How do computers and the internet, and photography effect or influence genealogy?

Question

It would be better if it was JUST effect for computer and internet and JUST influence for photography, to make it easier for all of us.

Answer 1

The internet is a great tool for many things. It can affect the way you photograph things, it can affect the way you deal with other people.

Personal experience with doing geneaoly on the internet has been enlightening. I've made contact with relatives in other countries who I have never met, yet I have so much in common with them.

Answer 2

Strange maybe to add photography into the computer/internet slant.

Computers and the internet obviously give us quick access to information that, before their use, we might have found difficult or even impossible to access due to factors of distance or maybe even knowing of a particular documents existence.

However , researching genealogy over the internet, i have found that parish records, council records etc can often be incomplete or not existent on the net, and often we are reliant on the ability of a person or team of people to transcribe the original records accurately, or in the least to provide good quality scans of the originals.

So whilst the internet is a valuable tool , some times it is necessary to follow leads in the real also.

Internet sites and forums are also a way of posting messages that are accessible by people all over the world, so if you are looking for a person or family abroad then this is a good way to open up your search, you never know who might be able to piece together a little part of your history.

Photographs i guess could be posted on such genealogy internet sites in the hope that someone might recognise the place or people pictured. Photographs also give us a visual, a face  a sense of place and maybe personality of the people pictured, so if we come across faces of ancestors we never met then this certainly helps form a bond or a kind of knowledge of them in some way. Maybe this simply helps us empathise, or may run deeper if we see a strong family resemblance or trait.

:-)