Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Related to Barack Obama? Aren't we all?

...
One of my emails this morning said:

"Hi, Barack Obama (Washington, DC) has confirmed you as his fourth cousin once removed on We're Related. Follow this link to see how you are related: http://apps.facebook.com/we_r_related/?page=profile&fid=0U812&ref=fl.30

"We're Related Team"

Well, thank you We're Related for figuring this out! I couldn't resist clicking on the link provided (figuring that it was just an advertisement or something), but I saw this (two screens):




Pretty neat, huh? But WRONG! Here is even more genealogy data put on the web that is WRONG! By a reputable genealogy data provider, too. The horrors. If you examine the line of descent from the common ancestor, you will see that they conveniently put (private) after my grandparents and parents names, thereby creating the impression that they are respecting the privacy of my deceased loved ones. Heck, everyone knows who those folks are if they read my blog. They even added my photo to make it look authentic!

Did you notice that they even spelled my cousin Barack's name wrong at the top of the page? Does my cousin Barack really have a Facebook page?

Everyone who reads my blog know that I really am related to Barack Obama - see my post Yep, Barack Obama is my cousin! We are 8th cousins once removed, not 4th cousins once removed.

You would think that, in the interest of accuracy, We're Related would get it right. After all, they went to the trouble to create the information in We're Related to make this chart and send it to me. And to many other Facebook genealogists too, I think. I wonder how many?

I would correct this error if I could find the time to laboriously enter the information for my more than 2,000 known ancestors into We're Related on Facebook. I decided to wait until they permit a GEDCOM upload. They've been promising it for over a year. I've been waiting a long time, with great patience. When, oh when, will We're Related stop holding my GEDCOM upload hostage?

7 comments:

Ginger Smith said...

Yep! I got this too :) I wonder how this happened?

Abba-Dad said...

I guess it's because we're all related? Nice April Fool's joke, that's generating a lot of buzz for them.

BTW, if you want a great free tool that takes screenshots of an entire webpage (even the part that's hidden below the fold), you should download Fireshot. It's really a great tool. And I think it also works on IE (although not sure why anyone would even use IE).

Cheryle Hoover Davis said...

I just received the VERY SAME email from We're Related! LOL!

APRIL FOOL'S DAY joke from We're Related, and pretty funny!

Jeri J Steele said...

I got this too only by the time I looked at it Family Link had taken the page down. Suspect Facebook and/or FamilyLink was hacked.

Another great free tool for capturing the screen is Jing. I also use it for small training videos.

GeneaDiva said...

I received the email too. I didn't bother to open and read it though.

Sheri Fenley said...

The Genea-Fool? See, becoming the EasterGenie doesn't sound like such a bad idea now. Hee hee

Anonymous said...

Since you are related to the President, would you please settle this birth certificate issue. As far as the State of Hawaii is concerned in people receiving the original long form of the birth certificate: "Those listed as entitled to obtain a copy of an original birth certificate included the person born, or "registrant" according to the legal description from the governor's office, the spouse or parent of the registrant, a descendant of the registrant, a person having a common ancestor with the registrant, a legal guardian of the registrant or a person or agency acting on behalf of the registrant."
This way it would be settled once and for all and we can move on or move forward depending on the answer.

Janice Priest
janicepriest@att.net