1939 register - search tips discussion

[Mean_genie]

So if you leave your door open, or your bag unattended, it's OK for people to take your stuff. That seems fair.

[Deirdre784]

Is anyone getting info they are not supposed to though? All the hints i've seen merely help you find the available info quicker. The 2nd name appearing (for those who have it) is helpful but again would be available anyway.

[Guy Etchells]

Is anyone getting info they are not supposed to though? All the hints i've seen merely help you find the available info quicker. The 2nd name appearing (for those who have it) is helpful but again would be available anyway.

Not information I am not supposed to get but interesting information about the family.
For instance a married step-daughter in the same house as her step-father.
Her mother had died  in 1932 and she had married in 1919.
There is one blanked person in the same house.

It raises questions, was her husband visiting with her at the time, had her husband been called up and she was visiting her step-father?
Was the other occupant one of her half-brothers or half-sisters?

That to me is one of the joys of research, each answer adds more questions.

Cheers
Guy

[Blue70]

So if you leave your door open, or your bag unattended, it's OK for people to take your stuff. That seems fair.

I think it's more comparable to going into a bookstore and picking up a book and reading a part that interests you then putting it down and walking out.


Blue

[bibliotaphist]

This search interface is the product of a long, deliberate, sophisticated design process by a company with a great deal of experience in the genealogy market, employing some presumably well-paid UI specialists and software engineers.

On that basis I would assume that any search technique made possible by the interface, has been made possible intentionally.

[Deirdre784]

Is anyone getting info they are not supposed to though? All the hints i've seen merely help you find the available info quicker. The 2nd name appearing (for those who have it) is helpful but again would be available anyway.

Not information I am not supposed to get but interesting information about the family.......

But available from the preview screen, which might tempt you to unlock the record? Still don't see what FindMyPast might be complaining about .... We are not able to get the blanked info.

[smudwhisk]

This search interface is the product of a long, deliberate, sophisticated design process by a company with a great deal of experience in the genealogy market, employing some presumably well-paid UI specialists and software engineers.

On that basis I would assume that any search technique made possible by the interface, has been made possible intentionally.

And quite likely this is why the pricing structure is at the level it is at.  They knew they would get a lot of complaints if people purchased "households" and found they were the wrong individuals (particularly with common names), so they needed to provide "help" to ensure people managed to find the correct individuals.  As a result of this I'm sure they were fully aware when they launched the site that so-called free information would be able to be gleaned from their search facility and therefore pitched the price accordingly.  As a company with a long history in the genealogy business, they will know from past experience that there will be people who wouldn't pay anyway even at a much lower price and that they had to work out how to recover their costs, and subsequently make a profit as a commercial company, but reduce the complaints that they may get about people not being able to find the correct households because of incorrect data in the original registers and/or the company's transcriptions and index.

[Mean_genie]

Making use of the search facilities on the site, and being clever about it, to identify a likely match for a few households - fair use. Using the same tools to re-construct large amounts of data without paying anything - not fair use. Back to the Ts&Cs. If you want to pursue the bookshop analogy, flicking through a book and reading a page or two to see if you want to buy it - fair use. Taking pictures of multiple pages with your phone so you have all the content you want without paying for it - not fair use. The bookshop  could stop people taking advantage by putting sealed clear wrappers on all the books which be an awful nuisance for the majority, but if they are losing sales because too many people are using them as a library, they much just choose to do that.

[clairec666]

Mean_genie - I love your bookshop analogy.

Findmypast can "plastic-wrap" a certain amount of information, but need to leave enough available so that people searching the register can be sure they've got the right record. This'll leave it open to some level of abuse... but nobody's getting an entire record for free.

I've found so much from findmypast and ancestry without paying. But you'll miss out on vital stuff like occupations, marriage witnesses... and the travel and military records contain so much information which can't be found for free. And I'll ALWAYS look at the original census image, just to look at the lovely writing.