I was looking at the marriage license application for some distant cousins, and it appeared that the uncle of the groom signed the document as the father of the bride. The document, as many marriage applications do, testified that the couple were not first cousins. The bride wasn't of legal age, which is why the father had to sign his permission.
No, I'm not going to post images, or name names. The marriage took place in 1938, and while the bride and groom are deceased, I'm sure there are living relatives.
I am positive it isn't a coincidence of names. The father/uncle's 1969 obituary clearly identifies the bride as his daughter, and the groom's mother as his sister.
However, there are two pieces of evidence that suggest the marriage was not as it seems.
1) The bride was born in 1920. She doesn't appear in the 1930 census with the father who signed her marriage license application in 1938.
2) Her tombstone follows the Jewish custom of including the father's Hebrew given name. And the inscribed given name doesn't match.
So my current hypothesis is that at some point between 1930 and 1938 she was adopted. So the marriage wasn't one of genetic first cousins. I'm unsure how the law at the time treated relationship through adoption.
Unfortunately, her death was too recent for her death certificate to be public, and I am not a close enough relative to request a copy. So the easiest way for me to confirm this would be to contact family members. While we live in the same area, this isn't a branch of the family that my family has maintained contact with over the years, and I have only learned about them through research. Even if I have found or do find close living relatives, delicate questions such as these aren't the ideal ice-breakers.
Showing posts with label Legal/Ethical. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Legal/Ethical. Show all posts
Sunday, August 4, 2013
Monday, March 4, 2013
The Government isn't a Ministry of Magic
The process of genealogical research involves searching for information, evaluating the reliability of that information, comparing it to other bits of information one finds, and resolving conflicts.
At times I feel some individuals place too much faith in the reliability of some documents.
Particularly governmental documents.
For example:
There are cases where individuals were never, or almost never, referred to by the name on their birth certificate. There are genealogists who will insist that the name of this ancestor is what appeared on the birth certificate, as if a piece of paper with a government’s stamp magically overrides the name everyone who ever mattered to the individual called them.
My maternal grandfather had a brother named Allen. Allen’s 1914 birth certificate clearly states “Adolph.” The name ‘Adolph’ even appears on his father’s 1921 naturalization records. However, early census records indicate the given name quickly changed to “Albert” and then “Allen.” No one probably ever referred to him as Adolph after the age of 10. He may have been Adolph at birth, but his name quickly changed. No “Change of Name” certificate had to be filed with the government for this to be the case. The government doesn’t have magical control over our names.
In the above case, I argue, the government isn't right. But the government can also be wrong. (There is a difference between not-right, and wrong.)
If you were asked to identify what US Time Zone a specific state resided in, what would you consider the Primary Source of information? The US Legal Code on time zones, correct?
Below are quotes from the 1997 version of the code, linked to above.
Sec. 263. Designation of zone standard times
The standard time of the first zone shall be known and designated as Atlantic standard time; that of the second zone shall be known and designated as eastern standard time; that of the third zone shall be known and designated as central standard time; that of the fourth zone shall be known and designated as mountain standard time; that of the fifth zone shall be known and designated as Pacific standard time; that of the sixth zone shall be known and designated as Alaska standard time; that of the seventh zone shall be known and designated as Hawaii-Aleutian standard time; and that of the eighth zone shall be known and designated as Samoa standard time.
There’s also a specific section of the US Code referencing Idaho, which is split between two time zones.
Sec. 264. Part of Idaho in third zone
In the division of territory, and in the definition of the limits of each zone, as provided in sections 261 to 264 of this title, so much of the State of Idaho as lies south of the Salmon River, traversing the State from east to west near forty-five degree thirty minutes latitude, shall be embraced in the third zone: Provided, That common carriers within such portion of the State of Idaho may conduct their operations on Pacific time.
Reading Sec. 263 and 264 together, what is the logical conclusion about the State of Idaho?
Clearly: Part of Idaho is in the third zone, and the third zone is the Central zone. So, the part of Idaho that isn't in the Pacific zone, is in the Central zone.
That is, if you held the US Legal Code as a magically irrefutable document between 1966 and 2007.
In 1966, sec. 263 was changed to add the Atlantic zone as the first zone, and all other zones were renumbered. Section 264 wasn’t changed until 2007. So part of Idaho was in the central zone for 41 years. If you went by the legal code.
I would like to think this 2006 post of mine on my personal blog had some influence on the government's delayed action.
At times I feel some individuals place too much faith in the reliability of some documents.
Particularly governmental documents.
For example:
There are cases where individuals were never, or almost never, referred to by the name on their birth certificate. There are genealogists who will insist that the name of this ancestor is what appeared on the birth certificate, as if a piece of paper with a government’s stamp magically overrides the name everyone who ever mattered to the individual called them.
My maternal grandfather had a brother named Allen. Allen’s 1914 birth certificate clearly states “Adolph.” The name ‘Adolph’ even appears on his father’s 1921 naturalization records. However, early census records indicate the given name quickly changed to “Albert” and then “Allen.” No one probably ever referred to him as Adolph after the age of 10. He may have been Adolph at birth, but his name quickly changed. No “Change of Name” certificate had to be filed with the government for this to be the case. The government doesn’t have magical control over our names.
In the above case, I argue, the government isn't right. But the government can also be wrong. (There is a difference between not-right, and wrong.)
If you were asked to identify what US Time Zone a specific state resided in, what would you consider the Primary Source of information? The US Legal Code on time zones, correct?
Below are quotes from the 1997 version of the code, linked to above.
Sec. 263. Designation of zone standard times
The standard time of the first zone shall be known and designated as Atlantic standard time; that of the second zone shall be known and designated as eastern standard time; that of the third zone shall be known and designated as central standard time; that of the fourth zone shall be known and designated as mountain standard time; that of the fifth zone shall be known and designated as Pacific standard time; that of the sixth zone shall be known and designated as Alaska standard time; that of the seventh zone shall be known and designated as Hawaii-Aleutian standard time; and that of the eighth zone shall be known and designated as Samoa standard time.
There’s also a specific section of the US Code referencing Idaho, which is split between two time zones.
Sec. 264. Part of Idaho in third zone
In the division of territory, and in the definition of the limits of each zone, as provided in sections 261 to 264 of this title, so much of the State of Idaho as lies south of the Salmon River, traversing the State from east to west near forty-five degree thirty minutes latitude, shall be embraced in the third zone: Provided, That common carriers within such portion of the State of Idaho may conduct their operations on Pacific time.
Reading Sec. 263 and 264 together, what is the logical conclusion about the State of Idaho?
Clearly: Part of Idaho is in the third zone, and the third zone is the Central zone. So, the part of Idaho that isn't in the Pacific zone, is in the Central zone.
That is, if you held the US Legal Code as a magically irrefutable document between 1966 and 2007.
In 1966, sec. 263 was changed to add the Atlantic zone as the first zone, and all other zones were renumbered. Section 264 wasn’t changed until 2007. So part of Idaho was in the central zone for 41 years. If you went by the legal code.
I would like to think this 2006 post of mine on my personal blog had some influence on the government's delayed action.
Friday, February 22, 2013
Free Art for Your Blog
One way to enliven a blog entry is with photography or artwork. Many entries on a genealogy blog will obviously be illustrated by photographs from family collections. However, sometimes we write about things for which we don't have photographs. Some bloggers are handy with a camera, or the sketchpad, but others aren’t. Those of us who find our creativity restricted to the palette of words in the dictionary soon find ourselves wondering where we can find free photography and art.
Sure, you can go to Google Images, search for keywords, download, and then use the images you find. However, while possibly tempting, most bloggers realize there are legal issues with doing this. Furthermore, we don’t want people copying and pasting our words on their websites without our permission; therefore we should show the same respect to photographers and artists.
However, there is a lot available that is free (or almost free) of copyright restrictions. Below are five good resources; there are undoubtedly others. Those with suggestions should include them in a comment to the post.
I. Flickr
A. The Commons
Flickr, the photo-sharing website, has a section they call The Commons. The Commons began in January of 2008 when The Library of Congress released about 1500 photographs from their collection to display on Flickr. Since then, The Library of Congress Flickr collection has grown to over 17,000 photographs. Several other libraries and museums have added photographs from their collections. If you search The Commons any photographs you find will be completely free of copyright restrictions. If you follow a link to the museum’s full collection on Flickr, leaving The Commons, some of those photographs may have copyright restrictions. The description of the photograph should indicate whether or not there are any restrictions.
[Note: The 1860s image on the left of the Jefferson Barracks military post just South of St. Louis, Missouri came from the New York Public Library collection at The Commons.]
B. Creative Commons
Flickr also has a section entitled Creative Commons
Anyone is able to contribute photographs to this section. These photographs aren’t completely free of copyright restrictions, but they fall into the “almost free” category. There are six groups, each with a different combination of four requirements
Attribution: The simplest, this means to use the photograph or artwork you must provide credit. An easy way to do this is to provide a link to the individual Flickr account from which the work came.
No Derivatives: You can display the artwork or photography exactly as it appears; you can’t make any changes. (Changing the size of the photograph, as well as trimming a ‘detail’ are both derivative works. Even copying the image in photo-editing software, pasting it into a new file, and adding a caption in whitespace underneath, is still a derivative work. The image you download from Flickr must be the exact same file you upload to your website.)
Non Commercial: – You can’t use the work for commercial purposes. (While many people will think ‘commercial’ means putting the photo on the cover of your CD, or on a tshirt you sell on CafePress – if your blog has advertisements from which you make money, a court could decide your blog is commercial. Since you probably don't wish to upset the artist, I would recommend asking permission from the owner – as they should be easily contactable from their Flickr accounts.)
ShareAlike: ShareAlike means if you make a derivative work, you must distribute it under a similar Creative Commons license
With those four definitions in mind, here are the six Creative Commons categories at Flickr, each of which can be searched individually:
1) Attribution License: Only attribution is required. You can make derivatives, use it for commercial purposes, etc. Once you make changes to the work, you can redistribute your derived work under a different set of requirements.
2) Attribution No Derivs License: You must give credit, and you aren’t allowed to make any derivatives. But as long as you don't make any changes to the work, you can still use it for commercial purposes.
3) Attribution – Non Commercial – No Derivs License: The most restrictive of the categories, the photographs are still free to use on a personal, non-commercial site.
4) Attribution – Non Commercial: Derivatives are allowed.
5) Attribution – NonCommercial – ShareAlike: If you make a derivative work, you must distribute it under a similar Creative Commons license
6) Attribution – ShareAlike: Same as #5, but you may use for commercial purposes.
II. LIFE Magazine
LIFE Magazine is sharing a large portion of their historical photo collection on Google Images .
They have the images organized by decade, and images from the 1880s through the 1910s are free of copyright restrictions. Those in the 1920 category and later are restricted to “Personal – non-commercial usage.”
III. The US Government
The US Government has an index of the images available on all their websites:
Images range from insects on the US Department of Agriculture website, photographs of the Grand Canyon on the National Park Service website, to images of the lunar surface on the NASA website.
IV. Classic works of art are a great way to illustrate your entries.
Art History Resources on the Web is a handy index to websites where you can find classic works of art that are free of copyright restriction.
Note: While artwork might be in the ‘public domain’ the photographs of the artwork might not be. If the image is the painting only, and you don’t see the frame, or the museum wall behind it, one photograph is going to be nearly identical to any other photograph, so it can be safely assumed to be in the public domain. However, once the creativity of the photographer enters into the photograph, you are on rockier grounds. And if the work of art is a sculpture, the photographer will often matter.
V. Pixabay
Pixabay is a relatively new entry into sources for free photography and artwork, but they look extremely promising. Quoting from their Terms,
While they state you don't need to attribute your source, some bloggers may decide it is safer to do so. Anybody can set up an account at Pixabay, and start uploading photographs. Pixabay states that they attempt to screen the uploads, but there is no guarantee they are 100% successful. By linking to the image source on Pixabay, if the image was inappropriately uploaded, the original rights holder will know who to hold responsible. Here's Pixabay's recent response when asked what one should do if an original rights holder files a complaint.
Note: Pixabay has an agreement with Shutterstock. All search results will start with a handful of images that link to the Shutterstock website. Those images aren't free, but they are very easy to scroll past.
There are websites that will sell you the rights to photography, such as Shutterstock, iStockPhoto, or Getty Images . However, since there are several places to find free images, unless there is a particular image at one of these sites that really strike your fancy, there is no need to use them.
With all these sources for free photography and artwork, when you don't have a photograph from your family collection for a blog entry, your entry doesn't need to be image-free.
This article is revised and updated from a 2009 post.
Sure, you can go to Google Images, search for keywords, download, and then use the images you find. However, while possibly tempting, most bloggers realize there are legal issues with doing this. Furthermore, we don’t want people copying and pasting our words on their websites without our permission; therefore we should show the same respect to photographers and artists.
However, there is a lot available that is free (or almost free) of copyright restrictions. Below are five good resources; there are undoubtedly others. Those with suggestions should include them in a comment to the post.
I. FlickrA. The Commons
Flickr, the photo-sharing website, has a section they call The Commons. The Commons began in January of 2008 when The Library of Congress released about 1500 photographs from their collection to display on Flickr. Since then, The Library of Congress Flickr collection has grown to over 17,000 photographs. Several other libraries and museums have added photographs from their collections. If you search The Commons any photographs you find will be completely free of copyright restrictions. If you follow a link to the museum’s full collection on Flickr, leaving The Commons, some of those photographs may have copyright restrictions. The description of the photograph should indicate whether or not there are any restrictions.
[Note: The 1860s image on the left of the Jefferson Barracks military post just South of St. Louis, Missouri came from the New York Public Library collection at The Commons.]
B. Creative Commons
Flickr also has a section entitled Creative Commons
Anyone is able to contribute photographs to this section. These photographs aren’t completely free of copyright restrictions, but they fall into the “almost free” category. There are six groups, each with a different combination of four requirements
Attribution: The simplest, this means to use the photograph or artwork you must provide credit. An easy way to do this is to provide a link to the individual Flickr account from which the work came.
No Derivatives: You can display the artwork or photography exactly as it appears; you can’t make any changes. (Changing the size of the photograph, as well as trimming a ‘detail’ are both derivative works. Even copying the image in photo-editing software, pasting it into a new file, and adding a caption in whitespace underneath, is still a derivative work. The image you download from Flickr must be the exact same file you upload to your website.)
Non Commercial: – You can’t use the work for commercial purposes. (While many people will think ‘commercial’ means putting the photo on the cover of your CD, or on a tshirt you sell on CafePress – if your blog has advertisements from which you make money, a court could decide your blog is commercial. Since you probably don't wish to upset the artist, I would recommend asking permission from the owner – as they should be easily contactable from their Flickr accounts.)
ShareAlike: ShareAlike means if you make a derivative work, you must distribute it under a similar Creative Commons license
With those four definitions in mind, here are the six Creative Commons categories at Flickr, each of which can be searched individually:
1) Attribution License: Only attribution is required. You can make derivatives, use it for commercial purposes, etc. Once you make changes to the work, you can redistribute your derived work under a different set of requirements.
2) Attribution No Derivs License: You must give credit, and you aren’t allowed to make any derivatives. But as long as you don't make any changes to the work, you can still use it for commercial purposes.
3) Attribution – Non Commercial – No Derivs License: The most restrictive of the categories, the photographs are still free to use on a personal, non-commercial site.
4) Attribution – Non Commercial: Derivatives are allowed.
5) Attribution – NonCommercial – ShareAlike: If you make a derivative work, you must distribute it under a similar Creative Commons license
6) Attribution – ShareAlike: Same as #5, but you may use for commercial purposes.
II. LIFE Magazine
LIFE Magazine is sharing a large portion of their historical photo collection on Google Images .
They have the images organized by decade, and images from the 1880s through the 1910s are free of copyright restrictions. Those in the 1920 category and later are restricted to “Personal – non-commercial usage.”
III. The US GovernmentThe US Government has an index of the images available on all their websites:
Most of these images and graphics are available for use in the public domain, and they may be used and reproduced without permission or fee. However, some images may be protected by license. We strongly recommend you thoroughly read the disclaimers on each site before use. For information about obtaining seals of Federal Agencies and the United States, please see the Government Printing Office website.
Images range from insects on the US Department of Agriculture website, photographs of the Grand Canyon on the National Park Service website, to images of the lunar surface on the NASA website.
IV. Classic works of art are a great way to illustrate your entries.
Art History Resources on the Web is a handy index to websites where you can find classic works of art that are free of copyright restriction.
Note: While artwork might be in the ‘public domain’ the photographs of the artwork might not be. If the image is the painting only, and you don’t see the frame, or the museum wall behind it, one photograph is going to be nearly identical to any other photograph, so it can be safely assumed to be in the public domain. However, once the creativity of the photographer enters into the photograph, you are on rockier grounds. And if the work of art is a sculpture, the photographer will often matter.
V. Pixabay
Pixabay is a relatively new entry into sources for free photography and artwork, but they look extremely promising. Quoting from their Terms,
"Images on Pixabay are bound to Creative Commons Deed CC0. To the extent possible under law, uploaders of Pixabay have waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to these Images. You are free to adapt and use the Images for commercial purposes without attributing the original author or source. Although absolutely not required, a link back to Pixabay would be nice."There are a handful of limitations. For example: if there's a person in the image, you might need to get a 'model release' from that person to use it for commercial purposes. If there is a company trademark in the photo, you might need to get permission from that company for commercial usage. They also state you can't use the images for "unlawful or immoral purposes." The latter is somewhat difficult to define globally. What one person, locality, state, or country considers immoral, another might not. Though one immoral purpose specifically mentioned is pornography. There are other limitations mentioned in their terms, which should be read.
 |
| As one might expect, there are a lot of cat images at Pixabay [source] |
Note: Pixabay has an agreement with Shutterstock. All search results will start with a handful of images that link to the Shutterstock website. Those images aren't free, but they are very easy to scroll past.
There are websites that will sell you the rights to photography, such as Shutterstock, iStockPhoto, or Getty Images . However, since there are several places to find free images, unless there is a particular image at one of these sites that really strike your fancy, there is no need to use them.
With all these sources for free photography and artwork, when you don't have a photograph from your family collection for a blog entry, your entry doesn't need to be image-free.
This article is revised and updated from a 2009 post.
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Did Ancestry Shut Its Doors on All Professionals and all Bloggers?
Marian at Roots and Rambles has an intriguing post. It appears Ancestry.com has changed its Terms of Service.
From the comments to the post:
The entire current Limited Use License (with some of the language emboldened for emphasis)
And since "Republication or resale of any of the content or other protected data is prohibited" - this implies if a personal family historian has a blog, and "republishes" the content on their blog, they are in violation of the TOS as well. Even if the blog isn't commercial, since it's 'republication or resale' and not just 'resale.' [Note that the old TOS allowed resale and republication of content 'relevant to specific research for an individual.']
This seems to be in direct conflict with the email Heather Wilkinson Rojo of NutfieldGenealogy received from Ancestry Legal regarding Pinterest. But maybe Ancestry Legal was responding with the old TOS in mind, and not the new TOS.
I think Ancestry.com needs to clarify this for all professional genealogist and all bloggers. And if the above interpretation is accurate, they need to offer subscription refunds for those professional genealogists and bloggers who are no longer allowed to access their website for the purpose they originally subscribed.
Update: It appears that Ancestry updated their TOS today, April 26, but the limited use license paragraph is the same in the newest version.
Update 2:
I believe Ancestry updated their TOS twice today, though it is possible I misread the update earlier. Anyway, the language in the Limited Use License has changed. It now reads:
Hat/tip to The Legal Genealogist for this second update.
From the comments to the post:
Old TOS (October 6, 2010)
You are licensed to use the Content only for personal or professional family history research, and may download Content only as search results relevant to that research.
New TOS (March 24, 2012)
You may access the Website, use the graphics, information, data, editorial and other Content only for personal family history research.
The entire current Limited Use License (with some of the language emboldened for emphasis)
You may access the Website, use the graphics, information, data, editorial and other Content only for personal family history research. Republication or resale of any of the Content or other protected data is prohibited. The Content may be downloaded onto mobile devices or desktop through the use of authorized Ancestry software. When downloaded, the Content remains subject to the limited use license contained in this Agreement. You may use the software provided on the Website only while online and may not download, copy, reuse or distribute that software, except where it is clearly stated that such software is made available for offline use. Ancestry and its licensors retain title, ownership and all other rights and interests in and to all information and Content on the Website. Bots, crawlers, spiders, data miners, scraping and any other automatic access tool are expressly prohibited. Violation of this limited use license may result in immediate termination of your membership and may result in legal action against you.The entire Limited Use License from the old TOS
You are licensed to use the Content only for personal or professional family history research, and may download Content only as search results relevant to that research. The download of the whole or significant portions of any work or database is prohibited. Resale of a work or database or portion thereof, except as specific results relevant to specific research for an individual, is prohibited. Online or other republication of Content is prohibited except as unique data elements that are part of a unique family history or genealogy. Violation of this License may result in immediate termination of your membership and may result in legal action for injunction, damages or both. You may use access software provided on the Service only while on line and may not download, copy, reuse or distribute that software, except where it is clearly stated in connection with software that it is made available for offline use and a license for that use is provided in connection with that software.The old TOS specifically mentioned professionals, so the absence of professionals in the new TOS can't be an oversight. It seems Ancestry is saying if you are a professional genealogist and you access their website for your business, you are violating their Terms of Service, and if they find out, they are likely to terminate your subscription.
And since "Republication or resale of any of the content or other protected data is prohibited" - this implies if a personal family historian has a blog, and "republishes" the content on their blog, they are in violation of the TOS as well. Even if the blog isn't commercial, since it's 'republication or resale' and not just 'resale.' [Note that the old TOS allowed resale and republication of content 'relevant to specific research for an individual.']
This seems to be in direct conflict with the email Heather Wilkinson Rojo of NutfieldGenealogy received from Ancestry Legal regarding Pinterest. But maybe Ancestry Legal was responding with the old TOS in mind, and not the new TOS.
I think Ancestry.com needs to clarify this for all professional genealogist and all bloggers. And if the above interpretation is accurate, they need to offer subscription refunds for those professional genealogists and bloggers who are no longer allowed to access their website for the purpose they originally subscribed.
Update: It appears that Ancestry updated their TOS today, April 26, but the limited use license paragraph is the same in the newest version.
Update 2:
I believe Ancestry updated their TOS twice today, though it is possible I misread the update earlier. Anyway, the language in the Limited Use License has changed. It now reads:
You may access the Website, use the graphics, information, data, editorial and other Content only for personal or professional family history research, and download Content only as search results relevant to that research. The Content may be downloaded onto mobile devices or desktop through the use of authorized Ancestry software. When downloaded, the Content remains subject to the limited use license contained in this Agreement. You may use the software provided on the Website only while online and may not download, copy, reuse or distribute that software, except where it is clearly stated that such software is made available for offline use. Ancestry and its licensors retain title, ownership and all other rights and interests in and to all information and Content on the Website. Bots, crawlers, spiders, data miners, scraping and any other automatic access tool are expressly prohibited. Violation of this limited use license may result in immediate termination of your membership and may result in legal action against you.The line about resale or republication appears to have been removed, suggesting bloggers are within the TOS once again.
Hat/tip to The Legal Genealogist for this second update.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Really Simple Syndication? - or Stealing?
A Contrary View
Note: I am not a lawyer, nor do I play one on TV.
RSS - it stands for Really Simple Syndication. It's how bloggers 'syndicate' their blogs. What does this mean?
It means that the full text of our blog posts are there to be picked up by any "feed reader," unless we change the settings of our blog to only provide an excerpt, or no feed at all. This is generally considered a good thing, because many people read so many blogs, they don't have time to visit each one directly. They 'read the feeds' in a feed reader such as
and others. Google, Bloglines, Newsgator, and the others don't have to contact every blogger and ask them if its OK if they deliver the full text of their blog posts to any reader who subscribes through their service. By providing an RSS feed we are granting permission ahead of time.
And while bloggers might be tempted to only feed an 'excerpt', forcing the reader to visit their blog to read the whole post, many if not most readers will refuse to do so, and just won't subscribe to blogs that only provide an excerpt. And those blogs will get read by less people.
There are some websites that aggregate feeds by topic. For example, AllTop has a Genealogy page.. They created this page back in 2008. My blog is on it, as are the blogs of many of the top geneabloggers. All of them know they are there, because AllTop informed them that they were. (At least, they informed me. So I assume they informed everyone else.) The only real service AllTop provides in my mind is excerpts of blog posts, and links to the original. (They do provide listings of the 'most popular' blog posts too.) They put up ads on their pages. They have no original content. Their purpose is obvious - make money from the ads. AllTop doesn't specialize in genealogy -- they have these theme pages for almost every conceivable theme. At least, any theme they can come up with to generate money for themselves. (This is how I view their business model.) I know I didn't have a problem with it when AllTop informed me of it. I figured they might direct more people to my site. If not, they are only publishing excerpts. It's fair use. My feed is out there.
A recent addition to the Web is RootsFeed. They do specialize in Genealogy. There is no information on the website about who is behind it, but it's certainly possible they are more knowledgeable about the genealogy blogging community than AllTop is. Several genealogy bloggers, some of whom have feeds which appear on AllTop, have become riled up by having their feeds appear on RootsFeed.
Some of the commentary: DearMyrtle, EOGN, FootnoteMaven, GeneaBloggers
The reasons usually given
1) They provide no original content
2) Excerpts from our blog posts are next to their ads, generating money for them
3) They imply through the use of the word 'contributors' that we are active participants.
The first two apply to AllTop as well. Arguably, the third complaint has been partially addressed by RootsFeed by removing the word 'contributor' and with a new footer on blog excerpts
"This is a syndicated post written by AUTHOR from BLOGNAME"- with the BlogName linked directly to the blog.Some bloggers might still object, arguing 'syndicated post' implies an active contributor. But it doesn't. I suspect legally, if you have an RSS feed, your blog is syndicated to any and all feedreaders. It doesn't matter where that feedreader is, and what it is being used for. Do some of the major feedreaders put up ads next to the feeds? I suspect it's possible. I know Google Reader and Bloglines don't, but that doesn't mean others don't. There's no way to keep track of all the feedreading software out there.
I also know that the only differences I see between AllTop and Rootsfeed right now, are
1) Rootsfeed specializes in genealogy information. That, arguably, is a plus.
2) Rootsfeed does require you to click twice to get to the full blog post on the original site. They provide a short excerpt (headline and the first sentence or so) with a link to a longer excerpt, and then a link to the original site. They're obviously looking to double their ad revenue.
3) AllTop did go to the trouble to contact the bloggers and inform them their posts were being used. After the fact, and not beforehand, but still, a sign of greater professionalism. Though I'm not sure greater legality. The contact emails weren't beforehand asking for permission. They, like Rootsfeed, assumed they didn't need permission. And I suspect they're right. We grant that permission through having an RSS feed. Otherwise, Google, Bloglines, and Newsgator would have to contact us as well. And I know they haven't contacted me.
[We don't grant permission to excerpt without attribution. That's no longer syndication, but plagiarism. Taking credit for the work of others. Neither AllTop nor RootsFeed does this.]
Note: I am not a lawyer, nor do I play one on TV
Here's an article - 4 years old - that does quote some lawyers.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Neil Gaiman, Truth, and Verifiability
Neil Gaiman poses an interesting ethical dilemma on his blog.
Gaiman is a fantasy and science fiction author. Some of his well-known works include The Sandman comics, and the novels Coraline, The Graveyard Book, and American Gods.
He's a bit elliptic in the post, but apparently, when writing the novel, American Gods, he made something up. Authors often do that, especially in works of fiction. Then someone wrote a reference book on something, and borrowing largely from his novel, wrote about this thing Gaiman made up as fact.
And now the Wikipedia article on this something from the novel, which used to correctly cite Gaiman as the source, now no longer mentions Gaiman at all. It now treats this made up thing as fact, and cites the reference work.
Gaiman knows how Wikipedia works, and knows he can't just 'fix it.' Because in the world of Wikipedia - "Verifiability" is more important than "Truth." And "Original Research" is frowned upon.
He somewhat likes the notion, in a twisted-author-sense I think I understand, that something he made up is now considered a fact.
However, he doesn't progress his problem one step further. What happens on Wikipedia when he creates his explanatory blog entry, and then fixes the Wikipedia entry, saying he made this something up, and then cites his own blog entry as evidence?
Does anyone with experience editing Wikipedia believe they'll let him get away with that? Yes, Gaiman says it's the truth. But that's irrelevant. In the world of verifiability the "reference work" is probably more reliable than he is. [Note, Gaiman doesn't provide the nature of the reference work, so this is an assumption.]
Gaiman can write his blog post, but until some other equally reliable reference cites this something as his creation, only then will there be a way to 'verify' that he is the creator.
[He could also try to get the author/publisher of the reference work to publish a corrected edition, and that I suspect would be sufficient.]
***
A good genealogist would likely not take Neil Gaiman's word for it either. But, when he points out that American Gods has an earlier publication date than the reference work, it would suggest the need for further research. We could, for example, search Google Books for an earlier reference, and without finding one, grant that he is likely correct that he invented it. But this is 'original research.' Something genealogists do a lot of, and Wikipedians aren't supposed to do.
Update Neil Gaiman has found several more references to his made up fact in his own Google Books search, along with many other online references. So he's not up against only one source.
Gaiman is a fantasy and science fiction author. Some of his well-known works include The Sandman comics, and the novels Coraline, The Graveyard Book, and American Gods.
He's a bit elliptic in the post, but apparently, when writing the novel, American Gods, he made something up. Authors often do that, especially in works of fiction. Then someone wrote a reference book on something, and borrowing largely from his novel, wrote about this thing Gaiman made up as fact.
And now the Wikipedia article on this something from the novel, which used to correctly cite Gaiman as the source, now no longer mentions Gaiman at all. It now treats this made up thing as fact, and cites the reference work.
Gaiman knows how Wikipedia works, and knows he can't just 'fix it.' Because in the world of Wikipedia - "Verifiability" is more important than "Truth." And "Original Research" is frowned upon.
The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—whether readers can check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether editors think it is true.
Wikipedia does not publish original research. The term "original research" refers to material—such as facts, allegations, ideas, and stories—not already published by reliable sources. It also refers to any analysis or synthesis by Wikipedians of published material, where the analysis or synthesis advances a position not advanced by the sources. - (emphasis theirs - follow the links above for more details)There's already a source that says this something is fact. He realizes he needs to create a source that says it's fiction - his fiction. So - he says...He could create a blog post that explains how he made this thing up, and then cite that. He wonders if he should.
He somewhat likes the notion, in a twisted-author-sense I think I understand, that something he made up is now considered a fact.
However, he doesn't progress his problem one step further. What happens on Wikipedia when he creates his explanatory blog entry, and then fixes the Wikipedia entry, saying he made this something up, and then cites his own blog entry as evidence?
Does anyone with experience editing Wikipedia believe they'll let him get away with that? Yes, Gaiman says it's the truth. But that's irrelevant. In the world of verifiability the "reference work" is probably more reliable than he is. [Note, Gaiman doesn't provide the nature of the reference work, so this is an assumption.]
Gaiman can write his blog post, but until some other equally reliable reference cites this something as his creation, only then will there be a way to 'verify' that he is the creator.
[He could also try to get the author/publisher of the reference work to publish a corrected edition, and that I suspect would be sufficient.]
***
A good genealogist would likely not take Neil Gaiman's word for it either. But, when he points out that American Gods has an earlier publication date than the reference work, it would suggest the need for further research. We could, for example, search Google Books for an earlier reference, and without finding one, grant that he is likely correct that he invented it. But this is 'original research.' Something genealogists do a lot of, and Wikipedians aren't supposed to do.
Update Neil Gaiman has found several more references to his made up fact in his own Google Books search, along with many other online references. So he's not up against only one source.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
The Records of the Van Every Family
For the past couple years, in my genealogical travels around the web, and in surname messageboards on various genealogy sites, I’ve seen references to the following Family History:
A week ago, Randy Seaver at Genea-Musings wrote about the GenalogyToday, GenWeekly and LiveRoots trio of sites.
I started browsing around, searching for surnames, and discovered they were selling copies of the book for a reasonable price.
I put an order in immediately. The site said there could be a 6-8 week wait, so I knew not to expect it in my mailbox the next day. I also didn’t expect it to appear in my mailbox 7 days later. But boy was I happy to see it there last night.
I had lots of fun browsing through it. I found some interesting information about the Van Every immigrant forebears, my 8th great grandfather, Myndert Fredericksen, and his brother, Carsten.1
Some of this information will appear in later entries, but Piersol fortunately included a good number of footnotes, so I am going to see how many of the original sources I can find.
The existence of this reprint got me thinking. The reprint appears to be 'print-on-demand' with 8.5 * 11 pages, softcover, fastback tape binding. I'm interested in the content, so this didn't bother me. However, the publisher, Higginson Books, focuses on reprinting out-of-print local histories and genealogies. I wondered if the book was no longer under copyright. Because if it were still under copyright, I would watch how much of it I quoted in any post I wrote. Otherwise, not so much.
It was published originally (in 1947) in Canada, which became a full signatory to the Berne Convention in the 1920s. Therefore, copyrights in Canada last at least the life of the author, plus fifty years. I'm not sure when (or if) Mary Blackadar Piersol died, but unless it was before 1960, the book is still under copyright . I expect Higginson Books went through official channels to republish the work.
So I won't quote in detail, but as I said, Piersol does include footnotes, so perhaps I'll be able to quote from her sources.
Note 1: There are two traditional Dutch naming patterns, one based on the father’s name, and one based on locality. The former is similar to traditional Hebrew naming patterns in that children only get one name, and their surname is derived from their father’s name. Myndert and Carsten’s surname was Frederickse or Fredericksen, because their father was Frederick Van Iveren. Frederick's surname was derived in the second fashion, from a town, possibly Everinge or Evere. Myndert and Carsten’s descendants reverted to that surname, and it mutated to either Van Every or Van Avery, depending upon the branch.
The records of the Van Every family: United Empire Loyalists, New York State, 1653-1784, Canada, 1784-1947, by Mary Blackadar Piersol, T.H. Best (Toronto), 1947.It’s been on my list of resources to find, though it’s out of print. I may have been able to retrieve a copy through Inter-Library Loan, but I wanted my own personal copy, and every place I found references to it said there were no copies available.
A week ago, Randy Seaver at Genea-Musings wrote about the GenalogyToday, GenWeekly and LiveRoots trio of sites.
I started browsing around, searching for surnames, and discovered they were selling copies of the book for a reasonable price.
I put an order in immediately. The site said there could be a 6-8 week wait, so I knew not to expect it in my mailbox the next day. I also didn’t expect it to appear in my mailbox 7 days later. But boy was I happy to see it there last night.
I had lots of fun browsing through it. I found some interesting information about the Van Every immigrant forebears, my 8th great grandfather, Myndert Fredericksen, and his brother, Carsten.1
Some of this information will appear in later entries, but Piersol fortunately included a good number of footnotes, so I am going to see how many of the original sources I can find.
The existence of this reprint got me thinking. The reprint appears to be 'print-on-demand' with 8.5 * 11 pages, softcover, fastback tape binding. I'm interested in the content, so this didn't bother me. However, the publisher, Higginson Books, focuses on reprinting out-of-print local histories and genealogies. I wondered if the book was no longer under copyright. Because if it were still under copyright, I would watch how much of it I quoted in any post I wrote. Otherwise, not so much.
It was published originally (in 1947) in Canada, which became a full signatory to the Berne Convention in the 1920s. Therefore, copyrights in Canada last at least the life of the author, plus fifty years. I'm not sure when (or if) Mary Blackadar Piersol died, but unless it was before 1960, the book is still under copyright . I expect Higginson Books went through official channels to republish the work.
So I won't quote in detail, but as I said, Piersol does include footnotes, so perhaps I'll be able to quote from her sources.
Note 1: There are two traditional Dutch naming patterns, one based on the father’s name, and one based on locality. The former is similar to traditional Hebrew naming patterns in that children only get one name, and their surname is derived from their father’s name. Myndert and Carsten’s surname was Frederickse or Fredericksen, because their father was Frederick Van Iveren. Frederick's surname was derived in the second fashion, from a town, possibly Everinge or Evere. Myndert and Carsten’s descendants reverted to that surname, and it mutated to either Van Every or Van Avery, depending upon the branch.
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
A simple reminder
When you find something online that is useful to your genealogy research -- don't assume it will remain there to return to and review at a later date. If it's downloadable, download it and save it to your hard drive. If not, copy and paste it into a word document.
This may be easy to remember with personal, educational, or other amateur websites. But don't forget even the big websites can be forced to take things down by lawsuits, etc.
Google has faced some recent lawsuits over their Google Books project. I'm not positive it's related, but I have discovered that several books that used to be "Full View" (and downloadable in PDF form) are no longer available except in "Snippet View" at best, and in some cases no preview at all.
These are all books published prior to 1920, most prior to 1900, so it's not an issue of whether or not they were in the public domain. I'm not entirely certain what the issue was.
This may be easy to remember with personal, educational, or other amateur websites. But don't forget even the big websites can be forced to take things down by lawsuits, etc.
Google has faced some recent lawsuits over their Google Books project. I'm not positive it's related, but I have discovered that several books that used to be "Full View" (and downloadable in PDF form) are no longer available except in "Snippet View" at best, and in some cases no preview at all.
These are all books published prior to 1920, most prior to 1900, so it's not an issue of whether or not they were in the public domain. I'm not entirely certain what the issue was.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Czech Grocery Store uses Missouri Blogger's Family Photo for Advertising
A grocery store in the Czech Republic found the perfect family to promote its local delivery service. They were young, attractive, and the children had infectious smiles.A virtual Facebook friend saw the "life-size ad", took a photo of it, and sent it to the blogger. The article goes on to say that if this happened in the US, laws are such the response would be easy. You would just need to go to the company and say "show me the money." Things get a little more complicated with foreign countries.
But the family had been plucked from a photo in cyberspace, and the stars had no idea they were endorsing a foreign grocer in an advertisement thousands of miles away. [Link]
This is something to consider by anyone who posts family photos on the web. The blogger "says she has learned an important lesson about posting pictures online: Always use low-resolution images (so they don't look so good when enlarged) or stick a digital watermark on the photo."
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Free Art for your Blog
One way to enliven a blog entry is with photography or artwork. Many entries on a genealogy blog will obviously be illustrated by photographs from family collections. However, sometimes we write about things we don't have photographs for. Some bloggers are handy with a camera, or the sketchpad, but others aren’t. Those of us who find our creativity restricted to the palette of words in the dictionary soon find ourselves wondering where we can find free photography and art.
Sure, you can go to Google Images, search for keywords, download, and then use the images you find. However, while possibly tempting, most bloggers realize there are legal issues with doing this. Furthermore, we don’t want people copying and pasting our words on their websites without our permission; therefore we should show the same respect to photographers and artists.
However, there is a lot available that is free (or almost free) of copyright restrictions.
I. Flickr
A. The Commons
Flickr, the photo-sharing website, has a section they call The Commons. The Commons began in January of 2008 when The Library of Congress released about 1500 photographs from their collection to display on Flickr. Since then, The Library of Congress Flickr collection has grown to over 5000 photographs. Several other libraries and museums have added photographs from their collections. If you search The Commons any photographs you find will be completely free of copyright restrictions. If you follow a link to the museum’s full collection on Flickr, leaving The Commons, some of those photographs may have copyright restrictions. The description of the photograph should indicate whether or not there are any restrictions.
[Note: The 1860s image on the left of the Jefferson Barracks military post just South of St. Louis, Missouri came from the New York Public Library collection at The Commons.]
B. Creative Commons
Flickr also has a section entitled Creative Commons
Anyone is able to contribute photographs to this section. These photographs aren’t completely free of copyright restrictions, but they fall into the “almost free” category. There are six groups, each with a different combination of four requirements
Attribution: The simplest, this means to use the photograph or artwork you must provide credit. An easy way to do this is to provide a link to the individual Flickr account from which the work came.
No Derivatives: You can display the artwork or photography exactly as it appears; you can’t make any changes. (Changing the size of the photograph, as well as trimming a ‘detail’ are both derivative works. Even copying the image in photo-editing software, pasting it into a new file, and adding a caption in whitespace underneath, is still a derivative work. The image you download from Flickr must be the exact same file you upload to your website.)
Non Commercial: – You can’t use the work for commercial purposes. (While many people will think ‘commercial’ means putting the photo on the cover of your CD, or on a tshirt you sell on CafePress – if your blog has advertisements from which you make money, a court could decide your blog is commercial. Since you probably don't wish to upset the artist, I would recommend asking permission from the owner – as they should be easily contactable from their Flickr accounts.)
ShareAlike: ShareAlike means if you make a derivative work, you must distribute it under a similar Creative Commons license
With those four definitions in mind, here are the six Creative Commons categories at Flickr, each of which can be searched individually:
1) Attribution License: Only attribution is required. You can make derivatives, use it for commercial purposes, etc. Once you make changes to the work, you can redistribute your derived work under a different set of requirements.
2) Attribution No Derivs License: You must give credit, and you aren’t allowed to make any derivatives. But as long as you don't make any changes to the work, you can still use it for commercial purposes.
3) Attribution – Non Commercial – No Derivs License: The most restrictive of the categories, the photographs are still free to use on a personal, non-commercial site.
4) Attribution – Non Commercial: Derivatives are allowed.
5) Attribution – NonCommercial – ShareAlike: If you make a derivative work, you must distribute it under a similar Creative Commons license
6) Attribution – ShareAlike: Same as #5, but you may use for commercial purposes.
II. LIFE Magazine
LIFE Magazine is sharing a large portion of their historical photo collection on Google Images .
They have the images organized by decade, and images from the 1880s through the 1910s are free of copyright restrictions. Those in the 1920 category and later are restricted to “Personal – non-commercial usage.”
III. The US Government
The US Government has an index of the images available on all their websites:
Images range from insects on the US Department of Agriculture website, photographs of the Grand Canyon on the National Park Service website, to images of the lunar surface on the NASA website.
IV. Classic works of art are a great way to illustrate your entries.
Art History Resources on the Web is a handy index to websites where you can find classic works of art that are free of copyright restriction.
Note: While artwork might be in the ‘public domain’ the photographs of the artwork might not be. If the image is the painting only, and you don’t see the frame, or the museum wall behind it, one photograph is going to be nearly identical to any other photograph, so it can be safely assumed to be in the public domain. However, once the creativity of the photographer enters into the photograph, you are on rockier grounds. And if the work of art is a sculpture, the photographer will often matter.
There are websites that will sell you the rights to photography, such as iStockPhoto or Getty Images . However, since there are several places to find free images, unless there is a particular image at one of these sites that really strike your fancy, there is no need to use them.
With all these sources for free photography and artwork, when you don't have a photograph from your family collection for a blog entry, your entry doesn't need to be image-free.
This article is revised somewhat from an article written for the St. Louis Bloggers Guild
Sure, you can go to Google Images, search for keywords, download, and then use the images you find. However, while possibly tempting, most bloggers realize there are legal issues with doing this. Furthermore, we don’t want people copying and pasting our words on their websites without our permission; therefore we should show the same respect to photographers and artists.
However, there is a lot available that is free (or almost free) of copyright restrictions.
I. FlickrA. The Commons
Flickr, the photo-sharing website, has a section they call The Commons. The Commons began in January of 2008 when The Library of Congress released about 1500 photographs from their collection to display on Flickr. Since then, The Library of Congress Flickr collection has grown to over 5000 photographs. Several other libraries and museums have added photographs from their collections. If you search The Commons any photographs you find will be completely free of copyright restrictions. If you follow a link to the museum’s full collection on Flickr, leaving The Commons, some of those photographs may have copyright restrictions. The description of the photograph should indicate whether or not there are any restrictions.
[Note: The 1860s image on the left of the Jefferson Barracks military post just South of St. Louis, Missouri came from the New York Public Library collection at The Commons.]
B. Creative Commons
Flickr also has a section entitled Creative Commons
Anyone is able to contribute photographs to this section. These photographs aren’t completely free of copyright restrictions, but they fall into the “almost free” category. There are six groups, each with a different combination of four requirements
Attribution: The simplest, this means to use the photograph or artwork you must provide credit. An easy way to do this is to provide a link to the individual Flickr account from which the work came.
No Derivatives: You can display the artwork or photography exactly as it appears; you can’t make any changes. (Changing the size of the photograph, as well as trimming a ‘detail’ are both derivative works. Even copying the image in photo-editing software, pasting it into a new file, and adding a caption in whitespace underneath, is still a derivative work. The image you download from Flickr must be the exact same file you upload to your website.)
Non Commercial: – You can’t use the work for commercial purposes. (While many people will think ‘commercial’ means putting the photo on the cover of your CD, or on a tshirt you sell on CafePress – if your blog has advertisements from which you make money, a court could decide your blog is commercial. Since you probably don't wish to upset the artist, I would recommend asking permission from the owner – as they should be easily contactable from their Flickr accounts.)
ShareAlike: ShareAlike means if you make a derivative work, you must distribute it under a similar Creative Commons license
With those four definitions in mind, here are the six Creative Commons categories at Flickr, each of which can be searched individually:
1) Attribution License: Only attribution is required. You can make derivatives, use it for commercial purposes, etc. Once you make changes to the work, you can redistribute your derived work under a different set of requirements.
2) Attribution No Derivs License: You must give credit, and you aren’t allowed to make any derivatives. But as long as you don't make any changes to the work, you can still use it for commercial purposes.
3) Attribution – Non Commercial – No Derivs License: The most restrictive of the categories, the photographs are still free to use on a personal, non-commercial site.
4) Attribution – Non Commercial: Derivatives are allowed.
5) Attribution – NonCommercial – ShareAlike: If you make a derivative work, you must distribute it under a similar Creative Commons license
6) Attribution – ShareAlike: Same as #5, but you may use for commercial purposes.
II. LIFE Magazine
LIFE Magazine is sharing a large portion of their historical photo collection on Google Images .
They have the images organized by decade, and images from the 1880s through the 1910s are free of copyright restrictions. Those in the 1920 category and later are restricted to “Personal – non-commercial usage.”
III. The US GovernmentThe US Government has an index of the images available on all their websites:
Most of these images and graphics are available for use in the public domain, and they may be used and reproduced without permission or fee. However, some images may be protected by license. We strongly recommend you thoroughly read the disclaimers on each site before use. For information about obtaining seals of Federal Agencies and the United States, please see the Government Printing Office website.
Images range from insects on the US Department of Agriculture website, photographs of the Grand Canyon on the National Park Service website, to images of the lunar surface on the NASA website.
IV. Classic works of art are a great way to illustrate your entries.
Art History Resources on the Web is a handy index to websites where you can find classic works of art that are free of copyright restriction.
Note: While artwork might be in the ‘public domain’ the photographs of the artwork might not be. If the image is the painting only, and you don’t see the frame, or the museum wall behind it, one photograph is going to be nearly identical to any other photograph, so it can be safely assumed to be in the public domain. However, once the creativity of the photographer enters into the photograph, you are on rockier grounds. And if the work of art is a sculpture, the photographer will often matter.
There are websites that will sell you the rights to photography, such as iStockPhoto or Getty Images . However, since there are several places to find free images, unless there is a particular image at one of these sites that really strike your fancy, there is no need to use them.
With all these sources for free photography and artwork, when you don't have a photograph from your family collection for a blog entry, your entry doesn't need to be image-free.
This article is revised somewhat from an article written for the St. Louis Bloggers Guild
Saturday, April 4, 2009
Glass House Genealogy Blogging
After reading 5 Bad Genealogy Sources, and reading the author's defense of himself here, and reading Chris Dunham's take here, I wondered why Chris hadn't listed the Genealogy and Family History blog in his Blog Finder? Surely a blog that incites such debate should have a place in his directory.
After a little investigating, I discovered a possible answer: Maybe he had blacklisted the blog because of suspected duplicate content. Take this post, "Genealogy Software: Tips on Finding the Right One," posted November 30, 2008. The advice is pretty generic, which may have made him suspect that it came from an article mill. Googling the first sentence brings up 170 results. Here it is posted on a different blog a year earlier.
This must be a fluke, right? Well, how about this post, "Ancestry.com: The Best Website to Learn About Your Genealogy," published October 30, 2008. 307 Google results. This post appears to have come from here, and this post from here. But given the lack of proper attribution, it's impossible to tell who wrote what when.
The proprietor of Genealogy and Family History seems to have cleaned up his act a bit in the past month or so. But maybe not. He wrote this just four days ago:
Taking articles from article mills is one thing. It gives bloggers who have difficulty coming up with their own ideas a chance to give their blog a little verisimilitude, without really violating some ethical codes, as the articles are there to be taken. You're lying to your readers when you claim you wrote them, but the creators of the property don't care.
But if you read the Terms of Use at eHow, authors of eHow articles retain all copyrights. So taking an eHow article, and changing a few words here and there, isn't just creative sloppiness. Maybe it's an example of cryptomnesia?
As the author referenced comments on this thread, both he and the author of the eHow article may have retrieved the article from the same source - an article mill offering 'private label rights'. So he would only be guilty of 'creative sloppiness', which as I never argued otherwise, is legal. His new post explaining how he doesn't write all his articles is here. "Private Label Rights" do grant you the right to use 'ghostwritten' material, but it is still more honest to your readership to make it clear that you do, which at least he now does.
The Small Print: Proper attribution: Genealogists in Glass Houses.
After a little investigating, I discovered a possible answer: Maybe he had blacklisted the blog because of suspected duplicate content. Take this post, "Genealogy Software: Tips on Finding the Right One," posted November 30, 2008. The advice is pretty generic, which may have made him suspect that it came from an article mill. Googling the first sentence brings up 170 results. Here it is posted on a different blog a year earlier.
This must be a fluke, right? Well, how about this post, "Ancestry.com: The Best Website to Learn About Your Genealogy," published October 30, 2008. 307 Google results. This post appears to have come from here, and this post from here. But given the lack of proper attribution, it's impossible to tell who wrote what when.
The proprietor of Genealogy and Family History seems to have cleaned up his act a bit in the past month or so. But maybe not. He wrote this just four days ago:
I recalled that I had written an article last year about Genealogists using Twitter as a means of connecting with others who were researching their Family History. So as it’s obviously a topic of interest to folks I searched the blog and here’s a link to the article which originally appeared back in October 2008:The linked article is remarkably similar to a tutorial at eHow.com, submitted by a user named Moomettesgram a month earlier.
Genealogists and Twitter
Taking articles from article mills is one thing. It gives bloggers who have difficulty coming up with their own ideas a chance to give their blog a little verisimilitude, without really violating some ethical codes, as the articles are there to be taken. You're lying to your readers when you claim you wrote them, but the creators of the property don't care.
As the author referenced comments on this thread, both he and the author of the eHow article may have retrieved the article from the same source - an article mill offering 'private label rights'. So he would only be guilty of 'creative sloppiness', which as I never argued otherwise, is legal. His new post explaining how he doesn't write all his articles is here. "Private Label Rights" do grant you the right to use 'ghostwritten' material, but it is still more honest to your readership to make it clear that you do, which at least he now does.
The Small Print: Proper attribution: Genealogists in Glass Houses.
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
LIFE images 1850s-today
LIFE magazine has released millions of their photographs on Google Images.
Search millions of photographs from the LIFE photo archive, stretching from the 1750s to today. Most were never published and are now available for the first time through the joint work of LIFE and Google.
[link]
It should be noted that while they say they will continue to add more photographs, the earliest decade currently in the archive is 1860s. The first successful photograph supposedly was produced in 1827. Therefore, I think the above contains an obvious typo.
The question might arise -- are any of these photographs in the public domain? Let's take a look at this chart by the Cornell University Copyright Information Center. My assumption is that all the photographs fall under the category of Works for Hire - the company of hire being LIFE. According to the description, most of them were unpublished. So prior to their publication this week on Google, they had a copyright of 120 years from creation. Therefore, on January 1, 2008 any of the photographs dated prior to 1888 were in the public domain. I am fairly certain once a work enters the public domain, that isn't retracted.
However, all the post 1888 photographs are now published. And published works for hire have a copyright of 95 years after publication.
So it is quite understandable why LIFE went along with Google's idea of publishing all these unpublished works. If I am correct, it extends their copyright significantly. But the currently 100-200 pre-1888 photographs are in the public domain.
Sunday, January 6, 2008
Living People
Randy asks if he should be helping clients find living people.
Yesterday, Cyndi of Cyndi's List, was saying that searching for live people wasn't genealogy. Several people disagreed with her in the comment thread.
Of course the examples they came up with - searching for lost - or formerly unknown - cousins, hoping they have the missing information they've been seeking - is not the same as a client seeking help in finding a grade school classmate.
I am reminded of my discovery back in September of the online Texas vital records. One of the two blind letters I finished writing yesterday was to a cousin in Texas. It will be mailed tomorrow. The other is to a cousin here in St. Louis. I've never met either of them, and didn't know they existed until recently. I'm hopeful they will be happy to be found - and happy to find me.
I'm not sure what I would do if someone asked me to help them find a non-relative. While I am by no means a professional yet, I now know several techniques I didn't know a year ago, which means I know more than the average person. I'd probably help a friend out (someone I knew wasn't the stalker type), but I would hesitate helping a stranger. of course, they could go hire a private detective. People are findable - depends upon how hard you want to find them. I think I recall reading that the #1 most requested job of private detectives is simply finding people. A lot of us are lost.
A private detective blogger suggests if you are unsure about a client, when you find the missing person, instead of giving the client the information, you contact the missing person and ask for permission to give the client the information. Or you agree to deliver a letter from the client to the individual. That seems like a good precaution. The post also details some rather specific true-life horror stories. (I also had to remind myself several times while reading the post that one doesn't judge the quality of a private detective by how well they use the English language.)
Yesterday, Cyndi of Cyndi's List, was saying that searching for live people wasn't genealogy. Several people disagreed with her in the comment thread.
Of course the examples they came up with - searching for lost - or formerly unknown - cousins, hoping they have the missing information they've been seeking - is not the same as a client seeking help in finding a grade school classmate.
I am reminded of my discovery back in September of the online Texas vital records. One of the two blind letters I finished writing yesterday was to a cousin in Texas. It will be mailed tomorrow. The other is to a cousin here in St. Louis. I've never met either of them, and didn't know they existed until recently. I'm hopeful they will be happy to be found - and happy to find me.
I'm not sure what I would do if someone asked me to help them find a non-relative. While I am by no means a professional yet, I now know several techniques I didn't know a year ago, which means I know more than the average person. I'd probably help a friend out (someone I knew wasn't the stalker type), but I would hesitate helping a stranger. of course, they could go hire a private detective. People are findable - depends upon how hard you want to find them. I think I recall reading that the #1 most requested job of private detectives is simply finding people. A lot of us are lost.
A private detective blogger suggests if you are unsure about a client, when you find the missing person, instead of giving the client the information, you contact the missing person and ask for permission to give the client the information. Or you agree to deliver a letter from the client to the individual. That seems like a good precaution. The post also details some rather specific true-life horror stories. (I also had to remind myself several times while reading the post that one doesn't judge the quality of a private detective by how well they use the English language.)
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Yom Kippur 1899
Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, begins Friday night at sunset. But for this post, I’m taking you back 108 years to 1899:
The above comes from the Sept 15, 1899 New York Times. (read the full article) They used to charge a fee to read their archives, but this week they opened up most of it for free. Everything prior to 1922, and thus in the public domain, is freely downloadable as PDFs. Anything after 1987, out of NYTimes generosity, is also free. There’s still a large amount they charge for, but they decreased the price as well. (It used to be $4.95 per article, and the ones I've found in my searches so far have been $3.95)
Several of my Newmark ancestors were likely at the Great Synagogue that day. They were in London from 1893 to 1909. They were definitely at the Synagogue a couple years later, on August 31, 1902, but that’s a different post I will write soon.
Dreyfus had been convicted in 1895, but this protest followed rumors of an army cover-up and his possible innocence. Pertaining to that, here’s another interesting quote from the above article:
Dreyfus was pardoned on September 19th. And while a pardon, as the article points out, is usually all one can expect in most countries after a conviction, in 1906 he was exonerated by a military commission. (source)
Speaking of which...Are there black sheep in your family tree that you would like pardoned/exonerated? Craig Manson of Geneablogie has created a new service called the Historical Appellate Review Project
“Jews Celebrate Atonement Day by Holding Demonstrations”
“Chief Rabbi Adler Speaks”
“Says Last Saturday’s Verdict was a Disaster to France”
London – Sept 14 English indignation against France was strengthened today on account of the observance by all Jews of the Day of Atonement.
The day was celebrated here, especially in the East End, with Dreyfus demonstrations…The Great Synagogue in London presented a striking spectacle. It was crowded from 6 o’clock in the morning until 6 at night and thousands were unable to enter.
The above comes from the Sept 15, 1899 New York Times. (read the full article) They used to charge a fee to read their archives, but this week they opened up most of it for free. Everything prior to 1922, and thus in the public domain, is freely downloadable as PDFs. Anything after 1987, out of NYTimes generosity, is also free. There’s still a large amount they charge for, but they decreased the price as well. (It used to be $4.95 per article, and the ones I've found in my searches so far have been $3.95)
Several of my Newmark ancestors were likely at the Great Synagogue that day. They were in London from 1893 to 1909. They were definitely at the Synagogue a couple years later, on August 31, 1902, but that’s a different post I will write soon.
Dreyfus had been convicted in 1895, but this protest followed rumors of an army cover-up and his possible innocence. Pertaining to that, here’s another interesting quote from the above article:
“Let the majesty of the law be vindicated,” [Chief Rabbi Adler] concluded, “and let them not seek a pardon, which should be rejected with scorn, for where no crime was committed, how can a pardon be granted?”
Dreyfus was pardoned on September 19th. And while a pardon, as the article points out, is usually all one can expect in most countries after a conviction, in 1906 he was exonerated by a military commission. (source)
Speaking of which...Are there black sheep in your family tree that you would like pardoned/exonerated? Craig Manson of Geneablogie has created a new service called the Historical Appellate Review Project
HARP, the Historical Appellate Review Project, is dedicated to setting the record straight. Using state-of-the-art genealogical and legal research procedures, HARP will investigate your family's alleged black sheep and let you know if their names might be cleared! In certain cases, we even may be able to go to court and get the official record changed!That sounds like a great idea! I haven't found any ancestors yet that have been convicted of any serious crimes, but if I do, and think it may have been an unfair conviction, I now have a place to go!
Friday, September 14, 2007
What's in the public domain?
Note: I live in the US, and so this post is US-centered. Different laws apply in different countries.
The recent discussions on copyright, due to their origin, have mostly focused on "fair use" and technology's impact on copyright law. But if a work is in the public domain, it is free to be used in any way anyone likes, without the need to get anyone's permission.
In genealogy we read source material of various age, and the issue of public domain can arise. There is some confusion though about what is in the public domain, due partially to recent court decisions revising the code, and partially due to different laws being in effect depending upon when a work was written, and where.
I don't work somewhere that understanding copyright law is part of the job description, but a colleague a couple days ago told me he was certain that it no longer mattered when the author died, it was a flat 95 years after creation. This is wrong, but it is understandable why they might think this. There has been a lot of media about corporate copyright, and work-for-hire now lasts for 95 years. Another colleague in the discussion claimed that Disney is actually trying to argue that some of their characters were created by Walt Disney, and not by the company, so that the clock starts when Disney died in 1966. I haven't verified this, but it sounds like a smart business move, for if they are successful, Mickey Mouse won't be public domain until after 2036 (1966+70), instead of 2022 (1928+95). Yielding an extra 14 years of profit.
The Intellectual Property Officer at Cornell University creates an annual chart detailing what is in the public domain as of January 1st of the current year. It depends on factors such as whether the work was published, or unpublished, with notice or without, where, and when. But the chart does a great job in my opinion of simplifying it as much as it can be simplified, and still cover all contingencies.
Note: all my comments regarding length of copyright terms in this post come after reviewing the chart linked above. It's been 12 years since I had any formalized training on copyright law, and that was only one college course, though I do try to follow news stories about related issues.
The recent discussions on copyright, due to their origin, have mostly focused on "fair use" and technology's impact on copyright law. But if a work is in the public domain, it is free to be used in any way anyone likes, without the need to get anyone's permission.
In genealogy we read source material of various age, and the issue of public domain can arise. There is some confusion though about what is in the public domain, due partially to recent court decisions revising the code, and partially due to different laws being in effect depending upon when a work was written, and where.
I don't work somewhere that understanding copyright law is part of the job description, but a colleague a couple days ago told me he was certain that it no longer mattered when the author died, it was a flat 95 years after creation. This is wrong, but it is understandable why they might think this. There has been a lot of media about corporate copyright, and work-for-hire now lasts for 95 years. Another colleague in the discussion claimed that Disney is actually trying to argue that some of their characters were created by Walt Disney, and not by the company, so that the clock starts when Disney died in 1966. I haven't verified this, but it sounds like a smart business move, for if they are successful, Mickey Mouse won't be public domain until after 2036 (1966+70), instead of 2022 (1928+95). Yielding an extra 14 years of profit.
The Intellectual Property Officer at Cornell University creates an annual chart detailing what is in the public domain as of January 1st of the current year. It depends on factors such as whether the work was published, or unpublished, with notice or without, where, and when. But the chart does a great job in my opinion of simplifying it as much as it can be simplified, and still cover all contingencies.
Note: all my comments regarding length of copyright terms in this post come after reviewing the chart linked above. It's been 12 years since I had any formalized training on copyright law, and that was only one college course, though I do try to follow news stories about related issues.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Privacy in Texas
Several discussions on legal and ethical issues lately. As a newcomer to the genealogical community, I don't know how common this is. I have come upon another one that's troubling me.
Last night, doing some research on a surname in Texas I came across the Ancestry databases of their birth, death and marriage indexes. Several states have their death indexes online. This can be useful. Missouri even has their death certificates online - up until 1956. But they stop with certificates less than 50 years. They have no index for recent deaths either. The St. Louis Public Library has an index for Post Disptach obituaries that isn't complete, but when it is, will be up-to-present. This doesn't trouble me much, since all the people in the index are deceased.
But indexes of births and marriages for people who are still living? The Texas birth index at Ancestry is for 1903-1997. The marriage index is for 1814-1909 and 1966-2002. If I had been born in Texas, I'd be on it, as would my parents, and grandparents. The birth index gives names of both parents, with maiden name for the mother. Combined with the marriage index, this provides an easy reference to track the generations. There is a large gap in the marriage index, but still, while the census stops at 1930, if the family remains in Texas, you can pretty much keep on going until the current generation of parents. And then at several phonebook websites (Or on Google if you figure out the city they live in) you can probably find the phone number of the living generations. And give them a call and say, Hi, I'm a cousin.
It certainly might not be advisable to start out the conversation that way. And you might do better trying to find their address and writing a "blind inquiry" letter to them. (Uncle Hiram has some good advice on that.) It's way too easy to hang up a phone. But Texas certainly makes it easy. I'm not sure how many other states do this. Randy at GeneaMusings back in February suggested California was the only other one. Chicago (Cook County) recently announced it is putting a lot of their vitals online - with an estimated date of arrival in January, but I don't know if this will include recent vitals.
He also asks for input on the privacy issue. I didn't see his post back then (see first paragraph) but I'm giving it now, I guess. I don't like it.
Well, that is, looking at it from the perspective of somebody tracking me down - online - within a couple hours of fairly easy research - if I don't want to be tracked down that easily. I don't have to worry about that, I don't live in Texas.
But I do have some Texas relatives. I now know their names. I won't mention the surname. And while I'm not about to pick up the phone, I think I'd be silly not to write a couple letters. Gives them the option of not replying. I might even play 'dumb' and say that I think 'we may' be related. Don't want to scare them by telling them that I *know* we are. Of course, I'd be surprised if this hasn't been discussed in Texas newspapers, and they know full well how easy it is. So they might see right through my facade.
Last night, doing some research on a surname in Texas I came across the Ancestry databases of their birth, death and marriage indexes. Several states have their death indexes online. This can be useful. Missouri even has their death certificates online - up until 1956. But they stop with certificates less than 50 years. They have no index for recent deaths either. The St. Louis Public Library has an index for Post Disptach obituaries that isn't complete, but when it is, will be up-to-present. This doesn't trouble me much, since all the people in the index are deceased.
But indexes of births and marriages for people who are still living? The Texas birth index at Ancestry is for 1903-1997. The marriage index is for 1814-1909 and 1966-2002. If I had been born in Texas, I'd be on it, as would my parents, and grandparents. The birth index gives names of both parents, with maiden name for the mother. Combined with the marriage index, this provides an easy reference to track the generations. There is a large gap in the marriage index, but still, while the census stops at 1930, if the family remains in Texas, you can pretty much keep on going until the current generation of parents. And then at several phonebook websites (Or on Google if you figure out the city they live in) you can probably find the phone number of the living generations. And give them a call and say, Hi, I'm a cousin.
It certainly might not be advisable to start out the conversation that way. And you might do better trying to find their address and writing a "blind inquiry" letter to them. (Uncle Hiram has some good advice on that.) It's way too easy to hang up a phone. But Texas certainly makes it easy. I'm not sure how many other states do this. Randy at GeneaMusings back in February suggested California was the only other one. Chicago (Cook County) recently announced it is putting a lot of their vitals online - with an estimated date of arrival in January, but I don't know if this will include recent vitals.
He also asks for input on the privacy issue. I didn't see his post back then (see first paragraph) but I'm giving it now, I guess. I don't like it.
Well, that is, looking at it from the perspective of somebody tracking me down - online - within a couple hours of fairly easy research - if I don't want to be tracked down that easily. I don't have to worry about that, I don't live in Texas.
But I do have some Texas relatives. I now know their names. I won't mention the surname. And while I'm not about to pick up the phone, I think I'd be silly not to write a couple letters. Gives them the option of not replying. I might even play 'dumb' and say that I think 'we may' be related. Don't want to scare them by telling them that I *know* we are. Of course, I'd be surprised if this hasn't been discussed in Texas newspapers, and they know full well how easy it is. So they might see right through my facade.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Ancestry backs down
Ancestry has removed their collection of web caches. The announcement is carefully written in neutral language as one would expect from a corporate PR office, but they explain their initial intent ("an effort to preserve history – if a Web page featuring important family history information were taken down in the future, a cached version would still be available"), acknowledge they have heard the concerns raised (not listing those concerns, but PR rarely focuses on the negative unless they feel they have to), and announce they are removing the information 'for the time being.'
The announcement is pretty fresh, and already a few bloggers have picked up on those words. They're the most colloquial-sounding words in the release, but taking them at their word in the rest of the text, they still would like to provide the information, but they want to review the concerns that have been addressed by the community and come up with a way to do it that will be less objectionable. Which is commendable.
I'm a newcomer to this community, but considering the time frame this has all occurred in, their response is impressive. Companies are best judged not by the mistakes they make, because mistakes will be made, but in how they respond to criticism of those mistakes.
The announcement is pretty fresh, and already a few bloggers have picked up on those words. They're the most colloquial-sounding words in the release, but taking them at their word in the rest of the text, they still would like to provide the information, but they want to review the concerns that have been addressed by the community and come up with a way to do it that will be less objectionable. Which is commendable.
I'm a newcomer to this community, but considering the time frame this has all occurred in, their response is impressive. Companies are best judged not by the mistakes they make, because mistakes will be made, but in how they respond to criticism of those mistakes.
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Caching, Ancestry, Archive, and Google
I have a personal blog where I talk about everything that comes to my mind. This is what it looks like now.
This is what it looked like in March 2005, July 2004, December 2003, and a full five years ago in August of 2002. All the links are courtesy of the WayBack Machine. Archive.org has been archiving the internet for several years now. Here's what another website I maintain looked like in October of 2000
There has been some talk about Ancestry’s caching of genealogical websites – such as USGenNet and genealogy blogs. Such as at Genea-Musings, About.com’s Guide to Genealogy , and Genealogue.
When I blog I know what I blog may appear elsewhere. I consider myself a poet, and have included some poetry in some of my blog posts. I’ve had some of this poetry appear on other sites without credit. (In these instances I emailed the owners and asked them to include a byline…which they did.) I’ve also had poetry I’ve written appear on websites, credited, but without people asking, which legally they are required to do…but I’m not wealthy enough to take them to court, and I don’t really mind, usually. I now have a Creative Commons copyright notice on the blog which allows people to distribute the content as long as they don’t make any money off of it, and as long as they give me credit. I don't have that notice on this blog. It's probably not going to appear here.
Of course, USGenNet doesn’t have a Creative Commons copyright notice on their site. And if you search for their archives at archive.org you will be able to access their archived homepage, but when you try to follow a link, you will receive the error msg: "We're sorry, access to [url] has been blocked by the site owner via robots.txt." Basically, robots.txt files are files webmasters put on their sites to tell searchbots that they shouldn’t archive their pages. I could put these on my site, but I don’t. USGenNet does. Understandably, too. Bots are still physically able to ignore the requests and archive the pages…- it's just respectable archival search engines (such as Google and Archive.org) don’t ignore the requests. Partially probably due to fear of legal retribution. Ancestry, apparently (key word - I'm still stating an opinion here) is ignoring these electronic requests. Note: I've been assured they didn't ignore robots.txt files.
As others have stated, I state as well, what this means legally is beyond me. I’m not a lawyer. I took a media law course in college over ten years ago, and have some clues, and this looks suspicious, but I am certainly not an expert. It should be interesting to watch if Ancestry does insist what they appear to be doing is legitimate, as there are a whole bunch of companies – completely outside of the genealogy industry – who might justifiably be worried about the results of a court case in Ancestry's favor. If a court decides Ancestry can cache pages on sites with robots.txt files specifically requesting pages not be cached … will Google and Archive.org decide to still be nice? I suspect every newspaper in the country has a stake in the answer to that question.
And while it certainly feels more reprehensible for Ancestry to charge for viewing their cached files, I suspect that newspapers or any other website which wishes to protect their content hope that's not the deciding factor, as archival websites making their content available for free likely isn't an acceptable solution from their perspective.
This is what it looked like in March 2005, July 2004, December 2003, and a full five years ago in August of 2002. All the links are courtesy of the WayBack Machine. Archive.org has been archiving the internet for several years now. Here's what another website I maintain looked like in October of 2000
There has been some talk about Ancestry’s caching of genealogical websites – such as USGenNet and genealogy blogs. Such as at Genea-Musings, About.com’s Guide to Genealogy , and Genealogue.
When I blog I know what I blog may appear elsewhere. I consider myself a poet, and have included some poetry in some of my blog posts. I’ve had some of this poetry appear on other sites without credit. (In these instances I emailed the owners and asked them to include a byline…which they did.) I’ve also had poetry I’ve written appear on websites, credited, but without people asking, which legally they are required to do…but I’m not wealthy enough to take them to court, and I don’t really mind, usually. I now have a Creative Commons copyright notice on the blog which allows people to distribute the content as long as they don’t make any money off of it, and as long as they give me credit. I don't have that notice on this blog. It's probably not going to appear here.
Of course, USGenNet doesn’t have a Creative Commons copyright notice on their site. And if you search for their archives at archive.org you will be able to access their archived homepage, but when you try to follow a link, you will receive the error msg: "We're sorry, access to [url] has been blocked by the site owner via robots.txt." Basically, robots.txt files are files webmasters put on their sites to tell searchbots that they shouldn’t archive their pages. I could put these on my site, but I don’t. USGenNet does. Understandably, too. Bots are still physically able to ignore the requests and archive the pages…- it's just respectable archival search engines (such as Google and Archive.org) don’t ignore the requests. Partially probably due to fear of legal retribution. Ancestry, apparently (key word - I'm still stating an opinion here) is ignoring these electronic requests. Note: I've been assured they didn't ignore robots.txt files.
As others have stated, I state as well, what this means legally is beyond me. I’m not a lawyer. I took a media law course in college over ten years ago, and have some clues, and this looks suspicious, but I am certainly not an expert. It should be interesting to watch if Ancestry does insist what they appear to be doing is legitimate, as there are a whole bunch of companies – completely outside of the genealogy industry – who might justifiably be worried about the results of a court case in Ancestry's favor. If a court decides Ancestry can cache pages on sites with robots.txt files specifically requesting pages not be cached … will Google and Archive.org decide to still be nice? I suspect every newspaper in the country has a stake in the answer to that question.
And while it certainly feels more reprehensible for Ancestry to charge for viewing their cached files, I suspect that newspapers or any other website which wishes to protect their content hope that's not the deciding factor, as archival websites making their content available for free likely isn't an acceptable solution from their perspective.
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