Hello You are receiving this email because you are subscribed to the FreeBMD News mailing list, which provides updates on the progress of the FreeBMD project, https://www.freebmd.org.uk/   This mailing list has been operated through Rootsweb for many years. From March 2nd 2020 Rootsweb will no longer be operating mailing lists.   FreeBMD mailing lists are now being provided by Groups.io and you will find details of the mailing lists at https://www.freebmd.org.uk/lists.shtml   The FreeBMD News list has become the FreeBMD Main Group. As a member of this list you will shortly receive an invitation to join the FreeBMD Main Group. If you wish to continue to receive information about the progress of the FreeBMD project, please respond to that invitation by clicking on the link to 'accept the invitation'. Details of the group are at https://freebmd.groups.io/g/Main   The FreeBMD Advice Group replaces the FreeBMD-Admins mailing list, on which transcribers can ask questions about aspects of FreeBMD and can receive replies from experienced transcribers. Details are at https://www.freebmd.org.uk/lists.shtml#advice   The FreeBMD Discuss Group replaces the FreeBMD-Discuss mailing list, on which experienced transcribers can make suggestions or offer opinions for improvements in how FreeBMD works. Details are at https://www.freebmd.org.uk/lists.shtml#discuss   The FreeBMD Syndicates Group replaces the FreeBMD-Syndicates mailing list for Syndicate Co-ordinators and others managing FreeBMD. Details are at https://www.freebmd.org.uk/lists.shtml#syndicates   If you are or become a member of any of the FreeBMD Advice, Discuss or Syndicates groups you will automatically be subscribed to the FreeBMD Main Group.   If you have any problems with subscribing, please email mailto:Main+owner@FreeBMD.groups.io   Jeff Coleman List admin, FreeBMD mailing lists

Free UK Genealogy is a CIO (Charitable Incorporated Organisation) acting as an umbrella organisation for FreeBMD, FreeREG and FreeCEN. For latest news and information on Free UK Genealogy please visit http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/ In the middle of July Dr Pat Reynolds Executive Director Free UK Genealogy sent out an email regarding draft Open Data and Transcriber Agreement documents with a response required by Saturday 27th August 2016. Great effort was made to identify and include as many volunteers as possible from the three organisations in the distribution of the email. I've received reports from some volunteers in FreeBMD that they have not received the email and they have heard erroneous statements about its contents via Facebook and other means. If you are a volunteer in FreeBMD please let me know off list if you have not received a copy of the email from our Executive Director and I will pass on your details. It is extremely important that you are aware of the draft Open Data and Transcriber Agreement documents and submit any comments before the deadline of 27th August 2016 Regards Allan Raymond FreeBMD Coordinator of Syndicates and Volunteer Coordinator Note: If you are subscribed to any of these three FreeBMD mailing lists, Admins, Discuss or Syndicates then you DO NOT need to be subscribed to the FreeBMD News list since any email to the FreeBMD News list will be propagated through to the other lists please see http://www.freebmd.org.uk/lists.html You may therefore receive multiple copies of this email if so please delete any surplus copies.

For latest news and information on Free UK Genealogy please visit http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/ When you are on the page don't forget to join the Free UK Genealogy mailing list to get updates on latest project developments. Regards Allan Raymond FreeBMD Coordinator of Syndicates and Volunteer Coordinator

For latest news and information on Free UK Genealogy please visit http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/ When you are on the page don't forget to join the Free UK Genealogy mailing list to get updates on latest project developments. Regards Allan Raymond FreeBMD Coordinator of Syndicates and Volunteer Coordinator

We are looking for people who can help us improve our websites and test out some new ideas and provide feedback. Please check out http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/blog/2016/05/04/can-you-help-us-to-improve-our-websites/ for further details. If you require further information please use the contact at the bottom of http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/blog/2016/05/04/can-you-help-us-to-improve-our-websites/ . Regards Allan Raymond FreeBMD Coordinator of Syndicates

Unfortunately the following message has been delayed due to Rootsweb server being out of action for about two weeks until a couple of days ago. An update: The Trustees and I thank those who have already taken the time to comment on the agreement. As a result of feedback already received, we are considering making a number of changes. The Trustees will be meeting in mid-March to discuss a revised agreement and process. We will not be implementing this 'as is', but having a second phase of consultation, in which we hope to reach more past and present transcribers and others who may have copyright in FreeBMD and our other projects. We encourage everyone to look at the current version (http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/about/transcriber-agreement-consultation/), and provide their feedback by Sunday 13th March, so that we can make all the changes needed. Best wishes, Pat Dr Pat Reynolds Executive Director

Dear All Conference proceedings are now published here: http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/about/conference/ Updated FAQs: http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/about/transcriber-agreement-consultation/faq I will also be emailing and using social media to share these links. Many thanks Helena -- Helena Hyde Engagement Co-ordinator Free UK Genealogy | http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk Free UK Genealogy is a charity acting as an umbrella organisation for FreeBMD, FreeREG and FreeCEN. A charity registered in England and Wales, number 1096940

Just a reminder that Free UK Genealogy has a web home page at: http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/ This is where to go for strategic aspects of Free UK Genealogy Free UK Genealogy is the name of the registered charity comprising FreeBMD, FreeCEN and FreeREG Regards Allan Raymond FreeBMD Coordinator of Syndicates

Calling all FreeBMD transcribers, coordinators and other volunteers - registration to the Free UK Genealogy Open Data Conference is now open to all. Spaces are limited so if you haven't booked your place yet please visit https://freeukgenealogyconference.eventbrite.co.uk to reserve your place. Kind regards Helena HydeFree UK Genealogy Engagement Co-ordinator

Hi Quite correctly it is has been pointed out to me that not everyone is on or wishes to be on Facebook. You can gain access to the Free UK Genealogy page on easyfundraising, as follows. 1. Click on the easyfundraising link at: http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/ 2. Click the "Support a good cause" button 3. In the Cause Name box enter Free UK Genealogy 4. Click the "Support this cause" button against the entry for Free UK Genealogy 5. Create An Account and follow the instructions which subsequently appears. Regards Allan Raymond ----- Original Message ----- From: Allan Raymond To: FreeBMD-News-L@rootsweb.com Sent: Sunday, December 20, 2015 8:20 PM Subject: Donate to Free UK Genealogy via easyfundraising In case you missed the item on the Free UK Genealogy Facebook page. Did you know you could be collecting FREE donations for Free UK Genealogy (comprising FreeBMD, FreeCEN and FreeREG) every time you shop online via easyfundraising? There are nearly 3,000 retailers including Amazon, John Lewis, Aviva, thetrainline and Sainsbury's, who will donate a percentage of the amount you spend to Free UK Genealogy to say thank you for shopping with them and it won't cost you a penny. There are no catches or hidden charges and by shopping in this way, Free UK Genealogy will receive funds which will help keep our data available, free of charge. Please visit the Free UK Genealogy Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/freeukgen/ , look for the message 19 December 2015. Regards Allan Raymond FreeBMD Coordinator of Syndicates

In case you missed the item on the Free UK Genealogy Facebook page. Did you know you could be collecting FREE donations for Free UK Genealogy (comprising FreeBMD, FreeCEN and FreeREG) every time you shop online via easyfundraising? There are nearly 3,000 retailers including Amazon, John Lewis, Aviva, thetrainline and Sainsbury's, who will donate a percentage of the amount you spend to Free UK Genealogy to say thank you for shopping with them and it won't cost you a penny. There are no catches or hidden charges and by shopping in this way, Free UK Genealogy will receive funds which will help keep our data available, free of charge. Please visit the Free UK Genealogy Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/freeukgen/ , look for the message 19 December 2015. Regards Allan Raymond FreeBMD Coordinator of Syndicates

Just a reminder that Free UK Genealogy has a Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/freeukgen/ Free UK Genealogy is the name of the registered charity comprising FreeBMD, FreeCEN and FreeREG Regards Allan Raymond FreeBMD Coordinator of Syndicates

It's extremely pleasing to announce that following the FreeBMD database update on 21 February 2014 we passed a significant milestone by having a total of over *** 300 million records *** ( 300,035,559 to be precise) on FreeBMD. This is due to the outstanding efforts over the years from almost 12,000 transcribers supported by their Syndicate Coordinators. Our transcribers are currently working on years up to and including 1971. Many thanks to all who have contributed to our Project. Allan Raymond FreeBMD Coordinator of Syndicates

Hi, Following last weeks press release by Ancestry a lot of questions were raised about whether the data was on their free area or not. We made them aware of this and I am happy to say that they have issued a separate announcement in this week's Rootsweb Review. We hope that this clarifies the position and makes it clear that the FreeBMD data will not be charged for and is not part of the subscription services. Here is the full article from Rootsweb Review: ============================================== ACCESS TO FREEBMD DATABASES. An agreement has been reached with the producers of FreeBMD (Free Birth, Marriage and Deaths) to mirror its data and make it freely available online. The FreeBMD database is included in the free access area of Ancestry.com, plus FreeBMD continues to host the data on its site at http://freeBMD.rootsweb.com/ FreeBMD's mission is to provide free access, via the Internet, to the Civil Registration index for England and Wales. The Civil Registration system, which has been in place since 1837, is one of the most important sources of genealogical research for those researching English and Welsh lines. "We are very pleased to have our information available to the millions of people who pursue their family history through the free areas of the Ancestry.com service," said Graham Hart of FreeBMD. "As a volunteer effort, we are always eager to introduce more and more people to this wealth of information, which is often so vital to research into their families and the past" "FreeBMD's collection of data is recognized worldwide as a premier source for those tracing familial roots throughout England and Wales," said Andre Brummer at Ancestry. "Our pledge is to continue to recognize and support worthy volunteer efforts such as FreeBMD that make critical records freely available to the world." FreeBMD has grown to include more than 18 million entries made by more than 2,400 volunteers from all over the world. It was originally conceived in 1998 by a couple of genealogists and a computer programmer in order to make these valuable genealogical records more readily available and free of charge to researchers. Joined by a fourth genealogist on the core team, the project has evolved to include literally thousands of volunteer transcribers who share the original aim. Initially, permission was gained from the Office for National Statistics and Crown Copyright notice is acknowledged. FreeBMD information can be accessed at http://freeBMD.rootsweb.com, or via the new Ancestry.com offering at http://www.ancestry.com/search/rectype/vital/freebmd/main.htm ============================================================ Cheers Graham Graham Hart Camilla von Massenbach Dave Mayall Ben Laurie Corgi the transcribing duck Arnold the scanning stegosaurus

Hi, Ancestry have issued a press release announcing their New Data Collection for the UK and Ireland. (http://www.ancestry.com/library/view/news/articles/4741.asp) They now carry a copy of the FreeBMD database on their site. Access to the FreeBMD records on the Ancestry site is free. You have to join to gain access to some of their other data but this does NOT include the FreeBMD records. Ancestry continued the RootsWeb sponsorship of FreeBMD and we have always said they could take make the data searchable on their site as long as they meet our criteria ... i.e. it is available free on the Internet. As they are launching their new UK and Ireland section, they have taken up this offer and have put a copy of FreeBMD on their site. They are NOT allowed to make a charge for FreeBMD. We see this as positive in a number of ways: 1) Ancestry have sponsored us well in the past and this makes their commitment to the project that much greater. 2) People are now able to search on both the FreeBMD website or on Ancestry, thus releasing some of the pressure on the FreeBMD website. 3) Ancestry have a different search engine and more horsepower, so they can support a wider variety of queries than the FreeBMD site. We appreciate the concern that this has caused but would like to assure everyone that FreeBMD remains committed to putting the GRO indexes on the Internet and searchable for free. We will not allow anyone, and nor will the ONS from whom we have permission for the project, to put the FreeBMD data on the Internet and charge. Cheers Graham Hart Ben Laurie Dave Mayall Camilla von Massenbach Corgi the transcribing duck Arnold the scanning stegosaurus

Hi, I am sure a lot of you will have noticed that FreeBMD has been offline for the past week. This was caused by a hardware problem on one of the disks. After trying to fix the problem, we took the decision to restore to a new disk. It has taken us the past few days to get the new site up and running and to recreate the database. Unfortunately the database rebuild had problems and we have only got 5.1 million records in the database. The remaining records will be brought online and the expected time for that is next weekend. Note, that we had backups of the data and we have recovered all but the last few records uploaded. As a result of the problems with the upload, the search is giving strange results. 1) There are only 5.1 million records to search so you won't get as many hits at the moment. 2) The search is returning records in a strange order and is returning duplicates. Please do not email us about problems with the search, because we already know them ! :) Thanks for being patient while the system was down and please be patient for another few days :) Cheers Graham Graham Hart Camilla von Massenbach Dave Mayall Ben Laurie

TEN MILLION REASONS TO VISIT FREEBMD Details of 10 million English and Welsh births, marriages and deaths are now available for free on the Internet. FreeBMD, the world’s biggest family history project is celebrating having passed the 10 million milestone in its bid to transcribe the indexes of births, marriages and deaths between 1837 and 1900 and make them available in a free, easily searchable internet database. The project is being carried out by a world-wide group of more than 1550 volunteers and now gives anyone whose ancestors birth, marriage or death was listed between those dates a one in ten chance of finding them. Searchers all over the world have praised the site, saying it has helped them find ancestors without spending hours trawling patiently through records and every day a further 58,000 records are added. Searches can be made for all entries of a particular name or narrowed to include a certain range of years, type of event or area or county. The database also includes a wildcard option so someone searching for a particular name can also pull up variants. Despite the celebrations, more volunteers are still needed to speed up the rate at which entries can be made available. The majority of the 10 million entries have been transcribed in about a year which means that unless more volunteers are found, the project could take another ten years to complete. Volunteers only need a computer with internet access and some spare time, and the project is ideal for one-finger typists! Details of how to get the best from a search and how to volunteer are included on the FreeBMD website which can be found at http://FreeBMD.rootsweb.com . FreeBMD would like to acknowledge the generous assistance of rootsweb.com and ancestry.com, without which this project would not have been possible. ENDS -- Dave Mayall

Hello, In September, we proudly annouced FreeBMD reaching the three million mark. The current database update contains over five and a half million records. This works out at over 20,000 records per day on average since September, more than one every five seconds. Recently, an amazing 40,000 records have been reaching FreeBMD every day. Every expectation and target is broken. Enthusiastic volunteers have supported us and enabled FreeBMD to grow and accommodate our ever growing force of transcribers. The web site has been reorganised; the syndicate organisers have been provided with extra support and advice; the transcribers with an indispensible and authoritative Knowledge Base; new (and old but maybe less seasoned) transcribers with personalised help and troubleshooting; database support functions have been programmed and improved; information and background to the registration districts incorporated; massive amounts of scanning, printing and distributing of records has occurred; circulars have been written and sent out across the mailing list universe; and lastly, but most importantly, volunteers have worked for half an hour or more per week transcribing and uploading their efforts to FreeBMD at RootsWeb. Finally, two of our volunteers, Roy Jennion and John Pain have managed to secure a complete set of film, all events, 1837-1900. Ancestry have kindly sponsored its purchase. All we need to do now is to figure out how to scan all that stuff as quickly as you are transcribing it! If you know someone who can spare half an hour a week and some finger power, please point them at the web site http://FreeBMD.RootsWeb.com We only have another 95 million odd records to go..... Best wishes Camilla Ben Graham Dave FreeBMD is transcribing the birth, marriage and death indexes of England and Wales 1837-1900 and placing the searchable database on the Web for free access.

We would also like to thank Elinor Wood, Allan Raymond and Dave Mayall, in particular, for their efforts. By the way, we hit 4 million records today too. Thank you to all our volunteers - all 700 odd of you (at latest count). Cheers Camilla ------- Forwarded message follows ------- From: "Allan Raymond" <allan_raymond@btinternet.com> Hi All, We are very pleased to let everyone know that we have just gone live with our new look FreeBMD Web Site at http://freebmd.rootsweb.com/ Simplicity has been uppermost in our thoughts when revamping the site and we have attempted to make it far more user friendly and hopefully it takes into account the comments from our volunteers. We will be looking at all the associated FreeBMD web pages over the next couple of weeks to standardise them to a common format. And importantly, if you have bookmarked any of the FreeBMD pages there is a possibility these may not work with the new look site.You may therefore need to create new bookmarks. Our special thanks to Dave Mayall for driving forward all the work on the new site and taking on board the continual changes which we requested during the testing process. We welcome your comments on the new site. Allan Raymond ==== FreeBMD-Admins Mailing List ==== FreeBMD - http://FreeBMD.rootsweb.com ============================== Shop Ancestry - Everything you need to Discover, Preserve & Celebrate your heritage! http://shop.myfamily.com/ancestrycatalog ------- End of forwarded message ------- -- Camilla Gemmingen von Massenbach Email: camilla@algroup.co.uk FreeBMD co-founder http://FreeBMD.RootsWeb.com/ IIGS member http://www.iigs.org/ Personal site: http://www.links.org/surnames.htm

Hello, The FreeBMD database has now reached the 3 million entry mark. Congratulations and well done to all the FreeBMD volunteers! Than you everyone who has helped, in particular, with providing source to transcribers. Volunteers have been sending out fiche (often bought especially), printing out hard copy and sending that out as well as those who have been involved with scanning. Thanks are due to Darryl Bonk, in Canada, who has been scanning for the project. We have now uploaded 15 quarters of marriage entries which he's scanned. Thanks are also due to Ancestry who will be scanning the film which they've bought for the project. The first 6 films have now arrived here in London. Between them so far, they alone, have provided upwards of 4 million entries which are just itching to be transcribed. Meanwhile, in London, volunteers have been helping scan entries using the scanner bought by RootsWeb. We would like to thank, in no particular order, David Marshall, Mark and Chris Pepall, Colin Tuckley and Jo-Maree Courtney. (I now have a terrible feeling I may have forgotten someone here.) If anyone else would like to help out scanning here, please contact us. We would also like to introduce and thank Elinor Wood and Allan Raymond who are coordinating new volunteers and syndicates respectively. The recent upsurge in volunteers is largely due to their efforts. Best wishes Camilla Ben Graham -- Camilla Gemmingen von Massenbach Email: camilla@algroup.co.uk FreeBMD co-Leader http://FreeBMD.RootsWeb.com/ IIGS member http://www.iigs.org/ Personal site: http://www.links.org/surnames.htm