Have you seen Roberta's latest post about New Ancestor Discoveries at AncestryDNA?

Question

As usual a great blog from Roberta Estes about NADs and the challenges that come with them.  Also some interesting info about limitations with creating NAD's and DNA Circles I wasn't aware of.

https://dna-explained.com/2016/06/14/trying-to-make-ancestors-out-of-nads/#like-13838

Comments

I like the bit that says "Tree copying is the equivalent of a genealogical social disease."

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Absolutely.

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What is a NAD. (I read the article so I know that it means New Ancestor Discorvery) but what is that? Must be an ancestry.com thing. But as far as I am concerned. money spent on ancestry.com is a waste.

I would add some concepts to Roberta's. Besides Copying being a social disease. There are genealogical crimes. Such as morphing a person into another, changing the spelling of a surname, that one may claim them as an ancestor, especially if that line is notable, auspicious or documented.

And creating a non existent relationship or even a person.

One other thing. The title genealogist is thrown around too casually.

Roberta Estes, is a genealogist,I know of her work, her studies and admire her. However the vast majority, are family researchers, not genealogists, and that includes me.

A person who repairs his own car is not a mechanic, Applying a disinfectant and band aid to a wound does  not make one a doctor or nurse.

By calling ourselves genealogists we insult real genealogists, then again I know of or rather have heard of so called genealogists, who because they are getting paid to deliver a product, commit genealogical crimes.

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I too have looked at my NADs and gotten no where, their birth and death ranges are already filled in in my tree.  Researching, I even went so far as to start building an isolated node in my own tree around the NAD, but that didn't help, although it did turn the NAD into a circle match, even though they are still unconnected to me, their algorithm is flawed.

Answer 1

I've basically had the same experiences as Roberta with NADs.  They aren't ancestors of mine, but they're related (generally through marriage) to my ancestors.  Of the ones I've figured out, they're related to siblings of my ancestors.  I haven't found them to be of any use for me personally, but if I felt like contacting all of the people I'm matching, I could help them connect their lines to mine...  Because that's why they aren't showing with the correct ancestral match -- they don't have their tree completed up to our MRCA.

Comments

I've only seen a few but they come and go.  It is nice to see them when they arrive and I get excited but I haven't yet been able to link any to my tree. However it keeps telling me one thing, I must have more US colonial ancestors connection (by descent or maybe marriage) that I don't know about yet!  Got to get more connections out to the main tree!