RootsWeb Newsroom

In last weeks RootsWeb Review I wrote an article about the World Archives Project and I wanted to clarify some questions that have come up.

The World Archives Project is still in the Beta testing stages.  So when you are using the tool and you see something you think could be improved, or if you run into errors please use the “Provide Feedback” link at the top of the page to let our team know about your experience.  We consider this a community effort and want to work together to make keying a good experience.

The second item I want to note is in regard to the benefits of the project.  Not only will the indexes be free to everyone, but active participants (those who key 900 or more records in a quarter) will have access to all of the images that are part of the World Archives Project.  In the future active participants will also be able to vote on what collections they would like to index.

Another benefit to the World Archives Project is the opportunity for genealogical and historical societies to partner with Ancestry in sponsoring data sets.  Partnering societies will have their logos and a link to their site displayed on Ancestry.com; we hope that this will bring more traffic to the society and to the project.  These societies will also receive a copy of the index and images for their own use.

If you want to read more about the project see the links below,

Ancestry Weekly Journal article 

World Archives Project Blog

World Archives Project Message Board

 
Please feel free to email questions that you have to worldarchivesproject at tgn.com.

Over the past few months we have seen a few changes to the RootsWeb team – we have been reorganizing responsibilities and have also added a few new team members.  Our two new members are working on the HelpDesk team and want to introduce them to you.

BreAnn has worked for TGN for close to 4 years.  She has worked in our member services department and was most recently a member of our advanced service team.  Her personal interests include movie watching, traveling, skiing and watching reality shows with her husband of 4 months!

Mike has worked for TGN for over 3 years and has developed a wide variety of experience within our member services department; his most recent role has been with the Technical Support team where he has excelled in providing both support to the members as well as training to new hires. His personal interests include genealogy, hiking and camping with his dog, and watching movie classics.
Gerhard, who most of you are familiar with, is now managing web accounts (accounts@rootsweb.com), is List Master (listmaster@rootsweb.com) and is also working on the RootsWeb Review.  He continues to enjoy working with the community members and volunteer administrators.

Elaine is still our message boards administrator and oversees all message board activities (messageboards@rootsweb.com) - this work keeps her pretty busy.

Anna is also still around and is working on improving the RootsWeb experience, she has also taken on additional responsibilities with other parts of the company. 

And we want to wish a fond farewell to Donna Popelish.  Donna has been with RootsWeb for over a decade - so she has seen a lot of changes and a lot of growth!  We want to thank Donna for her dedication to RootsWeb and the RootsWeb community!  We wish her the best with her future endeavors.   

Today Ancestry.com and FGS announced the Public Beta for the World Archives Project.  This project is a community keying initiative that will allow participants to contribute to the effort of indexing genealogical and historical records.  You can read about the project on the main Ancestry.com Blog here.

If you are interested in participating to help preserve the world’s records, please download the software and let us know what you think.  The URL for the main World Archives Project page on Ancestry.com is www.ancestry.com/WorldArchivesProject; we invite you to share it with anyone interested.  If you are a society leader or member and are interested in learning more about how your society can be involved in the World Archives Project please send an email to worldarchivesproject@tgn.com.
 

I think the World Archives Project fits right in with what RootsWeb stands for - not only will the indexes we assist in keying be free for everyone but the community is assisting each other in bringing new records online and preserving valuable information. 

If you are out in Philadelphia attending FGS please stop by the Ancestry.com booth to learn more, and to say hi.

Over the past few weeks you may have noticed a few glitches while you were searching and browsing the site.  The main reason for the interruptions is the addition of 18 new servers – yes 18!  We are very excited for this addition to the site as it means a more stable environment, a little increase in overall site speed, the ability to add additional features, and overall a lot more flexibility. 

We are about three quarters of the way through the move so you will likely notice a few delays over the next coming weeks.  As we work on more major areas we will post notices up on the Help page.  We appreciate your patience and support as we continue to move data to the new servers.   

 
The RootsWeb team is very excited for the new additions and want to say a special THANK YOU to our developers for all the work they have done to get the servers up, running and the data moved.  

If you have a freepages account and wish to change the background color of the acknowledgement banner you will need to follow the instructions below: