For all those who are lamenting the probable demise of FMP, you might be interested in this letter that I recently wrote to the Cheshire Record Office about difficulties with their Cheshire records on FMP, and this is the reply I received.... Thank you for your email of 29 May. I can easily understand your frustration as we share it here. As our records are on Findmypast we have free access to the collections here and across Cheshire Libraries. We too were unaware of the modification made to the site until they happened, and although we have brought a whole list of issues up with Findmypast, as yet these have not been rectified. This situation is most unsatisfactory from our point of view as the site, and the Cheshire Collection, have been in continual use by staff and searchers here at the Record Office since its launch, but we have made our concerns known to Findmypast and will continue to do so on our own, and users’ behalf. If you do not renew your subscription in July you can still access the indexes to the Cheshire Collection at www.familysearch.org as the indexes in use at Findmypast were compiled by the Mormons and are available at their site. Copies of any entries which you find at familysearch can be ordered through our eshop at our website. I realise that this may not be as convenient as being able to view images and download them but it may go some way towards lessening the inconvenience until Findmypast address the issues arising from their upgrade. Thank you for bringing this to our attention and I will make sure your email is passed on to the Archives and Local Studies Manager. Yours sincerely Liz Green *Archivist* Cheshire Archives and Local Studies If more owners of the record collections were to write and voice their displeasure to FMP maybe they would take more notice than they do of us mere mortals who pay them to view these records. On 6 June 2014 02:40, Beverly Alexander <alexbev@comcast.net> wrote: > >From the USA, I found FMP to be very valuable in my search for Cheshire > ancestors. Past tense! > > It is mostly useless now, can't find anything but the census'. But that > doesn't bother me as much as the fact that FMP does not care that they have > destroyed its usefulness. I have written them 3 times on the subject, and > all inquiries have been ignored. I have a full-up worldwide Ancestry > account, but they can't hold a candle to FMP, that is the old FMP. > > It makes me so sad. > > Beverly > Culpeper, VA > > -----Original Message----- > From: cheshire-bounces@rootsweb.com [mailto:cheshire-bounces@rootsweb.com] > On Behalf Of Adrian Bruce > Sent: Thursday, June 05, 2014 12:13 PM > To: cheshire@rootsweb.com > Subject: Re: [CHS] FMP > > <<snipped>> > I keep reading that it has got better but I have seen no difference. > <<snipped>> > > Depends where you're looking. They have reintroduced the ability to > download > pages of newspapers, for instance. > > <<snipped>> > None of the main family history sites seem to be working well at the > moment, > Ancestry and FamilySearch are having trouble too. Looks as though they are > all busy updating their websites to fit in with the current fashion for > doing everything from an iPad or tablet <<snipped>> > > Working on tablets and smartphones has to be a given. It's perfectly > possible to do it - you just need to design layouts that respond > differently > to being on different sizes of glass. > > Re Ancestry - Yes, New Search anyone? And I suspect the impractical > mechanism to choose birthplace in the FMP censuses had its inspiration in > Ancestry restricting people to birthplaces in a drop-down list. And where > did Ancestry get its inspiration from? The programmers? I suspect not - I > think they got the idea from American *genealogists*. You don't have to go > far before you find American genealogists going on about placename > authority > tables, i.e. a full and complete list of *all* placenames. > > (Honesty compels me to point out that when American genealogists refer to > placenames they mean jurisdictions - and it might be possible to produce > such a list for the UK - I think http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk has > just > that. But the Norwegian genealogists seem to be producing a database of all > farm-names!!! Maybe "farm" means something different to them...) > > Adrian > > > > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > CHESHIRE-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes > in the subject and the body of the message > > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > CHESHIRE-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message >