I was a little surprised to learn that pre-1612 genealogical data was expressedly excluded from the WikiTree site design. I simply must ask...
Why? Isn't the purpose of a family tree to trace your ancestry back as far as possible provided that the data is reliable?
In my case, I have painstakingly gone back through direct-line descendants for many generations; in one branch all the way to ~750 A.D. The data is from reliable sources. Given the 1612 cut-off on WikiTree, I am not sure that I want to invest my valuable time into a project that automatically loses 862 years of my work; a span of 12+ generations. As in... Wow!
For my tree, which currently spans a period of 1,262 years, a loss-reduction of 862 years is almost a 70% decrease in the timeline alone. With respect to family trees, the farther back in time one does their research with the ever-increasing power-of-2 exponential increase in the number of profiles involved, that 70% decrease would be over a 95% reduction in the number of affected tree-members assuming all branches were fully populated.
While that level of completeness would rarely be seen on most family trees going that far back in time, the effective "limitation" to a serious amateur genealogist such as myself is heartbreaking.
Was this impact considered in selecting the 1612 cut-off?
I would like to see a discussion on this topic by other serious members; perhaps in an entirely new thread. As for me, within 24-hours of signing up with a global project that sought to bring the world's population closer together by a common family tree design, my bubble of interest and excitement just burst. Before I lose all of my enthusiam towards this worldwide project, please help me to try to understand the rationale for the 1612 cut-off.
Thanks for everyone's time and assistance on this discussion. I really am disappointed in learning about this desiged-in limitation. It probably shows... <sniff, sniff, sniff...>
Dave Hamm, K4EET