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Flagging Errors found in Source Material Transcriptions
in Sources
It's frustrating to find an error, many times very obvious, when going through records. It would be extremely helpful to the whole community if there was an option to flag that entry so that an authorized FS member could review and make corrections. I do extensive research and have found that many records are transcribed incorrectly, volunteer transcribers, bless their hearts, are human afterall. And, I{m not talking about mispellings and such, but rather the sex of the individual, actually centuries in which events occur, and sometimes dozens of entries in a volumne not indexed at all.
Not asking for the right to edit, but rather a simple way to flag and report errors. I believe this option would vastly improve the service FS offers the whole community.
Comments
It would be really useful to be able to comment on an error. I found the marriages of two sisters and they did not make sense and tally with census records. An Elizabeth Holderness married Frederick Hopwood at Pocklington, 27 April 1826. Family Search has Elizabeth as Hopwood.
Maria Holderness married William Dodsworth 4 Dec. 1826, but Family Search has Maria Holdsworth.
I was able to check the images at the Borthwick Institute, but cannot persuade Family Search to change their data.
If I could add a comment to the record, anyone researching the family could make their own decision..
Again I believe the FamilySearch response for not allowing errors to be flagged would likely be that it does not have the resources to implement such a proposal. However, it is not only the major commercial websites (e.g. Find My Past) that deal with reported errors satisfactorily, but free to access sites (that presumably rely on volunteers) like FreeBMD / FreeREG, too. These sites quickly review such reports and corrections are often made within days.
If FamilySearch is to continue to emphasise that it right up there with the major commercial sites, it must find a way to stop confusing / misleading its users with errors (many of which apply to whole collections, not just individual entries) that it stubbornly refuses to correct.