Beginning March 2nd, 2020 the Mailing Lists functionality on RootsWeb will be discontinued. Users will no longer be able to send outgoing emails or accept incoming emails. Additionally, administration tools will no longer be available to list administrators and mailing lists will be put into an archival state.
Administrators may save the emails in their list prior to March 2nd. After that, mailing list archives will remain available and searchable on RootsWeb
The new search engine server is now online and can operate at the
speed of a full T1 connection.
Courtesy of hacks by Dale Schneider, you can search the USGenWeb
Archives, now with *headlines* and *updated* to within the last 24
hours, at:
http://www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/ussearch.htm
Courtesy of hacks by Karen Isaacson, you can search the archives of
any mailing list (except those withdrawn by the listowner), now with
nicer *formats* and *updated* to within the last 24 hours, at:
http://searches.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/listsearch.pl
I'd also like to explicitly thank the folks who provided the
resources that have made this new facility possible:
o RootsWeb's Patrons, Donors, Sponsors, and Members.
o Palladium Interactive, developers of the Ultimate
Family Tree software for genealogists.
Folks interested in helping RootsWeb provide new facilities can
become Members by using the Web form at:
http://www.rootsweb.com/rootsweb/how-to-subscribe.html
By the way, the next server we'll be bringing online will be a box
dedicated to supporting Marc Nozell's HTMLized versions of the
mailing list archives. We should have that box online within 48
hours, though it's reasonable to expect Marc to need a little time
after that to get his software installed. (:
Projects after that include a dedicated IRC server, upgrading the
mail hub, upgrading the main Web server, building a NT-based
FrontPage server, bringing a "dirtylists" list server online, and
bringing a third ordinary list server online.
[ The "dirtylists" server is for the big, rarely used announcement
lists. We've developed a number of those things with 5,000 to
300,000 subscribers, and every time a post drops we kick the
daylights out of the list server with hundreds or even thousands of
bounces. We need a specially tuned box to handle these turkeys. ]
No rest for the wicked, I suppose ... Cheers, B.
--
Dr. Brian Leverich Co-moderator, soc.genealogy.methods/GENMTD-L
RootsWeb Genealogical Data Cooperative http://www.rootsweb.com/
P.O. Box 6798, Frazier Park, CA 93222-6798 leverich(a)rootsweb.com
Dear folks,
Forgive this lengthy message but this is probably the most important
"business" announcement I have made thus far.
Whether you are now to this list or have been around a while, you probably
realize that providing all the material and services has a cost. Since the
beginning of RootsWeb, the cost, both in time and financial resources, have
been borne exclusively by Dr. Brian Leverich and Karen Isaacson, as well as
the donations that list owner sponsors, members, and users have provided..
The costs have been significant and with exponential growth in the past
year, it appeared that unless more resources could be developed, RootsWeb
was going to reach a very critical stage.
I am very pleased to announce that the help that has been needed has been
forthcoming. Palladium Interactive, the owner of Roots IV genealogical
software, has signed on as a corporate sponsor. To allay any fears about
this relationship, I am attaching a message from Dr. Brian Leverich and Tim
Pierce, sysadmin.
--Derick
---------------------------------------------------
Dear RootsWeb Community,
On 1 April 1998, Palladium Interactive reinforced the contributions of
thousands of individual genealogists by becoming the sole commercial sponsor
of the oldest and largest Internet genealogical resource: the RootsWeb
Genealogical Data Cooperative.
An *extremely* important aspect of the sponsorship is that Palladium's
commitment to RootsWeb goes far beyond simple financial support: Palladium
and RootsWeb will work together to develop an exciting new generation of
tools linking individual genealogists' lineage databases to the myriad data
resources on the Internet.
Palladium Interactive is the creator of the Ultimate Family Tree software
for genealogists, the only genealogical software that can be used by novices
but provides all the capabilities that experienced genealogists need. UFT
itself has a distinguished lineage, being descended the widely-acclaimed
Roots III and Roots IV software packages that defined professional-grade
genealogical software more than a decade ago.
Rootsweb also traces its origins back more than a decade to the founding of
the ROOTS-L mailing list and the Roots Surname List query system. Now with
more than 300,000 users, RootsWeb currently hosts more than 2,500
genealogical Websites and more than 3,100 mailing lists dedicated to surname
and locality research. The hosted Websites include:
* the Roots Surname List, which now includes 404,000 submissions
from 55,000 genealogists
* 40 of the 50 USGenWeb state pages and a large majority of the
3,100 county pages
* the USGenWebArchives with hundreds of megabytes of searchable data
* and hundreds of other resources
Besides ROOTS-L, RootsWeb also hosts 3,100+ other mailing lists dedicated to
the discussion of specific surnames, ethnic groups, and geographic
localities. RootsWeb's Web servers handle 1,000,000+ Web "hits" each day,
and RootsWeb's list servers allow genealogists to exchange 3,000,000+ pieces
of e-mail each day.
While RootsWeb has historically been supported by thousands of individual
contributors and while individual contributions will remain RootsWeb's
mainstay, Palladium's contribution provides RootsWeb with the ability to
substantially increase the range of resources freely available to Internet
genealogists.
For example, the first two months of Palladium's sponsorship have allowed us
to add:
* A new search engine server, which has immediately made the
equivalent of 500,000 new pages of data searchable by Internet
genealogists and which will allow us to upload another 4,000,000
pages in the near future.
* A new high-capacity router, that will increase from 2,000 to 5,000
the number of genealogists who can simultaneously be use RootsWeb.
* A new mailing list archive server, which will enable genealogists
to conveniently scan the archived posts of our 3,100 mailing using
their Web browsers.
In addition to the immediate, tangible benefits of Palladium's sponsorship,
RootsWeb believes that the joint Palladium-RootsWeb software development
projects will provide much, much greater benefits to the genealogical
community. Over time we expect to see the seamless integration of Ultimate
Family Tree with the burgeoning genealogical resources on the Internet,
allowing even novice users to easily find Internet Websites, mailing lists,
and databases where they can extend and refine their understanding of their
family's history.
On behalf of the million members of the Internet genealogical community,
RootsWeb thanks Palladium for their contributions to the near-term needs and
long-term advancement of our community.
Sincerely,
Dr. Brian Leverich
-----------------------------------------------------------------
So there's the official story. As to some of the concerns that have begun
to float around:
WILL MANDATORY FEES BE IMPOSED ON LIST SUBSCRIBERS?
----------------------
No. RootsWeb is free: it is a resource provided free of charge to the
general genealogical community. Period.
Some people have expressed worry about the phrase ``services at minimal
cost'' in Brian's letter. Minimal means zero: we will not charge
across-the-board fees to subscribe to mailing lists or run archive searches.
The reason that for emphasizing ``minimal cost'' rather than ``no cost'' is
to remind people that running RootsWeb does cost real money, and we want to
encourage as many people as possible to become RootsWeb Members and Sponsors.
DOES THIS MEAN THAT UFT OWNS MY MAILING LIST OR MY DATA?
---------------------
No. Absolutely not.
Palladium's sponsorship has *no* effect whatever on RootsWeb's relationship
with the listowners or list subscribers. The terms of the sponsorship are
limited to underwriting the cost of RootsWeb operating expenses, and funding
new research projects. There is no way that RootsWeb would enter into a
commercial partnership that would involve taking away your rights as
genealogists, listowners and RootsWeb sponsors.
RootsWeb's chief source of funding is still from individual subscriptions.
That's how Brian and Karen prefer things: it means keeping people our
highest priority, and it's the best way to avoid compromising your interests
in favor of some nameless corporate machine. The goal here is to augment
our main financial support with a healthy partnership to produce some really
powerful genealogical tools.
Regards,
Tim Pierce
RootsWeb Genealogical Data Cooperative
volunteer sysadmin and general hacker