Genealogy Chat

GOOGLE & BING.

They sound a bit like 1940’s Hollywood film stars or cloth puppets on some children’s TV show. They’re not, they are powerful internet search engines which can provide you with links to websites which may help provide that answer you need in your genealogical quest.

What you get back will depend upon what you put in. Entering a single word into the search box will return millions of sites. Being a bit more specific can reduce the number dramatically and the links returned are more likely to be relevant to your needs. Purely for a bit of fun try this experiment and you will see what I mean.

1) Enter just your surname into the search box and see how many links are returned.

2) Repeat but this time add your birthplace to the search and see how many returns you get this time.

3) Finally repeat that and add your birth year into the search.

Every day there are dozens of requests for help on GR message boards where the question asked might easily have been answered had the enquirer tried using a search engine themselves.

There is no guarantee that the links that are returned will answer your specific question but they might. A bonus is that some of them may provide additional information or clues as to what to try next. You may even discover that you are listed in someone’s online family tree. (That happened to me)

The moral being that whilst less can often be more, when Googling or Binging entering more usually returns less but what you get is probably more relevant.

Good luck with your research.

Good mornining, uncle Jonesey,
I must be growing up because I already know about Mr Google, but you have once again moved me on a square by increasing his potential for me,
Thanks again!
love,
Jill

Morning Jonesey,
I am following your tips with interest...I already spend hours on Google,but how do I get on to Bing?
I havent heard of this..I have Google as my home page,so find that easy to acsess.
Kay

Just Google Bing and you will get a link to it. (lol)

It is Microsoft's equivalent to Google.

Ok thanks
I will try that now
Kay

of course you might be like my daughter


she put her forename in Google .. ....... it is an uncommon one and she wanted to know whether there were any others in the world.



She discovered several young women with the same name, mainly from the Philippines, offering their "services"

THAT was an eyeopener!




When I put in my own name ............ I discovered among other things that a posting I had made on Friends Reunited back in 2006 had been copied by someone and was showing as posted on a site that I had never ever been on.



sylvia

Apparently I used to date Bob Marley!!

Jan

now THAT's interesting!!


where were you living??

Jamaica I think, though I have forgotten ever being there. Also had a child but have forgotten that too!
Jan

now, that's some serious Seniors moments!