Suggestions

At least we got there in the end Scozzie. :-D

I agree completely with C, and .............. as GB said ..... with all the female posters on here :-D

Please, please, please do something to stop these poor people posting on old threads.

It gives a terrible image of GR if they're getting directed to these obsolete "discussions" just to be told by us that they're way out of date.

There were 13 such messages resurrected yesterday MC. Like you, I feel so sorry for these people but it isn't their fault, they've simply been led up the garden path.


A very poor introduction to the site for them :-(

I am still at a loss. What exactly is the problem and why is there any upset?

IGP...if you were to go into a store which, on an advert at the front door, offered you 300 of exactly what you were looking for then when you got inside you found that the three hundred items were old, rusted and no use whatsoever, would you go there again?

People pulling up old threads in the hope that is going to lead to a result for them and then being told it won't because the person posting hasn't been here for 6 years,is frustrating for the person searching, frustrating for the members who choose to try and help, and counter productive for GR...because no one likes being promised something and then not getting it...they go elsewhere.

Supposing on your home page it said there were 1000 'discussions' on Cheshire...would you feel cheated if 999 of them only mentioned it in passing...eg as part of a copy and pasted birth registration?

Maybe not, maybe you are the soul of patience....maybe you wouldn't think GR was promising more than it was delivering...

IGP ........................


I think you are being deliberately obtuse!!


There is a new feature, showing on Home Page, that says how many "discussions" of your maiden name, place of birth, or other name in your tree, may be found on GR

For example, on my Home Page, it says there are 64 discussions on a name in my tree, and over 1000 discussions containing information on Oldham.

First, these are NOT discussions, at least not in the sense that I (and I think you) believe to be "discussion".


They are just threads on which the name appears ............

.......... so, I click on Oldham. The first "discussion" is on a person named Amanda Oldham. The next 9 are threads on which a census has been posted, with Oldham being mentioned either as place of birth OR of residence.

Those are NOT "discussions".

In the case of my surname ............ most of the "discussions" that I have looked at are actually originally from me! I have provided information to most people with an interest on that surname on this site ................ hence there is nothing new to me.


But what is happening is that people, especially newbies, are clicking on the link, especially for the surname, and posting with great excitement, asking or giving information ..................... and unknowingly are raising long-dead threads started by people who are no longer on the site, and have not been for many years.

As an example ............... I have now seen 3 threads with "Member:- since 2001 Number of Posts: 0"

Now, you and I both know that GR didn't start until 2002 ............... so how can someone be a member from before the site existed?! :-S :-S

Most threads being raised are from 2002-2006.

There is little chance of there being any response to such old threads.

Many of us are spending time posting messages to the person who has raised the thread, recommending that they attempt to send the OP a pm, in the hope that the fact that GR sends an email re such messages may result in a response.

AND we are also suggesting that they start a thread of their own.



We want GR to either remove the feature OR add information along the lines of "Please check the date of last posting on a thread. You should send a personal message to the person if the thread is more than 3 years old"


At the moment, it is yet another ill-thought-out addition to the site ................. and shows how little GR staff understand how the site works at this end.




Does that make it any clearer for you?????



sylvia

My tree opens with a surname beginning with H

Only one person with that surname in my tree and no matches on this site for that person although GR claim when looking at my tree that there is one match. Rubbish as when you click on that supposed match there is none.

There are 175 discussions threads for this one surname. So I did a random sample of 10. None of them were of any use to me at all. Some were a corruption of the name or even an occupation. Some were dated 2003 or 2004 and had never been replied to.

If the other 165 discussions were as useless as the ten I checked then I would have wasted hours reading them.

I did not even bother to check the 100's of discussion threads on Holborn as I only have one person born in that area, the person with the surname of H, and they are all probably census or BMD info posted on lookups threads.

So a complete waste of time and should be done away with

IGP - if you don't understand the problem then that's not our fault. You're commenting on something that you're not involved with.

Many thanks for the members who have explained why, in their view, there is a problem with 'old' threads appearing for discussion.

However, I am still not convinced that the function should be removed as in the years that I have been researching I many many examples of threads and postings on genealogy websites have actually provided information which has enabled me to move forward by pointing me towards another direction, which has actually broken down walls.

So don't dismiss all 'old' postings as useless. These are often the ones that come up trumps......!


So, having said all that, moving the next issue that was raised, why is there 'Upset' being caused.

I just wondered if the Team had given any more thought to the 'Discussions' issue.


Newcomers are merrily posting away on the FA board oblivious to the fact that they are posting mostly to fresh air.


They are not coming back to check the advice given them by members either.


Seems such a pity. :-(

Hi Cynthia, on Friday we changed the text that is shown at the top of the search results box. So, when you click on the link from your homepage you'll see the list of threads with your surname in, and there is some new text at the top.

Also, I had a chat with Phil this morning about changing the way we display the threads added by deleted members. Phil is going to take a look and see what we can do there.

Kind regards,

Estelle

Maybe the access to all boards should be made a different way

ie When you want to go on the General Chat - you first have to read a short (very short & to the point) explanation of what the board is for
And the same for all the others.

Maybe some people would read before going into the boards

This is what happens on Rootschat so why not here?

PP apart from the general chat board there is explaination at the top of the boards or a PLEASE READ BEFORE POSTING. have you not noticed?

I am wondering what this has got to do with the discussion issue though?

Hello Estelle,

Thank you, that explanation should, hopefully, help - IF people read it of course.


The only thing I would suggest is for you to add that you will contact the members who posted long ago IF they still have the same email address.


If the post is very old, the OP may have married, moved or even died. I'm pretty sure that most people don't have the same email address that they had 8-9 years ago.




PP, as jax says, there are guidelines at the top of each board but they are not obligatory to read.


When the last changes happened, Janey Canuck was instrumental in trying to improve things in that directions. The guidelines were added and we all hoped they would help......but......this is where the words 'horse' and 'water' spring to mind ........ sigh.


Don't half miss JC on the boards - best researcher going :-(



Cx

"These matches have been found on the Community Boards in member discussions. Please be aware that some of these discussions may be very old. To check the date the discussion was originally posted click on the title of the post you want to read in the ‘Topic’ column. You’ll see the date the discussion was first posted in the right hand corner. If it was added more than a few years ago there is a chance that the original poster may not see your reply to their thread. We suggest you send the member a message instead by clicking on the ‘send message’ button. They’ll receive a message from us letting them know you’ve been in touch and we’ll let you know when they reply.

To amend your search, click here. "


Hopefully, this will really help ................ if, as Cynthia says, people do actually read the message :-D



Like C, I really do miss JC ................. so many good ideas and excellent researching now being sadly missed. :-(




sylvia

Do you remember when she 'outdid' a professional researcher Sylvia?

I couldn't make head nor tail of how she worked things out but, by gum, she got some cracking results..... :-D

she did indeed ................ I sat here open-mouthed sometimes as I tried to follow her reasoning ............


......... it was often way out of the box, but certainly solved a lot of brick walls for people!




and of course she was another one lost from the boards in frustration at GR.




sylvia

Jax, I was merely responding to the original posting, not the chit chat that followed.

I know that there is an explanation at the top of each board when you look at the page. I merely suggested that when you click on General Chat, you get a whole page of quick instructions about what the page is for and then you enter that board by clicking on an enter button at the bottom of the page.

But as you obviously do not want people to answer the original thread, in future I will not comment on the topic in case I offend anyone who has gone into 'thread slippage' within their own little clique. :-(

PP The Original posting was about the Discussion feature, where mainly new people were by passing any boards and any guidelines. clicking on that and replying to very old posts.

I am not even going to reply to to your last comment