Wait a minute, what kind of habit are we talking about here?
Hold your horses, nothing crazy is going on here. I’m talking about my Ancestry.com habit. Don’t worry this is not an Ancestry bashing post. This isn’t even a post about how disappointed I am in Ancestry. While there are some problems with the website, as a website owner, I’m sympathetic to issues that pop up.
So why are you breaking your Ancestry habit then?
To be upfront, I fully intend to imbibe in my favorite genealogy website later. That’s right I said favorite. It’s my first genealogy love, it’s the one that I learned on. It however… expired on me. I didn’t have the subscription saved up to pay up front for it, so I decided to break my habit. I was not going to go into credit card debt just to keep Ancestry. Aren’t you proud? I’m trying being all grown up and stuff. Ha!
Why are you posting about your Ancestry subscription?
Well, this technically isn’t about Ancestry. You see when I switched from Family Tree Maker to Legacy, I did that because I felt I had no other choice. I made myself only use Legacy. Once I figured it out and got comfortable with it, I don’t even miss the other software. No more switching back and forth. There is just one software for me.
I realized this week that I haven’t been using other sites that I’ve paid for because I’m so comfortable with Ancestry. I’m used to it. It’s easy to just jump on and get to work. I could be missing some great things about other websites and I don’t even know it.
Why pay for the other sites if you love Ancestry so much?
Touché.
Aren’t you all so happy I laugh at myself and talk to myself in these blogs? Anyway, I had gotten a subscription to Find My Past last year at a discounted rate. I was in Florida helping with my newborn niece and nephew. I was in baby zone and I had no time to spend money. There I was on a rare day in Florida sunshine and my brother, sister in law and the babies were out. Then I saw IT. Not the horror movie, but a 50% off sale on one year of Find My Past. I hadn’t spent money in so long and it was so quiet! I grabbed it. I used it for some English research and then forgot about it.
You forgot about it?
That’s right, don’t judge me. I said there were BABIES! Anyway, it wasn’t until I got a notice that my Find My Past subscription was successfully renewed that I remembered. Good job cancelling that auto renew feature! I’m so on top of things sometimes.
So that’s how I got a whole year of Find My Past that I didn’t really mean to get. I’m an adult though and it’s my blunder and I’m going to make the best of it. I mean I paid for it already, I might as well give it a fair chance.
This is where MyHeritage also comes in
Don’t tell us that you forgot about MyHeritage too. Oh no, I did that one a month before Find My Past auto renewed. I again went for a great deal and this one is supposed to be price locked as long as I don’t cancel. That means I now have a year of My Heritage and Find My Past and I’m giving myself that year to get comfortable with them or get so frustrated with them that I make the informed decision to be done with them.
Unfortunately for you guys, you’ll probably be hearing about it. I have no idea how this is going to go. Who doesn’t love a good cage match between two genealogy websites?
Cage Match… Really?
Okay so I’m not a cage match person and I’m not really pitting one against the other. I’m just seeing what each has to offer. Between their databases and their search algorithms, and the user interface. I’m not talking about prettiness. I’m talking about ease of use. How hard is it to actually find things?
How is this going to work?
The great thing is that when I started my Genealogy Do-Over, I didn’t have access to MyHeritage and I didn’t have access to Find my Past until last year when the babies were born.
This means that I’m going to go back through my list on these websites and see if there are any additional records that I can find that weren’t on Ancestry. In my mind most of the basics should all be the same but something should stand out on each site quickly. I can’t wait to see what happens.