Sometimes it's because they're direct descendants of a great, great's sibling and one can see they have a lot of great information on their line. That's a perfect time to share your line with them and they share their line with you. It's a great chance to reconnect with a line of your family.
And there are times when I message someone because their tree is a cut and paste of all the trees out there and include a lot of wrong information. Those are touchy messages. What I try to do is touch on a couple areas where their information and mine differ. In one case it was something simple, such as a wrong year for a marriage. Since I have a copy of the marriage license, I'm very confident in my research. Especially since it's one of my direct ancestors and it came from a local courthouse.
The other possible error was in reference to whom our g, g, g grandmother married. Again, I have a marriage record of whom she married. This time it was one that came from FamilySearch.org that's a scanned image of the real deal. Plus I have a certified copy of the same record that I found in my mother's information.
Imagine my frustration when I received a response back that basically said, "Yeah, I just copied the information knowing there's a lot of wrong information out there and I don't bother to verify anything." Those weren't the exact words, but that's a condensed summary of it.
My one question to such people is very simply, why? Why do you bother to pretend to be a genealogist if you aren't going to verify anything?
I understand putting information in your tree that you haven't verified. I do it myself. However, I do attempt to put a note on the information that it hasn't been verified. I'll admit I don't always make the note. Which is one of the main reasons why I have my tree set to private. Until every "fact" has been verified, my tree will remain private. I don't want to spread the fiction tree syndrom.
I know there are mistakes in my tree. I had one cousin from one of those direct descendant of one of my great, great's inform of a few errors. I really appreciated that information. He knows that line. I'm learning whose who in that line. While I haven't made the changes, I will go through that line again, verifying everything and making corrections.
Once again, if you're going to post a public tree, why not make sure it's accurate, or at the very least, make notes on the parts that you haven't proven yet? Why spread the misinformation?
It takes time and energy to produce even a false tree. Why not spend that time and energy producing an accurate tree?
Do you know what you're missing by doing a cut and paste tree? You're missing the thrill of discovery. You're missing the thrill of proving who your ancestor really was. You're missing the thrill of having a hunch and then stumbling on a long lost relative who actually has a letter proving your hunch was right.
I refuse to join the cut and paste crowd. Is there any chance I can convert any of them into becoming a real genealogist? That's why I attempt to make contact with them. Hoping they'll get the thrill of learning new provable information.
Sadly, I feel like it's a losing battle. I hope I'm proven wrong on that hunch.
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