Collaborative Family Trees
There are lots of reasons why you should add your relations to the giant trees created by family historians around the world
Many online hosted projects aim to create a single family tree through collaboration. One thing to be aware of with such projects is that users may need to sign up to various rules and cede some ‘sovereignty’ over the ‘territory’ that was previously their exclusive domain. However, the rigorous interrogation process for all facts contributed by users can often strengthen the conclusions reached.
Among the projects providing such opportunities is the free-toaccess WikiTree project at wikitree.com. Participants collaborating on a profile page for a relative can make edits, contact each other through the site’s internal messaging system and interact through the site’s Genealogist-to-Genealogist Forum (G2G).
Similar to WikiTree is Geni ( geni.com), which not only allows users to collaborate to help create a “single world family tree”, but can also host projects centred on a particular theme, with links to profiles of the people involved. A good example is a project on the RMS with background information on its construction and ownership, and the passengers and crew who sailed on her. The project page includes lists of people created within the Geni database.
FamilySearch’s Family
Tree ( familysearch.org/tree/ overview) also allows users to upload details about relatives that can be edited by others. If this happens, the name of the person who made the change will be noted, and you can contact them to discuss it further. FamilySearch’s Help section at familysearch.org/help/helpcenter/ family-tree includes an article entitled “How can I prevent other people from making inaccurate changes to Family Tree?”.