Incorrect information added by others
Someone made an assumption about my ancestor's parents. Then, more ancestors were added to these incorrect people. So, my tree is not private to me? Anyone can pop in anything they like? Is that it?
Answers
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Perhaps it would have been better to have researched the product before participating. See https://www.familysearch.org/en/help/helpcenter/article/what-is-the-purpose-of-familysearch-and-family-tree.
Particularly the first paragraph of this article:
Family Tree is different from other similar genealogy sites in that it is a single, public tree linked together in families, rather than a site that only allows users to create and manage their own private trees. This distinction means that everyone works together on the same data, allowing for the potential to connect every member of the human family.
So, unfortunately, you have chosen the wrong product if you wish to maintain a private tree. FamilySearch's "Family Tree" is very useful if you wish to collaborate with others (many of whom might be distant cousins, or perhaps have no direct connection at all to the family branches you are researching), but not so suitable if you don't want changes to be made to the profiles of your family members.
I'm just an ordinary user and, like you, get completely exasperated at some of the ludicrous additions of incorrect "relatives". However, Family Tree has helped me find out so much about past generations of my ancestors and relatives that I consider, on balance, it is well worth to continue participating in this community project, in spite of its "negative" aspects..
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The idea that someone should have read all the instructions etc. before starting in is somewhat weakened by all the cheerleading on the front pages, inviting one and all to jump in and get started.
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Thanks for answering. I realised how bad things were when Family Search sent me charts about how I was related to all the world’s worthies. I smelled a rat! Instead of my ancestor’s parents being simple crofters from Benbecula someone had assumed, without any evidence or source, that her father was an aristocrat. Then, of course, the whole tree from there back is most likely rubbish. Oh well
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So anyone can take our tree we researched for years jump on and post things to our tree?
if that is the case then I will work on deleting my info because it will get messed up with people putting things on there I do not know has been done.
I started the tree to put accurate info for relatives to find. If my info is being compromised then others will be misled.
Very disappointed if this is the case.
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As has been stated so many times on this forum, there is no "our tree" / "my tree" concept when it comes to FamilySearch's Family Tree.
Of course, if you feel so disillusioned about the possible legacy of your contributions to Family Tree, you can delete the individuals you have created - but only if no other user has made a contribution to those profiles. If they have, then the record of your ancestors / relatives will remain, even if you personally withdraw from participating in the communal Family Tree project.
The article at https://www.familysearch.org/en/help/helpcenter/article/how-can-i-prevent-other-people-from-making-inaccurate-changes-to-family-tree makes some useful suggestions, which might go some way in minimising unwarrented changes by other users. Particularly helpful should be your adding up to 4,000 individuals to a "Following" list, whereby you can keep a check on every change that other users make to (up to 4,000 of) your relatives' profiles.
If you want to preserve a family tree where you are the only contributor / editor there are many other options available - including free-to-use versions of suitable genealogical software. Even if you do carry on with working in Family Tree, it is highly advisable you should keep a copy of your family tree on a separate program where nobody can touch it.
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i have always had a tree on Ancestry and also a smaller edition on Family Search. In the past I did some transcriptions for them which I believe is how Ancestry obtains its data for most countries (Scotland’s Government hangs on to its own certificates). However, I now realise that having a tree on Family Search is a bit useless when the tree turns out to contain a lot of unsourced entries which turn out to be rubbish. Thank you, Paul for standing up for Family Search.
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However, I now realise that having a tree on Family Search is a bit useless when the tree turns out to contain a lot of unsourced entries which turn out to be rubbish.
This really depends on where in the Tree you are looking. It's really big so it's impossible to make broad generalizations. According to FamilySearch's 2023 Infographic ( see: https://www.familysearch.org/en/blog/2023-familysearch-year-in-review ) Family Tree at year end had about 1,550,000,000 profiles. To these profiles are attached about 2,970,000,000 sources which gives a misleading average of two sources per profile. I say misleading because there are a lot of profile with no sources yet and a lot with dozens of sources.
And rubbish? Let's look at two extreme cases.
My great-great-grandfather has a very complete profile with 98 sources and 72 memories. The profile is very stable and very reliable.
Then there is Beowulf (ID: L69Y-B45). He is there with minimal information and with one source in a reason statement. His profile is ripe for conflict as people argue over whether he was even a real person. I would agree this goes in the rubbish pile.
So why consider using Family Tree when you can find both gold and lead in the tree? This is the example I usually give.
I also have a small tree in Ancestry which includes that great-great-grandfather of mine. When I die, that account will be closed and while the tree might remain there public for a while, eventually Ancestry will do something that will make it inaccessible. That is just what for profit companies do. On Ancestry, there are 1181 public trees that include him. If I find some new information or a correction to his information and add it to my Ancestry tree, it is highly unlikely that anyone else will ever see it. It will be lost among all those other trees and there is no way I can get it corrected on them.
In FamilySearch Family Tree, my great-great-grandfather has just one profile. When I die, that profile will continue. Due to the theological basis of FamilySearch, Family Tree will be maintained by the church that created and runs it basically forever. You can find profiles in Family Tree that were first created in the 1850s that have been maintained up through various iterations of databases. If I find some new information or a correction to his information and add it to his profile, the twelve people following it get an e-mail within the week to let the know about it and have a chance to confirm or refute the change.
Knowing that my first seven or eight generations back in Family Tree are well maintained, stable, and will be preserved is an acceptable trade off for knowing that Charlemagne the Great is having his profile edited a dozen times a day as people fight over what version of his name and history is correct.
Regarding what you ran across with your family, do consider that you were able to find the error and have the opportunity to correct it to be a positive feature of Family Tree.
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