Do You Wiki?

Carolyn L. Barkley has written an interesting article about wikis for genealogy. She describes the purposes of wikis and then mentions several genealogy wikis. She first mentions the Encyclopedia of Genealogy (which is sponsored by this newsletter) and then goes on to describe at length both WeRelate.org and the FamilySearch wiki, a “free online encyclopedia of genealogy information.”

You can read this interesting article at http://www.genealogyandfamilyhistory.com/?p=101.

Comments

[Rebecca Ann JORDAN]

I posted some information on Wiki and was shot down. I had the notion that I knew where my uncle's Medal of Honor was, but there were people on wiki who claimed to know better than me. They were very rude to the point of telling me to quit making the changes based on personal research. Huh? When I finally got the source of the bad information to admit that they were wrong, then suddenly everyone was impressed that I knew the real facts. No one apologized, however. I stay away from wiki. It is a sandbox with small children fighting over toys.

Give some people some power and they will abuse it.

[Rebekah Martineau]

@Rebecca,

I am sorry to hear that you had such a negative experience with a Wiki system. We at Family Pursuit ( http://www.familypursuit.com ) truly believe that wiki genealogy is a very effective way to conduct genealogical research. Using a wiki with other collaborators not only reduces duplicate research but also improves the quality and accuracy of your conclusions. Of course, it is all dependent on having users who care more about accuracy than their own pride. It relies heavily on sources and documentation, but we believe that most researchers are willing to concede they are mistaken if reliable evidence is provided. After all, we don't have to go very far back before we all share the same ancestors. Dick posted a great blog about that just a few weeks ago, Brad Pitt and Barack Obama are Related ( http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2009/05/brad-pitt-and-barack-obama-are-related.html ).

I would encourage you to give a genealogy wiki another try. Our free wiki-based Community Family Tree ( http://www.familypursuit.com/resources/index.php ) utilizes an advanced wiki in an effort to help distant cousins find each other and collaborate together.

[dorisw]

I sympathize, Rebecca. I corrected a seriously flawed Wikipedia entry that was unsourced and provided my sources. Someone else, whether the person who had written the original version or another, went back and changed what I had submitted -- again without sources! The bad info remains because I refuse to participate in this game of oneupsmanship.

The advantage with WeRelate and MyHeritage is that you are notified of proposed changes and do not have to accept them. It can be extremely time-consuming, though, to keep up because so many genealogists rely on old sources that have long been discredited.

Doris

[Rob]

Collaborative websites (like Wikipedia and other wiki-related sites) would always have those who have malicious agendas to change or deny information about particular ancestors (or descendants). Even in the absence of proven or questionable sources, these malcontents would surely edit entries according to their personal whims or bias and play a game of power against someone like Rebecca Ann Jordan.

There must be something to ensure a system of checks and balances within a wiki-site, like if you correct/edit an entry and provide source(s), others would rate it up or down (required membership, click only once in each different entry).

The biggest problem with genealogical wiki-sites is that most today's descendants are descended from the common gentry with little or no sources about them and there are plenty of sources of royal, noble and landed gentry ancestors. Plenty of people in America could claim they are descended from some royal or noble ancestors but it is very difficult to prove which ancestors came from the common gentry lines or which ancestors came from the royal/noble lines, due to naming (spelling of names), geographic or geopolitical factors. There seem to be a lot of gray areas between 1400s and 1700s for genealogical researches. The common (and poor) folks of England and Europe between 1000s and 1700s weren't considered important enough to be documented, especially the womenfolk and who they were descended from. Wiki-sites would be at the mercy of those people who can summarily edit your genealogical entries of your ancestors without consideration.

[Dick Eastman]

Wikipedia is not a genealogy-specific wiki so it doesn't have many controls for handling of different opinions and/or conflicting sources or lack of sources of information. However, the genealogy-specific wikis are generally better equipped for such differences.

Most of the genealogy wikis do not allow you to REPLACE anyone else's information but you are allowed to APPEND your data. When there is a difference of opinion, each contributor can plead his/her own cases and cite whatever sources he or she wishes. The reader then gets to choose which version to believe, if any.

My opinion is that masses of genealogy information will never be consistent and no single claim will ever be iron-clad and beyond doubt. We will always have differences of opinion and I would encourage such differences be documented. I would suggest that we all should consider the evidence, both pro and con, and then derive our own conclusions. Modern genealogy wikis encourage this.

- Dick Eastman