You are Invited: Saturday EOGN Dinner after RootsTech in Salt Lake City - Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter

I attended last year's dinner at the Radisson and enjoyed my evening chatting with Marie Dougan from Scotland and some delightful genies from the US.

If you are hanging around in Salt Lake City you may wish to join Dick Eastman on the evening of the conference close. Details are available on Dick's blog.

You are Invited: Saturday EOGN Dinner after RootsTech in Salt Lake City - Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter

New Android Tablet - The Kindle Fire

Although Dick Eastman stated in a post today that: "The Amazon Kindle Fire does NOT run Android or iOS or any other established operating system. Instead, the entire operating system is developed by Amazon. That means there will be no genealogy applications available at launch. If the Kindle Fire becomes popular, I expect that genealogy apps and thousands of other apps will appear within a few months."

Snip from Eastman post on my RSS Feed

 From my reading of various technology blogs I am fairly sure that the Amazon Kindle Fire does run on an Android  system that has been adapted by Amazon.

See:
http://mashable.com/2011/09/29/amazon-kindle-fire-android-hijack/

http://www.engadget.com/2011/09/28/amazon-fire-tablet-unveiled-7-inch-display-199-price-tag/

http://techcrunch.com/2011/09/02/amazon-kindle-tablet/

The Amazon App store that provides apps for the Kindle Fire has some genealogy apps available. Unfortunately one of my favourites Family Bee is not there. There are genealogy apps available for Kindle Fire users at launch.

Additionally there are many non-genealogy apps in The Amazon App store that genealogists will find useful for a range of genealogy activities.

Postscript: Since I snipped the paragraph above from Dick's blog it has disappeared from his post. Thanks, Dick, for making the correction. 

Dinner with Dick

Genealogist, Dick Eastman, has been organising genealogy dinners for 22 years. He said that last night's dinner after the closing session of the Rootstech Conference had the largest attendance and was the easiest to organise. It was also more formal than the other dinners. Previous attendees agreed that it was the best ever.

It was formal in that there was an organised activity but it certainly wasn't stuffy, it was a great deal of fun. Held in a banquet room at The Radisson Hotel right next door to the Salt Palace Convention Center it was very convenient especially for those of us who were resident there. It was an international group that gathered to celebrate the end of a very successful conference. There was an Israeli, two Kiwis, two Aussies, a couple of Scots, some Poms, a couple of Canadians and lots of Americans. Although the conference had been going for three days we had an opportunity to meet even more new people in the relaxed atmosphere at the dinner. It was there that I discovered the identity of the other Aussie at Rootstech, it was Professional Genealogist, Allan Murrin, from Joy Murrin Family History Services in Sydney,

After a buffet dinner it was down to business. Sandwiched between a Scot and a Kiwi I had great difficulty cheating in the formal activity of the evening, Genealogy Jeopardy, hosted by Kory Meyerink. I wasn't able  copy my neighbours' answers as we were rather a cluless trio with the majority of the questions having a strong North American bias. Never the less we had lots of laughs and learnt about some foreign resources. This was an excellent after dinner activity that I can recommend to genealogy organisations. Instructions on how to make a powerpoint to use in the activity can be found here.

Prizes were awarded to those with the highest scores in the game, Dick also handed out some lucky door prizes. The gentleman who won an iPad, the main prize in the draw was the envy of many attendees.

Unfortunately I neglected to take photos of this evening so have to rely on my memory for images.

Thanks, Dick, for organising this event that gave us an opportunity to engage in discourse about the conference, have fun and meet more new people. 

Digitally preserving your family heritage

In a blog post before the Rootstech conference Dick Eastman interviewed Barry Ewell. Dick passed on this information about Barry's talk "Digitally Preserving Your Family Heritage with Barry Ewell"

"In fact, for those who are unable to attend RootsTech in person, Barry has kindly offered to make his handouts and PowerPoint slides available after the conference to anyone who wishes them.

If you are unable to attend RootsTech but would like to receive Barry's PowerPoint slides and handouts, send an email after the conference to bj57barry@msn.com with the word "rootstech" in the subject line. Barry will reply with a URL where you can download the information. Please do not write until after the conference is over, however. That will be on February 13 or later."  

Australians, who could not attend Rootstech may wish to avail themselves of Barry's offer.

Name dropping

Earlier @infolass asked on Twitter if I had met anyone famous at Rootstech yet.

People at my table at the media dinner for Rootstech Official Bloggers and others I sat with were Amy Coffin, Joan Miller, Dick Eastman, Elisa Scharton and Illya James D'Addezio. Close by were Dear Myrtle  and Lorine McGinnis Schulze.

Dick Eastman and Geniaus at The Roof Restaurant

After dinner there was a geneabloggers meetup in the bar of the Radisson. I can't list all the people I met but the highlight was meeting the energetic and fun Thomas MacEntee, founder of Geneabloggers who greeted me with a great big hug. Love your style, Thomas.

At last I meet Thomas Macentee

Is It Unverified Data and Will It Always be Unverified?

I subscribe to Dick Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter via RSS but I usually don't comment on his posts as they are about things I read about elsewhere or relate to US affairs.

This morning I read an opinion piece "Is It Unverified Data and Will It Always be Unverified?" by Dick that made a lot of common sense. I encourage you to read it.

In the world of genealogy there are a number of snobs around who appear to look down their noses at those of us whom they think are not professional in our approach to research. I have undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in Information Science and Education but choose not to apply rigorous academic standards to my hobby of genealogy. I do it for fun and my interest but choose to share it via my website in the hope that others may gain clues to their ancestry.

In September in my post "I am a name collector" I outlined my thoughts on adding unreferenced or dodgily referenced data to my family tree. I had been a little annoyed by a few articles I had read comparing name collectors with "real genealogists".

I congratulate Dick Eastman, one of the foremost genealogy writers in the US, for his article, "Is It Unverified Data and Will It Always be Unverified?".

And I say Bah Humbug to the "real genealogists" who discount the many  "name collectors" who help other by providing unreferenced clues that may help them knock down their genealogy brick walls.