It's funny how much I rail against the prying eyes of the government and just about every corporation I deal with - "what's you phone number, what's your birth date, what's your mother's maiden name....blah, blah, blah" - and yet spend my time lamenting how little detail our ancestors were asked to give.
It's always interesting to see what communities were required to give what details. My Scottish ancestors gave out so much more information on their civil registrations than my English. My Dutch fiancee started her tree and could quite easily, with free records, get every birth, marriage and death date on all branches. What she was missing was the details - no occupations, no causes of death.
I think the problem genealogists of the future are going to encounter is too much detail, along with far, far greater mobility. (I've lived at least 5 different cities for example.)
