wrote:

> Is it me or is Ancestry.com becoming more and more a gimmiky
> commercial enterprise rather that a serious research site?
> What with "2 stage log-ins through Google", "back stories", "My
> family stories", "Pet's DNA" It used to be a decent research site.
> It still is I suppose, if you you can get through the tangled web it
> has weaved.
>
> Or of course perhaps it's just me, a grumpy old man sounding off.
> p.s. I hope the hyphen is in the right place!! Re. previous remarks

Interesting set of answers. I'll probably stick with Ancestry despite
it's quirks.
Out of interest, is it possible to upload the media as well as the GED
file from Ancestry to FMP? I have it all downloaded onto RootsMagic if
it can be done that way.

BTW Just in case anyone doesn't know, there is a very old but very
useful piece of software called Simple Family Tree which I have used
for many years. As I say it is simple but so useful for quick
references, it is still available at
https://www.portablefreeware.com/index.php?id=922

Geoff

Peter Johnson wrote:
> And you can tell that its focus is the US market by the way that it
> incorporates US place names in the database of UK placenames, despite
> knowing that UK users are not in the US.

Geography seems to confuse US programmers in many way

On 08/12/2023 15:42, J. P. Gilliver wrote:
> In message <ukuv4r$1nkf0$1@dont-email.me> at Fri, 8 Dec 2023 06:36:58,
> knuttle <keith_nuttle@yahoo.com> writes
> []
>> The 2 stage login stinks.   I had been working on Ancestry yesterday,
>> and left it for a couple of hours.     I think was running out of time
>> and wanted to quickly check something.   Could not because of the
>> Ancestry 2 step.
>
> I selected email as the delivery method, and it never arrived, despite
> several "resend" attempts.
>>
>> As you say, my Ancestry subscription is become less and less valuable,
>> and is quick reaching the point where it is more bother that good.
>
> I've let mine lapse until they have a good offer: last renewal would
> have been more than twice what I paid last year, so they can stuff that!
> I much prefer FindMyPast's search anyway, with the on-screen hit counter
> making it very easy to adjust what you're specifying.
I switched my account subscription from Ancestry UK to Ancestry DE.
Their International Deluxe is currently 59€ for six months. There is no
problem logging in to the UK website and using that.
I wouldn't be surprised if they get more signing up for a DNA test and
to find out their "ethnicity" than to do serious genealogy research. For
several years now, I've got a large number of DNA hits where there is no
or only a minimal tree so impossible in most cases to work out a
connection, possibly due to past Christmas gift promotions?
After the England/Wales 1921 census are there any major databases to add
which would attract researchers? I doubt many "millennials" will be
interested (and their parents/grandparents will possibly already have
done significant research?) It is mainly filling gaps so they will have
to invent "gimmicks" to keep the money flowing in.

On 12/08/2023 9:42 AM, J. P. Gilliver wrote:
> In message <ukuv4r$1nkf0$1@dont-email.me> at Fri, 8 Dec 2023 06:36:58,
> knuttle <keith_nuttle@yahoo.com> writes
> []
>> The 2 stage login stinks.   I had been working on Ancestry yesterday,
>> and left it for a couple of hours.     I think was running out of time
>> and wanted to quickly check something.   Could not because of the
>> Ancestry 2 step.
>
> I selected email as the delivery method, and it never arrived, despite
> several "resend" attempts.
>>
>> As you say, my Ancestry subscription is become less and less valuable,
>> and is quick reaching the point where it is more bother that good.
>
> I've let mine lapse until they have a good offer: last renewal would
> have been more than twice what I paid last year, so they can stuff that!
> I much prefer FindMyPast's search anyway, with the on-screen hit counter
> making it very easy to adjust what you're specifying.
It is my impression that Findmypast is oriented toward Britain and Europle.
Would a person whose family is mainly in Pennsylvania and Northern
Indiana see any benifit for Findmypast?
Right now my research has progressed to the point that my families are
now in the late 1700's, so since Ancestry is mainly focused on the late
1800's and 1900's I am not find the information I need.

On 12/08/2023 12:25 PM, john wrote:
> I wouldn't be surprised if they get more signing up for a DNA test and
> to find out their "ethnicity" than to do serious genealogy research. For
> several years now, I've got a large number of DNA hits where there is no
> or only a minimal tree so impossible in most cases to work out a
> connection, possibly due to past Christmas gift promotions?I truly believe that is the case, otherwise when you try to contact a
DNA match, you would get more that about 7% response rate to your request.

Ancestry know that and have done nothing to make it easy for a person
seriously working on their ancestry, otherwise they would have a system
to better filter the DNA matches.

All of my current research is in greater that the 5th generation. If
they were serious about help the researcher they would provide filters
that could screen out those matches where there is not enough
information in their online tree. I am not going to research a match
that is a 5th to 8th cousin and their tree contains ten people

On 08/12/2023 10:15, Colin Bignell wrote:
> I have always ignored their story lines, but I think that pet DNA has to
> be the silliest idea yet.

I can see there could be a market for pet DNA testing but it will
(hopefully!) be completely separate from the normal human DNA service.

There is always going to be a bias towards the USA because of the size
of the customer base.

On 08/12/2023 11:36, knuttle wrote:
> The 2 stage login stinks.   I had been working on Ancestry yesterday,
> and left it for a couple of hours.     I think was running out of time
> and wanted to quickly check something.   Could not because of the
> Ancestry 2 step.

Unfortunately we are just going to have to get used to 2FA, more and
more sites are using it.

One website that I use a lot adopted it (with no opt-out), you just load
a small utility every day when you first use the PC each day and then it
operates in the background.

On 08/12/2023 16:14, Peter Johnson wrote:
> It's never been a 'serious research site.' You can tell that because
> it assumes that every user is researching their own family.

I researched some friends' family and did not have any problem doing so.
I have looked at others as well.

On 08/12/2023 20:52, JMB99 wrote:
> On 08/12/2023 10:15, Colin Bignell wrote:
>> I have always ignored their story lines, but I think that pet DNA has
>> to be the silliest idea yet.
>
>
> I can see there could be a market for pet DNA testing but it will
> (hopefully!) be completely separate from the normal human DNA service.

For people with pedigree animals, perhaps, but I doubt any of the
moggies I have ever had cared who their parents were.

>
> There is always going to be a bias towards the USA because of the size
> of the customer base.
>
>

--
Colin Bignell

On 08/12/2023 18:11, knuttle wrote:
> Ancestry know that and have done nothing to make it easy for a person
> seriously working on their ancestry,  otherwise they would have a system
> to better filter the DNA matches.

Don't most people download their DNA data and upload to sites like
GEDMatch. I don't think other DNA site allow that.

On 12/08/2023 3:56 PM, JMB99 wrote:
> On 08/12/2023 11:36, knuttle wrote:
>> The 2 stage login stinks.   I had been working on Ancestry yesterday,
>> and left it for a couple of hours.     I think was running out of time
>> and wanted to quickly check something.   Could not because of the
>> Ancestry 2 step.
>
>
>
> Unfortunately we are just going to have to get used to 2FA, more and
> more sites are using it.
>
> One website that I use a lot adopted it (with no opt-out), you just load
> a small utility every day when you first use the PC each day and then it
> operates in the background.
>
>
Could you tell us more about the utility?

Friday, December 08, 2023 at 10:03, Geoff wrote:
Ancestry (at least in part)

>Is it me or is Ancestry.com becoming more and more a gimmiky commercial
>enterprise rather that a serious research site?
>What with "2 stage log-ins through Google", "back stories", "My
>family stories", "Pet's DNA" It used to be a decent research site.
>It still is I suppose, if you you can get through the tangled web it
>has weaved.

>Or of course perhaps it's just me, a grumpy old man sounding off.
>p.s. I hope the hyphen is in the right place!! Re. previous remarks

Also an grumpy ol man, IMO Ancestry was always bad, but yes getting worse, it's
all about making money, I know they (or their parent org) were ahead of the
game for whatever reason, they kept records, that were usful to us, and that is
also where the US centric angle started

I miss the old days

"Roots.com" newslists

On 08/12/2023 20:59, Colin Bignell wrote:
> For people with pedigree animals, perhaps, but I doubt any of the
> moggies I have ever had cared who their parents were.

Owners of pedigree animals have detailed records of the animals 'family
tree' so might find such a service useful. It is a niche service but
can run alongside the normal DNA testing service.

On 09/12/2023 01:09, knuttle wrote:
> Could you tell us more about the utility?

Do a search on 'AUTHY'. I know nothing about it, it just works in the
background and was supplied by the organisation whose servers I access.

On Fri, 8 Dec 2023 20:58:08 +0000, JMB99 <mb@nospam.net> wrote:

>On 08/12/2023 16:14, Peter Johnson wrote:
>> It's never been a 'serious research site.' You can tell that because
>> it assumes that every user is researching their own family.
>
>
>
>I researched some friends' family and did not have any problem doing so.
> I have looked at others as well.
>
I wasn't saying that it's a problem. Just commenting on the assumption
that they make.

On Fri, 8 Dec 2023 12:57:22 -0500, knuttle <keith_nuttle@yahoo.com>
wrote:

>It is my impression that Findmypast is oriented toward Britain and Europle.
That's because you're using the .co.uk version

>
>Would a person whose family is mainly in Pennsylvania and Northern
>Indiana see any benifit for Findmypast?
>

If they use the .com version, yes.

In message <ukvjj4$1qnco$1@dont-email.me> at Fri, 8 Dec 2023 18:25:56,
john <john1@s145802280.onlinehome.fr> writes
>On 08/12/2023 15:42, J. P. Gilliver wrote:
>> In message <ukuv4r$1nkf0$1@dont-email.me> at Fri, 8 Dec 2023
>>06:36:58, knuttle <keith_nuttle@yahoo.com> writes
[]
>>> As you say, my Ancestry subscription is become less and less
>>>valuable, and is quick reaching the point where it is more bother
>>>that good.
>> I've let mine lapse until they have a good offer: last renewal would
>>have been more than twice what I paid last year, so they can stuff
>>that! I much prefer FindMyPast's search anyway, with the on-screen
>>hit counter making it very easy to adjust what you're specifying.
>
>I switched my account subscription from Ancestry UK to Ancestry DE.
>Their International Deluxe is currently 59€ for six months. There is
>no problem logging in to the UK website and using that.

Hmm - I might look into that; I can get by in German. Probably difficult
to connect without the UK stuff coming up, but shouldn't be
insurmountable. (I take it "International Deluxe" is the same as "world"
on the UK one.)
>
>I wouldn't be surprised if they get more signing up for a DNA test and
>to find out their "ethnicity" than to do serious genealogy research.
>For several years now, I've got a large number of DNA hits where there
>is no or only a minimal tree so impossible in most cases to work out a
>connection, possibly due to past Christmas gift promotions?

Yes, I suspect a lot are _either_ people who got it as a present and did
it (and sometimes a token amount of research) in order to not hurt the
feelings of the giver, _or_ (mostly USians) people who did it for the
"ethnicity estimate". (Pretty useless: mine's "47% England &
Northwestern Europe, 22% Scotland, 21% Wales, 9% Ireland, 1% Sweden &
Denmark" - yet of my 32 G3GP, only one is Wales and one is Scotland,
rest all England.)
>
>After the England/Wales 1921 census are there any major databases to
>add which would attract researchers? I doubt many "millennials" will be
>interested (and their parents/grandparents will possibly already have
>done significant research?) It is mainly filling gaps so they will have
>to invent "gimmicks" to keep the money flowing in.
>
I fear you're right. Though if they're not doing much adding, there
shouldn't be as much money needed anyway: sure, they've got to keep the
servers/searching engines going, but surely that's not expensive these
days.
>
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Old people today - they don't know they're born! They should stay where they
belong: on the main stage at Glastonbury. - The Now Show, 2015-7-10&11

In message <ul006k$1shqq$4@dont-email.me> at Fri, 8 Dec 2023 21:01:07,
JMB99 <mb@nospam.net> writes
>On 08/12/2023 18:11, knuttle wrote:
>> Ancestry know that and have done nothing to make it easy for a person
>>seriously working on their ancestry,  otherwise they would have a
>>system to better filter the DNA matches.
>
>
>
>Don't most people download their DNA data and upload to sites like
>GEDMatch. I don't think other DNA site allow that.
>
>
Judging by the instructions on GEDMAtch, quite a few of the sites that
do testing let you download their data and then upload it to GEDMatch. I
think some of the testing sites let you upload DNA data from other sites
to them, too. I know Ancestry do not allow that. (And have more people
who have tested with them than all the others put together.)
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Old people today - they don't know they're born! They should stay where they
belong: on the main stage at Glastonbury. - The Now Show, 2015-7-10&11

In message <ukvvmf$1shqq$1@dont-email.me> at Fri, 8 Dec 2023 20:52:30,
JMB99 <mb@nospam.net> writes
>On 08/12/2023 10:15, Colin Bignell wrote:
>> I have always ignored their story lines, but I think that pet DNA has
>>to be the silliest idea yet.
>
>
>I can see there could be a market for pet DNA testing but it will
>(hopefully!) be completely separate from the normal human DNA service.

I like your "(hopefully!)"! Reminds me of the introductory patter to one
of Tom Lehrer's songs: "He practiced animal husbandry, until they
[pause] caught him at it."
>
>There is always going to be a bias towards the USA because of the size
>of the customer base.
>
And, one gets the impression, greater interest in ethnic origin.
>
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Old people today - they don't know they're born! They should stay where they
belong: on the main stage at Glastonbury. - The Now Show, 2015-7-10&11

In message <lmf6nipb16tptedefsvdg1gi1jpdqf406b@4ax.com> at Fri, 8 Dec
2023 16:14:43, Peter Johnson <peter@parksidewood.nospam> writes
>On Fri, 8 Dec 2023 10:03:04 -0000 (UTC), "Geoff"
><onlyme101@btinternet.com> wrote:
>
>>Is it me or is Ancestry.com becoming more and more a gimmiky commercial
>>enterprise rather that a serious research site?
>
>It's never been a 'serious research site.' You can tell that because
>it assumes that every user is researching their own family.
>And you can tell that its focus is the US market by the way that it
>incorporates US place names in the database of UK placenames, despite
>knowing that UK users are not in the US.
>Having said that, I have got used to its search quirks over the years
>and can get more out of it now than used to be the case.

Indeed.

>I don't like the way that FMP works although I do make use of it
>occasionally, for things not on Ancestry.

I guess it's familiarity; I don't like the way Ancestry works, although
I have used it, for things not on FMP.

The LostCousins newsletter _very_ occasionally lists which of the two
companies has which counties (parish records), which is useful.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Old people today - they don't know they're born! They should stay where they
belong: on the main stage at Glastonbury. - The Now Show, 2015-7-10&11