One of the great ways to keep in touch and to gather family stories, photos, memories, recipes etc is through social media. There are a couple of websites dedicated to making this happen. One is MyHeritage:
http://www.myheritage.com/ While this is primarily a "wiki" of cloud storage for your family tree MyHeritage also allows you to create a family website where you can invite other family members to share via photo uploads, share family news and print off the family tree. In someways it serves as an online family newsletter. Members must be invited to join the site, keeping it private.
- MyHeritage is free to use. However, the capacity of members on your family tree at the free level is 250. My grandfather fathered 21 children, so you can imagine how useful that capacity is.
- MyHeritage offers a free record match. I have less than a handful of people who were or are in the US, yet all 79 record matches are US records.
- MyHeritage is a huge conglomerate. Since their launch 10 years ago, they have been in the business of acquisition, most recently acquiring FamilyLink and Geni.
The other website is Rootsy.com:
http://www.rootsy.com/. Rootsy is also private where people are required to login after receiving an invitation to join. Rootsy is new and, by their own admission, run by a small group of entrepreneurs. I'm guessing this group are Google aficionados. The pages are very simplistic. Nothing is clickable. There is no way to upload a Gedcom, meaning a big make work project for people who are actually interested in genealogy. It takes an inordinate amount of time to log in. I have yet to find where or how to upload photos, videos, share recipes, invite others, share news.....
Maybe one day, someone will launch a site that actually allows families to easily and quickly stay in touch and to share.
No comments:
Post a Comment