Saturday, February 27, 2021

My Day 3 at RootsTech Connect 2021

The way this day ended was a lot more exciting and stimulating than how it began for me here in the genea-cave pecking away on my keyboard.  I actually got to talk to people in person (well, on Zoom, but it's better than chatting via text).

1)  The sessions that I watched yesterday afternoon and today included:

*  Ron Tanner on "What's coming on FamilySearch.org."  He mentioned improving the Add/Find process on Family Tree, changing hinting records and possible duplicates on Family Tree, notifying users of Family Tree changes faster, and improving the "Genealogies" feature with hints, sources and memories.

*  Crista Cowan on "Daily Wrap Up with Feb. 26."  Not much new information here.

*  Miles Meyer on "Adding Maps to Your Family History Analysis."  Some good tips here on map sites, and using Google Maps, Google Sheets and Google Earth.

*  Drew Smith on "Crowdsourcing Your Brick Walls."  Drew covered message boards, mailing lists,  social media and crafting queries in his three talks.

*  Cathie Sherwood on "Ankle Beaters and Barkers: Exploring Our Ancestors' Occupations."  I enjoyed this talk which provided many links to websites with historic occupations. 

*  Debbie Kennett on "Secrets and Surprises: Uncovering Family History Mysteries Through DNA."  Debbie reviews how DNA analysis has solved a multitude of cases and the impact on users.

2)  I watched parts of the Keynotes on the Main Stage.  I enjoyed the Song contest review, and thought that Steve Rockwood's keynote did not have enough genealogy content.

3)  I saw a Facebook invitation in the Ambassadors Group several days ago about an After-party at 1 p.m. PST today so I signed up.  It was Live on Facebook and YouTube for an hour, hosted by the Family Connections Experiment folks.  This had about 40 attendees on YouTube (couldn't tell on Facebook), and had a number of prizes given away.  I won a lifelong Collectionaire membership which looks interesting.  I will probably blog more about it sometime.  This was fun to see real people talking excitedly and sharing, plus I won something!

4)  After a short nap, I joined the DearMYRTLE After Party at 4 p.m. PST, which had up to 66 attendees in a Zoom meeting.  This was also invigorating since I knew most of the people and put a face and voice to people I had not seen or heard before.  It was mainly sharing in the first hour, and then we played a Scavenger Hunt game in the second hour.  We were divided into groups of 3-5 to solve six research questions in 15 minutes.  Our group split up the tasks, and most groups got it all right.  

5)  My Relatives at RootsTech count is now 105,127, with one third cousin 1x removed and 16 4th cousins 1x removed.  

6)  So that is RootsTech for another year.  I did not miss the airplane ride, the hotel room, the cold weather in Salt Lake City, JB's restaurant.  I did miss the excitement, the real Expo Hall, the Media Hub, seeing and talking with hundreds of friends, and the in-person after party at DearMYRTLE's home.  

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Disclosure:  I am a RootsTech Connect 2021 Ambassador and have committed to providing regular publicity about the conference.  I have received free registration, snacks, meals and other benefits from FamilySearch over the 11 years of RootsTech.

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4 comments:

Sheri S said...

Here's my Challenge post https://www.facebook.com/sheri.snodgrass.7/posts/10223271487313660

Cathie said...

So pleased that you enjoyed my presentation on Ankle beaters and barkers, Randy. Thank you for giving it a mention.

Miles Meyer said...

Thanks for the mention of my talk on adding maps to your family history. Glad you liked it.

Debbie Kennett said...

Thanks for the mention of my talk.