From: "margaret greer" <margogreer1(a)msn.com>
To: ENG-LIVERPOOL-L(a)rootsweb.com
Date: Tue, 26 Nov 2002 13:04:31 -0000
Subject: Re: [ENG-LIV] GRO indexs
I am also a BMD transcriber and find most of the assigned GRO index pages
very easy to read, however if anyone has tried to read the early
handwritten pages, they will know how difficult these are.
If the scanned pages online contain errors, then so too, do those in
public libraries etc
Surely, if this company setting up the GRO Index online, do not have
Crown copyright permission from the ONCS, then the data on the site will
be illegal. In order to carry out such a vast undertaking ie. scanning
all of the indices from 1837 to 1984, someone at the ONCS must have known
about it! Where did they get the raw data?
In my mind, any information legally available elsewhere, ie Libraries,
Family history centres etc, should be offered to Internet users and it's
up to the consumer whether they pay for access or not. We have too much
secrecy in the UK. A Freedom of Information Act should be passed asap as
promised by the government when elected in 1997.
I will use both sites
Margaret
----- Original Message -----
From: Keith and Margaret Tinkler
Sent: 26 November 2002 04:31
To: ENG-LIVERPOOL-L(a)rootsweb.com
Subject: Re: [ENG-LIV] GRO indexs
I am just speaking as a transcriber - not with authority, but one of the
conditions attached to FreeBMD transcription project (Licensed from the
GRO as you saw in another posting) is that the index data will always be
available free of charge -
Ancestry offers separate access to the same transcribed data - but it is
still free. The FreeBMD organizers have as their eventual ideal the
attachment of the raw index data (as that 1837online site is purporting
to offer) once you have found
the index entry of interest, so that you can check the transcription
yourself but I dont know if that is currently part of the licensing
agreement.
The claim of the "1837online" site that there are "no known
omissions"
from the Index is entirely fatuous. Its about equivalent to the Free Beer
tomorrow offers ... A controlled study by an historian (with access to
actual GRO records; and
comparing data to Parish and other records) showed that as many as 1
record in 40 may be missing. That would be about 2.5 million records ....
Its roughly equivalent to missing one record on every page on every one
of the handwritten sheets; and
without rigorous checking thats awfully easy to do. And then you have to
assume that EVERYONE recorded every vital event between 1837-1900 ....
pssst pssst - want to buy a bridge off me? (The second volume of this
saga is available from Archive
CD books -- The Birth, Marriage and Death Records of England & Wales - A
Comedy of Errors, Act 2 Michael Whitfield Foster, Wellington, New
Zealand. 2002.)
The FreeBMD hopes to eventually minimize its own transcription errors by
the process of independent double transcription of all entries - on the
site all bold results have been double entered. But when all is said and
done we are all human.
on a brighter note ....
You might like to check the new search facilty at FreeBMB
(
http://freebmd.rootsweb.com/) which includes the option for phonetic
search on names - from a quick check on the name "Tinkler " is covers
more ground than the Soundex System. A new
update starts tomorrow - and in a month they will post the entire data
for 1902.
If Artificial Intelligence wants a REAL challenge: let it read and
transcribe the raw GRO data: it may be able to chase the World Champion
at Chess down the street; but lets see what it can do with the GRO
indexes ..
Keith
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