What brought you to WikiTree?
Some years ago I was introduced to WikiTree by a friend Christine Frost who has been a WikiTree member for many years and is involved in different projects and challenges. She is great for giving me advice when I need it and is experienced at finding sources in the UK, so I call on her sometimes to help with that.
What is your favorite thing about WikiTree, or which feature(s) do you like the most?
I really like the collaboration between members, and the ability to acknowledge and thank other members who have helped out with something big or small. It creates a sense of connection between all members, even if we haven’t made a genealogical connection yet. This spirit is already helping to develop a sense of the global family who are all connected and helping each other out and supporting each other positively. I think the spirit of WikiTree is an example of what I would like to see in wider society.
If you could improve one thing about WikiTree, what would it be?
I would like to make it easier to upload an image to several related profiles at the same time. For example, if I am uploading a photo of the family home, it can be a nuisance to scroll down my whole watch list and click people to connect to that photo, if I am not sure of their profile number. I often have to go in and out and scribble down the number of each person’s profile that I want to add the photo to, and then find them in the list. It’s a bit annoying. Whereas, I would love if when I upload an image to the first person, then I would see a list of their close family members (parents, siblings, spouse, children) and have the choice to connect the image to those other profiles too instead of searching for them all one by one.
What is an example of how WikiTree has helped you with your genealogy or how you’ve helped genealogy with WikiTree?
WikiTree has helped me to organise a lot of details I had collected over the years into a neat format. It is a great platform for me to share everything with family members. Also, when I am contacting DNA matches, it is great to refer the person to my WikiTree family tree, to see if they can find any connections
I think that every addition I make to WikiTree helps genealogy. The more we work on our global family tree, the more connections will be made and the more we will understand about our history and ancestors. This really excites me and motivates me to do what I can to build up our shared genealogical knowledge.
Any tips for someone just starting out on WikiTree?
Take it slowly at first and have a look around before you start diving in and adding people. Explore different profiles and see how they have been built up or written. Learn what details are needed for each person you add and consider what your source is for this information. Is it something your mom told you but is not 100% definite, is it handed on to you from a paper-family-tree that uncle Bob did 20 years ago, or do you have copies of the real birth, marriage and death records for the person? For WikiTree you need to have good, reliable sources that are recognized, such as civil registrations, census returns or church documents. You will need to learn what websites are available to find good sources of information for the country you are researching. Ask for help from someone on the G2G forum, or from another WikiTree member if you are not sure where to start to find sources.
If you are uploading a Gedcom, please take the time to visit each person’s profile and tidy it up and add the sources for each. It might be time-consuming to do this, but you will be glad in the end, and you will be doing a massive favour for the WikiTree community. There are too many Gedcom uploads already on WikiTree that are left unmanaged and unsourced and it is left to others to eventually try and tidy them up, so please be considerate about this!
Most of all, if you’re new, have fun and welcome to the “global family tree”. We hope to see you too interviewed as “member of the week” some day!!