Pet Peeves

On Facebook, anytime someone uses the word loose instead of lose or uses the wrong their, they're or there I have to stop myself from deleting them from my friend list. From the number of memes I've seen about spelling and grammatical pet peeves I am not alone. A lot of my genealogical pet peeves have been covered in previous posts about clickophile trees but here are a few that haven't been mentioned yet.

✿ The Family Name
It's not a "sir name" or a "sir-name." The word is surname.

✿ Ancestory
This is especially puzzling on the Ancestry.com Facebook page. How do they not see the correct spelling plastered all over the page?

✿ WWII vs. WW11
One is World War Two. The other is World War ELEVEN.

✿ The words ancestor, decedent, and descendant are not interchangeable.
An ancestor is "a person from whom one is descended; forebear; progenitor."
A decedent is "a deceased person."
A person "that is descended from a specific ancestor; an offspring" is a descendant.

✿ "Thanks in advance" or "TIA"
Translation: "I expect someone will help me (for free) and when they do I cannot be bothered to spend a few seconds of my own precious time to thank them personally."
Not everyone is bothered by this but it really rubs me the wrong way. If you are asking someone to help you acknowledge their comment/answer. First of all, it's polite. Second, it tells the person who helping that you saw their answer and they didn't waste their time. If it's on Facebook it only takes a second to 'like' a comment yet some people can't even manage to do that.

✿ The English Only Crowd
"Those records are in German. Why doesn't [whatever website they're complaining about] translate them? I don't know German." You've just told the world that you're either too dumb or too stubborn to learn. Part of learning about your heritage is learning the language(s) of your ancestors. You don't need to be able to read War and Peace in another language but will it kill you to learn the months, numbers and a few genealogically important words? You're not even required to memorize them, you can have a cheat sheet on your computer. To find a cheat sheet just Google 'genealogy word list' and the language you need. If you have gotten far enough back in your tree that the records are in a now defunct language or you can't read the language because of the script check the Learning Center on FamilySearch.

✿ Name Droppers
Name droppers are those people who post nothing more than a name on genealogy Facebook pages. There seem to be a couple of reasons for these posts. Some think Facebook is a search engine. Others do not know the difference between a Facebook fan page for a website and the actual website. Still others think there could be only one person in the world with that name. Can you think of other reasons, logical or not, for posting a name and nothing else?

✿ My family is more interesting than anything you have to say.
Some people think nothing of posting 20 photos in a row on a Facebook business page or in a Facebook group. Pages and groups are used by hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people. I've landed on pages and wondered if there was a Facebook glitch that took me to someone's personal page. While you may find your photos fascinating other people may have a question they'd like answered and you've just pushed their post really far down the page. You don't have to post them all at once or your can put them all in an album on your personal page, make the album public and post a link to it on the page you're visiting. Don't forget to include something about the album. Why are you sharing it? What are the surnames of the people in the album? Were all of the photos taken in the same place?

✿ "People should ask before attaching my photos!"
Some people think everyone should play by their personal unwritten rules. Isn't everyone on Ancestry.com psychic? You are playing in Ancestry.com's sandbox. Their terms of service state:

"Portions of the Website allow you and other Users to contribute material to be displayed on the Website ("User Provided Content"). For User Provided Content, Ancestry is merely hosting and providing access.
...
By submitting User Provided Content to Ancestry, you grant Ancestry, its parent company and all of its affiliates, a transferable license to use, host, sublicense and distribute your submission to the extent and in the form or context we deem appropriate on or through any media or medium and with any technology or devices now known or hereafter developed or discovered." [emphasis mine]

Don't like their rules? You can always send a suggestion about a change to their terms of service or a feature you'd like to see added. Until your suggestion is implemented either don't upload photos or upload them to a private tree. But don't upload them and then complain when other people attach them without asking permission. You gave them permission when you uploaded the items to Ancestry.com.

✿ People who exclaim, "This is a scam!"
Subscriptions to most online websites renew automatically. It is not a scam or a rip-off. In the case of Ancestry.com it's not even in tiny legalese.

Thanks to Katie for the screen cap!

✿ The "Ancestry.com is expensive" Crowd
I think I vented enough about the "Ancestry.com is expensive" comments here.

✿ Those who need a dentist not a genealogist.
They claim to want assistance but getting the information you need to help them is like pulling teeth. The conversation usually goes something like this:

 Patient: Can someone help me find my great-grandmother?
 Dentist: What do you know? Her name? Date of birth?
 Patient: She died when I was little and my mother hasn't told me very much.
 Dentist: What did she tell you?
 Patient: She told me... [proceeds to tell a long story with no dates, places or names].
 Dentist: You'll need to give us names, dates and places, something specific, before anyone can help you.
 Patient: She was born in Alabama or North Carolina. Maybe Tennessee.

That tooth is never getting pulled. This could go on indefinitely but usually ends when the person attempting to help just gives up. For tips on how to ask for help check out these two blog posts: Asking For Help and Help Me Help You.


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