How can anyone suggest merges between two totally different people?

Question

I'm on a mission to remove clutter from profiles by removing Rejected Merges. Some profiles can have up to 30 rejected merges because they are clearly not the same person.  

I cannot believe why anyone would suggest so many merges for one person when some don't even have the same surname. Some are born in different countries and have different parents, spouses and children.

Would appreciate your comment good or bad.

Comments

I have noticed similar rejected merges. Does it happen when someone is adding an individual and clicking all those that are not the same as the profile person they are adding?

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There are reasons for rejected merges, someone at some time felt it was necessary to 'announce' these people are not the same.

Whether I personally may feel that it is obvious that they aren't the same person others may not.

Removing rejected merges may lead to the same merges being suggested again, requiring the PM to reject them again.

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The algorithm that finds and suggests possible matches for a person casts a wide net to avoid missing a valid match. We humans need to use our good judgment to determine which suggestions (if any) have a realistic chance of being confused with the target person. It is a mistake to assume that the algorithm is smarter than we are.

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Thanks for your comment, M.

It is my understanding that when suggested merges are rejected the system will not allow the same merges to be suggested again. 

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I donʻt think that is correct, Roy.  I have found rejected merges - with no good explanation of why - and have been able to propose and complete a merge of the same profiles.

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Roy, I don't think so, I'm not sure that's the way it happens, especially if you are removing rejected merges, how would people know that the merge has been proposed and rejected?

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Roy's understanding is incorrect.

Answer 1

Hi Roy,

I was recently asked to merge one of my profiles with another and what I discovered made me really mad. The original profile had been 'modified' by a wikitree member  with obvious incorrect information (ie: different birth date, different parents and different state etc) which turned the original profile person into a completely different person. It was only because I took the time to review my original profile and check the history of the changes that had been made, that I could see what this wikitree member had done. They clearly had not looked for documents to support the original information in the profile but changed the information in the profile to suit their source instead of creating a new profile to match their sources. Additionally, there were no research notes to explain the reason for their changes. I had to go back to an earlier version of the profile (to where it had not been 'adulterated'), add the correct sources and reject the requested merge. It was only thanks to the person who suggested the merge (who was not the person that adulterated the profile) that I was able to correct the original profile. What angered me even more was that this wikitreer (who adulterated the profile) was a so-called experience wikitreer.

What really concerns me now is that this wikitreer may have adulterated many other profiles (not just mine). I could understand if this was an inexperienced person but it wasn't.

I'm now in the process of checking my other profiles to see if this person has ruined any more of my profiles.

Very very frustrating.

Comments

I feel for you, as I had a similar (not exactly the same) my managed profiles were a mess with inaccurate details due to non care with gedcompare.

So you are not alone in your frustration.

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See Help:Problems with Members.

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Very frustrating indeed. 

Answer 2

It says right on the Help page for merging:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:Merging#Rejected_Matches

Rejected Matches

If two profiles look similar but represent different people they should be set as Rejected Matches. This helps prevent you and others from confusing them in the future.

Comments

Thank you for the link, Dina. Made a comment on it.  

Answer 3

This topic was recently discussed in g2g:  https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/1507454/removing-rejected-matches?show=1507454#q1507454

Personally, I am not bothered by lists of rejected matches, and don't consider them clutter. 

Comments

Thank you for the link, Coleen. Made a comment on it. 

Answer 4

Numerous strange matches show up on profiles because of mistakes that members make in using the "Add Person" forms.

Yesterday I removed 92 "rejected matches" from a profile I manage. They had been created earlier in the day, apparently after a member mistakenly connected the profile as the wife of a person they were working on, then ticked the boxes on the Add Person form to create rejected matches for 94 profiles that had been suggested by the algorithm as possible matches for the name and date(s) they had entered on the form for the person they  Intended to add. I could not remove the rejected matches without stating a reason (which generstes a comment), so 92 members received puzzling notifications of a comment about my removal of a match between Calista Piccioli (the profile I manage) and a woman named something like Margaret Allen or Marie Hensley.

Fortunately, I think the design and wording of the new Add Profile forms that are now in beta testing should reduce the frequency of this kind of error.

PS - I left two rejected matches on the profile because they looked vaguely similar to Calista, mostly because they included her LNAB as one of the last names.

Comments

I have been using the new Beta test add a profile and it works well and is far simpler to check for possible duplicates/matches.

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Thank you, Ellen. You have answered my question about how someone can suggest merges between two different people. In your case 90 odd.   

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M Ross.

Not aware of the new Beta test. 

How does it work? 

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Check this out. I really like it.

https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/1508993/have-you-tried-the-new-system-for-creating-profiles?show=1508993#q1508993

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Thank you, M, appreciate the link.

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Thanks again M. 

The 80+ comments make interesting reading.