*For Now
I should lead by saying that this decision kills me. I have been a happy customer of Ancestry for years now, and I don’t have one complaint with them. Still, I have my reasons, and it’s not just about the price tag.
1. I have a LOT of findings to sort.
Let me show you something real quick.
See that “Transcribed” folder there? See how it’s empty? Or how about that “153 items” in the lower corner? I find joy in the discovery… not so much the organizational side of things. And the kicker — I have a ton of folders that look like this one. This is the research equivalent to being told, “Finish what’s on your plate first.”
2. Deadlines are great motivators.
There are databases on Ancestry that I’ve put off exploring, so deep and wide are their cavernous depths. I tell myself, “When I finish this or that project, then I’ll look at them.” You can see how well that’s working under reason #1. Maybe if I looked at my subscription as having a deadline, I would jump in there and glean what I can from their awesome pile of resources.
3. You don’t grow by staying in one place.
Continuous access to Ancestry, in a weird way, has hampered my growth as an amateur genealogist. I’ve gotten lazy, and I realized this last year when I discovered first Familysearch, and then fultonhistory.com with its massive collection of New York State newspapers. Happy as I was for awesome new resources, I couldn’t curb the disquieting feeling, “Why wasn’t I aware of this?” How about RootsIreland.ie? There’s also the fact that there are actually great GenWeb sites for some of the most important counties to my research. Finally, you can’t motivate yourself toward a GENEALOGY ROAD TRIP (insert geek-out moment here!) by being happy with what you’ve got.
4. I don’t know what I might need next.
As you know if you’ve been hanging out with me lately, I’m trying to finish my novel. What you might not know is that I’m already pumped about the next one. I have an exciting little baby idealet for a new historical mystery, and while Ancestry has been a great resource this time, I don’t know yet what resources will be most helpful for the next book. I need to reserve some room in the budget for those yet-unknown needs.
5. Okay, so maybe it is about the price tag, a little.
I think Ancestry is a fantastic value, don’t get me wrong. Like I said at the start of this post: I’m a happy customer — and will definitely re-subscribe when the time is right. However, I mentioned RootsIreland.ie … and I’m getting awfully curious about Archive.org. Also, I’ve been wondering what’s new at Newspaperarchive.com since I cancelled a month-to-month subscription a couple years ago. Not to mention my other interests — like finally joining American Christian Fiction Writers this year, and maybe attending a writers’ conference or two.
It all comes down to priorities, and making wise choices.
Sigh. That doesn’t make it easy, though.
Question for you: What’s your favorite web resource? (Free or paid, genealogy-related or not!)
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P.S. The winner of last week’s giveaway is: Linda Arthur Tejera! Congratulations!
Updated 4/18/2013: A lot of people seem to find this post by searching for Ancestry.com subscription rates. If that’s you, you’ll find them here. Thanks for stopping by, and hope you’ll visit again! (As noted above, my only affiliation with Ancestry.com is that of a happy customer. Completely free-will linkage.)
Good Luck with all the projects that you have on your plate. If you ever need me to look up something for you let me know I will be more than happy to do it for you.
Take Care.
Jose
Thanks Jose! I think the “too-many-projects” is more a personality quirk than anything else — I’ll always have more kettles than burners! Really appreciate the offer. I still have a few months left to go, but I may take you up on it after that.
Amen sister…I am so overloaded with “leaves” that I took a 6 month break. It really is like a soap opera…you can be away for quite a while, and then just pick back up where you left off without missing too much
I have thousands of leaves. You will never catch up. Once you accept one, the multiple exponentially. I’ve actually seen this happen. My solution, just ignore them.
Yep, I mostly just ignore the leaves. I wish I could turn off the hints just for other people’s trees. Not that I don’t enjoy looking at them, but I don’t import other people’s work. Maybe there is a way and I just don’t know it…
You are right about the priorities! I don’t know what my favorite one is but I do depend on Ancestry, Newspaper Archive, FamilySearch and NEHGS quite a bit.
If anyone figures out a good place to look at Indianapolis newspapers, I am looking!
I became a genealogy hobbyist a year ago. Despite the cost, I bought a subscription to ancestry.com to jump-start my research. I want to put all the information gleaned onto software that I have but, gosh, ancestry.com just makes research and citing too easy! Instead of using the software on my computer, I continue to fill my ancestry.com tree. But, at the very least, I recognize the need to move on, so there is that light at the end of my tunnel.
I am working on becoming certified but I know what you mean. I need to find another way to document and keep track of the family. Ancestry is easy but it makes us lazy.
I’ve been using the Family Tree Maker software on my computer instead of putting it on Ancestry. It was a little extra effort (especially due to the learning curve.. I have definitely duplicated some of my work) but I’m happy with my set-up now, although I am in need of an upgrade to the latest version.
Oooh… tell me about NEHGS… I just went to their site and nosed around a little. What do you feel are its main benefits?
I have a lot of New England research so they have many databases directly related to New England. You also get access to The Register, the magazine they have been publishing since the 1850s. It has lots of scholarly reports and data extractions. There is also The Great Migration project. They are researching everyone who ended up in New England in the years 1620-1635.
Years ago I purchased a year’s subscription to Ancestry (it was also about 1/3 of its current cost). I did get a lot of information but I think because I was so new at online genealogy that I missed out on a lot. This past December, I signed up for their two-week free trial. Man, I went crazy with all those dangling leaves. I ended up adding a one-month subscription (costly) and was still adding information. At the end of the month I decided there are so many free sites that I need to find and/or review. So that’s what I’m doing now. Rootsweb, GenWeb, FamilySearch, etc. Granted it doesn’t seem to be as fast or as “easy” as Ancestry but for now I think I just need to see what I’ve actually collected so far and save some money!
I think you’re finding exactly what I mean. If I didn’t have ready access to searchable databases, I’d have to go digging a bit more! I’ll admit, at first browsing images that weren’t indexed at FamilySearch seemed so hard, but I think I must have learned some patience. I do need to be better about tracking what I’ve already looked at though. No sense wasting time in the same resources just because I can’t remember that I already checked them.
Nice post! I paid for a subscription at geneanet.org. I find ancestry way too expensive.
I love the website France GenWeb wich provide for free loads of different data bases.
But I still prefer searching myself in the old records books! I research essentially in France and 90% of parrish and civil records are online for free
Romain
Hi Romain! Ancestry is expensive, particularly if you’re more interested in a very focused location as you are. I don’t often get to look in the physical record books — too far away — but it’s always exciting when I do get those opportunities. 90% free online just blows my mind, and wouldn’t you know, I don’t think I have so much as one French in-law in my whole tree. Jealous!
As for me, I’ve got lots of Germans, lots of Irish, a handful of English and one Greek.
Dear Brandy,
Well if one day you find some french roots, let me know and I will guide you through the records
Kind regards
Romain
Thanks!