I need some advice on uploading documents

Ralph Gray

I am now in my 70s and considering what will I do to preserve my twenty years of genealogical research. My solution has been to transfer it all to FamilySearch's FamilyTree.

However, over that time I have collected birth, marriage and death certificates; passenger lists; census records; and many other records that could be classified of "copyright".

My records are not complete without these artifacts.

• Can I upload these images to attach to the Tree without breaching copyright?
• Can I upload a transcript that refers to the source of the original without breaching copyright?

Gail Swihart Watson

So I am working in FamilySearch, uploading digital images of MANY, MANY photos, documents, letters and other things that I have inherited. I am collecting them into albums where I can generate a link and anyone with the link can view and download all the images. Anyone can "encounter" the album from a person's memories page as well. While people can remove tags from images, they cannot delete images from my gallery or album. Again, albums are publicly visible to anyone with the shared link.

The second thing I am doing is building multiple trees in Ancestry. I have shared the trees with many family members, and when I pass, if I have failed to give my login and password to people, Ancestry has a method for people to gain access to my trees.

I have created PDFs which are stories, but have not scratched the surface of all I want to do. These will put in writing stories I know about my ancestors or stories in-laws and others have told me about their ancestors.

I MAY do a public blog with each page telling the story of a deceased ancestor and providing links to information in FamilySearch or Ancestry with images and sources about them. Certain family members are against this, which is why I have not yet started it yet. I need to figure out how much - or if - I want to override the objections and do it anyway. The nice thing about a blog is the social media aspect of it. People can comment and add to it and you don't need "accounts" to see it. Much of the detail in FamilySearch and Ancestry requires account access.

With regards to you wanting to re-upload various documents, I would never upload anything that is publicly available. Census and Passenger lists are online. Find them and attach them as sources. Birth, death and marriage certs may be online. Look for them. If they are not online, those you can upload, and I have in spades with my own family.

Uploading a transcript of a source is also not very helpful without the citation of where it came from. I would first try to find the online sources and attach them. If what you have is not online, then upload the image, not transcript. Also, copyright does not apply to everything. A page of a book can be uploaded and not violate the copyright. I have done that and provided the complete title and author of the book. It is important to remember that information with out the citation is worthless for use in many applications.

Hope that gives you food for thought.

genthusiast

@Ralph Gray

• Can I upload these images to attach to the Tree without breaching copyright?

Access to vital records (bmd) seems to have become more restrictive over the past few decades - you may want to check with the various agencies. Census records are generally available - once they are released. However I believe (without knowing in particular) - that these are public records and many times genealogical copies are considered fair use so my uninformed legal opinion would be that you can upload them (since you have collected them). Other record types you mention may have permissioned use restrictions - meaning once you have obtained documented permission (from the record owner/custodian) you would be free to upload them to FamilySearch. Generally I believe you should be fairly safe uploading to FamilySearch - because it is a noncommercial use space (you are not trying to profit by publication of the information) - and are not transmitting any greater access rights to any FamilySearch user (the value is in the gathering/attaching of Sources to profiles to whom the records belong). At any rate you are attaching records of your ancestors/family - so in my opinion the records do belong to them and so you/family do have some right of use (what those rights may be I do not know in particular).

As Gail mentions above - I would also recommend a couple of other considerations: (Of course any finalizing of one's family tree involves review of profile relationships, Sources and Memory attachments.)

1. Convert your collection/family tree - with artifacts into a GEDCOM database (3rd party family tree management solution with FamilySearch sync capability). Gail prefers Ancestry - you could duplicate your tree there but to me it does not matter where or how as much - only that you duplicate it. If there is a release GEDCOM 7 compatible I would recommend it because of the inclusion of the portable Source images - but I have not yet seen such compatible releases (uninformed and haven't kept a sharp eye out for it).
2. If/when FamilySearch Genealogies permits GEDCOM 7 compatible upload - such should be a significant step toward preservation of your work. GEDCOM 7 documentation used to indicate that Genealogies was scheduled to adopt GEDCOM 7 specification - I believe it no longer indicates such. Why the most public GEDCOM portion of FamilySearch platform (I believe Family Tree is a proprietary GEDCOM platform) would not adopt its latest specification I don't know entirely - but have some suspicions. Perhaps the My Tree feature - announced at Rootstech 2023 will adopt GEDCOM 7 specification.
3. Distribute your work to any family relations that may have interest - hopefully someone will continue your work.
4. FamilySearch Sources can be detached/deleted from profiles (yes they can be reattached if located in Latest Changes - but some changes complicate restoring of profiles). There is currently the latest iteration of a proposed Idea to duplicate Sources to Memories (which are generally more stable or not removable from the profile). You may want to consider duplicating some Sources to Memories.

• Can I upload a transcript that refers to the source of the original without breaching copyright?

Yes - a transcription of a record generally has less restriction than it's image - so I would recommend adding your transcription of any Sources you have attached in Family Tree (in the Source Notes) . Your transcription of a record and your citation of that Source is 'your own work' and as such could be copyrightable for publication if you so desired.

I guess that is the last thing to consider - do you want to go to the additional step of publishing a book or some other media for attempting preservation? If you have broader, significant historical knowledge of the family story and/or places - you might wish to do so - but such can to a large extent be done within FamilySearch platform.

Áine Ní Donnghaile

@Ralph Gray You may want to read a recent thread on the Upload of Restricted Documents