| |
Last Week at OneGreatFamily . . .
Site Activity Summary
144,710 new individual merges!
40,265 new individual hints!
57,953 new family merges!
11,628 new family hints!
182 average individual merges per group
36 average individual hints per group
58 average family merges per group
5 average family hints per group
If you didn't receive a GenMail telling you about new merges in your
family tree, your tree wasn't affected by this activity. You may want
to add new individuals or information to your family tree to improve
the likelihood of matches and merges taking place.
OneGreatFamily wants to hear from you. Please send us your success stories
and your recommendations for new features.
Submit your story
Send us your wish list
|
OneGreatFamily.com Quietly Mapping the Human Family
Earlier this year researchers at the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium announced the publication of a refined draft of the human genome. The genetic map is composed of about three billion base pairs of DNA chemicals and, with the exception of 400 or so remaining gaps, all have been identified.
With equally vaunted ambition, a small startup in Springville, Utah, has set its sites on creating a single genealogical map of the human family tree and is rapidly making progress toward that goal.
Approximately 500,000 individuals use the OneGreatFamily online service, located at www.onegreatfamily.com, each month to participate in creating the human family tree and to see what research others may be contributing to their ancestral lines. Nearly 70 million names have been submitted to OneGreatFamily by more than 380,000 registered members since the service launched in June 2001.
Founder and CEO Alan Eaton created OneGreatFamily in an effort to solve all of the major problems associated with genealogy research.
"Creating a common pedigree for the human family tree provides a revolutionary way to do genealogy research," explains Eaton. "OneGreatFamily lets people see what research has been done on their branches of the human family tree by others. These researchers can see how they are related and continue to collaborate on an ongoing basis."
Eaton points to several other challenges that creating a common family tree solves. The benefits of tying family trees together include the following:
- a system that is extremely precise identifying someone's ancestors by relationships rather than by names alone
- the reduction of duplication that results in saving time and effort
- the ability to see all information available for an ancestor in one location, including alternate names, dates, and places
- the ability to leverage the research others have done to make research breakthroughs
- access to collateral ancestral lines (the families of siblings of direct ancestors) that often provide clues and information on direct ancestors and
- an easy way to collaborate with others on common ancestral research.
Eaton says OneGreatFamily is similar to an online family reunion. "OneGreatFamily is a destination site for people that want to come together in one place and share what they know about their family trees. OneGreatFamily ties all of the information together into one family tree, so people leave with more than they started with."
Eaton's passion for genealogy started more than 15 years ago, and he has spent the past several years designing and developing new genealogy services. While working on other projects, Eaton started conceiving of ways to use the internet as a place to combine and share genealogical information. "As anyone who's tried genealogy will tell you, one of the biggest problems with family history work is duplication of effort. The internet is the perfect platform for solving that problem by centralizing genealogical data," says Eaton.
People from 174 countries are using OneGreatFamily to publish and share their personal pedigrees, and OneGreatFamily.com is linking them all together. Information can be added by making individual entries to the OneGreatFamily database or by submitting GEDCOMs (a standard format for files containing family tree data).
"When you get back even just a few generations, it's amazing how family trees from far-flung places start interconnecting," Eaton explains. "As people continue to find our service and input their information, we continue to make connections." The result, after just a few years in operation, is an ever-expanding single family tree of the human family. "Already we're to the point where our users can often tell our system what individual ancestor they're looking for and find the information has already been submitted by someone else."
OneGreatFamily further features patented technology that verifies matching information in multiple ways for certainty and allows users to maintain their own "view" of information so they keep the data they want, even if it conflicts with someone else's view.
But the end result is that everyone is working toward a common goal. Variances or disagreeing data are shown to be conflicting and people can get to work on resolving those differences. Holes in the human family tree that need more research and attention are easy to see when everyone's individual efforts are combined. "Genealogy is by its very nature collaborative," says founder Eaton. "We make no bones about it, our goal is to map the entire human family."
A privately held company in Springville, Utah, OneGreatFamily is the premier provider of family tree services. Guest members of the company's online service (located at www.onegreatfamily.com) have free access to submit and edit their genealogies and to search the OneGreatFamily database. Subscriptions are also available that allow members to access additional information and functionality that is made available through OneGreatFamily's matching and merging service.
 Visit OneGreatFamily to get involved in this monumental project today
Subscribe to OneGreatFamily to support our continued growth and improvements
OneGreatFamily to Attend Senior Technology Showcase in Salt Lake City Area
OneGreatFamily has been invited to participate in the Senior Technology Showcase, a conference that will take place on November 20 and 21 at the SouthTown Expo Center in Sandy, Utah. More than 5,000 attendees are expected to learn how to use technology to improve life.
OneGreatFamily will be located in the exhibit hall and will be providing three scheduled classes on online genealogy Saturday, November 21.
Those who are interested in receiving training or learning more about OneGreatFamily are invited to stop by.
Learn about the Senior Technology Showcase today
Subscribe to OneGreatFamily to gain unlimited access
|
How does OneGreatFamily help me find all my ancestors?
by Chelsea Beattie - Marketing Manager
OneGreatFamily can help turn your computer into a genealogy dragnet! We
constantly "prowl after," search, and track down family names for our site
visitors. OneGreatFamily separates itself from all the other genealogy services in
that we search for ALL your ancestors ALL the time. In the words of Joe
Friday from the TV show Dragnet, "This is not something we hide behind. It’s
something we live up to."
Every week subscribers receive GenMail telling them about new merges and hints in
their family tree. More merges mean OneGreatFamily is becoming more
accurate, the database is growing, and people are actually seeing their trees grow! Even
when our members are not adding individuals to their own family trees, OneGreatFamily
is adding new and helpful information for them. More than one million names are added to OneGreatFamily each month by our growing base of members, and any of these ancestors may also be your ancestors.
Because OneGreatFamily automatically matches and merges information, it is possible to see which
individuals have been added to your family tree, day or night!
OneGreatFamily offers many resources that help members make their
genealogy experience easier and more rewarding. In addition to names, researchers add tens of
thousands of new sources each month. The service also offers resources, such as our free
online genealogy newsletter, and links to genealogy resources that include ethnicity and religion, genealogy
education, surname searches, online databases, and much more. OneGreatFamily also offers
tools such as printable genealogy forms and an alternate spelling search to further help researchers find ancestors and organize their findings.
Researching names should not be like trying to find a needle in a haystack.
All of these resources and tools are here to make it easier for you to
search and find names for your family tree.
The quality of information on OneGreatFamily improves each day because of
you! Your participation is vital. So turn your computer into a genealogy
dragnet today by using OneGreatFamily as your number one genealogy resource!
Subscribe to OneGreatFamily to enjoy unlimited access to this unique genealogy service
Visit OneGreatFamily to see your family tree
|
How can OneGreatFamily search for my ancestors?
OneGreatFamily is designed to help you build your family tree. In doing that, our unique match and merge system can enhance and enlarge your family tree for you! In order to utilize this technology, you must understand how it works and how you can optimize it to work for you.
How the technology works: How Matching and Merging works.
With OneGreatFamily, your data is stored in records. Records are created when you enter any information 'by hand' or by importing a Gedcom file. There are two types of records, Individual records and Family records.
An Individual record keeps track of all personal information for a particular ancestor. A family record ties the records of two parents and any number of children together and stores any family information.
All records in your group are matched against records from other members' groups in order to locate possible family tree connections. The matching and merging system performs a thorough check against any two records. If two records are found to be exact matches; or very similar, they are automatically merged. If they are similar, but not similar enough to be automatically merged, they are hinted. Light bulbs will appear next to the records, indicating potential matches.
How to optimize it to work for you: Sit back and let OneGreatFamily do the work!
In order to increase the likelihood of finding matches and growing your family tree, there are a few things you can do. The following information gives you some guidelines and techniques for optimizing the matching and merging process.
The most important thing to remember is to enter all available information for your ancestors. The more information you have for a particular ancestor (name, dates, places, etc.), the better chance you have at receiving matches to that record.
You should first include the ancestor's complete first and last name in your records. You can also include titles and adjectives, such as Jr., Sr., III, and Dr., to provide the recipient with more specific information.
Dates are very important. Be sure that you list the correct date information for all of your ancestor's lifetime events that are significant. Again, include all available verified information.
Include the locations of the events in your ancestor's life. Be sure to include their date of birth, death, and other vital personal information. Location is important in order to provide clarity and individuality to your ancestral records.
Family relations are one of the most important indicators of a potential match. If the two records have the same parents, spouses, and children, it is likely that they are the same individual. Be sure that you include all family relations for your ancestors. This is where an exception to some of the earlier rules comes into play. Although you may only have a name for a particular ancestor, you should add him/her to your file. This will not be particularly helpful in matching with this ancestor, but it will provide additional verification for the ancestors that he/she is closely related to.
Standardize your information. Keep your dates, places, names, and other information all in the same form. This will allow the recipient to work faster in identifying correct matches.
Send your technical support question to our team
Visit OneGreatFamily and expand your family tree today!
|
| |
Want some FREE time?
Current subscribers can earn additional free time by referring others
to OneGreatFamily.com. OneGreatFamily needs your help in growing the
largest single family tree in the world. You can get free subscription
time on OneGreatFamily by referring others to this unique service. When
anyone you refer to OneGreatFamily subscribes to our service and enters
your username, you get an additional free month.
Learn more about this FREE opportunity
Refer a new subscriber to OneGreatFamily
today.
|
|
