What Will Happen When I Become a Death Certificate?

[Paulc]

Have you considered what will happen to all your Family History work after you’ve gone?

https://chiddicksfamilytree.com/2022/04/24/what-will-happen-when-i-become-a-death-certificate/

[col48]

Sometimes. That's why none of it is online, it's on paper and local computer files I can be sure the next generation can find easily...... if they're interested!

[Anne in Carlisle]

That's why mine is on line as public trees. I also have paper summary files for each branch of mine and OH grandparents with instructions as to how to find the public tree on Ancestry and where the Family Historian files are on the computer. If the kids are not interested at least my work might help someone else if they find it on Ancestry.

Anne

[PhotoFamily]

Sometimes. That's why none of it is online, it's on paper and local computer files I can be sure the next generation can find easily...... if they're interested!

My g'aunt built an extensive family tree for her side of the family. I have the tree - but not the documents that support it. I visited her relatives in 2019 - they don't have the documents. Apparently, it was lost :(

OTH - I think part of the interest in genealogy is the hunt. Is it bad that someone starts from scratch?

And then there's DNA kits - should I delete them?

[Anne in Carlisle]

I wouldn't delete DNA kits. I have matches (distant) to people I have found are already deceased but they have helped in my search even so!

Totally agree that the 'hunt' for family is a large part of the fun. In a way I feel a little guilty that not much is left for my granddaughter if she was interested. I have made headway into her father's tree as well!

Anne

[Caroline]

I have recently decided to make full use of my membership of the Guild of One-Name Studies by using their Members Website Programme to host my online research. I already have the beginnings of a registered study as well.

I wasn't going to start using it yet, but WordPress decided to up their costs and limit their usefulness to me just as I was about to start paying for one of their paid plans.

I'd been using a hosting site up until now but wanted to be have less hassle in keeping the software up to date myself and it was becoming more expensive.

The Members Website Programme means that I now have my WordPress site up and running alongside the latest version of The Next Generation of Genealogy Sitebuilding ("TNG") for my treejust as I had before, but at considerably less cost and I can arrange to have it changed to a legacy site when the time comes or perhaps somebody one day might take it over. I still have some autonomy on what it looks like and it is up to me how I link the two parts together but no need to go under the bonnet of the web space any more.

I also plan to leave my DNA kits where they are.

[cbcarolyn]

That's why mine is on line as public trees. I also have paper summary files for each branch of mine and OH grandparents with instructions as to how to find the public tree on Ancestry and where the Family Historian files are on the computer. If the kids are not interested at least my work might help someone else if they find it on Ancestry.

Anne

ditto for me.

[col48]

I've not found any of the commercial software or the facilities for public trees do just I want. I have something like 6000 source documents, mainly on paper but quite a few in soft copy as well. For the sake both of data protection and of wanting to retain careful links to the sources, I've enjoyed writing my own software which is in some ways less sophisticated than the public stuff and in other ways more so. It enables me to organise the material extracted from the sources data as I like. This processed data is stored in files which can be readily loaded to independent spreadsheets, with cross-references in abundance for all but the earliest material. It is designed to be used like a database with overheads of my choosing rather than someone else's.

Spreadsheet compatability for the nearly raw data means it could be accessible long-term, almost free of the risks from software drift.

Some key points in my tree are online in other folks trees, so information can flow out to others where that is useful.

For the sake of avoiding this thread drifting even further off-topic, I don't plan to respond again in this thread.

[Paulc]

Thanks everyone for their comments and it's really good to hear that some of us have at least given the topic and subject some thought and have already got some plans in place. I really need to look deeper into this myself, I have no provisions made myself, and no immediate heir to my throne and the clocks ticking!!

[Paulc]

I have recently decided to make full use of my membership of the Guild of One-Name Studies by using their Members Website Programme to host my online research. I already have the beginnings of a registered study as well.

I wasn't going to start using it yet, but WordPress decided to up their costs and limit their usefulness to me just as I was about to start paying for one of their paid plans.

I'd been using a hosting site up until now but wanted to be have less hassle in keeping the software up to date myself and it was becoming more expensive.

The Members Website Programme means that I now have my WordPress site up and running alongside the latest version of The Next Generation of Genealogy Sitebuilding ("TNG") for my treejust as I had before, but at considerably less cost and I can arrange to have it changed to a legacy site when the time comes or perhaps somebody one day might take it over. I still have some autonomy on what it looks like and it is up to me how I link the two parts together but no need to go under the bonnet of the web space any more.

I also plan to leave my DNA kits where they are.

I really need to look into this and certainly need to look at a way of preserving my blog for the future, keep us posted on how you get on with this Caroline.

[keldon]

I am surprised no one has mentioned a good old-fashioned book. Clearly you can't put everything in a book and certainly not the original documents if you have any, but a book is a good way of telling your family story.

I have written my book. I have told the stories, provided detailed family trees, the names, etc. of all those appear in them and sources of the information.

It's cheap now to self-publish. Type your book on Word convert it to pdf and then use companies like Blurb and Lulu. I particularly recommend Blurb. You can print 1 or a 1000 copies. It's up to you.
https://www.blurb.co.uk/

You get an ISBN and then under the Legal Deposit scheme you supply a copy to six libraries including the British Library. The book will now be available to future generations should they wish to take up the baton.

[Paulc]

Thanks keldon, somebody else mentioned self publishing on Twitter but never gave any specific details. I will definitely look into this. Are you limited with images or anything?

[cbcarolyn]

I guess publishing is sometimes difficult, as you are never 'done'!

Just had a google about and I can see that there are places that will convert your blog into a PDF etc, that looks interesting.

here is one https://www.blogbooker.com/

[keldon]

Thanks keldon, somebody else mentioned self publishing on Twitter but never gave any specific details. I will definitely look into this. Are you limited with images or anything?

There's no limit on images, the limit will be your budget. With Blurb you could go for photobooks or as I did what they call trade books, Your normal paperback soft cover book. This is a book I wrote on my former village published with Lulu.com. You'll get an idea from this although the formatting is askew on Google Books.
https://www.google.co.uk/books/editi...sec=frontcover

Here's the pricing page on Blurb. Choose the type of book, type in the number of pages, press enter and the prices will adjust. You could order just one book if you wanted to. Go to a publisher and there would be a much larger minimum number. The only drawback is it's a learning curve.

https://www.blurb.co.uk/pricing#/

There's always an e-book. But will they work in 50 years time?

[Paulc]

I guess publishing is sometimes difficult, as you are never 'done'!

Just had a google about and I can see that there are places that will convert your blog into a PDF etc, that looks interesting.

here is one https://www.blogbooker.com/

Thanks Carolyn, somebody else posted a few similar options but I'm struggling to find where I saw them, but these do look viable options.

[Paulc]

There's no limit on images, the limit will be your budget. With Blurb you could go for photobooks or as I did what they call trade books, Your normal paperback soft cover book. This is a book I wrote on my former village published with Lulu.com. You'll get an idea from this although the formatting is askew on Google Books.
https://www.google.co.uk/books/editi...sec=frontcover

Here's the pricing page on Blurb. Choose the type of book, type in the number of pages, press enter and the prices will adjust. You could order just one book if you wanted to. Go to a publisher and there would be a much larger minimum number. The only drawback is it's a learning curve.

https://www.blurb.co.uk/pricing#/

There's always an e-book. But will they work in 50 years time?

Thanks Keldon, this looks to be a completely professional job, I am astounded at how reasonably priced they are. I can't see any reason not to give it a try. I guess the learning curve, layout, formatting etc is an obstacle to overcome, but this does look to be such a good deal.

[cbcarolyn]

you could certainly download your blog first and then get that formatted into a book.

[Paulc]

you could certainly download your blog first and then get that formatted into a book.

I am thinking about downloading the 16 biographies and 8 biographies into a book

[PhotoFamily]

Two resources not named - WikiTree and FamilyTree (on FamilySearch). Of course, others may edit your entries, which may be frustrating. I think both are committed to long term viability (nothing is certain in this world), and there's the problem of copyrighted materials that can be referenced but not uploaded to the sites.

[Anne in Carlisle]

Hmmm, I tried a very tiny part of my tree on the Family Search tree and was astonished when dozens of unproven people were attached it. I actually think it is outrageous that others can edit your tree! I have no problem with them copying it or even including it with their unproven own tree. However .... hands off my work, I want it left just as it is.
Anne