deceased label with no supporting sources
I have been a member of FamilySearch for many years, and appreciate it very much. There is, however, one error that I have encountered frequently. Many profiles are marked "deceased" with no death date, and with no sources listed that indicate that the person is indeed deceased. My question has to do with the origin of this label. Does a profile get labelled "deceased" only when a FamilySeach member marks it as such, or does this possibly happen automatically through the genealogy softwares that people use on their computers? For example, I use Legacy Family Tree from MyHeritage on my computer, and this software requires the user to choose between Yes and No for Living, for each profile. Since my computer is connected to the internet, I wonder whether this information gets transmitted to FamilySearch automatically. I suppose not, since it would be difficult to automatically match a profile on my computer with a specific profile on FamilySearch.
Similarly, I have often seen profiles where a death date is given, but again there are no sources given that indicate that the person has died.
Anyway, I would encourage my fellow FamilySearch members to not do this. If a member doesn't know if a person is living or deceased, or doesn't have a source indicating this, I would encourage them to not mark the person as deceased. When in doubt, do not include the profile, so as to protect the privacy of people who might be living. (Of course, people who were born 120 years ago can be assumed to be deceased.)
Best Answer
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Any time a profile is created on Family Search, living or deceased must be selected. Existing profiles can be edited to change from living to deceased or deceased to living. These are all specific inputs by a user. If the person is less than 110 years old and there is no proof of death, the user should enter the profile as living or not enter it. Living profiles are only visible to the user that entered it.
Unfortunately, there are many users who make inputs or changes without sources. FamilySearch encourages the use of sources for all information entered.
The problem you are seeing often happens when a user attaches a source such as a late year census record or an obituary. These sources often contain living persons. If the user creates a new profile for people list on these sources, they must be careful in marking whether or not the person is still living.
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Answers
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Third-party software that syncs with Family Tree can certainly mark a profile as Deceased, or create a new profile that is Deceased. Each third-party application follows its own rules for how it matches its profiles with Family Tree profiles, but it has access to FamilySearch services that will help determine if a profile matches.
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When I was new with Family History, I did not understand the importance of using sources. Now I realize how important it is, and I agree I wish everyone would source their information. Then I know how good the information is. Unfortunately, all we can do is ask and explain the why.
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more than 110 years from birth, automatic deceased
Less than 110? There are many ways to determine if somebody is deceased. Search obituaries, news sites, cemeteries, even contact the contributors, etc. Obituaries of others can yield clues to the deceased persons in question.
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If you don't have a verifiable source or a link to one, please don't change my living relatives to dead ones
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maryellenstevensbarnes1
FYI
WE (meaning everybody, except programmers) can NOT see your living persons and you can NOT see my living persons at all. Only YOU can change from living to deceased.
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@W D Samuelsen contact me please I already know that — I was speaking of relatives/family members entered by other people and of cases when an error was made during the web indexing era. P.S. There are lots of us experienced indexers/genealogists who have indexed hundreds of thousands of names who don't always understand all these programmers. Example: the word "your" does not always mean that I or you personally entered something - instead it often means belonging to as in "your relatives" so please don't SHOUT at me.
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