Even if you are standing in the state archives with the original on the desk in front of you? There are numerous errors in transcription and reading. More than a few generations back for most written records were produced without prior written documentation. Certificates of Baptism were not given out for free.
For more modern times, family history tools can provide invaluable. It’s one way some of those who have been disconnected can reconnect if the choose.
The DNA options assist in identifying or confirming connections. For tools such as Ancestry to be most useful, it’s argued a degree of sharing is required. Gedcom has a similar outlook. The security of this data is important for many reasons.
I’m uncertain concerning the risks of electoral roll data matching. These records reveal household details of those still living and most often closely related. Ancestry has found a way to identify and suggest records from the rolls for recent residences! Some families stay at the one place for more than a single generation.
This is like doing detective puzzles combined with really hard huge jigsaws. Some people just love that kind of logical, combinatorial puzzle. For myself, it’s a view into history, where you came from and the lives that those people lived.
We are wandering off topic here but one more observation; it lets you check family stories, some turn out to be polite fabrications, some are Chinese whispers where the real story got lost in transfer but some really weird and wonderful stuff turns out to be true. Things you would think are so unlikely that if you read them in a fictional historical saga you would mock the author for being absurd have happened to my ancestors or been performed by them.
I’d always thought finding a convict in the family history elevated your status? No such luck here, although at least one predecessor was well acquainted with the Government accommodation provided at East Maitland. @SueW will know what I’m suggesting. Moving interstate seemed to resolve any outstanding issues.
There are limits to how much we are prepared to share in public these days. Each generation appears to have seen privacy in different ways. Being recognised for achievement and success is often one of the few threads of family history left from prior centuries. Or not so commendable achievements in my one example. Compared with how business and life is transacted today, historically there was a different perception of the benefits/risk associated with public revelation. My view/interpretation.
What we have not discussed is how do we best share our more recent family history? Can it be in a way that does not risk the security or privacy of the immediate and near members of the family? Some relatives may be happy to share content, others as per @SueW example of one Aunt may prefer a selective (Edited) edition. Or in the instance of another I know, to bypass the significant numbers of illegitimate or adoptive relationships. One persons desire for identity vs another’s for secrecy. It’s a sad part of our social history, although not always with unhappy endings.
I recognise this is a slightly different take on this topic. There are those who have relied on exploiting the publicly available records to trace near relatives, in the hope of establishing their true identity. It’s apparently getting easier, but not everyone may agree with the intrusion or outcomes.
For some groups, it’s more than a hobby. Ancestry.com is not owned by the Mormons ( the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or LDS ), but I’m guessing would be used extensively by many.
Thats pretty much what I had to do. Interestingly (still remaining off topic, really) my father told his family of my existence, and apparently wanted me… but my mother told him nothing except i was born, my gender, and that I was to be adopted, and then after that they had nothing more to do with each other. So when I turned up for that side of the family, they were excited and eager to meet me (except for one of the half brothers who wants nothing to do with me - his loss, IMO)… on mother’s side, they had NO idea. None at all. I was “found” by my cousin’s wife as she was doing some research for him on the family at her local library. She sent a letter via snail mail to every instance of someone with my name in NSW, and we eventually talked on the phone and I met with them in Sydney. Delightful people, who knew my mother really well, loved her to bits, and was able to give me photographs. I was satisfied after that and didnt need to do more searching, though I am more and more curious because thats where my aboriginality comes from, and she seems to have gone to great lengths to deny hers. A sign of those times, I guess (1950).
I’m lucky, really, all those rellies could have been ferals.
When we drove to the Cairns Airport today to pickup the grandkids, my mobile beeped after receiving a text message.
I checked it when we got home and it was the nice people at Telstra advising me that they can provide great rates overseas, even if no one can travel internationally, but I guess that it is the thought that counts.
It’s all part of the agreement to help Telstra improve the consumer experience. If only they were as helpful when I need to bend over after dropping the phone on the floor?
Don’t talk about our politicians like that! Or did you have someone else in mind?
When I was younger I was very much against all these terrible things other countries do. Over the years, I have learned a few of the things our own does - and while we may not be down in the gutter with the worst of them we can be pretty awful. And our closest ally is definitely in that gutter, while preaching lengthy sermons about the sins of others.
As a ‘middle power’ Australia is to some extent able to avoid employing some of the dirtier tricks used by ‘great powers’ to hold and extend their reach. 'twere hypocritical, though, to ignore the fact that allies as well as enemies employ such tools equally against ‘friend’ and ‘foe’. Be it China, the US or Russia, they all employ similar methods to get ‘the job’ done whether political, military or economic.
I wouldn’t be surprised that Australia conducted espionage in China, very likely we do (“we” used to mean as a Country and not us personally). East Timor should be enough of a Litmus test of our willingness to carry out such activities and when we get caught doing so we figuratively try to hang not only the whistleblowers but their legal counsel as well. Are we spying elsewhere, do we conduct cyber-warfare, my honest opinion but no proof of such is that we would & we are and I know we have proof that we have in the past because East Timor proves that.
Lying? I don’t think they are doing that but it is certainly a bit of the pot calling the kettle black.
I wouldn’t be surprised either. It could be Australia directly or one of the other 5 eyes which share information with Australia.
Australia would also be monitoring interest of other countries in the South Pacific as well…to protect its own interests.
What I can say is if the photo of the compass, Shanghai (?) metro map and some currency is proof of spying, either Australia’s spy agencies live in the dark ages or the Australians were caught red handed maybe 100-150 years ago and managed to work out Shanghai metro system well in advance of the Chinese. Either that or I used to spy before modern smart technology was invented when I travelled.
The articles are about internal Chinese politics and Australia shouldn’t humour the Chinese by responding.
It’s not like I would trust anything coming out of China but how do you know they are lying? Unless you work for an Australian overseas intelligence service, how would you know that Australia is not conducting espionage in China? I surely don’t know. Maybe they are. Maybe they aren’t.
The real objection is that this is whataboutism from China. Whether Australia is or is not conducting espionage in no way changes the truth or otherwise of the claim that China is conducting wholesale cyber intrusions in Australia.
One thing is clear … China is taking a much more aggressive line with Australia, regarding a whole range of issues - and we should be firewalling ourselves, economically and network-wise.
This is called desinofication.
It is worse than that. We disappear the whistleblower (secret charges, secret evidence, secret trial, secret conviction, secret imprisonment - what’s not to like?), and conduct ongoing prosecution against the legal counsel.
Maybe we have more in common with China than we would care to admit.
Now coming back to haunt the entire world … in the US an Ass Act (aka a Backdoor Act, more correctly known as the Assistance and Access Act, in Australia) has just been introduced into the Congress.
US commentators are blaming, mostly, Australia.
This matters as this will affect all global US tech giants (like Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook) and while in theory the US Ass Act will only affect services, software and hardware used in the US, it is conceivable maybe even probable that tech companies won’t bother to produce a specific insecure version of the product or service for the US market. Hence the US backdoor will probably apply everywhere in the world, including of course in Australia.
Presumably you are referring to the ‘Earn IT’ Act, a piece of legislative distraction that requires platforms containing user-generated content to meet government specifications (so far undefined, but almost certainly abolishing end-to-end encryption) in order to not be liable for the content generated by their users.
I was not aware that Australia was being blamed for this, I thought the US AG was on the nose.
One wonders how platforms such as Signal can continue to operate in Australia.
Okay, I am now officially terrified. Given that legislators tend not to have a clue about technology and tend to want all the datas, this kind of thing is likely to get passed by the US Parliament in this or the next presidential term. (It may be delayed by Democrats who don’t trust the current president or AG, but that will only be temporary.)
Whether either bill survives constitutional challenge is another matter.
that I am referring to the next paver on the road to hell.