Hello List. The following is an old email I received. It was my understanding that Roots Web was now a part of Ancestry.com unless something happened after this email was sent. Any comments would be appreciated. Lois >From: RootsWeb-Announce@rootsweb.com >To: RootsWeb-Announce@rootsweb.com >Subject: Good News, Bad News, Good News: The Merger of RootsWeb and >MyFamily.com >Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2000 05:09:28 -0700 > >Good News, Bad News, Good News: The Merger of RootsWeb and MyFamily.com > >Good news: You, our users, have helped create at RootsWeb one of the >largest and most popular sites on the Internet. In May, we had over >149 million page views (according to Nielsen NetRatings combined home >and work statistics), sent over 155 million e-mails, and handled over >two million downloads of files from the various archives hosted at >RootsWeb. Everyone, take a bow! This is an incredible community of >genealogists, and the advances we're all making in our research due to >the sharing that occurs here is unprecedented. > >Bad news: The more popular RootsWeb becomes, the more costly it is to >simply stay alive and online. Expenses continue to exceed revenue. >We ran up a truly scary loss last year. Without outside help, it's >not clear how long we'd be able to go on like this. > >Good news: MyFamily.com (you may know them better as Ancestry.com) >recognizes the importance of the genealogical community that has grown >here at RootsWeb, and wants that community to continue to thrive. >They're excited to provide the financial stability we need to ensure >RootsWeb will be around for years to come. > >Brian and I are pleased by Ancestry.com's coming involvement with >RootsWeb. Now we can all focus on helping each other on the mailing >lists and message boards, uploading our GEDCOMs, and building Web >pages to share our research. > >Better news: As a special thank you to those of you who have helped >make RootsWeb such a vibrant Internet community, Ancestry.com is >making the following offer: > > You are invited to visit Ancestry.com today and sign up for a FREE > 14-day trial with no obligation. You'll gain full access to all 600 > million names in more than 2,500 databases. Go to the following address > to begin your free trial now: > > http://ancestry.com/subscribe/subscribetrialx.asp?sourcecode=G11BA > <http://ancestry.com/subscribe/subscribetrialx.asp?sourcecode=G11BA> > > You must activate your FREE trial by July 5, 2000. > >More good news: No one is going to charge you to use RootsWeb. You'll >still find RootsWeb at www.RootsWeb.com. Everything you're used to >using will still be here: the 19,000 mailing lists, the hundreds >of millions of names in free genealogy databases, the interactive >learning guides, the weekly RootsWeb Review and Missing Links, >the numerous tools for tracing your family history, the tens of thousands >of message boards, the thousands of independently authored web sites. >RootsWeb will still support worthy genealogy projects and societies, >such as the USGenWeb Project (www.USGenWeb.org), the Immigrant Ships >Transcribers Guild (ISTG.rootsweb.com) and the FreeBMD Project >(FreeBMD.rootsweb.com), and other groups that provide free >genealogical resources. > >And don't worry, you won't be charged to access RootsWeb. No one >will put your data on CD without your permission. Our Privacy Policy >(http://www.rootsweb.com/rootsweb/pledge.html) and our Acceptable User >Policy (http://www.rootsweb.com/rootsweb/aup.html) are unchanged. >Other promises made over the years will continue to be honored. You'll >still deal with the same RootsWeb volunteers and employees. In >fact, most users won't notice any changes, except exciting new tools, >more content, and better genealogical resources. > >If you would like more information, please check out our >official press release at > > http://www.ancestry.com/home/celebrate/rootsrelease.htm > >Thanks again for your support! Now, let's go figure out where >great-great-grandpa really came from, before that UFO deposited him in >rural Indiana in 1848... > >Karen > _________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com. Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at http://profiles.msn.com.