Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter

Podcast: Connie Reik Talks About Zotero

Connie Reik is a Government Publications Coordinator and Research Librarian for History at Tisch Library at Tufts University. She also teaches how to perform research. She teaches these skills to college students and, more recently, to genealogists. Along the way, Connie has become an expert and instructor in the use of Zotero, a free citation manager and note taker.

Connie now gives talks and workshops on Zotero at genealogy conferences. I knew that her former students have been enthusiastic about Connie's seminars at previous conferences. As one student told me, "Where has this been all my life?" I found Connie at another genealogy conference and asked if she would share some of her expertise with newsletter readers. Although it is impossible to capture a one- or two-hour hands-on seminar in a short audio podcast, Connie did manage to provide an overview and was able to tell why Zotero is such a great tool for genealogists.

Dick Eastman Is Interviewed

I have recorded quite a few interviews over the years and made them available in this newsletter. Now the tables have been turned. Grant Brunner of Geni.com recently recorded an interview of me and has now made it available on the Geni.com web site.

The interview focused primarily on my background in genealogy, blogging, and how this newsletter has changed over the past 15 years. Here are some questions Grant asked:

Podcast: An interview with Daniel Horowitz

Podcast: An interview with Daniel Horowitz, Chief Genealogist at MyHeritage. In our conversation, Daniel talked about the many service offerings of MyHeritage, including the unique advantages of group collaboration, or "family social networking." The company is especially strong in interfacing with social networks, building personal web sites, multimedia, face recognition, and more. He also described the newly-announced “Family Goals,” a pioneering group payment system that enables family members to chip in to jointly purchase a subscription. Finally, Daniel briefly give a hint about future products that will involve "smart" cell phones and other devices.

Podcast: An Interview with Grant Brunner of Geni.com

Geni is a collaborative online service that is solving many of the problems of genealogy by inviting the world to build the definitive online family tree. Using the basic free service at Geni.com, users add and invite their relatives to join their family tree, which Geni compares to other trees. Matching trees are then merged into the single world family tree, which currently contains nearly 50 million living users and their ancestors. Pay services include enhanced research tools as well as keepsake products created from family tree data.

At the recent Southern California Genealogy Jamboree held in Burbank, I had a chance to talk with Grant Brunner, Community Outreach Manager at Geni.com. You can listen to our conversation by clicking on PLAY in the link below.

(The picture above and to the right is of Grant Brunner and myself.)

Podcast: an Interview with Sandra Rumble of GenDetective

GenDetective is a brand-new Windows software program that helps you organize your genealogy data. Other programs tell you what information you have. GenDetective will analyze your GEDCOM files and tell you what you don't have. It will created printed reports as well as reports on your smartphone, Kindle, Nook, laptop, or most any other computer than can display text. You can take your report with you on a research trip to a library, an archive, of any other repositories. You can read more about GenDetective in my recent articles at http://goo.gl/OzjiC and at http://goo.gl/WtC92.

I had a chance to talk with Sandra Rumble, one of the principles at GenDetective and I asked her about the product, especially how to use it.

Podcast: A Conversation with David Rencher of FamilySearch

I recently had a chance to sit with David Rencher, Chief Genealogical Officer of FamilySearch. We were at the annual conference of the National Genealogical Society, held in Charleston, SC. You can listen to our conversation now by clicking on the link below.

DavidRencher

David talked about a number of topics of interest to genealogists, including:

Podcast: A Conversation with Cliona Weldon and Brian Donovan of findmypast Ireland

I recently had a chance to talk with both Cliona Weldon, General Manager of a brand-new web site, called findmypast Ireland, and with Brian Donovan, Director of the new company. Brian is also well known for being the Director and CEO of the Irish genealogy company, Eneclann. I asked Cliona and Brian about the new services and products being offered by findmypast Ireland.

findmypast Ireland is a joint venture between findmypast and Eneclann, the award-winning Irish history and heritage company. Findmypast Ireland will host the most extensive collection of Irish land records available anywhere online and will be a valuable resource for those 80 million people worldwide who claim Irish ancestry.

FindMyPast-Ireland

Podcast: An Interview with Melinde Lutz Byrne of Boston University's Genealogical Research Certificate Program

I recently had an opportunity to interview Melinde Lutz Byrne, Director of Boston University's Genealogical Research Certificate program. These courses teach "how to do it right." Topics covered include basic to very advanced genealogy research techniques, including Genealogy Foundations, Techniques and Technology, Evidence and Evaluation, Forensic Genealogy, and Ethnic and Geographic Specialties. The instructors include Melinde Lutz Byrne, Elissa Scalise Powell, Allison Ryall, Thomas W. Jones, Pamela Sayre, and Mary Ann Boyle. The program has now graduated more than 400 students.

This is a high-powered program that is highly respected by professional and advanced genealogists alike.

Melinde Lutz Byrne

You can listen to our conversation by clicking on the icon above. You can also save it to your computer's hard drive or to iTunes to listen to it later on your computer or iPad or most any other MP3 music player.

Podcast: An Interview with Lee Maxey of Boston University's Genealogical Research Certificate Program

I recently had an opportunity to interview Lee Maxey of Boston University's Genealogical Research Certificate program. Lee's work focuses primarily on remote students, those from around the world who want to significantly improve their genealogy research techniques. This is a high-powered program that is highly respected by professional and advanced genealogists alike.

Lee-Maxey

You can listen to our conversation by clicking on the icon above. You can also save it to your computer's hard drive or to iTunes to listen to it later on your computer or iPad or most any other MP3 music player.

Podcast: An Interview with David Allen of Old Maps, Inc.

At the recent New England Regional Genealogical Conference (NERGC), held in Springfield, Massachusetts, I had a chance to sit and talk with David Allen. He is the owner of Old Maps, a company that republishes historical maps. The maps range from the 1850s through the early 1870s. The company offers digital and printed reproductions of maps from all over New England. The company provides thousands of FREE, compressed maps on its web site. Highly detailed (non-compressed) maps on CD-ROM and printed on high-quality paper can also be ordered from the site.

These maps pinpoint the location of every house and the name of the family that lived there at the time the original map was produced. As such, these maps have great value to genealogists. Not only can you see where your ancestors lived, but also their neighbors and others in the extended area.

David Allen of Old Maps

Podcast: An Interview with Brenda Sullivan of the Gravestone Girls

I recently had a chance to talk with Brenda Sullivan. She is one of "the Gravestone Girls," a company that teaches how to make cemetery gravestone rubbings without damaging the stones; gives lectures about cemetery art, history, and symbolism; and also creates replicas of tombstones by making an impression of the art of the tombstones.

In this interview, Brenda talks about her background and the services of the Gravestone Girls. I found her products to be a fascinating preservation of disappearing art. Brenda also talked a bit about how valuable cemeteries can be at supplying information to today's genealogists.

Brenda_Sullivan

 You can listen to the interview by clicking on her name above.

Video: An Interview with Brewster Kahle

At the recent RootsTech Conference held in Salt Lake City, I had a chance to sit and talk with Brewster Kahle, a digital librarian who is also the founder of The Internet Archive. Brewster had delivered a keynote speech at the conference a few minutes earlier to about 3,000 people. He then kindly agreed to appear on EOGN in a video interview in which he discusses digital archiving to preserve information forever and to make it available to anyone, anywhere in the world, at no charge.

Podcast: An Interview with some of the FamilySearch Senior Managers

FamilySearch_Senior_Mgrs

At the recent RootsTech Conference, I had an opportunity to sit and talk with three of the senior managers of FamilySearch:

• Jay Verkler, CEO of FamilySearch
• Shipley Munson, VP of Marketing for FamilySearch
• Don Anderson, Senior VP of Patron Services for FamilySearch

Our primary topic of conversation was the RootsTech conference that was happening around us. I asked several questions, including:

• What is RootsTech?
• Why do you have a RootsTech?
• Why is FamilySearch doing this?

The three of them described the conference plans and some of the thinking that went into those plans. They also described the results and even made predictions about next year's events. My favorite quote in this interview was made by Jay Verkler: "We didn't expect 3,000 people, either."

You can listen to this podcast now with your computer's speakers or copy it to your iPod or any other MP3 music player for later playback. To listen to it now, click on the "FamilySearch_Senior_Mgrs" link above the picture. To save the audio file, right-click on the same link (Macintosh users can Command-Click), and select "Save As..." to save it to anyplace on your hard drive, to iTunes, or any other place as you wish. The podcast is 13 minutes 11 seconds long.

NOTE: This podcast was recorded in the RootsTech Community Zone Expo Hall. You will hear background noise as thousands of genealogists were in the hall, talking with vendors, trying various products, and even playing games in the RootsTech Playground.

 

Genealogy Goodness for the Droid

The following announcement was written by Lisa Louise Cooke:

Ever since we launched the Genealogy Gems Podcast App for the iPhone and iPod Touch earlier this year (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/the-genealogy-gems-podcast/id337736531?mt=8), we’ve heard from Android users that they want to be able to stream the show on their mobile devices too. And now they can! The Genealogy Gems Podcast Companion App for Android is now LIVE in the Android marketplace!

Podcasts Explained

Podcasts Explained

NOTE: You can listen to an audio (podcast) version of this article by clicking on the PLAY icon on the left of the "Podcasts Explained" link just above this line.

Podcasting is the ability to listen to audio files on the Internet. You can listen on your Windows computer, a Macintosh, an MP3 player (such as the Apple iPod), an iPhone, or most any other device capable of listening to audio files. In most cases, listening to a podcast is similar to listening to a radio program: a podcast might be all music or it may be a talk show or even a mixture of both.

The term podcasting comes from the word "iPod" and "broadcasting."

Podcasting has several unique features:

1. Podcasts are not plagued by static or other atmospheric noises in the manner of radio broadcasts.
2. Podcasts are stored online, and you can listen to them whenever you want. Unlike radio, you do not need to check a “station schedule” and be prepared at a certain date or time. Podcasts are available whenever YOU want them.
3. By creating podcasts, one can reach listeners all over the world. Unlike radio stations that typically cover a limited geographic area, anyone can create podcasts that will attract listeners worldwide. For instance, I live in the northeastern part of the United States, and I have created podcasts. I later received comments from listeners in Australia, New Zealand, England, Germany, Sweden, Hong Kong, and Saudi Arabia. 

A Podcast Interview with Ron Arons

I had a delightful time recently talking with Ron Arons. He is the author of two books: Wanted: U.S. Criminal Records - Sources and Research Methodology as well as The Jews of Sing Sing. He specializes in finding records of the black sheep of the family. Along the way, he seems to uncover many fascinating stories.

I managed to talk with Ron at the recent conference of the National Genealogical Society. Ron talked about his books and also shared a number of tips about researching records of those who were incarcerated. I was able to record our conversation and now can offer it here as a podcast. You can listen to our conversation right now on your computer or else save the file to your MP3 music player and listen to it later.

Podcast: An Interview with David Rencher about the NGS Conference in Salt Lake City

I recently had a chance to talk with David Rencher, Chief Genealogical Officer at FamilySearch. David talked a lot about the upcoming conference of the National Genealogical Society, to be held at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, Utah on 28 April through 1 May 2010. David talks about the number of attendees expected (pre-registrations are already at  a large number), the exhibits, the presentations, the Thursday evening events, the keynote speeches, and especially about the GENTECH events.

You can listen to our conversation by clicking on the following link:

David_Rencher_Interview_2010_04-19

NOTE: A transcription of this interview is available at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2010/04/transcription-of-david-rencher-interview.html

Your Suggestions About Podcasts

A few hours ago, I had a chance to talk with David Rencher about next week's annual conference of the National Genealogical Society. I recorded the conversation and that recording is now available on this newsletter's web site at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2010/04/podcast-an-interview-with-david-rencher-about-the-ngs-conference-in-salt-lake-city.html

I do have a couple of questions and would appreciate your opinions.

New Genealogy Gems Podcast iPhone / iTouch Application

The following announcement was written by Lisa Louise Cooke of the Genealogy Gems Podcast:

SAN RAMON, Calif. – January 4, 2009  -  The Genealogy Gems Podcast, the #1  podcast in the genealogy category in iTunes has launched the first ever genealogy podcast app for iPhone and iTouch (in partnership with Wizzard Media).   The Genealogy Gems Podcast app provides users with streaming genealogy audio and video on the go, and exclusive Bonus Content.

Sarah Long's Library Beat Podcast: an Interview with Dick Eastman

Sarah Long's podcast, "Longshots," explores the world of libraries through interviews with key library figures and commentary on issues that matter to libraries. She is the Director of the North Suburban Library System, an organization of over 650 academic, public, school, and special libraries in the north/northwest suburbs of Chicago. She is also a well-known podcaster, often posting podcasts of interest to librarians and others. Sarah recently interviewed me and that audio interview is now available online.

Sarah's description of the podcast is: