Just triple-checking that it's ok to add a life sketch in FamilySearch to a LIVING person. Life Ske
I know pictures are not.
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I've been trying to find out the definitive answer to questions regarding the details of the meaning of "private" with respect to living persons on FamilySearch. I was GOING to post my journal as a document in Memories, to be read ONLY after my death. But multiple answers I got back when I was still following the group for New Temple and Family History Consultants left me much less certain about what COULD become visible besides just tagged photos. I wish we could get a definitive answer from those who have inner knowledge of the programming and its capabilities for keeping living persons' memories completely private until they're marked deceased. And I never did get a definitive answer that confirms our Memories will become available once we're marked "Deceased" in FamilySearch. Personally, I'm now exercising much more caution than I used to, and even deleted a few things from my own and others' memories among my living relatives.
Can anyone directly connected to FamilySearch provide definitive answers to the above, beyond what's contained in the article that talks about the instances in which "private" photos can become public (such as tagging of some deceased persons in the same photo, for example)? I want to be able to preserve things now in "Memories", but have them become available only after I'm deceased (and have the same protections for Memories I put on living relatives' pages). Excellent question (and concern) @ShellyR Leavitt1
-- Chris
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I would personally post one page that does not have any intimate details on and then have someone in the close family see if they can see it when they sign on. that should answer your question. I do also know that for you to have the pages read in order, you will need to post the last page first and the first page last. Good luck. (I found that out when I posted my dad's funeral service.)
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@Sharon Ormsby Multiple-page documents can be scanned in such a way that they produce one file. I happen to use an outstanding scanner program called VueScan (a one time fee for lifetime upgrades). I primarily use it for photos, but it has a feature that allows multi-page documents to be scanned in proper order, producing one single file. I used it to scan a 100+ year old document that is 24 pages long, typed by my grandfather after his return from WWI. It's on his Memories page as a single document that can simply be opened and read just like any other .pdf document. It's only if you post multiple pages as separate uploads that you end up getting first in/last out viewing results.
(By the way - VueScan allows virtually any scanner (even really old ones) to be used regardless of which operating system you're using. I thought my ancient Epson Perfection 1650 scanner as well as my expensive Nikon Coolscan V slid/film scanner needed to be just thrown out after Windows XP went into the Microsoft Graveyard. But VueScan works independently of the operating system and I'm easily using both now on the most recent updated version of Windows 10. It's also excellent at basic photo editing, not just scanning (I didn't even bother installing my Nikon Scan software on Windows 10 and haven't needed it for editing). And the document scanning feature (which includes OCR capability!) is very valuable. I've got no affiliation with either VueScan or the man that produced and updates it regularly. I just discovered it years ago, and wouldn't be without it. With lifetime upgrades, it's been worth every penny.)
-- Chris
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Do you have to buy that program? Of course, I did upload them into the family search program one at a time, several years ago. Thanks for the tip.
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By the way, @Sharon Ormsby, it's not just a matter of whether "Private" pages can be seen simply by logging on. There are other ways, such as viewing a photo on someone else's page that has that deceased person tagged in the photo. Even if the living person in the same photo is tagged, they'll still show up in the photo on the deceased person's Memories page, but the tag will simply be missing. And any story that has been added about the photo will be there for anyone to see. So if any living people in the photo are mentioned in the story, that will be available for any and all to view simply by viewing it on the deceased person's page where that deceased person was tagged. There are apparently other ways in which "Private" data can still be viewed, and FamilySearch has appropriately noted that so people will use caution. And I'm still questioning just how much could theoretically be found by people that are highly skilled in searching the internet. I wish I could find out from those intimately involved in the construction of FamilySearch (programming) whether I can post my journal, for example, and have it remain entirely private until my death, but be fully available once I'm marked "deceased."
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@Sharon Ormsby asked, "Do you have to buy that program?" -- Yes, that's now his business after years in computer programming and photographic endeavors. I just checked their site (www.hamrick.com) and noticed that there are two versions. The professional version is the only one that has lifetime upgrades and can use film and slide scanners, do optical character reading (OCR), and use all the advanced features. The professional version does it all (and is apparently the one I got, or else that became the professional version - can't remember). The standard version only does fairly basic photo or document scanning using most any flatbed scanner, and only gets a year of upgrades. I've been using it since back in the Windows XP days (nearly 20 years), and now it doesn't matter which operating system anybody uses (Windows.exe, macOS.dmg, Linux.tgz, Linux.deb, or Linux .rpm) or what scanner - Vuescan works with them all, with more scanner models being added all the time. I get an upgrade every week or so, it seems.
Wonderful "best kept secret" resource, in my opinion. I've scanned hundreds of very old 35mm slides with it and gotten outstanding restoration of Kodachrome slides even as old as the late 1950s. It's not Photoshop, but it also doesn't have the same steep learning curve as Photoshop. In my opinion, if somebody isn't a professional photographer needing stunningly beautiful results that exceed even what the camera sees, this will do just fine for family history purposes.
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Chris, I'm no expert, but I have read many posts in the community about how a record tagged to a living (private) lesson gets out to where others can see it. To the best of my knowledge, there are two ways.
- The memory is tagged to both living and deceased persons. Because anybody looking at the deceased perfume persons memories will see it, it's not private.
- If the memory is only tagged to the living person, but the memory is placed into an Album, anyone accessing the Album will be able to see it.
If it's only tagged to the living person, and not added to an Album, it should pure private.
Wit all of that said it will only be automatically viewable if we are talking about you being the living person. Any additional living persons you may enter may already have their own official entry, which you can't see because they are living. That entry will automatically become public when their ward clerk records their death. Your page still med to be manually updated, marking them deceased. Then your page and the official one can be merged, so your memories and sources will be combined with the official record.
Whew. I hope this makes sense, and helps.
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I wasn't sure your question was answered.
All info on a living Person is private, so the life-sketch is only seen by you.
Regarding Memories, all memories can be seen by anyone on the internet. Period. That memory may be hard to find but it is viewable by anyone. When a memory is tagged to a living Person that memory will not show up in search-engine searches, but the memory is still visible to anyone, say if you had a link to it.
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Like many other things, wording is changing (not a bad thing, just an observation). I just saw new wording that entirely backs up your paragraph on Memories. It didn't used to be worded that way. I don't like the answer, but at least I now know that they've identified that Memories are not a safe place to put your own (or other living relatives') information and expect it to remain private until death.
What bothers me is the number of times in the past that I've seen videos, articles, etc., that seemed to assure privacy within a living person's Memories. Now that that's myth, and the fact that the life sketch is very limited on length (as I sadly learned last night), we have no way of putting a person history on FamilySearch unless we're fine with it being 100% available to any/everyone. There are many very legitimate reasons why a personal history may not be appropriate for others to be able to read until after the person's death - not just because of potentially scandalous information, but sometimes because of rather private events that aren't inappropriate for evaluation in a historical sense (we are, after all, striving to learn family history), but may be very sensitive for others to read while the person is still alive and functional.
And after death, the disposition of a personal history - if found - will be up to the person finding it. It could be made available to family per the wishes of the deceased, it could be edited for reasons that would not have been acceptable to the person that wrote it, or it could be entirely destroyed and lost to history. FamilySearch potentially provides a marvelous way of preserving such records per the wishes of the account holder. I truly hope that is looked at closely by the programmers and decision makers at FamilySearch.
The example that hits home for me is a 24 page typewritten account of my grandfather's WWI experiences in Siberia. No one even knew of its existence until very soon before his death when he gave it to my mother and told her he did not want it published. I suspect at least part of that was because he was in the Intelligence Section of the U.S. Army Expeditionary Forces, and apparently knew about many classified and highly sensitive things. He included a "scrapbook" (incredible photo album) that was given to one of his other daughters, but neither sister knew of the existence of what the other was given during their lifetimes. After he died, I was given the manuscript, and my cousins just happened to find the photo album that originally was obviously meant to accompany the manuscript, which included some very difficult photos. Because of the exceptional historical value of the manuscript particularly (events to which he was eye-witness that were unknown to historians as far as actual details were concerned), I wanted to preserve his desire for it not to be published, yet make it available for historical researchers. Stanford University's Hoover Institution was selected after careful research for contribution of the manuscript. Copyright protection is intact, though researchers were able to access it during the flurry of research in 2018 (100th anniversary of the end of WWI). And I was able to obtain permission of the Hoover Institution as part of the contract to post it on FamilySearch in my Grandfather's Memories. That way my descendants can all read the entire 24 page manuscript and know what Grandpa experienced, and the incredible personal emotions and insights he had as a result.
Yet if that was me who experienced and wrote about it, and I was still living, I would have to depend on the integrity and sensitivity of my descendants to make sure that the paper document was handled after my death according to my wishes - and that those people somehow managed to secure the document after my death rather than others finding it and not handling it appropriately. If I could post it in my memories now, and it would only become accessible to anyone after I was deceased in FamilySearch, no problem - in fact, ideal. But that isn't possible now. I don't have a good solution for that, and was hoping someone from inside FamilySearch happened to monitor this forum and could start addressing the issue. For a wonderful resource that is all about preserving personal and family history, this could be a marvelous "correction" if fixed.
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Almost any scanner will allow you to scan a document into a PDF file that puts all your pages in order in the one PDF document. This is the best way to add long histories or other documents to individuals in FamilySearch. Most FS Libraries have such scanners for both documents and books. It cost nothing to scan and safe to a flash drive. I can even do it on my cheap printer at home!
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FYI - The Logan FS Library has a rapid slide scanner that works very well for slides - and it's free! I suspect that other FS Libraries have it as well. Just takes a little of your time. There are also scanners for books and other documents that put scans into one file. Best feature - free!
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