Free Genealogy

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PROVO, Utah, May 12 — Ancestry.com, the world’s largest online family history resource, today announced that its members have added more than 1 billion people to more than 10 million user-generated family trees on the site since the tree-building and -sharing tools debuted in July 2006. Within just the last two years, members have more than tripled the number of people and family trees, and Ancestry.com members continue to benefit from the site’s content.

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(M2 PressWIRE Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) - General Register Office information now available on Directgov - As the number of people investigating their family history continues to soar, people can save cash and find out how to go about researching their family tree by using Directgov.

Following programmes like the BBC’s Who Do You Think You Are?, interest in genealogy has grown rapidly in recent years. Some commercial companies charge as much as GBP30.00 for a birth certificate but each certificate costs from just GBP7.00 if you order online via Directgov.

Public information about registering births, marriages and deaths in England and Wales has moved from the GRO (General Register Office) website and is now available on the government’s supersite, Directgov, from 7 April 2009.

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Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

The GRO online ordering service currently receives up to 7,000 applications a day and 2.5 million views per month. More than 2 million certificate applications are made each year, the vast majority of which are investigating their family tree, others need a certificate for legal or administrative purposes and 90 per cent of these applications are made online. Other significant areas of interest include finding out about places to get married, marriage fees, and registering a birth.

Directgov, the government’s flagship digital service, is now hosting information on registering births, marriages, civil partnerships and deaths, including details of how adopted adults can access their original birth records or place their details on the Adoption Contact Register. All the information is in plain English and the move to Directgov will improve public access to these services.

Directgov is an essential supersite, bringing together services and information from various government departments.

Jayne Nickalls, Chief Executive of Directgov, said: “This is a wonderful addition to the Directgov family and we are delighted to begin hosting this information. People don’t need to pay over the odds for what is an essential legal and historical document of life in the UK. Directgov can play a key role in helping people to access it and in saving money.” James Hall, the Registrar General for England and Wales said: “I am confident that all those accessing Directgov for information on topics such as getting married, registering a birth or what to do after a death, will find the information clear and helpful. People using the online ordering service will come through directly to the General Register Office, the only holders of the national record for England and Wales.” Television presenter and founder of Childline, Esther Rantzen, traced her own family history on the BBC’s television series, Who Do You Think You Are? Esther said: “Unraveling the secrets of my family was an incredible and emotional journey, one that I am pleased to have taken, even if some of the truths uncovered were hard to accept. Finding out where you come from helps inform who you are, and I am delighted to know that more people will be able to make their own personal discoveries using Directgov in an accessible and affordable way.” http://www.direct.gov.uk/familyhistoryFor more information on Directgov contact: sarah.carlin@coi.gsi.gov.uk 020 7261 8318 Notes to editors * Directgov provides user-friendly, 24/7 information on all government services - including education, transport, tax, crime, the environment, employment - all in one place and in plain English.

* As well as being available on the website http://www.direct.gov.uk , which now attracts more than 18 million visits a month1, it can also be accessed on any internet-enabled mobile phone, and on TV.

* http://www.direct.gov.uk is a Hitwise Top 10 Award winner for the quarter ending October - December 2008. During this period, http://www.direct.gov.uk ranked No. 2 based on market share of visits among all United Kingdom websites in the Hitwise Government - Central industry category. For more information, please visit http://www.hitwise.co.uk/ * Please note: Directgov is spelt as one word and with a lower case ‘g’.

* The migration from the General Register Office (GRO) website to Directgov comes as part of the Transformational Government agenda and a wider long-term plan to move customer-facing online information to Directgov, giving citizens access to services all in one place.

1 Directgov received more than 18 million visits to the website in March 2009 ((Comments on this story may be sent to info@m2.com)) (c) 2009 M2 COMMUNICATIONS LTD

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MyHeritage, the leading online destination for families, with more
than 27 million worldwide members, has just released the new
Family Tree Builder 3 with improved standard and premium features,
available as a free download from
http://www.myheritage.com/family-tree-builder

* Improved multilingual support:
Now with 34 languages for display and dual language data entry.

* SmartMatch Merge:
SmartMatch compares your tree with all the trees in the MyHeritage
database with the ability to merge information into your tree with
one click.

* SmartResearch:
SmartResearch compares each individual in your tree in more than 100
of the most important genealogical databases.

* All-in-one tree:
Presents for one individual everyone related to that person by blood
or marriage. It provides a complete view of your family tree.

* Improved Publisher:
Members can now work on other tasks while the publisher works in the
background.

* Video, Audio & Document Publishing:
Members can upload videos, audio clips and documents to your website so
the entire family can relive those great moments and learn about family
history.

* Geographical Mapping:
A list of relevant geographical place names for each tree.
This feature remembers previously entered place names so users
don’t have to re-enter the same locations.

You can read about all this new features in the attached Press Release
and experience yourself all the benefits of Family Tree Builder 3 by
downloading it from http://www.myheritage.com/family-tree-builder

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Cyndis List Roots Television Interview

At the recent 4th annual Wholly Genes Cruise the world famous Dick Eastman, with the help of Roots Television, was able to interview Cyndi Howells from Cyndislist.com.

Cyndi’s list, recently mentioned in a top 10 list of sites to visit by the Free Genealogy blog, has over 2450,000 cross referenced links to genealogy sites all over the world.  A leader in the original genealogy listing sites Cyndi has done more for opening up Genealogy to the masses than many of the larger sites put together.

Find out about Cyndis views and her thoughts on how the Cyndis List operation is run.  The whole interview can be seen here - http://www.rootstelevision.com/players/player_conferences.php?bctid=2474692001

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For all of your genealogy fans out there surfing the web and finding family information… Ancestry.com’s parent company, The Generations Network, has recently announced the availability of an Ancestry Toolbar. The Toolbar is a new feature that you can add to your Windows browser (Internet Explorer or Firefox) and use to save photos and stories you find on the Web to a person in your Ancestry Member Tree. With the toolbar, it’s possible to:

I recently talked about the new age of online genealogy and had a great response from this article about how the web is changing what and how and when we conduct research into our family history.

However, through daily online browsing it’s come to my attention that there are a whole range of “old” genealogy sites that have stood the test of time and that are still as popular as ever.  With that in mind here’s a quick overview of some of the top sites around the web.

	Cyndi’s List of Genealogy Sites on the Internet: This is probably the most popular genealogy index on the web. Cyndi’s site features over 16,800 links, categorized and cross-referenced, in over 60 categories, and is updated with impressive frequency.
	US GenWeb: This site serves as the entrance to the massive US GenWeb project, wherein volunteers across the US maintain linked websites about their states and counties. This page contains information about the project and links to state-level GenWeb sites.
	Rootsweb: The website of the genealogical data co-operative offers several different services to the genealogical community, including web-page hosting, search indexes and registries. This site tries to offer links to actual information, not just links to links.
	Helm’s Genealogy Toolbox: An attractive site with links to several tools of use to genealogists, including various guides and indexes, area-specific information and data on associations of interest to genealogists.
	Family Tree Maker Online: The only commercial site to make it into our top ten, the FTM site offers an extensive “how-to” guide, a genealogy mall, the 115-million-name Family Finder index, message boards, a biography assistant and more.
	Surname Research: A great site to visit when you’re doing genealogy late at night and in danger of falling asleep. Lots of bright colors, lots of enthusiasm and lots of surname data and articles.
	All About Genealogy: This site provides family history articles, historical files, graphics and many other items of interest to family historians. The Genealogy site and the Bookmarks will be of interest to a broader range of visitors.
	Ancestry & Social Security Death Index: Ancestry Hometown features an online database library, advice columns and Julianna’s links page.

So, a few good genealogy sites to run through that might take your fancy but come back soon for some more of the modern day sites that I’ll be reviewing soon.  Maybe you have a site that you would like Free Genealogy to review?  Send in your request today.

Many genealogists have got their own roots tied to scrapbooking and have movded this on to a full blown hobby incoorporating scrapbooking, building their family tree and researching records.

But, with the advent of online sites and new trends in genealogy how has the scrapbooking hobby changed?  Free Genealogy takes a look at scrapbooking, the new scrapbooking crazes and how this fits in with Genealogy online today.  Ditch those glue sticks, put away your paper scrapbooks and create your own digital scrapbook online.

ClipClip.org - While not about artistic creation of scrapbooks, it is more about the old meaning of the term where you would clip various articles from different sources and keep them in a book to share with others. ClipClip brings this concept to the Web and lets you keep snippets of Web pages for yourself or form groups so you can share what you find with others.

CropMom.com - CropMom allows you to make scrapbook pages based around your photos and then download them in various formats. Low resolution downloads are free and will have the site logo on them and are usable for emails and blogs. High resolution will cost you, but can be printed out on various items.

Famento.com - Famento is directed more towards clean pages built around your memories that are shared only with close friends, family and colleagues. They also encourage you to set up memorials for family members that you may have lost over the years.

JessicaSprague.com - Offers a mixture of free and paid tutorials on how to do digital scrapbooking as well as free software tool downloads and scrapbooking materials.

OneTrueMedia.com - Allows you to create and edit video montages and scrapbooks from your own media. The final products can be ordered as DVDs, shared on sites such as MySpace or even be delivered to your friends and family’s Tivos.

Scrapblog.com - Allows for drag & drop and creation of scrapbook pages and features integration with numerous services such as Photobucket, Flickr, Myspace, Facebook and so on.

Scrapease.com - Scrapease allows you to create your scrapbook pages and books for downloading, making a print album, or simply sharing it online with the option for people to leave comments on it.

Scrapo.com - Scrapo provides you with photo editing tools and drag & drop scrapbook creation, as well as group message boards, private messaging and a space to blog in.

Shutterfly.com - Allows you to create and order scrapbooks, photobooks, mugs and more. Will also allow you to create pages for sports teams showcasing team rosters, schedules, photos and everything else a team could want.

Smilebox.com - Offers hundreds of templates that you can use with your photos and videos. Add words and music, and then you can email it to friends & family, print it out and more. They also offer slideshows, ecards, photo albums and so on.

Like the sites above, then leave a comment.  All the best. Free Genealogy.