New and old users will produce duplicates, because abandoned trees demotivate,discourage and confuse them !

I'd like to add:

...including abandoned duplicate profiles that are marked as LIVING.

Yes!

I'd prefer the curators worry about public profiles.

.... and including Private profiles that are obviously abandoned, or that they get deleted all together.

Mike Stangel

Curators are worried about public profiles, but the problem is that if a user request to be added as manager to an abandoned profile, the abandoned manager receives that request and a curator doesn't see that ! The best way is to remove all managers who abandoned their profiles from the profiles and make the "curatorpool" first manager.
Or do you want that the curators make all abandoned profiles MasterProfiles ? Are curators then receiving requests for adding as a manager and connecting to other profiles. I think that that is abuse of the MP

Fred, I have sent aprox 2,600 requests to merge duplicate files and realized most of the managers have abandoned these profiles. This process is extremely slow and frustrating.
I sincerely hope this discussion will have an impact and Curators will be able to help. Thanks and regards, Luis

What, by the way, is the status of the 'zombie' project for profiles that still show as LIVING when it is an impossibility for then to be coded as such?

In addition to abandoned or forgotten profiles it is a constant problem when 1 is public but is attached to a cluster of 'private---tho obviously deceased' profiles......

Are we to ATTACH to those profiles and risk being 'captured' within a 'private realm? Or do we create a duplicate trail until such time as someone decides to 'slay the abandoned profiles'....and in the meantime ANYONE else can come along and LINK you to the same profile batch of OMBIES as were your original concern...and get yo captured anyway....

Or maybe I just don't understand...and I've been here a while...the newPros have no such background...so they, in all innocence; see a match and link away....and you are -'captured'

Private User
Curators are worried about public profiles, but the problem is that if a user request to be added as manager to an abandoned profile, the abandoned manager receives that request and a curator doesn't see that ! The best way is to remove all managers who abandoned their profiles from the profiles and make the Curators are worried about public profiles, but the problem is that if a user request to be added as manager to an abandoned profile, the abandoned manager receives that request and a curator doesn't see that ! The best way is to remove all managers who abandoned their profiles from the profiles and make the "curatorpool" first manager. irst manager.
i`m not agree with "curatorpool" in my casea in Uruguay was a disaster
a simple example http://www.geni.com/family-tree/index/6000000002499930324 our actuall President, in he past I managed this prophile
Alberto Adolfo Miguel Pérez Berinduague actual manager
User Statistics
Profiles Added 24
Profiles Invited 2
Profiles Managed 208
Photos Added 1
Videos Added 0
Documents Added 0
see the family around who is the manager, see the typical closing mother's parents
Eudoxia Zoa Terra Terra
Immediate Family:
Hide

Daughter of Benvenuto Pereira da Terra da Silveyra and Marfisa Terra
Wife of José Cruz Mujica Cipriani
Mother of Demetrio Mujica Terra and XX Mujica Terra
Sister of Beinvinda
Added by: Gabriel Artigue Carro on August 26, 2008
Managed by: Pablo Benítez Barreto, Enrique (Henri (V)) Raul Angenscheidt Baridon, Cr. ( J.)

Hi Enrique, the curatorpool should temporary. We transfer management to direct familygroup members as soon as they request for that !

The attitude expressed above upsets me a lot. I know of only a few folks related to me who started trees on Geni - and in most cases, they did so for their children. If this is true for the small number I know, I imagine it is true for a lot of folks.

Imagine creating a Family Tree for your children, for if and when they are interested -- putting up the info you have, then leaving it, knowing it will be there. There is no reason to do anything to it unless you know a family member died, was born, or got married -- and even then, perhaps once every 5 or 10 years is often enough to do an update. BUT because others have other priorities (not spelled out to you when you joined, etc.), ths tree may instead be handed over to someone else, info radically changed, etc. This does not strike me as appropriate.

Principially there is privacy within the familygroup 4th cousins and closer.
When we are talking about transferring management then are that public profiles outside the familygroup. There is an exception that is if an user deletes his account, then his profiles are without a manager.

It did not look to me like David, Fay, and Remi were just discussing Public profiles and those where the owner deleted his own account and no family member (or other) was given management. My apologies if I misunderstood.

That concerned perhaps merge activities to profiles within a familygroup who were given free by the only and exclusive manager for public merging

Private User
Agree with Lois Lubin
It is possible that more time I say something is deleted by an administrator.
In Uruguay, we had several problems with:
1) penalty on a person who managed 36,000 profiles
2) According to the Curator of administrative penalty orders was instructed who to give the profiles.
3) the administrator, with 36,000 profiles, came close all profiles, including parents if he neither knew, profiles with names FATHER father and mother with the name of MOTHER OF COURSE ALSO CLOSED .
4) What we had to do when we found other users weddings, jijos, etc. ? Duplicate free branches
5) One day this manager desapareciió (5/23/2011 to 05/30/2011) and profiles dueron awarded under the same conditions more or less close relatives, with no interest in the tree, merges or collaboration continue to call without no success, so people appear as named by Mr. Lois Lubin, if I the name is immediately deleted my comment

Enrique, I will believe you are right, but the policy of Geni changed. They want no longer profiles given free to outsiders and want these to reserve for familymembers with know how re the profiles and being active on Geni.

The privacy policy goes all the way out to my great-great-great grandparents.

To that menas that by using my ancestors, my oldest great-great-great grandparent is born in 1803. I have by far all descendants after this person, but I have 147 of them. All of them are, if I don't change my settings, marked private just because his descendants are inside my personal family-tree by the settings Geni have made. This will also effectively stop eveyone that is outside my family-group, but who is also a descendant of this person, to use my profile of him as their own, which will lead to duplicate profiles of the same person.

I'm all for privacy for living persons and back to maybe grandparents or great-grandparents, but back to great-great-great grandparents and for me the year 1803, is plain stupid to me, and is hindering the job of making one profile of each person. It's making the job of cleaning the tree a lot harder.

When these duplicate private profiles back to early 1800's get abandoned, it makes even more mess just because then more people would like to merge them, but are not aloud because the privacy of the profile.

I have set my familygroup on first cousins and closer, but that is my own decision. I came from a wiki genealogysite where I was an administrator. So I am familiair with total freedom of all deceased persons and with sufficient number of administrators quality can be assured. On Geni we have less than 100 curators for about 100 million profiles Even if we had 1000 curators then still we could not garantee quality. So I think that the combination of private profiles with familygroups are useful because of the quantity of curators.

Most all of my closest relatives have the ridiculously high default privacy settings AND made abandoned trees. I create a duplicate, look at mine and the abandoned tree's duplicate, and then ask for a merge that I know will never be approved.

As if I can't go to rootsweb and find more information on the last public profile and keep filling it in. It's not like this information can't be found all over the Internet and in census records. Maybe those born after 1930 should be protected, but beyond that, what's the point?

I agree, Faith.

But give your closest relatives a call, maybe the will give you access.

Faith Schaffner - in response to "what's the point" - see my comments and those of Hatte's just below, currently at bottom of this discussion: http://www.geni.com/discussions/90355

We mist not forget what caused this triviality. Geni was dualistic set up. As a social network site and as a denealogic site. That is it what now gives conflicts. On a wiki everybody knows that he has to do his research himself and protect the results by keeping those on his own harddisk in his own genealogy programm. Here are a lot of users who never were teached so and their only place they have their results is on Geni. For that reason Geni must protect these group of users but that conflicts with the interests of the regular genealogists who want one big tree.More and more comes the question to the users who want privacy and protection: do you think Geni is the right place for you and then unfortunately these users must answer, no Geni is for me not the right place..............

Well, by "closest relatives" on Geni, I'm talking about third cousins I've never met. I can't very well give them a call.

I understand what you mean, Lois, but you propose a solution yourself-- public/private shouldn't be determined by relation to user but by birth and death dates. For me, this is all no problem-- I make everyone beyond my grandparents public. But most people who use Geni are no power-users, and having taught 100 students this past year to use Geni, I can say that they cannot find, on their own, how to make a profile public. And merging? They totally don't understand that process, either, without careful demonstration and explanation. These are eighteen year old adults that grew up with the Internet. So having profiles locked down before 1800 has caused me immense headaches as a teacher and a genealogist. Sometimes I've had to "guess" student tree completion because they hadn't marked everyone public they were supposed to, and I have had to advise for students to duplicate existing data because other Geni users don't respond. This makes them more likely to abandon their trees, as well. It's a vicious cycle.

Faith Schaffner -
1) I think you should bring this total inability of supposedly intelligent adults to figure out how to use Geni to the attention of the Geni-team and try to work with them on how this can be remedied.

2) Why are they not logging on with you so you can see their private tree as well, if it is for a course? Seems an easier solution to me than making us modify how we do things so you can grade your students. Or have them use one of the "share a tree" options / print out the tree / or etc.

3) Note I strongly recommended no profile should be forcibly made public if they did not die at least 100 years ago. I would like this to apply even if very distantly related. I want it in addition to ability to keep relatives private (which apparently wasn't clear).
Above, you were suggesting make public anyone born before about 1930 -- big difference between born before 1930 and died before 1811.
Repeating - Big reason is: Folks in their 80s and 90s are the ones most susceptible to scams and other forms of elder abuse. I do not want to be inadvertently responsible for this happening.

4) Re: calling third cousins one has never met -- I have used smartpages, gotten phone numbers, made cold calls and by naming relatives confirmed that the person I called was my relative -- given the ease of this on several occasions, and the amount of info they gave me, it underscores how susceptible what we are doing leaves folks (especially, but not only, the elderly) to being scammed. But also means it is possible you might be able to call those folks up on the phone, as Remi suggested.

Fred B...I agree about people who try to maintain TOO high a list of personal profiles as private...for them...if they don't use a PDF (personal data file) is there any problem with them keeping that data on PAPER and starting at, say 1900, to become public....CAN you start a tree at THAT point?

That would solve LOIS's question too, I think, since it addresses those 'elders' who are at risk....believe me, when you start getting mail solicitations from AARP and every other medical/get rich quick/insurance company when you are in your early 50's, we don't want to give the 'scammers' any more sources to tap (I mentioned AARP, which I think is super....only because everybody knows WHO they are....NOT to say that THEY are scammers....but others DO buy their lists......

And I might point out that Registries of deeds, phone books, town reports, are ALL public...are used by scammers.....as well as OBITS...that is a primary source for scammers of the elderly....

I really think that if you leave off current location and anything other that name, place of birth and birthdate for people in your immediate PERSONAL family group....and maintain that data in whatever private manner you wish....that BOTH the genealogical tree as well as privacy are addressed....

So...either start at 1900 or start yourself and put everyone in but open anyone born 1900 or before "public' but keep data to the minimum...

Private User
I d'ont agree withFred Bergman (dutch curator) Transparent
7/27/2011 at 7:06 PM
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Enrique, I will believe you are right, but the policy of Geni changed. They want no longer profiles given free to outsiders and want these to reserve for familymembers with know how re the profiles and being active on Geni.

Yo no estoy de acuerdo con esa posición,En mi familia , junto con mi Sra, administro
Family Members 1,882
Blood Relatives 512
Ancestors 56
Descendants 19
Followers 59
Following 2,324
Profiles Added 6,402
Profiles Invited 233
Profiles Managed 7,262
NO ES MI INTERÉS MANTENER AL DÍA TODA LA INFORMACIÓN, PERO NO HAY GENTE CON GANAS DE HACERLO, POR LO QUE DARLE LA ADMINISTRACIÓN A UN PARIENTE CERCANO, LO MÁS POSIBLE QUE SEA EN UN TIEMPO UN PERFIL ABANDONADO.
YO SOLO PONGO GENTE QUE ME INTERESA, NO SOLO A MÍ SINO A MI PAÍS, SU HISTORIA Y SU CULTURA.
¿ CREE USTED QUE ALGUN PARIENTE CERCANO MÍO TENGA LA MENOR IDEA DE LO QUE SIGNIFICÓ SER VALDENSE POR EJEMPLO, SER EMIGRANTE Y SACAR ADELANTE UNA FAMILIA CON 13 HIJOS, SACAR ENTRE ELLOS LA PRIMER MUJER GRADUADA EN LAUNIVERSIDAD DEL URUGUAY, TENER 2 HIJOS MÉDICOS CIRUJANOS RECONOCIDOS MUNDIALMENTE, HABER TENIDO UN HIJO ABOGADO QUE NO SOLO INTEGRÓ LA SUPREMA CORTE DEL URUGUAY 1945-1952 LUEGO LA SUPREMA CORTE DE LA HAYA 1953
TENER LA SIGUIENTE RELACIÓN CON LOS EX PRESIDENTES URUGUAYOS ( FALTAN UNOS CUANTOS TODAVÍA PARA AGREGAR)
Lorenzo Cristóbal Manuel Batlle Grau is your first cousin once removed's wife's great grandfather. You
Enrique R. Angenscheidt your mother→ Blanca (Mima) Baridon Armand-Ugon
Alina Armand-Ugon Rivoir, Farmac. her mother→ Daniel Armand-Ugon Rivoir her brother→ Daniel Armand-Ugon Bittencourt
his son→ Matilde Batlle Ibáñez his wife→ Luis Conrado Batlle Berresher father→Luis Batlle y Ordóñez his father→ Lorenzo Cristóbal Manuel Batlle Grau
his father
José Pablo Torcuato Batlle y Ordóñez is your first cousin once removed's wife's great uncle.
You→ Blanca (Mima) Baridon Armand-Ugon your mother→Alina Armand-Ugon Rivoir, Farmac.her mother→Daniel Armand-Ugon Rivoir
her brother→Daniel Armand-Ugon Bittencourt his son→Matilde Batlle Ibáñez his wifeLuis Conrado Batlle Berresher father→ Luis Batlle y Ordóñez
his father→José Pablo Torcuato Batlle y Ordóñez his brother
Jorge Luis Batlle Ibañez is your first cousin once removed's wife's brother.
You →Blanca (Mima) Baridon Armand-Ugon your mother→ Alina Armand-Ugon Rivoir, Farmac. her mother→ Daniel Armand-Ugon Rivoir
her brother→ Daniel Armand-Ugon Bittencourt his son→ Matilde Batlle Ibáñez his wife→ Jorge Luis Batlle Ibañez her brother

Jorge Pacheco Areco is your wife's first cousin once removed's wife's uncle's wife's sister's late husband.
You →Beatriz Bidegain Roglia, III, Cr.(R) your wife → Luis ( Cocó) ( Chulo) Bidegain Rivas, II her father →Dorita (Tití) Bidegain Rivas, II his sister
→ Christianne Hareau Bidegain, III her daughter→ Juan Ignacio Masoller Hareau, IV, Arqto. her son→ Mercedes Solari Terra his wife→
Ana María Terra Rodríguez her mother→ Antonio Jose Terra Rodriguez Coll her brother Rosario Rompani Delmond his wife G. Rompani
her sister→ Jorge Pacheco Areco her husband

Private User
I do not agree with that position, in my family with my Mrs, administered
Family Members 1.882
512 Blood Relatives
56 Ancestors
Descendants 19
59 Followers
Following 2.324
Added 6.402 Profiles
Invited 233 Profiles
7.262 Managed Profiles
NOT MY INTEREST TO KEEP ALL INFORMATION, BUT WITH NO PEOPLE WANT TO DO, SO GIVE THE ADMINISTRATION TO AN IMMEDIATE FAMILY, AS MAY BE IN A TIME A PROFILE ABANDONED.
I JUST PUT PEOPLE INTERESTED, NOT ONLY TO ME BUT MY COUNTRY, ITS HISTORY AND CULTURE.
DO YOU BELIEVE THAT MY HAVE ANY CLOSE RELATIVE no idea what being Waldensian for example, be taking forward a MIGRANTS AND FAMILY WITH 13 CHILDREN, INCLUDING THE FIRST TAKE female graduates at university DEL URUGUAY, 2 SONS HAVE RECOGNIZED SURGEON WORLDWIDE, having a child not only integrates ATTORNEY TO THE SUPREME COURT OF URUGUAY 1945-1952 AFTER THE SUPREME COURT OF THE HAGUE 1953
HAVE THE FOLLOWING REGARDING THE former Uruguayan president (STILL MISSING A FEW TO ADD)
Christopher Grau Manuel Lorenzo Batlle is your first cousin's wife's eleven o'clock removed great grandfather. You
Enrique R. Angenscheidt your mother → White (Mima) Armand-Ugon Baridon
Armand-Ugon Alina Rivoir, drugs. her mother → Daniel Armand-Ugon Rivoir her brother Armand-Ugon → Daniel Bittencourt
are historical Batlle Ibáñez → His wife Matilde Luis Conrado Batlle → → Berresher father Luis Batlle y Ordóñez → His Father Manuel Lorenzo Batlle Christopher Grau
His father
José Batlle y Ordóñez Pablo Torcuato is your first cousin's wife's eleven o'clock removed great uncle.
You → White (Mima) Baridon your mother Ugon Armand Armand-Ugon → Alina Rivoir, Farmac.her mother → Daniel Armand-Ugon Rivoir
her brother Daniel Armand-Ugon → Bittencourt historical are → Matilde Conrado Batlle Batlle Ibáñez Berresher wifeLuis His father → Luis Batlle y Ordóñez
His father → José Batlle y Ordóñez Pablo Torcuato His Brother
Jorge Luis Batlle Ibanez is your first cousin's wife's eleven brother removed.
You → White (Mima) Baridon your mother Ugon Armand Armand-Ugon → Alina Rivoir, drugs. her mother → Daniel Armand-Ugon Rivoir
her brother Daniel Armand-Ugon → Bittencourt historical are → His Wife Matilde Batlle Ibáñez Jorge Luis Batlle Ibanez → her brother

Jorge Pacheco Areco is your wife's first cousin's wife's eleven o'clock removed uncle's wife's sister's late husband.
You Roglio → Beatriz Bidegain, III, Cr (R) your wife → Luis (Coco) (Chulo) Bidegain Rivas, her father II → Dorita (Titi) Bidegain Rivas, II His sister
→ Christianne Hareau Bidegain, her daughter III → Juan Ignacio Masoller Hareau, IV, Arqto. are her Solari Terra → Mercedes → His Wife
Ana María Rodríguez her mother → Terra Jose Antonio Rodriguez Terra Rompani Coll Delmondo her brother Rosario G. His Wife Rompani
her sister → Jorge Pacheco Areco her husband

Private User
I just want to handle the profiles on my posts, I can share with family members interested and active, but nothing more

Enrique, isn't that okay with you ? or is that your choice?