Is anyone else feeling frustrated with recent changes to Familysearch.org? [closed]

Question

I have noticed recently that census results on Familysearch.org now only pertain to the single person and I'm no longer seeing the full table of family members with links. You can see other names in a column on the results page but then you now have to search for them individually to get their details. I'm a huge bit miffed about this situation and I've just sent them a complaint telling them so. The problem is compounded by the fact that when I click to go to the Find My Past image and click to view the transcription, all I'm seeing is a transcription of the first family on the page, when often it's the other results i'm interested in so I am ending up squinting over victorian handwriting, trying to decipher something I shouldn't have to. I am a member of both sites. Just exactly how many sites do I have to be a member of to see the darn thing transcribed in black and white? I can feel a big Grrr coming on, lol.

Comments

If you want it mangled in black and white, you can join Ancestry.

But I suspect the issue is that FMP are protecting their interests by only allowing FamilySearch to show a hobbled version for free.

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I feel a bit miffed as I have until now regarded it in the highest light and volunteered to transcribe documents so that I was giving back, and paid for world subscription to FMP so that I could see the images to get the best possible out of it and then I find them throwing spanners in the machine. First it was the 1891 census, now it's the 1851 as well. (The limits on 1911 are understandable).  Twice now I have got a census transcription from FMP after clicking on the image in FSO that does not reflect my search terms. If I wanted the results for the next door neighbour I'd have put their name into my search! That's probably down to sloppy linking from FSO. The main reason I chose to subscribe to FMP is because I can use FSO search engine as their own search is dreadful.

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I am too especially because I just learned how to use it!  Can you tell me what FMP and FSO are?  Family search.org and ???

With the "improvements" in many websites I am getting the feeling that they are deliberately making it difficult, at the rate we are learning maybe they think we won't need them much longer!  Hobbled is a good word.

Thanks for the topic.

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FMP = Find MY Past - which is a PAID subscription site that hoards its records and transcriptions, much like Ancestry does. These are NOT collaborative businesses.

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I did say I had SUBSCRIBED to a PAID site (FMP, in reference to the full name I stated in my original post) to get the best out of my searches on Familysearch.org, which has links to FMP images (which you have to subscribe to to see them)  on the census results it displays. At no time did I say it was collaborative.

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I'm sorry Gillian. I was not disparaging your subscription. I was merely commenting how FMP and Ancestry were not allowing us  to have easy access to data that SHOULD BE freely available!!

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"Twice now I have got a census transcription from FMP after clicking on the image in FSO that does not reflect my search terms. If I wanted the results for the next door neighbour I'd have put their name into my search."

I've had that too Gillian, I thought it was something I was doing wrong or a glitch in ther system. 

Answer 1

This isn't a problem with every census, but with some of the Canadian & Scottish Censuses it has been an issue for me. Two years ago, I noticed a pattern in FamilySearch's Persistent Archival Links, or PALs, used to identify entries in historical records in kept their databases.

In short, the numbers are sequential, in a strange variant of base-30. Here's the encoding sequence:

M9S3Q7W4HCZ8D6XFNJVK2LGP5RTYB1

I wrote a blog post about this, along with a simple Python script, although usually I just do it by looking at that sequence. For instance, I have an ancestor, James Williamson (1802-1850), who shows up in the 1841 Scotland Census on FamilySearch at this URL:

https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/VYCW-46F

So I look at the sequence. The rest of his household's profiles should be accessible by swapping the last "F" with N, J, V, K, 2, & L. If I want to find a neighbour, I'd start by replacing the "F" with an "X" or a "G"

M9S3Q7W4HCZ8D6XFNJVK2LGP5RTYB1

It's a bit convoluted, but it typically works. The only time when it really doesn't seem to work is when the family is spread across 2 census pages, in which case they may not have been indexed sequentially. 

I hope that helps folks here. Give it a try and let me know if it helps!

Answer 2

I noticed that too with the 1851 census, I was aware of problems before like not grouping families if they were across two pages, but I can't understand this change at all.

I hope they change it back

Comments

Yes, and the sooner the better!

Answer 3

I have not noticed the change with my work with familysearch.org.

I can only guess that the changes you are seeing are not from them but rather from their "partner" sites because you state that you still have the same result even with a membership to Find My Past and viewing on their site.

Comments

Hi Dale the FamilySearch problem is this:

The census used to be like this, all the family on one page:

Name	John W Rushforth
Event Type	Census
Event Date	31 Mar 1901
Event Place	Ince In Makerfield, Lancashire, England
County	Lancashire
Civil Parish	Ince In Makerfield
Ecclesiastical Parish	Ince In Makerfield Christ Church
Sub-District	Hindley
Registration District	Wigan
Residence Note	Keble Street
Gender	Male
Age	44
Occupation	DRILLER WAGON SHOP
Relationship to Head of Household	Head
Birth Year (Estimated)	1857
Birthplace	Leeds, Yorkshire
Schedule Type	23
Page Number	5

HOUSEHOLD	ROLE	GENDER	AGE	BIRTHPLACE
John W Rushforth	Head	M	44	Leeds, Yorkshire
Sarah A Rushforth	Wife	F	41	Leeds, Yorkshire
George A Rushforth	Son	M	19	Leeds, Yorkshire
William E Rushforth	Son	M	18	Leeds, Yorkshire
Mary A Rushforth	Daughter	F	16	Leeds, Yorkshire

CITING THIS RECORD

"England and Wales Census, 1901," database, FamilySearch(https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:X9GB-P4H : 29 August 2015), John W Rushforth, Ince In Makerfield, Lancashire, England; from "1901 England, Scotland and Wales census," database and images, findmypast (http://www.findmypast.com : n.d.); citing Hindley subdistrict, PRO RG 13, The National Archives, Kew, Surrey.

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The 1851 Census (England) is now only showing one person despite the search page listing other people, so it makes it hard to find who those other people are (and the 1911 census doesn't even show on the search page if there is other people:

Name	John Rushforth
Event Type	Census
Event Date	1851
Event Place	Leeds, Yorkshire,Yorkshire (West Riding), England
Registration District	Leeds
Residence Note	Richmond Court
Gender	Male
Age	4
Occupation	Scholar
Relationship to Head of Household	Son In Law
Birth Year (Estimated)	1847
Birthplace	Leeds, Yorkshire
Page Number	18
Registration Number	HO107
Piece/Folio	2319 / 846
Affiliate Record Type	Household

CITING THIS RECORD

"England and Wales Census, 1851," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QKVG-KW9X : 24 July 2016), John Rushforth, Leeds, Yorkshire,Yorkshire (West Riding), England; citing Leeds, Yorkshire,Yorkshire (West Riding), England, p. 18, from "1851 England, Scotland and Wales census," database and images, findmypast (http://www.findmypast.com : n.d.); citing PRO HO 107, The National Archives of the UK, Kew, Surrey.

I don't use the external links so Gillian would know about that.

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Both of those records are on Find My Past and that backs up my point that it is the Find My Past site that made the changes to the way things are displayed. I do very little with records for people outside the US and the US census records I use look like the top one you just showed me so I still think the problem is with the partner site and not familysearch. As RJ said FMP is  not letting us see all of the data for free to make us pay.

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I think it must be a FMP problem, too.  I went to the Family Search site and looked at a census entry after reading this post.  Everything appeared as it was before and the whole family was showing in the census entry.

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I think I understand your point Dale, but it surprises me that find my past would make familysearch change how they index records.

 

Kristin I have only seen this problem for the 1851 census for England in the last month so it's not a widespread census issue.

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It's not Findmypast, their results all display in a table. It may be to do with how they license those indexes to Familysearch though. This last month or so  Familysearch results for the 1851 have changed again from having the familial information to individual results on the british censuses and the christenings don't even have a citation beneath.

Answer 4

Yes I am very frustrated. I dont even bother to look for the 1851 census any more on Family Search.

Now I get my 1851 census details from FreeCen.

If Family Search wont play ball with me, then I wont play ball with them.

I do still get the 1841, 1861, 1871 and most of the 1891 census records from Family search.

But if I dont find anything on Family Search - Census or BMD records - I will go to freeCen and freeBMD instead,. They seem to be fairly (but not totally) complete and so far they a lot more accurate!!

Comments

Nice Tip .. Thank You

Answer 5

I've been frustrated because Family Search stopped cross-referencing many early Connecticut births -- instead, they list "microfilm unknown".  It's like going off the gold standard. On the other hand, they've  

I'd send an example but I'm having computer issues at this end today.

Answer 6

Some paid sites do a free search.  You only get very partial results.  It's a teaser.

Giving data to other sites is just another form of teaser.

Comments

I never bother with them.

Answer 7

Totally changed my opinion on this matter after reading the replies - even renewed my expired Ancestry.com membership.

Comments

lol ... Ive only ever had one free 2 weeks. Because they have such an amazing database of records I succumb to the rouges and pay for a month about twice a year - and boy I make the most of it ! Like this month :)

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@SJ - from other posts here on wikitree, it's apparent that many people, such as yourself, have a misconception regarding what paid sites are offering. They are NOT offering access to public documents. They are offering access to IMAGES and INDICES of documents.

Someone spent time and money to access the documents; capture images of them; transcribe the information from those images, create indices of names, places, and dates; generate software to search that data, etc., etc.

It's not at all clear to me why anyone thinks that the time and expense to do all that shouldn't be compensated.

Over the years, I have been compensated to travel to places where public documents were kept, spent hours examining those documents, recorded information from those documents, and passed that information on to those who paid me to do it. If you think I should have done that for FREE, because I accessed public documents, you've got another think coming.

Neither those sites, nor I,  in no way restrict your access to the public records. You are in no way prevented by those sites, or me, from traveling to whereever the original documents are kept, or browsing through those documents page by page looking for a name, and recording whatever you want yourself.

 

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Completely changed my mind on this topic - you've all convinced me.

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Agreed, putting all this out there does cost money and we shouldn't expect to get a premium service for free but my question was asked nearly two years ago and was not about Ancestry, it was about changes to Familysearch, which have since been rectified. I'm not sure why this old thread has been resurrected to take a dig at Ancestry, but Ancestry bashing seems to be the new sport now we know there are no beaks and feet in McNuggets.

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You appear to be correct regarding the images. However, you previously said:

"Ancestry now has a throttle on all of our records."

IF, by "throttle," you mean access to images of U. S. census records, that appears to be simply false.

I visited https://www.archives.gov/research/census and found several other ways to access the microfilms, both online and offline.

Online - familysearch.org. I did not try each and every microfilm, but was able to view every filmstrip that I did try. I randomly tried one or two census districts in one or two states for 5 or 6 of the U. S. census collections (1790 through 1940). The only "throttling" I encountered was having to log in to familysearch. I haven't as yet been asked to pay for that access.

Online - possibly public libraries, state archives, etc., that may provide free access to ancestry.com and fold3.

Offline - buy the microfilms from the archives; visit the Wash., DC, archives or a regional office.

Regarding indices to the U. S. censuses, I have not researched what indexing the U.  S. government has done and made publicly available, but I was able to download (free) a PDF of the 1790 heads of families document which was published by the U. S. government.

Some transcribed indices are available (free) at http://www.us-census.org/. Also, familysearch does provide (free) access to and use of indices for each of the U. S. census filmstrips that I randomly accessed mentioned above.

 

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Sorry this is an answer to the comment above and not the original question! )
From my perspective ( other side of the Atlantic), I feel that the practice of some archives to allow ancestry or FMP to  digitise and to have( for a time) exclusive rights to some images has helped preserve and extend access to records.
Firstly , it means one can view images from home with a subscription but also , and importantly, freely at many  local libraries. Secondly the records themselves suffer from less wear and tear.(particularly important for parish records which are 'popular' documents.)Thirdly, the money received helps keep archives open and staffed for longer hours (archives are always an soft target to cut funding)
 From my local county, all the parish registers, plus others including wills, poor law records, prison records, poor law records, quarter sessions, apprentice registers, bastardy bonds and tithe maps have been indexed and digitised and are on Ancestry.The income  realised has  helped my local archives to remain open for reasonable hours and also to preserve and index many other documents. As a local 'historian' I can still visit the archives on 4 weekdays and 2 Saturdays a month to acess those  records that are unlikely ever to be digitised and put online. (I spent yesterday looking at land records from the 16th and early 17th cent . Hopefully my findings will help improve the accuracy of a set of wikitree profiles)
Since several  other county  archives follow a similar model, I can see images of documents online  that would previously cost a lot more money than a subscription in travel and hotel costs.(indeed my own family research sat on a backburner for about 35 years, it was simply too expensive.
 I could  see microfilm copies of the censuses at a local library but only for that area.I would  have to travel to London if I wanted to see images from elsewhere. I'd have to travel to the county where the event took place to see a baptism entry.
 I now transcribe a lot of  early wills .(and place them on here) Prior to digitisation that would have required a trip to the National Archives.
Ancestry and the other companies are not charities, to exist they have to make a profit . Nevertheless, I believe  more people are able to view images of  original documents than ever before.

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@ Bruce

Good arguments all around - maybe I'll give them another try.  When I last used Family Search I just came away as though the searches were limited and it was not as functional as I remember the old archive.gov site.

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All of the US census records were scanned by the Federal Government and are available in digital form.

There is no reason why they can't be put on one of the numerous available US.gov servers. 

"Nevertheless, I believe  more people are able to view images of  original documents than ever before."

People are able to see old docs because they are digitized and stored online.  Whether they're on a gov server or a private makes no difference.

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I can see US censuses in free platforms; that wasn't my argument .  https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/United_States_Census_Online
The subscription sites cover far more.

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Helen Ford is correct and very wise in my opinion.

For about £11 a month I have had access to many thousands of digitised records images. That would buy me one nice Coffee a week in a cafe, or approximately one copy certificate a month if I was doing my genealogy the traditional way. By subscribing, I don't have to leave the house (This armchair access to top notch records images is important for me as I am in a lot of pain daily, so don't want to travel much, which is possible as long as I have a pc and make my own frothy coffee :) ). In my opinion this is not expensive and pays into the system that allows me this important luxury.

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I appreciate everyone's input here - maybe I'll have to reexamine my valuation of Ancestry's services.  I am spending a lot more time on my tree lately and I'll have to admit that being able to reference their database daily saves a lot of time.  And as we know, time is money.

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I've flipped my opinion on this.

Since I started back to working on my tree in March, I've renewed my monthly Ancestry subscription twice.  I feel like I've gotten every bit of my $40 - I've pulled hundreds of records and referenced trees and all sorts of other records.

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That's really good to know. I have broken a number of brick walls using ancestry primary sources and am happy to be paying £70 for 6 months, though I could do 12 months and it would be slightly cheaper.

Answer 8

I have noticed that if I try to search Family Search I come up with little or nothing. If I use the Roots Search app/tool here on Wikitree I get different (sometimes better) results. I understand that Ancestry et al have to pay the employees, but they are so big that they are making the hobby pay to play. There are some records that just aren't available in any other format, unless you can travel to the library that holds it because they won't release it on inter library loan! I also suggest looking to see if there is a Family History Center near you, as there are free databases and indices available there that are not available on line.

Right now my issue is with fold3. I'm chasing a ghost and I think I found out where he went, by way of a land grant in Illinois for serving in 1812. Can't find the record anywhere else.

And many libraries like the St. Louis County Library have removed the original microfilm because everything is digital. Which is great until you try to use it with a 2 hour window (at most) and then it times you out and you have to start over again.

Sorry for the ramble, might be slightly manic this morning.