Question

Should I "Match" two profiles in GEDCOMpare if sources for both are poor?

Answer 1

The basic question is: Is there sufficient information in the sources to establish that the two people are the same?

If the answer is yes, then proceed; if the answer is no, then do not proceed with the merge.

Comments

Completely agree

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Try looking for more sources before you make your decision. If you find sources that give evidence of them being the same then go ahead and match them and add the source afterwards.

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My thinking is that I can match a profile, but the profile may be wrong.  If the sources are only other family trees,  isn't it possible to perpetuate errors by matching?  

 For example, many family trees may show that John Smith's spouse is Mary (Jones) Smith, but there is no evidence for / record of this relationship.  Yet people see this in someone's family tree, assume it's correct, and copy it to their tree.  Unfortunately this is what I did when I first started, until I realized how many errors are in many family trees.

Bottom line, in bringing in profiles from a GEDCOM file, will I have a chance to select which profiles I bring in, so I can keep only those with reliable sources, or do I have to keep them all?

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Yes you can select which profiles you want to add and skip over those you have doubts about.

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Ok, thank you for that helpful answer.

The GEDCOMpare team probably has heard this comment before, but it would be easier to be able to select which profiles I will add and then make those suggested Compares, before I have to accept or reject all the suggested comparisons, many of which I won't be adding to WikiTree anyway.