Ancestry.com to Acquire Footnote.com

Hi Kim,
Thanks for your great article around our acquisition of iArchives. It’s possible that many other people are thinking the same as you – that Footnote.com won’t be a priority for our business. I want to make sure it’s clear that Ancestry.com fully intends to grow the business and Footnote.com content. We truly want to see it develop to help benefit people interested in early American roots.

Heather Erickson
Ancestry.com

I am not one for negative comments but this I must say. I feel that Ancestry is “taking over” everything. When this happens, they take away things that were once free. Over the past few years I have seen it with Ancestry.com as well. Bit by bit, there was less and less you could do without a paid subscription. I understand things cost money, but to provide something initially and take it away is what frustrates me. I am just a single researcher working on my own family tree and like the majority of the population, I am down on my luck. Every research corner I turn these days I find more things on may websites I used to have access to, that are now only available for a fee, Ancestry.com being a huge offender. Instead of luring me in, they have pushed me away. Every thing seems to be owned by Ancestry, which, if Ancestry keeps a research site going that was scheduled to be shut down, then fantastic. Just please stop buying sites and taking away functions for the “little” people.

I too am a bit more discouraged. Footnote will now become another Ancestry. Don’t get me wrong, Ancestry is a great site if you can afford it but the info I am able to get anywhere free is how I must work on my personal family tree.

I get frustrated and search endless hours and days, weeks, and months…into years now. I am happy for any company or individual that does well and flourishes, but I just can’t pay the rates on a fixed income.

But congrats to Ancestry anyway. I’m sure you will do well.

Ruth.

I agree with the other comments. I have a paid membership to Ancestry, but have been concerned about the disappearing free sites. There is such a thing as being too big and I am starting to fear this is happening to Ancestry; border crossing cards; UK medal cards that give you NO information are not worth posting in a database. I liked FootNote the images were much more clear. They didn’t have nearly as much information, but I assume they would grow, but what they had was all worthwhile information. What happened to the law against monopolies?

I should have known better than to believe that Footnote will be different than Ancestry. Once my subscription runs out I will not renew it. I just don’t like the way Ancestry is doing business. Ancestry basically took information from people who thought these information would be freely shared, and then sold these information to the same people who gave them.
Juergen

Look, genealogy is a very competitive industry on both the commercial and open-community fronts. It makes sense to me that a commercial company that cannot remain competitive in the industry will be bought out by another commercial entity – especially if it brings value – which is exactly what I think is happening with Footnote. The question I am having is whether the commercial genealogy companies can remain competitive since genealogy fits so well in an open rather than closed environment. I think the genealogy industry is reaching a critical stage to see which way people will prefer to go – subscription to closed commercial entities or join open collaborative communities which can access the same sources. Summary: So don’t get upset when commercial entity buys another commercial entity – it’s still commercial and ‘has increased value’ to its subscribers.

I’m not sure I understand all the grieving about Ancestry swallowing up “free sites.” As far as I know, Footnote has always been a subscription site, so people who rely on free sites haven’t lost anything.

Ancestry is like a big Blob absorbing everything in it’s path.

Ancestry has been and is useful for me in my searches as it has databases for different places around the world. It is big and will only grow bigger.

However, I am concerned about free sites disappearing as well. That is why I volunteer to help transcribe census, baptism records, etc. I would encourage anyone who can to do the same. Help and support the various sites who do offer access to records free of charge. Volunteers are always needed.

I have been a subscriber to Footnote for the last 3 1/2 years. One reason is because of the cost. I do not have a paid subscripition to Ancestrey due to the cost.
While I administer some boards on Rootsweb, use the Rootsweb SSDI and use Ancestry at the library, I do not like what they did to the Family Tree Maker program. They made so many changes to it that I use an older version.
While I understand the need to support free sites like Rootsweb I think this is a bad idea. Just look to genealogical.com and the Family Tree Maker program.

Why do they have to try to take things away that us on set incomes need. I’m 73 an sure can’t afford ancestry due to the price. Now what will we do when they take the free sites away just forget about hunting our geneology.I’d like to see them try to live an get some enjoyment on a very low check.

I am concerned about what the acquisition will do to Footnote, too. I am just getting started, and Footnote has information that Ancestry appears to charge for. So, to me, that means level of access will be going down.

I am just getting to the point where paying for a service is probably going to be required. Ancestry’s rates are a turn off, but Footnote’s seemed reasonable.

I will hold off a little longer and see how things pan out, but like I said, I am nervous the Footnote will be going downhill.

In Regards to: Transcribing, I would encourage anyone who can to do the same. Help and support the various sites who do offer access to records free of charge.
That is the problem, people do this work, then sites like Ancestry takes over and charges for the information that we freely gave.

I have subscriptions to both, paid a year in advance; what can I expect as a “rebate”? Probably nada. Footnote was an exciting find when I first found it, it has some unique resources that are not duplicated elsewhere. The newspaper archives are incredibly helpful for a Chicagoan, but the OCR is horrible. I am not looking forward to the merge, as I believe there will be significant stagnation in data acquisition and previously free data charged for. And I expect an increase in price of 20%, effectively locking out a large segment of casual researchers.

I don’t object to the acquisition on the basis of the loss of free information, because Footnote is not free. They have special offers of free collections but to really use the site you have to pay. I do object on the basis of Ancestry swallowing up all the competition. Why pretend they are separate companies when ancestry owns all the databases, gets all the money, and determines all the policies?

I don’t object as much to them wiping out the financial competition as I do to them eliminating the intellectual diversity and different approaches to conducting research. Intellectual monoculture is not only undesirable but dangerous. Haven’t we learned from our studies of family history of the disruptive and even disastrous consequences of societies that allow only one view?

I am sure that many of us doing genealogical research have ancestors who suffered tremendous hardship or perished because of the Irish Potato Famine. Do they know that this was the result of extreme agricultural monoculture – a whole population being dependent on one variety of one vegetable for survival? One fungus destroyed that one vegetable in a very short time, and the whole population starved. When you have only one option, you are extremely vulnerable to any problem that develops with it. Intellectual monoculture has the same vulnerability and the same kind of danger, only instead of wiping out physical populations, it wipes out unique cultures.

Why were the Irish dependent on that one variety of potato to survive? That is a complex and very interesting issue, but the lesson here is to cultivate diversity. I think the FTC should investigate ancestry’s acquisitions under anti-trust laws, not just because they are becoming a huge financial monopoly, but because it put the brakes on them in terms of preserving intellectual diversity and freedom of speech.

Business practices of Ancestry aside, I just wanted to say don’t forget about your libraries! For those who cannot afford personal subscriptions to Ancestry.com many public libraries subscribe to Ancestry Library. The content is mostly the same, but you are able to use it for free at a library that subscribes. Basically the library is paying the subscription so you don’t have to.

Ancestry, while being one of, if not THE, biggest players in the field is nowhere near being a monopoly. In fact, I’d be surprised if it controlled over 15% of the worldwide genealogical market.

Free sites abound. The only problem with free sites is that once they reach a certain size it takes money and organization to keep them going- look what happened to Rootsweb – and they didn’t even have digital images!

Transcriptions may do for the older researchers but the younger have been brought up in a digital world and expect to seem images of actual records, not text about them; to provide those images online costs money.

Also, don’t kid yourself about free sites- they also cost money to someone and when those someones can’t afford to keep the site up then all that info will vanish- just like it would have vanished at Rootsweb had Ancestry not stepped in.

Ancestry did not buy iArchives for the content they had- they bought it to get access to their technology and that technology will be used throughout Ancestry’s holdings giving us better images, etc.

I also live on a fixed income but don’t consider less than $1.00 a day for the World Deluxe package to be particularly expensive- heck, it is less than what I pay for my internet service!

Genealogy has never been a cost free hobby at least not if it is done properly.

How could ancestry not know the technology or even hire an expert? It seems lame? and if so does that mean changes in the way we see it working. I am not a happy follower with footnote, but have only spent a small amount of time on it. I suppose as subscriber, I would be. For instance I entered in Dannenberg . Germany and would get peoples names. I entered in Juergen Meyer and they said one thing, but something was off. Then on another it said clearly other names, but not that one, but it said it was on the document, you click and you had to be member. If it was off like that no showing of the actual name, after a few minutes my trust was gone. Of course ancestry has some similar issues. Your looking for new york and there they are stuck on australia or their limited supply of information keeps showing.
They both could use some help in their technology. We can only wait and see what happens, I guess.
My biggest bug for years has been about searching the internet for years. I would find a site that promised lists and information…….thinking free or even maybe a special showing, i’d go in for it. but it still would lead me to limited showing, because you had to be an ancestry member.

I felt betrayed by those websites …. and felt ancestry was everywhere…….If people share their information where ever they can it helps. Not email me for more. but open sharing of family. keep he recent off, of course, but help the little guy.

sorry, I am in a biting mood today.

I have had a subscription to Ancestry.com for a few years now. I appreciated the new sources that Footnote.com, Archives.com and others have brought to the table. However, I do not have the financial resources to have a subscription to a plethora of sites just so I can access all the collections out there. In a small way, I think consolidation is a good thing to bring more efficiency to research and hopefully limit the needed subscriptions for access.

I’m not clear whether or not Footnote will become visible to those who have a subscription to Ancestry.com, but not Footnote. Or will there still be two separate subscriptions?

This makes me very sad to see that Ancestry is swallowing every family record they can find just to justify their outrageous prices to support the LDS church.

I shudder to think of how many more family records will be shared by people thinking it will be free for others to find and connect and instead find their records stolen from them and sold to others by Ancestry. This has already happened hundreds of times.

I have found many family members and records doing genealogy when it was free to the public, as it use to be and should be now. And I’m sad to know that thousands of others will be denied this opportunity because they can’t afford Ancestry’s growing prices.

I hope that everyone is aware that every dime spent at Ancestry.com goes to the growth of the LDS church and their members’ free access to our family records, so they can bless everyone into the Mormon church, whether it’s wanted or not.

I use Geni.com to share information with all my many cousins. It’s free, unless you want the Pro benefits, and there is a new exciting effort to document historical profiles. I add all the family history, pictures, documents that I find elsewhere for all to share, since most do not have a subscription to Ancestry. It’s also a social networking for families.

Rosemay, Thank you so much for your comments. Just to clear up any misconceptions here, Ancestry.com is NOT affiliated with the LDS Church. Ancestry.com is a for-profit business which puts online millions of records for genealogists to access. Yes, the subscription price is steep – but the access is sure a lot easier than it used to be. I can definitely understand how for people only tracing their own ancestors the price of an Ancestry subscription can be pretty expensive.

The LDS Church (a nonprofit by the way) has their own genealogy Web site at FamilySearch.org. They have also put millions of genealogical records online (search or browse Historical Records at beta.familysearch.org) and they offer these records for everyone for free! There are a few records collections on their site which link to a partner site for the digital images and these partners may charge a fee to view the record – but even in these cases the indexes online at FamilySearch are free.

Most of all, I wanted to make sure everyone is clear that Ancestry.com does NOT financially support the LDS Church with its profits. They are two different entities.

The cost of accurately digitizing and indexing records is extraordinary…like most sites, Footnote pays for the costs associated with digitizing through a subscription fee. So I appreciate the efforts of Ancestry, Footnote, and the free FamilySearch, and I like to think my subscription fees go toward preserving the records for future generations. Somebody has to pay the costs involved, and it rightfully should be the people using the records. Almost every library has a subscription, so you can still access it at no charge with a library visit.

Having said that, I hope Ancestry will put its resources behind additional digitizing of National Archives records. There is incredible information contained in the Archives. I would hate to see the wonderful Footnote site decrease rather than increase its usefulness.

I have a subscription to both Ancestry.com and Footnote, so what happens when Footnote is taken over? Will I still need to have 2 subscriptions and if not, will I be reimbursed for my subscription to Footnote?

I have been a paying member of Ancestry for over 2 years now and am happy to be able to share my research with my family and other researchers and relatives regardless of how distant. However, it seems that since Ancestry has been so successful that they would be putting effort into making more records available to their paying members. Nothing new shows up and I am hoping that the records they have acquired from Footnote will be available to Ancestry’s members, as it should be. I have no problem with Ancestry buying out any company, for this is what capitalism is all about. But, the info should now be available to people who are paying for it. It would be nice for Ancestry to follow through with their promises and commit to providing its customers with the info that they obtain. If a company like Ancestry is to grow like it has, then it should have researchers working around the clock to upload records and documents of many kinds to its databases. It is the integrity part of doing a business like this. The business grows, hence, the services they provide should grow as well, since, after all, they are raising their prices for membership and getting richer by the minute. Now it’s time for them to step up to the plate. My two cents.

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