General Chat

When I click on Community I now have a new entry down the bottom which shows my board name and gives me the option of changing it. It is not there when I click on My Threads.

This is the info:

Community settings Community name
Hide your real name and show a friendly alias when posting to the community boards

Save

Not there when I post or edit a post.

Oh, yes, I see it too.

Birdi

It has been there a week or so, I was directed to it when I wanted to change to my Christmas name.

A week!!! Well it certainly bypassed me. Never seen it before. Some are thicker than others!!

I'd not seen it either :-)

So I tried typing just the word testing, and this appeared:


Oops!
That site name is already taken, please choose another

Not on my lappy,but when I wanted to change my board name last week,took lots of alternatives before it would accept one.

I have sent a message to help for help to change back to me :-(


Joy (AKA Maid Marion & Joy Kentish Maid).

We have had big discussions on our thread about how the focus person in your tree shows in everyone's My Contacts box. It was pointed out to me, and I was not aware of it. Dumbo thought she could only see that info herself.

We went through and check each of our lists and then changed the name of our tree focus person to something anonymous/different/board name etc.

I contacted GR and asked them about it and this was their answer. Received a response very quickly too.

"We realise there is an issue regarding living people information. We have added some text to warn people that they should gain permission from living persons to include their details and that the tree data is under their ownership. Our terms and conditions reflect this.

Remember also, the data you put in is only available to search so does not positively identify someone and it is the contact with the owner of the tree that does this, by which time trust between the parties should have been established.

When adding your relation's details, the 'name' boxes will take up to 60 characters, so you are free to type in what you wish. As you have entered your name on your tree and your registration as Aunty Sherlock, other members cannot see your full name."

The bit about being Aunty Sherlock is because by the time they looked at my tree I had changed the living person's name to Aunty Sherlock.

should I scream and rant and rage and stomp my feet?



I don't have it!



sylvia

Well my dear that is just the way of the world. Some have it and some just don't. Tee hee!!

I wonder if it depends on what country of GR you are logged into. I am on www.genesreunited.com.au

Let me test and see if it makes a difference, you poor deprived personage!!

OK I am able to, being one of the privileged few, to log into both GR.co.uk and GR.com.au

I did a google on Canadian GR and up came a lot a people talking about GR on Rootschat. Edit - old stuff 2007/8ish.

Surmise therefore in my usual open the mouth before the brain is in gear , manner that there is not a Canadian version of GR. Although I must say I can not see any difference between the Oz or the Pommy versions.

Still with me. Good. The change your name thingy is at the bottom of the screen in both versions.

It only appears when you are in the home page of the Community Board screen.

There, there, don't cry. Chucks box of tissues. I'm sure you'll find it. If I can, you should be able to, but then, my name is Sherlock!!

I'm on GR.co.uk



BUT


I've found it!!


On the Boards Summary page ....... a page I've never looked at before, as I come onto the page with Success stories, then move from there to wherever I want to go!



so I am no longer deprived :)))

Oh well done! Another intelligent Canadian. Let me see, that makes, ummmm oh well never mind.....

Must say I've never been on the Success pages. I usually skip straight to My Threads to see what damage I've caused overnight.

I go from Home page by clciking on Community, that takes me to the Success board

then I click on My Threads to see what has been said by the daytime troublemakers :)))))!



and I would have you know we Canadians are very intelligent


.... even this Canadian by adoption :)))))

Re the reply you received from GR. What utter crud, as usual.

Trust between the parties?

Someone sends me a nasty unsolicited PM, and my full real name (if I had my name in my tree) then appears in their contacts list. *Even if* I have managed to figure out that I should delete my real name from my account details so it doesn't appear when someone clicks on my username and isn't shown as the sender when someone receives a PM from me.

The operators of this site know full well that people exchange PMs that have nothing whatsoever to do with their trees. In fact, I would surmise that far more of that type are sent and received than any having to do with family trees.

This entire site is an abomination when it comes to privacy. The "Privacy Policy" states:

http://www.genesreunited.co.uk/static/privacy.aspx

"Search results from your tree will only be associated with you by your first name (which will be displayed together with the search results)"

Well *ing duh, when you click on the "More info" button to send someone a message about a name in their tree, what do you see? Their FULL NAME, that's what.

Another thing a lot of people don't know is that although you may have concealed living people info from anyone who looks at your tree, the names and birth dates/places in your tree for those people will be shown if someone searches trees for them, with you identified as the tree owner.


Just my ongoing campaign ... crusade ... to let people know what *really* happens with their personal info at this site, and urge people to protect it by

- inventing a username that is not related to their real name
- removing their real name from their account details and using only their username for that purpose
- removing their real name from their tree, and also the names of any living people who have not consented to their info being made available to unknown third parties here

This site does NOT protect the personal information that is disclosed to/on it, and people need to know that so they can take precautions.

Hi Janey. Sorry not to have responded earlier. I have managed to fry the motherboard on my home computer and have had to wait until I could access this one elsewhere.

In a perfect world GR should be including your comments in their list of hints and tips. My belief was that only I could see the living information in my My Contacts box. I'm afraid GR don't allow for "operator stupidity".

I am also interested in the fact that I have seen comments from people who have been unable to prevent any or all of their details appearing in whatever guise on these boards. It is possible, just needs a bit of ingenuity, and care with what you put into what boxes. This process should be explained in a bit more detail than what is currently available.

Why it is considered necessary to have a "tree" persons name in the My Contacts list, relation column. I would prefer a blank space with the option to put in my own information. Or more importantly, if the contact has nothing to do with family history, and therefore an entry in the relation column is not needed, why have a name there at all.