Feb 14-20 2000

From merope@Radix.Net Mon Feb 14 13:31:05 2000

Date: Mon, 14 Feb 2000 13:31:02 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

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Fighting for truth, justice and the American Way...its Your Daily Board

Show!

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

Sunday 13 February 2000:

There was no Board-L traffic on this date.

Up From The Ashes Corner: We've heard that the recently formed

not-for-profit ALHN, Inc. will be formally dissolved within the month, and

ALHN is now more or less defunct. Do not despair however. We've also

heard that a group of ALHN founders and supporters will be putting up a

new site with the same focus and goals. This should be available shortly

and much of the fine work many of us are familiar with from ALHN will be

available there.

The More The Merrier Corner: In a recent announcement from the

Genealogy Exchange and Surname Registry, we learn that "The

GenExchange Partners Project...will feature free unlimited webspace,

hosted mailing lists, threaded discussion boards, and the most advanced

genealogy search engine technology available." This program will also be

able to use a new "GEDCOM collection project" that will be unveiled

soon. Both the Genexchange Partners and the GEDCOM projects should be

welcome additions to online genealogical resources. You can learn more

about the GenExchange at http://www.genexchange.org

"Most people, no doubt, when they espouse human rights, make their own

mental reservations about the proper application of the word "human."

---Suzanne LaFollette

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

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From merope@Radix.Net Tue Feb 15 13:35:19 2000

Date: Tue, 15 Feb 2000 13:35:17 -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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Frankly, my dear...its Your Daily Board Show!

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

Tuesday 15 February 2000:

Tim Stowell asks the group to vote on the motion to table Motion 00-3 [to

rescind Motion 99-4]. Thus far there has been three "nay" votes.

Tangled Web Corner: It appears that the online genealogy world is in a

constant state of flux. It now appears that there will be two, and maybe

three, offshoots of the entity formerly known as the American Local

History Network [ALHN]. As reported previously, a group of ALHN members,

including some current and former ALHN Board members [from its brief stint

as an incorporated nonprofit] will be forming an offshoot organization

called "The History and Genealogy Network" or "Histree". Another group of

ALHN members, including ALHN co-founder Mary Katzman, will be forming

"Independent Paths to History", which will consist mainly of a few central

pages that link to fully independent sites. Whether or not these two

groups will unite on common ground is not decided at this time. Still up

in the air apparently is the fate of ALHN itself. The name may or may not

be considered an asset of the corporation and may or may not need to be

transferred to another nonprofit when ALHN is dissolved. It is not

inconceivable that ALHN could itself survive as an independent entity,

although not as an incorporated nonprofit. The ALHN domain is currently

registered to Jeff Weaver, but we've heard he's busy as the proverbial

beaver scanning donated records for his New River Notes site [and happy as

the proverbial clam to be out of all this, no doubt]. We will keep you

posted as to which the dust settles.

"We trained very hard, but it seemed that every time we were beginning to

form up in teams, we would be reorganized. I was to learn later in life

that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing, and the wonderful

method it can be for creating the illusion of progress, while producing

confusion, inefficiency, and demoralization. "

---Petronius Arbiter, 66 C.E.

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

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From merope@Radix.Net Wed Feb 16 09:15:28 2000

Date: Wed, 16 Feb 2000 09:15:26 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

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

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The hobgoblin of little minds...its Your Daily Board Show!

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

Tuesday 15 February 2000; Wednesday 16 February 2000:

Voting proceeds on the motion to table Motion 00-3. The count stands at

one "aye" vote, 11 "no" votes, and one "abstain", with three Board members

left to vote. [the motion to table therefore does not pass, and presumably

voting will commence shortly on the motion to rescind Motion 99-4]

Teri Pettit notes that she didn't see anyone second the motion to table

Motion 00-3 and asks Tim "Did I miss it, or do motions to table a motion

not need to be seconded?" She says it doesn't matter much, but she would

like to "get straight what the rules are."

Some comments made by Board members in course of casting their votes on

this motion:

"I think it is OK to vote on Motion 00-3 without Census Project

representation as long as motion 00-3 is simply "Motion 99-4 shall

be rescinded."...Motion 99-4 was an attempt to clarify an ambiguity in

the By-laws, and Joe is right that it didn't make them much clearer...But

whatever it _was_ trying to do, it wasn't successful at it. Since

rescinding it will simply leave matters in the same unclear state they

were both before and after it was enacted, I don't think that a vote on it

will materially affect the status of any Special Projects or their

relationship with the USGenWeb Project Archives...we should not vote on

any motions that REPLACE 99-4, or otherwise attempt to clarify the status

of the Census Project, without having an active Census Project

representative on the Advisory Board. [Teri Pettit]

"My conscience does not permit me to do otherwise, so I vote Aye on the

Motion to Table" [Ginger Cisewski]

"I see no useful purpose in moving to table this. Whatever the outcome of

the vote to repeal 99-4, I can't see how it will have affect the current

state of affairs. [Ginger Hayes]

===

Correction Corner: A reader writes to correct information posted here

yesterday regarding the alhn.org domain, noting "According to Internic,

ALHN.Org is registered to AMLHISTNET. Jeff Weaver is the Administrative

and Billing Contact. According to both current ALHN, Inc. Treasurer Lucy

Dill and then-ALHN, Inc. President Jerry Dill, AMLHISTNET is aka American

Local History Network, Inc."

We've also received a note from a reader telling us that our quote from

yesterday [the one you all liked so much] is apocryphal. He sent along

this url, and its pretty much all you ever wanted to know about the

history of a fake quote that has a life of its own:

http://www.research.att.com/~reeds/petronius.html [the DBS fact checkers

think its still a great quote, regardless of who said it.]

"Anybody who isn't confused here does not really understand what's going

on."

---Belfast citizen, 1970

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

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From merope@Radix.Net Thu Feb 17 13:47:07 2000

Date: Thu, 17 Feb 2000 13:47:06 -0500 (EST)

From: merope <merope@Radix.Net>

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

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

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Moving right along...its Your Daily Board Show!

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

Wednesday 16 February 2000-Thursday 17 February 2000:

Voting proceeds on the motion to table Motion 00-3. The current count is

one "yes" vote, 12 "no" votes, 2 abstentions, and one member has not yet

voted.

New Zoo Review Corner: After a hiatus of several weeks, the "Send Us

Money" blurbs have reappeared in this week's Root$web Review.

Also noted in the RWR is Forbes' magazine recent review of some 5000 web

sites. Root$web was picked as one of the "Best of the Best"; their

reviewer notes "A good place to start", and for some reason called it a

"homey, ad-free site". [Their reviewer must have not noticed the large

commercial ads that cycle at the top of the pages.] As we recall, USGW's

own Jen Godwin is a writer for Forbes'; you don't suppose she had anything

to do with the review of RW, do you?

And finally, this week's RWR marks the first time we can find that Brian

"Da Boss" Leverich has been referred to in print as "Chairman". [He's

RootsWeb.com, Inc's Chairman of the Board and largest shareholder].

Down and Dirty Corner: Also of note, the USGenWeb Project was poorly

reviewed by Forbes, whose reviewer noted "Really just a portal with info

and links to state and county Web sites across the U.S." After navigating

through the site, the reviewer did not find it very useful and noted "The

USGenWeb Archives proved even more useless." He or she also found the

"overwhelmingly patriotic" display "nauseating." [Hmmm...given her

publicly stated opinons of USGW, maybe Jen wrote this one too...]

[After reading the reviews of the handful of genealogy sites reviewed, the

reviewer's criteria for a "good site" seemed to be whether or not they

found out anything on their own ancestors. They also seem to have

reviewed Family Search twice under familysearch.org and familysearch.com,

leading one to wonder how qualified their reviewers actually are.]

"Food for thought is no substitute for the real thing."

---Walt Kelly

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

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From merope@Radix.Net Sat Feb 19 08:51:08 2000

Date: Sat, 19 Feb 2000 08:51:06 -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

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Live from Camp Crystal Lake...its Your Daily Board Show!

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

Thursday 17 February 2000-Friday 18 February 2000:

Tim declares the Motion to table Motion 00-3 failed . Final count was one

"yes" voted, 12 "no" vote, 2 abstentions, and one member did not vote.

In response to Teri Pettit's question regarding seconding motions, Tim

reveals "After the voting started whether to table or not, I confirmed

that this was in fact the case but decided to let the vote go ahead and

play itself out." He says that in the future motions to table must be

seconded in a reasonable time or they die, and whatever motion is in

question either "continues under discussion or is voted upon."

Tim opens the vote on Motion 00-3, which was made by Joe Zsedeny and

seconded by both Rich Howland and Betsy Mills. Thus far, one board member

has voted "aye" and one has voted "no".

In voting on the motion, Teri Pettit notes: "I would have voted yes if the

motion presented for voting on had been simply "Motion 99-4 is rescinded"

or something to that effect, and if someone remotions with that neutral

wording I will vote yes." She agrees that Motion 99-4 is not clear and

should be replaced with something that clarifies the relationship of the

"USGW Project Archives" to the "USGW Archives Project". She does not

believe that 99-4 tried to "legitimize actions which have caused the

Census Project files to be unsearchable and not under the USGenWeb

directory system but rather under a Rootsweb directory." She notes

"Motion 99-4 does not say anything about directory systems or search

engines at all, and there is nothing in it to suggest that it is more

consistent with one side or the other of the Census Project controversy."

She says she connot vote yes as that would imply agreement with Joe's

statements regarding the intentions or effects of Motion 99-4.

"I am confident, of course, knowing that I shall fulfill my tasks as a

writer in any circumstances, and from my grave even more successfully and

incontestably than when I live. No one can bar truth's course, and for its

progress I am prepared to accept even death. But perhaps repeated lessons

will teach us, at least, not to arrest a writer's pen during his

lifetime."

---Alexander Solzhenitsyn

This has been your Daily Board Show.

-Teresa Lindquist

merope@radix.net

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