Robert Scott Horning wrote:
Having already been involved with several massive
volunteer
transcription efforts, including some that transcribe antique manuscript
records for old hand-written records of the sort you are discussing, I
think it is something not only possible but very likely to happen. This
is really nothing different than what is happening right now with the
Distributed Proofreader project, if you want to give an example of a
group of complete volunteers working over the internet and skattered
across many countries. Those volunteer transcription efforts I
participated included the transcribing of all of the records for Ellis
Island, as well as participation in transcribing the 1880 United States
Census... neither one of those were exactly trivial and wasn't just
microfilms but instead some very high resolution images sent
electronically (for current efforts). My wife was involved with some
early 19th Century church records from Lousiana... all of them hand
written as well. The current standard is a monochrome TIFF images, but
other data formats certainly could be used. This isn't decades from
now, but something that is currently happening. Software can even be
written to do some futher data processing to help clean up the image for
identification purposes... like trying to get that pesky little letter
you might think is an "o" but it could be an "a" or even an
"e".
I'm afraid that where this kind of ambiguity arises it is usually best
not to attempt to resolve it unless your arguments are very convincing.
Spelling in many of these old documents was atrocious. In many cases
the affected individuals did not know how to read or write, and the
local clergyman's spelling of entries into the parish records was
scarcely more than educated guesswork. My wife is from Quebec and her
family name is Guénard; another branch of the family ended up in Wyoming
in the mid-19th century.where the name became Guinard. Misreading an
accent on an "e" for the dot on an "i" is perfectly understandable for
some handwritings, or where a person has never heard of diacritics. I
would be very hesitant to have software resolve these issues.
As far as the reilability, I've used both original
records and the
scanned TIFFs, and frankly I think the scanned images are even better
than the original documents in terms of clarity of trying to decyper
what is there. The originals are still valuable, and can be refered to
by a professional researcher, but the need isn't really there for the
most part.
That's mostly right. Photographic techniques can help to bring out the
contrast between the writing and its physical background.
Now it would be necessary for even more software
changes to be made to a
project like this, but it is possible to do some very exacting
geneological research about people who are not even necessarily your
ancestors. As usual, citations are very important for this kind of
research, and the amount of original material that is available would
amaze you that can be considered a primary source. What makes this kind
of research interesting is that it has a very personal connection to the
individual doing the research. You would be surprised at how many
people would be willing to volunteer to help others out in getting some
of this genolgical research.
I agree. It is a community that very much understands the importance of
mutual help. If I am seeking a small bit of information from a far away
community that would be impractical for me to visit I can easily find a
local person to help. There may be nothing useful that I can do for my
helper in return, but I should be ready to help some other stranger when
the occasion arises.
One other thing to note is that geneolgists are loaded
with money that
they are willing to spend on worthy research projects. They tend to be
people at the twilight years of their life and usually retired. Not
everybody has the money, but enough do that some incredible waste of
money is done.
There are many commercial enterprises that just love seniors. They may
provide one or two pages of easy research, append it to a stack of
potboiler material, and charge a big fee.
Or more to the point, I think that starting a geneology
project is
actually going to be a significant source of revenue for the Wikimedia
Foundation rather than being a drag on the resources. And a geneology
database increases significantly in value as it grows. I can't say what
the critical number would be, but having over a million names would
certainly be a significant milestone to make any project, and people
have paid some large amounts of money ($1,000's) for much smaller
databases that might have some information they are looking for, or are
even willing to do international travel just to get a few additional
names and references.
Probabably so, and by charging very modest fees at that. The question
to ask then, given the massive number of genealogical websites out
there, what can we do that will make our site more desirable than all
the others.
Ec