- Starting from the ground up
- Sourcing your found records to the people
I cite both of these for the same reason: The information listed on already present trees (physical and online) should be considered NO BETTER THAN FAIRY TALES in displaying reality. Because who knows how already generated trees were put together - and who's to say they aren't totally wrong.
When people log into Family Search or they connect to a larger tree and see they have some of their line filled out. They poke around their new line and see how far back it goes... In doing so they waste time by looking at something which may or may not be true and don't produce a thing in doing so. In order to actually connect to our heritage you have to see the sources which give evidence for the people listed.
To the beginner with no information present it is the path they HAVE to tread in order to go back in the past at all. I don't think it wasted effort to find every record even mentioning a particular ancestor and attaching to that person in the ways described in previous posts.
UPDATES:
There are some updates: Family Search is encouraging more and more people to switch to Family Tree from new.familysearch.
Observe the section in the upper right, and that button there. Clearly they are having the general user interact more with Family Tree. Also the invite link below is no longer required. Simply going to FamilySearch.org/Tree will take you to the Family Tree feature and apparently activate it for future use.
Also notice these new images on the left for the login page and the surrounding text. I especially like the emphasis on FREE Service. And how under records it mentions saving those records in the source box. Anyway just thought I'd point that out!
