Rootsweb resources

Question

Hi all,

I understand that Ancestry are shutting down Rootsweb and there are various resources on there that could do with saving. There are thousands of transcribed wills , 7000 on this page all Kent wills:

https://freepages.rootsweb.com/~mrawson/genealogy/wills.html

And over 3600 of Surrey and other counties on this page:

https://sites.rootsweb.com/~engsurry/wills/index.shtml

Is there anything that Wikitree can do to save some of these resources?

Ann

Answer 1

You can save pages with the Wayback Machine. But doing it one by one would take forever.

There is a tool to save all pages within some page at once:

https://www.holisticseo.digital/python-seo/internet-archive/

But I don’t have the time to figure out how to use it. Maybe someone who programs regularly could figure it out quickly.

Comments

Maybe wikitree could save them somehow as they are both amazing resources.

Chris Whitten?

Ann

Answer 2

From a random check I've done, it looks like many (if not all) have already been archived.

See the main index here and check a few:

https://web.archive.org/web/20211028080539/https://sites.rootsweb.com/~engsurry/wills/index.shtml

Be patient as their servers are swamped with people trying to archive things ahead of the closedown of the rootsweb pages.

Answer 3

Since Ancestry is the owner of all Rootsweb webpages I would hesitate to take what is theirs without permission. Copyright rules should be considered.

I have cited Rootsweb pages and then took the extra step and transcribed the contents. Best a person can do.

Its a sad time to see all that info go behind Ancestry's paywall.

Comments

I have to say that I have quite a few transcribed wills on the Surrey Plus Wills index which I put on there so they were accessible for free so if Ancestry decide to put them behind a paywall I won’t be best pleased.

Ann

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Good idea, but the Surrey Plus Wills index seems to be an Internet Archive holding. They are in breach of copyright, which is under appeal but no guarantee that in the end the content the Internet Archive holds may have to be removed.

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What age are these Wills?

You can't copyright the information.

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Thats what a transcript is. Just dont copy paste the original info or image. Public domain rules only apply if copyright protection is not in place. Copyright protection can be applied for/transfered from original owners - to protect items from falling into the Public Domain.

Anyway, my two cents for what its worth.

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You can't copyright data but the transcripts could potentially be copyright. Copyright of the wills would not start until someone publishes them (the transcriber). There seems to be conflicting opinions and this could vary by country. I think it best to leave it to archive.org.