> Subject: Clarification > Date: Sun, 07 May 2000 19:00:26 -0500 > From: "Norma F. Jennings" <njennings@lisco.net> > To: IALOUISA-L@rootsweb.com > > I must apologize to our list members for my negligence in monitoring the > list. I have been so busy working on our own Cemetery Database that I > did not realize that our list was being used for a "paid Ancestry.Com > project". It really isn't fair to Rootsweb to take advantage of their > generosity in providing this list to our subscribers free of charge so > their competitors can profit. Since Ancestry will undoubtedly charge > for the use of this material at some later date, I must ask that this > list not be used in the future to help promote a project for any of > Rootsweb's competitors. The data I sold was sold over a YEAR ago for less than $300. More money than that has been spent making copies of Rosters, pension records, tombstone photos and other items which have been used to research data which has been made available for FREE via my website and the links to the Louisa Co site. The only reason the data was sold to anyone prior to the hard copy versions being made available FOR FREE to the area GS's is that I am on a fixed income and the only way I could afford to continue the research was to have money for postage, copies, etc. The same data that was copied has also been used to clarify tombstone transcriptions and other information which has been FREELY distributed to visitors of the sites and mailing list. I further have done a ton of lookups for folks who wrote to me from the list and looked up relatives for them-finding several for folks. I do apologise for going off on the list but the whole thing seems so PETTY under the circumstances. I will gladly continue to check the database for anyone on this list who emails me FREE OF CHARGE, as I have always done. > This really has nothing to do with what we do > for one another and I hope everyone will continue to help each other in > researching their roots. > When you unlink from 40+ cemetery transcriptions , it DOES have a great deal to do with what we do for one another. It makes things much harder for people researching the area to find the folks they seek and breaks up a unity that has been working between the respective websites since 1997. > > > To avoid any conflict of interests, our cemetery listings no longer are > linked to any other counties, but consist only of those researched and > prepared by our own members. > We will eventually have all the cemeteries on line thanks to Len Bowen's > initial efforts in scanning all available published data into an Access > database plus the contributions of several other members in trying to > verify and correct any and/all errors possible. Breaking this down into > usable on line files is now a monumental task but it will happen. > Initially, with an index to the existing cemetery book, and eventually, > the corrected and additional entries found and added to the database. > While this will be a useful resource, I still encourage you, whenever > possible, to seek out the original source. > We are all human and make mistakes. And mine was that I needed money to continue a project that will, in the end, benefit far more people than those on this list. I apologise to any of you who felt somehow taken advantage of but I was quite up front about how I had financed the project to try to locate 75,000+ burials. Several of you wrote AFTER the big to do happened on the list and submitted even more soldiers, leading me to believe it is a very small number of people who are making a very big thing out of the situation. I am pleased that many of you see the BIG picture. > > > I do utilize various resources on the Internet and I have no problem > with you helping others by pointing out where these resources are, but > we should remain loyal to Rootsweb when we are using the resources they > have provided for us and not use this list for our own profit or that of > a competitor. I am a very loyal supporter of Rootsweb and have stood up for it HUNDREDS of times when various US GenWeb Project folks have badmouthed it into the ground. I am making ZERO profit from the research (I have spent, in the past two years, close to $1700 (not counting the $600 my aunt spent on airfare, gasoline to walk cemeteries all over Iowa) on the project and received for the data I sold $261....PLEASE show me the profit!!). I have not sold any database which was contributed for free use on my website and have spent HUNDREDS of hours identifying soldiers units, death dates, birth dates, places of burial, etc. and adding it to the cemetery listings on my site as it is found. There is no charge to see it there. > What seems like a minor incident, if allowed, could lead to more prolific usage > in the future. I apologize and hope we can all > move on to more constructive issues. Sorry, folks, but I have to follow the > rules, too. > And I should never have allowed this to happen. > > Listowner > Norma Jennings There is no rule in the rootsweb list policy which states how one must use research done through their lists. This is Norma's rule and the LCGS's rule , apparently unpublished until now. Had I known they HAD such a rule on this list I would not have asked here for help with the project. Any one of you who has posted a query on this list and has subsequently published a book for your family reunion or of your genealogy and has charged for it, has done exactly the same thing I did--attempted to defray the cost of gathering data so you could share it with others. If you have ever gotten a piece of data from the list and then submitted your tree to World Family Tree, your data has been sold to others via Family Tree Maker.com I could have been sneaky like some other folks Norma and I are both WELL acquainted with and just not mentioned what I wanted the data for, but I was up front and honest in that while the ancestry.com part of it did exist, it is not the primary focus of the project. In fact, it is a very small part of the project. All someone had to do was write me an email saying "we'd rather you didn't ask for help with the project on the list" and that would have been the end of it. Instead, we now have several years Norma and I have worked TOGETHER to build a great coverage of cemetery data GONE because I dared to "color outside of the lines" in order to try to do a project that would benefit many more people than will ever see this mailing list or our web pages. There were over 75,000 men serving in the Civil War from Iowa, and hundreds of others from other states who died and were buried in Iowa. Louisa County is but a minute fraction of those men. The overall goal of the project is to locate them all, or as many as possible, and see to it that their gravestones are properly in place and in good condition (through the Veteran's Administration). It is truly sad that some are more concerned about the small picture than the big one. Long after these mailing lists and websites are gone, there will still be libraries where hopefully your great great great grandchildren will find the volumes of the Iowa Civil War Burials and be thankful that someone cared about their ancestors. Once again, I apologise for causing a problem with my project. The goal was to SOLVE a problem, not to cause one. I do hope the LCGS and Norma will reconsider the removal of the links to the Muscatine Co cemeteries at my website as a service to the RESEARCHERS this list is in place to assist. I see no purpose in roadblocking data.