Do I need to add live individuals to family tree for deceased people in my family tree?
I have many people in my personal family history that have not been added to family tree due to their immediate family members are still alive. I can add the live people to family tree which I know only myself would see. It seems like adding a lot of people can muddy the list of people in the tree. This would allow all deceased people to be tied to someone. Does family tree want these deceased people added without them being tied to a family tree or do I add the living people?
Answers
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No, you don't need to - but you get to decide. Generally in Family Tree you are trying to primarily link the deceased people to their family/tree. You can attach living descendants - but as you mention they will only be visible in your private living space. You get to decide whether you link these living people to the deceased ones you might add. If you do add/attach much information to a living person profile you should either get their permission or allow them to enter their own profile (the account is free). Obviously if you have many Memories to contribute about living people (who doesn't?) - that would be the primary reason to create their profile. Multiple living profiles will need to be merged upon decease of a living person (so if there are multiple living profiles - they will need to be marked deceased and merged into one/primary profile). I don't view this as a problem but some do - and it would be nice if the process were streamlined (made easier). Perhaps the easiest way would be for FamilySearch to already have created the Possible Duplicates list for all living profiles - such that they already know which is the primary one that all other duplicates will be merged into.
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In my opinion, the (only) purpose of living profiles is to connect your profile to the Tree, so that "View Relationship" works correctly. If that's not a priority for you, or if the connection doesn't affect you, then I wouldn't bother.
(FamilySearch is not a photo-sharing site, so I don't see much point to filling one's Memories with pictures of living people.)
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So @genthusiast has many good points. Getting people's permission, if they are alive, is something I do for all living people my age and younger. I only put living people on the tree when they have asked me to do their family history. For those living who are not interested in family history, most are not on the tree. For those living and on the tree, I also grab a photo from their public social media which *they* have posted and use it as the portrait. This is so I can send them screenshots of lineages and they know where "they" are in the scheme of things as well as how everyone is related to them.
One place where I differ from @genthusiast is that I usually do not upload any memories which contain a predominance of living people. (I have made exceptions from time to time.) I have access to thousands of photos of weddings, birthdays, family gatherings of siblings, cousins, their children and grandchildren, as well as my own. I will not upload any such photos to the internet much less the world tree (even though most are already on social media). I don't plan to digitize many of the photos in my custody of my children and grandchildren, either. That is for a future genealogist.
So, for me, the question of "Does family tree want these deceased people added without them being tied to a family tree" is kind of a moot point. Since I am doing family history, deceased people ARE tied to family - just not their complete set of living family for the most part.
For generations older than me, I am now down to one living aunt. I created pages for that generation because I suspected I would outlive them. So far so good.
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Thank you for your help on this question. These are good comments. I will give this some more thought before I move ahead.
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My opinion: obviously a profile created by the living person should be the primary one all other duplicates are merged into. But not all living persons have a FamilySearch account/profile - so which is primary could be difficult to decide ... I would prefer nearest relation (parent, sibling, niece/nephew, cousin probably in that order because my immediate birth family relationship is strongest with these people). Another good reason to add living people profiles - is to keep their relation straight (I have a hard time remembering which cousin is whom ... And how related - which if entered Family Tree helps considerably) ... So if you do a lot of descendancy research and contact living cousins - it is helpful but of course you can do that in an offline tree (3rd party tree management solution) ... But the choice is yours.
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