Ancestry launches 225 new DNA communities for British and French & diaspora

[Gadget]

I'm not sure that I understand, Jane.

 On the non-Beta that has appeared with Regions today,  I have those with and without trees for specific regions.  I can't replicate with the  very old search facility (see my add on snip, above).

Gadget

PS - they're not new to me!

[Gadget]

Going back to the original topic, as I said, I wasn't all that impressed as

I had the e-mail yesterday and  I was expecting something really informative. I found that all they'd done was break down my Wales grouping to North Wales and my North West England to Wirral and Flintshire and Cheshire, Merseyside and South Lancashire. All of which I knew from my own research and the trees of matches. They also showed me some matches that were in those areas, which I'd worked out long ago from their trees!

My other areas* remain the same   

I think it's geared to people who don't  examine their matches' trees and/or don't do their own research.

Gadget

* Scotland and Ireland; English Midlands

[melba_schmelba]

Gadget, I'm breaking my rule already!  However, here goes!

I just noticed that if I do a birth location search on the beta version, for Galway, Ireland, practically every match listed has a tree of some kind or other - some are private, but presumably still searchable. There are a very few without a tree, but the one I checked had Galway listed  on the match's 'summary' page.  This was the 46th match listed - ie the 45 above all had trees. This would not be normal for Ancestry as we all know, so again, I would say these searches relate to a scan of info on the match record/tree's etc to find matching information.

Why don't you check, and see if you get matches which by and large only have trees!

I tried the same with Donegal, Ireland, and only 1 match did not have a tree!

Yes, that has always been the case as far as I know. The surname search with the location search search attached or even unlinked trees, but also will find the person's location if they have it set, but the vast majority of people don't for privacy reasons. So the vast majority of results will have trees.

But I do know what you mean about the regions - one of the first things I did when looking today at the new regions added on the ethnicity estimate page was to click on the people listed 'Featured Matches' but it just gives you their DNA match page, not a big list like you used to get, I presume of whose DNA they have established match that region. I can't think of any reason why they would have removed that, it almost seem like in doing the featured match thing, they forgot to reprogram in the old link to full matches.

[Gadget]

Just done a little comparison to show what I now get via non Beta and Ethnicity estimates. Like you, melba, I don't understand why we can get a list of matches from each regional group on the non-b search but only Ancestry's selected examples in the Ethnicity details.  Also, I'm still not sure why they've not found any of my 45% Ireland and Scotland sub-regions when I can do some searches by various location and get a listing   

When the little pop-up (survey) appears at the bottom right we can all ask for a Regional choice on the Beta search page.

Gadget

[Janethepain]

Hi, Melba and Gadget

I've been away visiting my Dad (93 years old) and out on a walk afterwards, back, making my dinner at 8.30 pm! Glad to see  you've  got my point, maybe I didn't explain it well.  You are right, We need to ask to get the region searches back again!!

Thanks Jane

[Flemming]

Coming late to this thread but seem to have gone backwards personally with the recent 'enhancement' (might as well say I'm an Earthling which, I suppose, still has its value). How do they work all this out - is it based on the family trees of DNA matches, or is there some science to gene mutations, for example, in specific geographic locations? Happy to be directed to another thread if it's already been discussed there (I did search but there are lots of threads on ethnicity).

Thanks, Flemming.

[melba_schmelba]

Coming late to this thread but seem to have gone backwards personally with the recent 'enhancement' (might as well say I'm an Earthling which, I suppose, still has its value). How do they work all this out - is it based on the family trees of DNA matches, or is there some science to gene mutations, for example, in specific geographic locations? Happy to be directed to another thread if it's already been discussed there (I did search but there are lots of threads on ethnicity).

Thanks, Flemming.

Some companies do either acquire or commission surveys of as near as can get 'pure' sampling - for example Living DNA recently asked for samples of people whose grandparents were all born in a 50 mile radius. 23andme have also recently asked for samples for areas they have little data such as Africa. The Irish DNA atlas asked for similar but 8 great grandparents so probably a bit more accurate.
http://familyhistory.ie/wp/irelands-dna/
LivingDNA's database was originally based on the Oxford University People of the British Isles survey
https://www.peopleofthebritishisles.org/

But I believe Ancestry have used their vast interconnected tree database combined with associated DNA to make these latest Irish and GB DNA communities. They are not digging up people in graveyards and testing them  .

[Flemming]

The Irish DNA atlas asked for similar but 8 great grandparents so probably a bit more accurate.
http://familyhistory.ie/wp/irelands-dna/

Has Ancestry used this for their own Irish ethnicities?

Living DNA recently asked for samples of people whose grandparents were all born in a 50 mile radius.

Is there an issue here with their database being so small?

ISOGG has ratings out of 10 for 'Overall accuracy and sophistication of the biogeographical ancestry analysis' which puts 23andMe at 7, Ancestry at 5, MyHeritage at 4 and FTDNA at 3.5, although it's not clear when this rating was done. I wonder if it might be revised given Ancestry's recent enhancement.

[melba_schmelba]

The Irish DNA atlas asked for similar but 8 great grandparents so probably a bit more accurate.
http://familyhistory.ie/wp/irelands-dna/

Has Ancestry used this for their own Irish ethnicities?

Not as far as I know Flemming, but I suppose it's possible as that data would have quite some value for these DNA testing companies.

Living DNA recently asked for samples of people whose grandparents were all born in a 50 mile radius.

Is there an issue here with their database being so small?

ISOGG has ratings out of 10 for 'Overall accuracy and sophistication of the biogeographical ancestry analysis' which puts 23andMe at 7, Ancestry at 5, MyHeritage at 4 and FTDNA at 3.5, although it's not clear when this rating was done. I wonder if it might be revised given Ancestry's recent enhancement.

Living DNA probably has better samples for England & Wales than MyHeritage or FTDNA. 23andme and Ancestry are probably on a par with them now. LivingDNA were specifically asking for Irish and Scottish samples last year, as well as from most other parts of the world so that is the areas they were weak in. I am not clear whether LivingDNA have yet integrated this new sampling to their results. I think 23andme do probably pip Ancestry at the post on 'biogeographical ancestry' as it is more of their focus, besides the health side, whereas Ancestry has been a bit more about linking to family trees and finding matches that way.