I, too, appreciate what I have learned from AncestryDNA. I finally loaded my very large tree to Ancestry just recently, did the AncestryDNA test and immediately linked to 30 individuals' trees showing where our lineage intersected in our trees some as close as 3 generations, others as far as 7. These were all on major lines I have researched for decades and if nothing else it confirmed that I had been on the right track after all and there was some comfort knowing that someone connected at 7 generations was thinking the same as I. For one who does not yet have time to prepare all these fancy spreadsheets, match segments, etc. and correspond with my thousands of matches at FF and 23, most of who don't have trees loaded past 3 generations, I have certainly gained from my AncestryDNA work. I would expect that AncestryDNA will eventually expand past the US and yes, we are definitely at the beginning of this journey. Regards, Ruth Cottrell -----Original Message----- From: autosomal-dna-bounces@rootsweb.com [mailto:autosomal-dna-bounces@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of David Drabold Sent: Wednesday, December 04, 2013 5:50 AM To: autosomal-dna@rootsweb.com Subject: [AUTOSOMAL-DNA] Ancestry vs the rest Hi everybody, I would like to just stick up for Ancestry for a minute. I have learned far more from Ancestry than either FTDNA or 23andme. There is not any doubt that the "high confidence" (so called fourth cousin) matches are usually informative. For that matter, the "medium" ones often are, and I have also learned from some of the lower confidence matches. Yes, there are zillions of speculative matches, but no harm done (I also have 900 or so on 23andme)... Ancestry is very clear that these are speculative and we can easily ignore them as desired. At least the people on Ancestry are actually interested in ancestry, unlike 23andme (most of the time in my experience, a point of endless irritation on my part). I am inclined to think that the best of the bunch is FTDNA from a scientific point of view. I have just had limited success there, despite some good serious people "on the other end of the match". I guess it may have to do with my personal demographics and who is testing where. I am glad to hear from Tim that the Ancestry BP and cM criteria are strongly correlated. I would be interested in a quantitative proof that one criterion is uniformly superior to another. I would be surprised if this could be demonstrated. Ancestry could be improved in many ways, but my advice, as given to someone yesterday, is to take the Ancestry test. Of course the use of gedmatch is very important to map out the chromosomes, and add rigor to speculations. Until the testers automatically undertake the kind of work nicely described by Jim (for example), its going to be frustrating. One still gets the impression that we are very much of the beginning of this journey. Regards, Dave Drabold http://www.phy.ohiou.edu/~drabold ______________________________ For answers to Frequently Asked Questions about mailing lists, please see: http://dgmweb.net/MailingListFAQs.html ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to AUTOSOMAL-DNA-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message

Ruth A word of caution: 1. We can find a Common Ancestor with a Match. 2. We can share a segment of atDNA with that same Match. 3. This does not guarantee that the segment in 2 above came from the CA in 1 above Probably over half the time the segment will come from the CA; but with over 200 CAs now identified with Matches, I can tell you that at least 30 of them, probably more, are not the source of the shared DNA segment. You need segment Triangulation AND genealogy Triangulation to have high confidence. Jim - Sent from my iPhone - FaceTime! On Dec 4, 2013, at 10:59 AM, "Ruth Cattles Cottrell" <ruthcottrell@verizon.net> wrote: > I, too, appreciate what I have learned from AncestryDNA. I finally loaded > my very large tree to Ancestry just recently, did the AncestryDNA test and > immediately linked to 30 individuals' trees showing where our lineage > intersected in our trees some as close as 3 generations, others as far as 7. > These were all on major lines I have researched for decades and if nothing > else it confirmed that I had been on the right track after all and there was > some comfort knowing that someone connected at 7 generations was thinking > the same as I. For one who does not yet have time to prepare all these > fancy spreadsheets, match segments, etc. and correspond with my thousands of > matches at FF and 23, most of who don't have trees loaded past 3 > generations, I have certainly gained from my AncestryDNA work. > > I would expect that AncestryDNA will eventually expand past the US and yes, > we are definitely at the beginning of this journey. > > Regards, > Ruth Cottrell >