Feb 1-6 2000

From merope@Radix.Net Tue Feb 1 08:39:20 2000

Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2000 08:39:18 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

Reply-To: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

To: Daily Board Show <usgw_all@listbot.com>

Subject: Daily Board Show

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More fun than a barrel of monkeys...its Your Daily Board Show!

*warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk!

Tuesday 1 February 2000:

There is no Board-L traffic on this date, thus far.

Ministry of Information Corner: A reader has reminded us that there are

already an history and a timeline for the USGW project posted online. The

history is at: http://www.usgenweb.com/about/history.html and is pretty

much the standard blurb. The timeline, however, is interesting. It was

last edited in late June 1999, and its at:

http://www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/forma1.htm., which is, curiously enough,

in the Archives directoy heirarchy, not the directory for the national

pages [in other words, its not a national page, but it plays one on TV].

Take a close look at the bizarre organizational structure of the tables.

First, in the upper table, we have the founding of KYGenWeb and USGW, and

then the Archives, under which are listed the Census, Map, and Pension

Projects. Separately listed is the Tombstone project, and the formation

of the Board. In this table Kidz and Lineages are listed under USGW. Now,

in the bottom table ignore for a moment that the listing of the Board

members fails to include the At-Large representative, but does include

"Rootsweb server". On the left hand side of this table, we find the

USGenWeb Project, with Kidz and Lineages listed under it, and way over on

the other side of the table, we find the USGenWeb Archives. Under

Archives is listed the Census, Map, and Pension projects, and then

Tombstone listed as a separate item. Not surprisingly, since this page

was created by Maggie Stewart-Zimmerman, the link to the Census Project

goes to Census I and there is no link to or mention of Census II. Given

the author, the date on this page, its placement in the Archives

directory, the organization setting up USGW and the Archives as two

separate and parallel entities, and the failure to mention Census II, we'd

venture a guess that this page isn't so much a timeline as an agenda. So

why is it linked to from the National page?

We hear from little mice that the Board is currently discussing revising

both the history page and the timeline. Perhaps this time they can post

one that recognizes all facets of the project, and doesn't exist to serve

the Archives' point of view.

Another Fine Mess Corner: Let's review Motion 99-4 [it's at:

http://www.usgenweb.com/official/boardvotes-99-1.html#99-4, if you need a

primer]. Motion 99-4, which passed, specifically directs that the first

paragraph of the resolution be posted on the "USGenWeb Project web page

concerning the special projects". Strangely enough, the paragraph no

longer appears on _any_ page associated with the Special Projects, and

especially not the one located here:

http://www.usgenweb.com/projects/projects.html, which was updated just a

couple of days ago [after the DBS pointed out how out of date it was].

Now, we could swear that paragraph used to be there; what do you suppose

happened to it? And why do you suppose that a duly voted on and passed

motion is being ignored?

"Men take more pains to mask than to mend."

---Benjamin Franklin

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

-----------

From merope@Radix.Net Tue Feb 1 14:14:50 2000

Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2000 14:14:48 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

To: Daily Board Show <usgw_all@listbot.com>

Subject: News Flash!

Message-ID: <Pine.SV4.3.96.1000201141024.17406A-100000@saltmine.radix.net>

MIME-Version: 1.0

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A DBS News Flash!

Amazing Disappearances... An alert reader has notified us that the Who's

Who page for the Advisory Board located at this URL:

<http://www.usgenweb.com/about/whoswho.html> has recently been updated.

Kay Mason's name and email address have been removed and her Board seat is

shown as "Open".

Looks like they have plans for that seat after all.

There you have it, a DBS News Flash!

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

From merope@Radix.Net Tue Feb 1 21:07:26 2000

Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2000 21:07:25 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

Reply-To: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

To: Daily Board Show <usgw_all@listbot.com>

Subject: News Flash!

Message-ID: <Pine.SV4.3.96.1000201205900.4083B-100000@saltmine.radix.net>

MIME-Version: 1.0

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A DBS News Flash!

Abracadabra Corner: We've noticed that, like magic, Kay Mason has been

restored not only to the Board:

<http://www.usgenweb.com/about/whoswho.html> but to the Special Projects

coordinator page as well:

<http://www.usgenweb.com/about/whoswhocoord2.html>

This magic happened about two hours after Kay's untimely removal was made

public by the DBS. Score another one for yellow journalism!

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

From merope@Radix.Net Wed Feb 2 08:55:05 2000

Date: Wed, 2 Feb 2000 08:55:03 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

Reply-To: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

To: Daily Board Show <usgw_all@listbot.com>

Subject: Daily Board Show

Message-ID: <Pine.SV4.3.96.1000202060855.5244A-100000@saltmine.radix.net>

MIME-Version: 1.0

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Seeing no shadow...its Your Daily Board Show!

*warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk!

Tuesday 1 February 2000:

The sleeping Board awakes!

Ginger Cisewski, saying she is "deeply saddened by what I have seen in my

tour of the USGenWeb national website this evening", notes a number of

changes made recently to national web pages without discussion or

approval. She notes first the removal of Census Project rep Kay Mason

[reported here yesterday]. She also remarks on the timeline compiled by

Maggie Stewart-Zimmerman and notes that "the ONLY link labeled as

belonging to "Census Project" leads further into the Archives Census

Project with absolutely NO mention being made of the USGenWeb Census

Project, which is the ONLY official Census Project." She describes

updates to the special projects page, including the addition of the

Pension Project and Digital Map Library, which "are displayed in such a

manner as to beguile a visitor into believing they are separate and

official USGenWeb Special Projects in their own right, which they most

certainly are not." Ginger reminds the Board that she pointed this error

out previously "but the only change made was to add those two sub-projects

to yet another "Special Projects" listing". She also notes that the

statement required by Motion 99-4 has been removed and says "I can only

assume that it was done because it was perceived by some Board members as

a bad reflection on the USGenWeb Archives Project and its non-sanctioned

Census Project, which happens to be led by one of our own Board members."

Ginger closes with by noting that it is apparent that most of her

colleagues "don't personally agree with a section of the Bylaws or it

conflicts with whatever personal agenda you have, then you can simply opt

to ignore it and do what you wish." She reminds them that a bylaw is a

bylaw and "In a democratic organization, you work within the structure of

the existing laws to change or repeal the bad ones", and it is never right

to ignore them. She states "The only "membership" I see getting any

representation from the current Board is the Archives Project, and

apparently through whatever means possible and at the expense of all

others."

Holly Fee-Timm responds by noting that since Ginger herself noted that the

changes were made with Boad discussion or approval, she should not assume

"agreement, disagreement or even knowledge of these by your fellow Board

members."

Ginger Hayes notes that GingerC is making broad statements and harsh

accusations against the whole board, and she resents it. She has no idea

what GingerC is talking about, but notes "since there is no active

representaive for the USGW Census Project since Kay Mason, in effect,

removed herself, why shouldn't the seat be listed as open?" She doesn't

think the Census Project is interested in a recall and apparently doesn't

care whether it has representation or not. Regarding the rest of

GingerC's post, GingerH suggests it mights have been "more productive to

ask about the changes and suggest some resolution instead of blasting all

the board members".

Pam Reid tells her colleagues that she's doing extensive revisions to the

website, which is large and often out of date. She notes that she made a

few changes, such as the Kay Mason issue, that were made without

direction, and some of the items mentioned by GingerC were old problems

that haven't been fixed. She says she plans to revise the Special

Projects pages "tonight" [Tuesday] but thinks its "important to have a

page to these links, but perhaps they should not be called special

projects." She does not recall removing the statement required by Motion

99-4 but will fix it; she thinks maybe the statement was never added and

that was on oversight on her part. She assures the Board that she is not

political and "only want[s] the pages to reflect what they should

reflect." She says "I wasn't aware I needed Board approval to make

improvements to the site....However, if the Board would like to approve

each and every change that is made to the site, that can be arranged."

She says she always reacts quickly when there are objections noted to the

pages.

GingerC notes that the page at

<http://www.usgenweb.org/projects/projects.html> is very misleading. In

the first paragraph the page says "Most of the Projects listed on this

page are not officially designated as USGW Special Projects", and in the

third paragraph it says "Each of the projects identified on this page is

an "official" Special Project of The USGenWeb Project." She points out

that only two of the seven projects listed are not "official" Special

Projects. She also notes that the "Archives Project" is not the same as

the "Project Archives" referred to as the "digital library" in the bylaws

and continuing to refer to the Archives Project in that way only furthers

confusion and "amounts to false representation." She says "These pages

all need to be as concise and accurate as possible to enhance a greater

understanding and appreciation of the USGenWeb Project. Sending visitors

and potential volunteers in endless circles is not the way to accomplish

that."

Betsy Mills says that she disagrees with GingerC, and believes the

Archives Project and the Project Archives are "one and the same." She

says "I was here from close to the beginning and know the intent of

the project, the archives and the bylaws." She says that "Kay's Census

Project" caused most of the confusion by breaking away from the Archives.

Pam Reid forwards a message to the Board from an author who wants to use

screen shots of the webpages in a book called "How to do Everything with

Yahoo!" She asks the Board what they think of his request. [The author

is Alan Neibauer, and a list of his previous publications is at

http://www.neibauer.net]

Joe Zsedeny notes that Mr. Neibauer's offer sounds great, but ask which

webpages he's referring to.

Joy Fisher also thinks clarification of Mr. Neibauer's offer is needed,

but also says "If it is just the National pages, I move that we allow Mr.

Neibauer permission to use screen shots of our National Pages in his book

"How to do Everything with Yahoo!"

Wednesday 2 February 2000:

In response to GingerC's concerns regarding the project pages, Pam Reid

says "I am working too quickly and not carefully enough. I reworded it

again and hopefully it will not be so confusing now." She also notes that

she also thinks that "The USGenWeb Archives is the official repository of

The USGenWeb Project."

Holy Fee-Timm also chimes to note that she agrees with Betsy that the

Archives is USGenWeb's digital library. She also notes that regarding the

Census Project "until and unless the Board resolves that situation, I

believe we must list both of them equally or else we leave the visitor

even more confused."

GingerC notes that "This is an argument of semantics. The personal

interpretation of any of us, myself included, is irrelevant and immaterial

and none of us have any justification for changing the wording on the

website to reflect our personal preferences." She quotes the relevant

portion of the bylaws and says that "Archives Project" and "Archives

Project" are not the same, and regardless of the intent behind the wording

of the bylaws it is the responsibility of the Board to uphold them as they

were written. She notes that there "There have now been multiple changes

to the wording throughout the national website where none was needed, and

much of it carries thinly veiled bias and innuendo. Links seem to pop up

daily to additional Archives sites and now there is even one on the main

page which attempts to usurp the Census Project's right to exist." She's

not upset by the cosmetic changes to the pages, but thinks that "changing

the PHILOSOPHY of the website is something that should be discussed and

voted on by the entire Board."

The Moving Finger Corner: Our webmaster has indeed been busy. The USGW

home page now has the "USGW Census Project" and the "Archives Census

Project Census Images" [that's a mouthful] linked under "USGW Census

Project" section, even though the latter should be correctly linked under

the Archives section. The contradictory info from the Special Projects

page has been removed, but the paragraph from Motion 99-4 is nowhere to be

seen. Kay Mason has been restored to the Board, and to the listing on the

project coordinators Who's Who page. Maggie's timeline and it's

misleading information regarding the Census Project remains unchanged and

the link to it from the National site remains intact.

This is not rocket science. It should be fairly easy to list each Special

Project and subproject properly, without implying anything about any of

them. For instance on the home page:

USGW Archives: The USGenWeb Archives offers actual transcriptions of

public domain records of many types. It includes several subprojects,

including the Archives Census Project, the Archives Census Project Census

Transcriptions, the Archives Pension Project, the Archives Digital Map

Library, and the Archives Special Collections Project. [with links to

appropriate pages]

USGW Census: The USGW Census Project has complete census transcriptions

as well as links to transcriptions found elsewhere on the internet.

USGW Tombstone: The USGW Tombstone Project contains transcriptions of

tombstones and other burial records

Other Projects: [lists anything not mentioned above, Kidz and Lineages,

for example]

See? Simple.

Never Give a Sucker An Even Break Corner: As of Feb 1, 2000, the

California Franchise Tax Board indicates that GenSoc.org, Inc. is not a

tax-exempt organization under 501(c)3.

Copycat Corner: NCGenWeb SC Elizabeth Harris has announced the North

Carolina Migrations page at:

http://tn-3.rootsweb.com/~ncarolina/migrations.shtml

Go check it out! Also don't forget about the Migrations Project, which is

located at http://www.migrations.org. [the NC page is not part of the

older Migrations Project, but seems patterned on it. Might this be the

template for a "new" Root$web project?]

"Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery."

---Charles Caleb Colton

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

------------

From merope@Radix.Net Thu Feb 3 08:37:07 2000

Date: Thu, 3 Feb 2000 08:37:06 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

Reply-To: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

To: Daily Board Show <usgw_all@listbot.com>

Subject: Daily Board Show

Message-ID: <Pine.SV4.3.96.1000202160109.13931A-100000@saltmine.radix.net>

MIME-Version: 1.0

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The future is today, worry about it tomorrow!...its Your Daily Board Show!

*warning* contains editorial content. Handle with proper tools and read

at your own risk!

[its another long one today, folks, but the stuff at the bottom is pretty

good, so stick with it!]

Wednesday 2 February 2000:

Joe Zsedeny says that Betsy is correct [in that Project Archives=Archives

Project]. He says "Try writing a link to each of "Digital Library",

"Project Archives" "Archives Project". In each case you link to the

USGenWeb Archives." [actually, this isn't true, since the Archives don't

include Lineages or the Census Project information] He also states that

"Someone in writing the bylaws made a simple semantic change which needs

to be corrected", but he doubts it ever will be.

In regards to the screen shot issue he sees nothing wrong with it, "Just

make it clear that the USGenWeb Project and Rootsweb are separate

entities." He says the no author needs permission to write about the

project, and they will probably not give editorial power over their

product.

Ginger Hayes responds to GingerC by asking for specifics of where wording

needs to be changed or where the philosophy of the webpage has changed.

Joe Zsedeny notes that "all Board members were attacked for something

most, if not all, were unaware of. Then Pam was attacked for an innocent

attempt to do her job as Webmaster..."; he thinks the paranoia is getting

extreme. He stresses that "there is no conspiracy afoot to put spin on

anything" and that he himself is too open to conspire. He guesses that

"things have been so quiet that some are getting nervous", but he likes it

that way. He thinks a private message to Pam would have sufficed, and

asks everyone to calm down so he can go blow snow.

Pam Reid says that she was unaware that she had changed the wording on the

national site to a large degree and that she just made small changes she

thought would be helpful. She says she'll fix it if she made any errors.

She also states "I KNOW for a fact that the authors of the Bylaws

considered the Project Archives and the Archives Project to be one and the

same." [Pam is extremely fond of the "I was there" approach to

interpreting the bylaws.] Pam also says that the changes she made were

what she thought was requested and suggests that Perhaps the Board needs

to discuss which Census Project we link to and how we do that." She closes

with an assertion that she didn't make any changes that she considers to

be philosophical in nature and asks for them to be pointed out to her. She

says "I have only tried to improve our site and our image on the Web.

There have been MANY compliments about the new look and I do believe that

people feel it presents a more professional appearance. THAT was ALL I

was trying to do!!!!!!" [emphasis hers]

Teri Pettit seconds the motion to allow the use of screen shots in Mr.

Neibauer's book. She also asks if "everything we do requires an official

motion and vote, or whether some things can just be taken care of as

ordinary business."

Teri notes "Taken exactly as they are worded, the Bylaws are often

ambiguous and sometimes contradictory, so determination of the intent is

an inescapable prerequisite of any attempt to abide by them." She points

out various places the words "USGenWeb Archives Project" and "USGenWeb

Project Archives" are used in the bylaws and describes two plausible

scenarios for the "dual terminology": 1) "Project Archives" refers to "the

directories, their file contents, the search engines which access them,

and the web pages which index them" and is essentially equivalent to the

digital library. "Archives Project" refers to "the team of volunteers who

have responsibility for maintaining those directories and indexes, and for

coordinating transcribers"; or 2) It was a careless oversight, and the

terms "The USGenWeb Project Archives" and "The USGenWeb Archives Project"

were meant to be entirely synonymous." [there's a third possibility: it

was neither careless nor an oversight, but was done deliberately to

justify the presence of a representative for each of the Big 3 on the

Board or maybe just to soothe the respective egos of the Project

coordinators. Now that some people aren't happy with the consequences of

that decision they are trying to convince us that really isn't what they

meant at all.] Teri says she leans toward option 1 because of the

different way the dual terminologies are used and because "The Tombstone

Project and Census Project are everywhere listed as parallel to The

USGenWeb Archives Project, with no hint that they are in any way

subsidiary in terms of project hierarchy." She notes, however, that "

This is not, however, to suggest that The USGenWeb Project Archives are

not wholely under the management of The USGenWeb Archives Project

volunteers. The Bylaws are silent on that matter. This is where original

intent must come under consideration, in that the Bylaws were in most

cases codifying the status quo at the time they were written." She

concludes by saying " the term "The USGenWeb Archives Project" is the

phrasing used in Article XIII on Special Projects, so it is the more

appropriate term under the Bylaws to use on a page describing Special

Projects to our volunteers. "The USGenWeb Project Archives" is the more

appropriate phrase to use on a label for a link to the Archives'

directories, search engines, or index pages."

Pam Reid notes that she has added the statement from Motion 99-4 to the

Projects page of the national website, and asks the Board if there's

anyplace else they'd like to see it.

Pam also asks the Board to "discuss and solve" the issue of the two Census

projects and decide how it wants to handle listing them. She feels it

would be wrong not to link to Census I, since it would hurt researchers,

but she notes "I need the Board to discuss how we handle this situation."

Pam says she's written to Mr. Neibauer and told him that if he wishes to

use shots from state or county the "Board does [not] have have

authorization to grant that permission". She also told him "the idea of

using shots from the National Site had been fairly well receieved, but

that we would like to know in advance which pages he plans to use." She

will keep the Board informed when she hears back from him.

Better Late Than Never Corner: An alert reader has brought to our

attention an interesting thread on alt-genealogy from the beginning of

January. The thread began with Cyndi Howells' annual post regarding her

webpages and eventually morphed into a discussion of Root$web, profits,

and management practices [in one of the messages in this thread, the RW4

figured prominently]. The most interesting comment made, though, was by

Margaret Olson, an employee of RW. In response to concerns about

RootsWeb.com, Inc's status as a for-profit corporation she said:

"RootsWeb.com may be "for profit" but it is not profitable. It has

investors, but it is a long way yet from being profitable."

So. Root$web has "investors". We do wonder who all was invited to

"invest" and what these folks expect as a return on their "investment".

[this entire thread can be viewed at www.deja.com; go to the "power

search" link and search for "rootsweb" and "profit". We apologize for

being so late in reporting this, but we haven't been reading the

newsgroups lately.]

Today's quote is from a reader:

"The best decision would be to decree that the census site be house with

the archives and the files as well. This will ensure that the majority of

volunteers will be happy. Also, it must be decreed that the Coordinator

not have the ultimate control to "fire" people or alienate them in any

way. This serves only the purpose of coordinator and not of the USGW

Project as a whole."

---Stacy Orchard, Archives Census Project Coordinator emeritus, to the

Board, 17 Feb 1999

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

---------

From merope@Radix.Net Fri Feb 4 17:51:13 2000

Date: Fri, 4 Feb 2000 17:51:11 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

Reply-To: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

To: Daily Board Show <usgw_all@listbot.com>

Subject: Daily Board Show

Message-ID: <Pine.SV4.3.96.1000204075406.16894C-100000@saltmine.radix.net>

MIME-Version: 1.0

Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII

Status: O

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Can they do that on TV?...its Your Daily Board Show!

*warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk!

Thursday 3 February 2000:

Shari Handley asks "Why do we even need a motion for this? As "the public

representative for the project" (Bylaws Article VI, Section 2), the

National Coordinator should be able to field an inquiry such as this and

give an answer." She says Tim can ask for the Board's input if he feels

he needs it but he should be free to make decisions on such day to day

business as this and she trusts that he would take to make sure that the

project will be portrayed accurately. She also says "To make the guy wait

around while we hash out every niggling detail and examine every possible

angle . . . ad nauseum . . . makes us look bad, and he's liable to just

say "forget it!" . . ." [the ellipses are hers]

Pam Reid corrects her earlier message to add in the word NOT in the

sentence "I told him in the message that if he wanted to use shots from

State or County pages, the Board does NOT have authorization to grant that

permission."

Ginger Hayes replies with a fervent "Amen!" to Shari's post.

Pam notes that she doesn't disagree with Ginger and Shari. She thought

she should run the request by the Board but figured it would be an easy

decision to make. She feels "it is an honor we were asked and that it

can only be good for us to be included in the book."

Teri Pettit agrees with Pam but says she would like some clarification on

"what kind of things require official motions and voting (thereby needing

2/3 approval to pass), what kind of things should be run by the Board but

it's OK to just say "I'm thinking of doing this, any objection?", and what

kind of things the National Coordinator or the Webmaster can just do on

their own without asking the Board."

Ginger H agrees with Pam is an honor and doesn't think the Board needs to

review galley proofs. She also apologizes for sounding frustrated but she

thinks some things don't need motions, and that the Board is "getting too

caught up in trivial matters that should be no brainers while important

things just hang in limbo and aren't addressed."

Joe Zsedeny also agrees with Pam but notes that "unelected individuals are

injecting themselves into our deliberations and confusing the issues." [my

god no! Not constituents talking to the reps!] He thinks requests for

interviews, books, etc., should be passed by the Board for comment but a

motion is not required. He notes that "these things have been rare in the

past so it is difficult to make a list of things that might require a

motion. I think we will have to take it on a case by case basis." [Its a

pity Joe doesn't like hearing from project members; he might learn

something.]

Friday 4 February 2000:

Tim Stowell says he did not see the request until Pam forwarded it to the

Board, but he says that for similar things in the past, he's run them by

the Board for comment. He notes that "other than Holly and myself, no

other Board member is responsible to more Project members interests.

Therefore it seems to be in the best interests of the Project to at the

very least, pass along such requests to the rest of the Board." He agrees

with Ginger that they shouldn't leave Mr. Neibauer waiting overling, but

he says that Pam has already contacted him to confirm which screenshots he

wants to use.

Tim asks the Board Secretary to address Teri's question on what Board

business requires motion and what does not.

Tim reminds the Board that Motion 00-2, to allow the use of screenshots of

the National pages in a book, has been made and seconded and is currently

open for discussion.

Pam suggests amending the motion to read that the Board is "ONLY granting

permission for Mr. Neibauer to use screen shots from The USGenWeb National

site and that this permission does NOT extend to USGenWeb State or County

sites."

Joy Fisher accepts the amendment to the motion

Adieu Adieu Corner: We are very unhappy to learn that Elizabeth Harris, SC

for the NCGenWeb since July 1998 will be stepping down in July 2000. The

NCGenWeb is currently planning for an election to replace her; we wish

them luck in finding someone with her skill and expertise.

Coming and Going Corner: Elizabeth Harris has written to stress that the

NC migrations project was not meant in any way to compete with or copy the

Migrations project located at http://www.migrations.org. She says that

she, Marceline Beem, and Betsy Ross began working on the idea months ago.

She also stresses that "Our project is most assuredly NOT a political move

on the part of RootsWeb to counter or compete with Patrick's non-rootsweb

migrations project." [Fair enough, but neither was GenConnect, originally].

[note to Elizabeth: I generally do not respond to people who write to ask

me the names of my sources.]

We've also been told a similar project may be in the works for Florida,

interestingly enough, designed by the same former RW employee, Marceline

Beem.

"I was on IRC a while back.. just before B banned the RW 4... and he was

all upset about the stuff on the ALL list... Betsy, Randy Winch and

either Elsie (Leigh Compton) or GenConnect Pam were also there(all RW

staff members).. and They were telling me that Brian was threatening to

kick USGW off RW because of all the problems with the ALL list.. I asked,

the States, counties and SPs? and they said yes.."

---Anonymous, 3 Mar 1999

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

-------------

From merope@Radix.Net Sat Feb 5 09:37:26 2000

Date: Sat, 5 Feb 2000 09:37:25 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

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To: Daily Board Show <usgw_all@listbot.com>

Subject: Daily Board Show

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Monster, John, monsters from the id!...its Your Daily Board Show!

*warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk!

Friday 4 February 2000:

Pam Reid posts that she has made a few changes to the USGW home page and

the Special Projects page "that hopefully will solve the semantics

problems that we are experiencing now." She asks the Board to let her know

what they think of the changes. [Unfortunately, Pam's changes are a little

confusing; under the heading "The USGenWeb Archives Census Projects" she

has listed onot only Census I, but the Map, Pension, and Special

Collections projects as well.]

Pam informs the Board she has uploaded changes to the "Researcher

Information" page of the website

[http://www.usgenweb.com/researchers/researcher.html] and asks the Board

for their opinion. She has added a great deal of new information in many

categories. She notes [both in her mail to the Board and on the page

itself] that it is a work in progress and she's open for suggestions. She

also says she won't have much time this week for further updates to USGW

pages, as she has other obligations.

Broken Corner: We hear that Root$web's Surname Express has not been

indexing surnames since December; reportedly they are "looking into it."

The auto-moderator for the soc.genealogy.surnames newsgroup hierarchy must

be out of service again as well, as the only posts going through to it are

the RSL updates.

On the Move Corner: The Migrations project at http://www.migrations.org

has formally announced it is out of the beta test phase. Please visit and

help this site to grow! Incidentally, for those of you who wish to link

directly to the Migrations search facility, we understand that there are

currently buttons and coding you can add directly to your page that will

allow people to search the database from your page. Currently, buttons for

county and state searches are available; a button and coding will shortly

be added for surnames. Buttons and coding may be obtained at:

http://www.migrations.org/graphics/codingfaq.htm

"Be careful that what you write does not offend anybody or cause problems

within the company. The safest approach is to remove all useful information."

---Scott Adams

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

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From merope@Radix.Net Sun Feb 6 08:51:56 2000

Date: Sun, 6 Feb 2000 08:51:54 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

To: Daily Board Show <usgw_all@listbot.com>

Subject: Daily Board Show

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MIME-Version: 1.0

Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII

Status: O

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Daring to eat the peach!...its your Daily Board Show!

*warning* contains editorial content. Read at your own risk!

Saturday 5 Feb 2000:

Pam Reid notes that she has implemented a suggestion sent by a member to

help alleviate the semantic confusion caused by the national web pages.

She notes that the link from the index page to the Archives page now goes

to a page with the heading "USGenWeb Project Archives", with the

Motion 99-4 statement, and "an explanation of the "The USGenWeb Project

Archives (the correct name per the bylaws). From there, there are links

to the Archives page and to the search engines." [Unfortunately, she has

linked to a page that equates the "Project Archives" with the "Archives

Project"; see below]. She says that she might consider doing the same for

the Tombstone and Census Projects, or put all of the SPs on the same page,

making it clear which are official SPs, which are part of the Archives,

and which are conducted by individuals. The format of the Projects page

would remain as is, and Archives Project subproject would be bulleted

under the USGenWeb Project Archives.

Pam informs the group that she feels the section on Wars in the revamped

Researchers section is weak and she will be adding to that page as she is

able. She asks people to send her links to War and Military sites that

should be included.

Ginger Cisewski says she appreciates all the work Pam has put into

reworking the national pages; she finds the new look more professional.

However, she objects very strongly to wording on the new Projects page.

She says "The wording of our Bylaws, which was reiterated in Motion #99-4,

makes it very clear that the "Project Archives" is NOT the same thing as

the "Archives Project" and reserves the name "Digital Library" for the

"Project Archives." There is absolutely NOTHING in the Bylaws that

mentions or justifies a person as being the Coordinator of the "Project

Archives."" She notes that it is important to follow the bylaws

regardless of personalities and loyalties. She notes that the new page

presents "the Archives Project as being the "Project Archives" with Linda

Lewis as the Coordinator. Unfortunately, according to the Bylaws that

position simply does not exist." She feels the page is an "exercise in

misrepresentation" and it should be taken down. She also says that the

project page is misleading in that the subprojects are misnamed, since the

bylaws refer to official special projects as "The USGenWeb XX Projects, so

that the subprojects should be named "USGenWeb Archives Census Project,"

"USGenWeb Archives Pension Project," etc. She notes that the other two

Special Projects aren't even listed on the page. GingerC suggests the

following: "why not go "back to basics" and eliminate links to ALL the

Special Projects from the main page altogether. Provide one link only to

"The USGenWeb's Special Projects" which would take you to the Projects

Page. All the Projects page needs is that required statement, and one

link each to the main page of each Official Project". She notes that

simplification will avoid confusion and misrepresentation. A simpler

version of the page would also eliminate maintenance work and be less

confusing for the visitors.

Confusion Corner: If you look at the page now at:

http://www.usgenweb.com/projects/archives.html, it is apparent that Pam

has taken the blurb for the Archives Project, and replaced mentions of the

"USGenWeb Archives Project" with the phrase "USGenWeb Project Archives".

Otherwise, the description, history, personnel, and submission

instructions are all those of the Archives Project. The page now at:

http://www.usgenweb.com/projects/projects.html lists the subprojects of

the Archives and the Kiz and Lineage progects. This page only briefly

mentions the Tombstone and Census Projects. The Tombstone and Census

Project links on the main page go directly to their home pages. The net

effect of these changes, which I am reasonably sure Pam did not intend, is

to equate the USGenWeb Archives Project with the USGenWeb Project

Archives. The latter, as mentioned in the bylaws and as delineated in

Motion 99-4, is the _combined_ material in all official Special Projects.

The former is a subset of the latter. To equate them essentially drops

the Tombstone and Census Projects from the USGW Project Archives.

Update on the News Corner: A quick search of WHOIS at

http://www.networksolutions.com reveals that Root$web employee Nancy Trice

is still listed as the Administrative Contact for usgenweb.org and

usgenweb.net domains. It has now been 11 months since the Board passed a

motion directing Brian Leverich to have the contacts changed to Tim

Stowell's name, and at least six months since Brian actually publicly

agreed to do it.

"False opinions are like false money, struck first of all by guilty men

and thereafter circulated by honest people who perpetuate the crime

without knowing what they are doing."

---Joseph Marie De Maistre

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

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