Say, would you mind…?
(Note: This issue came up again in the discussions after yesterday’s blog post on taking the work of others without crediting them. It’s another side to the ethical issues we deal with, and this post from last year is repeated as The Legal Genealogist‘s take on it.)
You see it all the time, out here on the internet.
It seems perfectly innocent.
It’s just a request for help, and helping is something we do here in the genealogical community.
It goes like this:
I don’t subscribe to Big-Pay-Website but I understand that Important Document For My Family is available there. Would someone who is a Big-Pay-Website subscriber please get me a copy of Important Document? I’d sure appreciate it.
There’s only one honest and ethical answer that can be given to that question:
No.
The simple fact is, it’s wrong.
Just plain wrong.
For the person asking for that Important Document, it’s freeloading.
It’s like asking your neighbor who has high speed cable internet service if you can run your wire to his modem so you can use his service. Or if he’d mind sharing the password to his router so you can use his wireless system.
Pure and simple, it’s taking something without paying for it.
And for the person who subscribes to Big-Pay-Website, it’s no different from taking a pencil from your employer’s stockroom for your friend to use — when you’d never dream of taking a pencil from your employer for yourself.
The fact is, it costs money to provide easy online access to a wide variety of documents. Somebody has to pay for acquiring the documents, scanning them, digitizing them, making the equipment and software available to serve them up online.
Big-Pay-Website can only pay for those things if people pay it — fairly and squarely — for the information it provides. To stay in business, it sets terms and conditions for our use of the website.
And that’s what those of us who are subscribers agree to when we sign up. We may not like the terms and conditions; we may whine and moan about the costs.
But that’s the deal, and we’ve agreed to it. Big-Pay-Website is keeping its end of the bargain by making the documents available. We need to keep our end by using the access under the limits set in the terms and conditions.
And those terms often say we can only use Big-Pay-Website for our own research. Sometimes that includes research we’re hired to do for others, but particularly with some of the online newspaper sites, it’s our own personal research only.
Reader Jerry Kocis ran across a variation on this recently in a genealogy group on Yahoo.com. The message there focused on a newspaper article about the death of a member of the inquirer’s family in a train accident in 1890, and the newspaper website at issue has terms that limit its use to our own personal research only.
Jerry posted it on Google+ as an ethics question:
Is it right (ethical) to avoid paying for a subscription to a site’s content by asking for a subscriber to locate the content for you?
Just asking the question gives the answer. No. It’s not right.
Now there is a difference between verifying that the document exists and actually getting a copy of the document. Knowing for sure that the newspaper is available on a particular pay website and that the article is in the paper may be the incentive that pushes me over into subscribing to the site to get that article.
But if I ask you to use your subscription to get me a copy of the article itself?
You know what to tell me. You know I really do have other options. You know I can write to the newspaper. I can go to a library that has the newspaper on microfilm. I can hire someone in that area to track down a physical copy. I can do all the things we as genealogists used to do before there were Big-Pay-Websites, before there was an internet.
So if I ask, just say no, okay? It’s wrong.
I can’t believe what I am about to say: I’m a faithful follower of this blog thanks to the usually excellent subjects, explanations and comments. However, in this case, I’m sorry Judy, but there is a flaw in your argument.
Not all “Big-Pay-Website” are created equal. There is grey area here.
As a professional genealogist, Ancestry.com lets me access their holdings, which I can use and pass on to a client. Does my client have to subscribe to Ancestry.com for me to be able to access the information? No. In the same vein I will conduct research for free because the recipient has helped me (I am doing my own research, after all).
Not all newspaper sites are created equal. Thanks to my public library I have access to the archives of (what I believe are) two of the largest newspapers in Canada (The Toronto Star and the Globe and Mail), as well as a myriad of other databases and resources.
What about the “Big-Pay-Website” that suck up my free content and charge you to see it: is it ethical that for-profit companies make profit from my effort without paying for it?
Last year I photographed all the headstones in my local municipal cemetery. I was challenged by a municipal worker. When I inquired at the town hall about the issue I was told that the township restricted what was being done in the cemetery because a big genealogical society had published a transcript of all the headstones, profited from it and refused to share it without a user paying for it. I got my hands slapped for offering on an open website to do lookups in the transcripts I had purchased: said big genealogical society considered what I was doing was “copyright infringement”. WHAT? Said big genealogical society thought they could copyright what was written on a headstone in a publicly accessible cemetery?
There are two issues that turn people away from the genealogical community: (1) it’s an “old boys club” and (2) there’s a fee for everything.
I have a local radio announcer who repeatedly states that “common sense” is an oxymoron. Not every genealogist is a professional and understands all the legal and ethical issues we face. If this issue is so important than why don’t the “Big-Pay-Website” troll every forum and launch lawsuits for every infraction? Because it’s not reasonable or practical.
Are you so concerned about someone asking for something? Ignore it. If everyone else understands the ethical issue then no one will answer the query. Simple. The time it would take me to go to “Big-Pay-Website” (if I subscribe to it), look up the Terms of Service, read the whole thing to determine if I am violating my user agreement and then respond to tell the questioner that his/her request is unethical/illegal/fattening/etc. I wouldn’t have time for research.
I do realize that there are people out there that seem to have some sense of “entitlement” and expect everything for free: in my circles we call them “leeches”. They don’t stick around long because they over-stay their welcome. But the occasional request? Do we have to beat these people over the head to drive home an idealistic message?
Yes, I could get in my car, drive for hours or days to go to where some particular information is, look it up and abstract/transcribe/photocopy it: but is it practicle? Or I can get in my car, drive for half-an-hour and go to my nearest Family History Center where the good folks with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints offer me so much more, for free. By the way, the FHC’s have an institutional subscription to “Big-Pay-Website” like Fold3, etc. (the “Big-Pay-Website” newspaper cites we’re talking about).
Does “Big-Pay-Website” really expect EVERYONE to pay? No. Look at Ancestry.com: they tried to restrict the use of their site and masses stopped paying for access. Like any business, “Big-Pay-Website” companies know that these things happen and take them in stride.
Bottom line: not all “Big-Pay-Website” have the same Terms of Service and you really need to know what and if before declaring that every request for help on a forum is not ethical.
I really do share many of your concerns, Tim, and do believe that turn about is fair play. But I also believe two wrongs don’t make a right. We can’t control what others do, except by voting with our feet. If you don’t like the rules at One Big Pay Site, go elsewhere — let that One wither on the vine.
I also share your concerns, Tim. I only volunteer where my records will be kept “free”, but I do subscribe to “Big-Pay-Website”…I just wait for the 50% discount comes rolling around in my email after my last expiration. Can’t help it…they are still the best out there.
Actually, said big genealogical society was right. They aren’t claiming copyright on the headstones, but on their transcription of the headstones, which they do have copyright on. Nothing to stop you from doing your own transcription and making it publically available.
In the United States, mere copying of existing information (such as transcribing the contents of existing headstones) lacks the degree of originality that’s required for copyright protection. A society could add other information (from obits, family histories and the like) and get a compilation copyright on the whole, but facts — even facts reported on headstones — can’t be copyrighted, and copying anything else doesn’t create a new copyright.
At least one Big-Pay-Website can be accessed for FREE through many libraries and Family History Centers. We can certainly encourage our friends to take advantage of that. And more and more is coming onto familysearch.org every day, also FREE.
I used to love Familysearch.org, and can occasionally still find some stuff “for free”. But, lately, it seems that all the indexes lead to the “Big-Pay-Websites” to view the actual images…not very “free”.
There’s still a lot available free on FamilySearch. And anything free is a plus.
Many such pay sites are available at libraries!
Tim, I agree with some of your comments but disagree with others. Let me focus on one – the Genealogical Society transcript of Cemetery stones. It is not okay for you to copy those and share with others. It’s not a question of the Society saying they own the names etc on the stone.
They went to the Cemetery. They copied the names. Then they presented those names in their own layout in the booklet. The facts are not copyright but the way they are presented, is. The fair thing would be for you to go to the cemetery and do your own copying of names on the stones.
Judy I am glad you brought this subject up. One thing that has bothered me is a fairly well known volunteer lookup site has many volunteers who state “I have access to Ancestry.com, FindMyPast and GenealogyBank. I am willing to look for your names there” WHAT???!!! That is WRONG. Just WRONG.
Lorraine, I disagree with your comment that they went to the Cemetery and copied the names. Really? I happen to copy gravestones for Big Name Website’s and enter the data for people doing genealogy….. The other thing is, they don’t own the copyright to the headstones or the names, ridiculous! They can present it any way they want, same as I can, but they cannot copyright it.
Facts cannot be copyrighted, correct. The way facts are expressed can be copyrighted but not the facts themselves.
Hi
I have learned so much from your posts and cannot tell you how much I appreciate your blog. I used that learned knowledge when an distant family member contacted me and wanted help finding our common ancestors. I was fine with helping but wasn’t about to overstep the law. I was supposed to send him “everything I could find”. Well, instead, I did a search and copied the list of results showing the names of the records for him and gave him that. Otherwise, he needed to buy his own website subscription. I knew it would be illegal to give him the records but I had also learned from being burned a couple of times before. People contact you wanting records on the promise to share and once you provide, they disappear never to be heard from again. I break the law for no one.
Thank you!!!
Mary
Thanks for this, Judy. I was happy to read that I’d done the right thing earlier this year. I was approached by a new contact I’d made in my maternal line. He and I share 4x great-grandparents. Turns out I have much more interest in documented proof than he does BUT this did not stop him from emailing me to ask me to download newspaper items (social notices) from a Big-Pay-Newspaper-Archive in Britain for a list of…are you ready…34 people. All but 6 of the 34 are NOT direct ancestors of mine. I refused and he took himself off in a bit of a huff. So, I lost a contact, but one of dubious ethics, and I retained my own self-respect and ethics.
Does this apply to look ups in books? Or is that a horse of a different color? I tell folks online to go to the library for “Big Pay Websites” but I usually share what I have in books. Is this a no no? Some of my local history reference and genealogy books are long, long out of print or hard to find (but maybe that doesn’t matter?)
Heather, you’ll be happy to know that print books don’t have terms and conditions (apart from standard copyright). You can certainly share a fact that you find in a book (facts can’t be copyrighted).
A single fact from a book doesn’t bother me. A lookup service at the request of the publisher (a local genealogical society, for example) same thing. But wholesale copying is where the line must be drawn.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/raogkUSA/permalink/572466606188565/
sigh ….
What about my second cousin and I splitting memberships.
Neither of us can afford all and we are researching our
mutual relatives. Can we share what we find?
Depends on the terms of use — the contract between you and the website. You have to read what it says and see if it’s allowed.
PS By splitting, I meant — I buy big box and she buys big newspaper or vice versa. She is attaching big box items to her big box tree that she invited me to join, Seems as though they are explicitly encouraging it?
I certainly don’t mind helping the rare request from someone in real need. And I don’t see this as a breech of trust, or of the end user agreement. Repeated help, no. But on the rare occasion when something comes up, no, I don’t see a problem. I also don’t charge people for the rare look up. And it happens so very infrequently, it’s a nonissue for us.
NOW, that said, we are a two ancestry subscriber household. Both my husband and I are genealogy hobbyists. While a single subscription would be legal and ethical for us to use, there are times that we both want to use Ancestry at the same time, we just prefer our own accounts. And we approach Microsoft Office the same way, we both can can be using Access databases at the same time.
Sharing with another family member you’re actively working with is one thing. Having someone else outside of your research circle getting help like this? Um… no.
I had this happen to me with my local library. I’m sure not going to give away their services when they are so underfunded. You can provide a person with the exact source, date, page and they still don’t want to pick up the phone and pay — even if it’s just a dollar or two.
Amazing that people won’t even support their own local library.
Hi dear Judy,
Thank you SO much for repeating this previous blog and the one you did a couple days ago. I will be putting the link to this blog with references to the FB post I saw on Tuesday when someone asked another person in the group to get her a document on a “Big-Pay-Website” which infuriated me. Not sure why I didn’t submit a response post. However, I definitely will go back to that group on FB saying “Don’t ask! The answer is and always will be NO!” with this blog link.
;o) V.
Doing what’s right is sometimes uncomfortable. But it’s still right.
I think that something that helps confuse the issue is that at least one Big-Pay Website has a TOS that is at odds with what it allows the subscribers to do. For example, when viewing an image on a family tree, you are given the option to add that image to your own family tree. But the TOS has that you should ask permission first. When looking at the image of a document, say a death certificate, this website gives you the option to ‘share’ the image with a friend, and again, the TOS does not support this.
It does make it difficult to do the right thing, and know what the legal right thing is, when the Big-Name Websites continue to offer subscribers the ability to disregard the TOS.
You’re absolutely right that clarity in the TOS is the way to go.
Well done.
Thanks for the kind words, Bob.
Don’t these pay sites also have T&Cs about professionals paying different subs to use their sites for commercial gain (ie to help a customer?)
I believe myself, on teaching people to fish, rather than doing the fishing for them.
And yes my library has free access to certain pay per view sites.
Do the searches at home, make a list of what images you want to view for free at the library.
đŸ™‚
Some absolutely do have different subscription rules — and rates! — for professionals.
I am my family’s genealogist for a reason, that reason being that I enjoy it immensely, while the rest of the family does not. They have little interest in tearing through endless records, organizing a bunch of convoluted, questionable, related facts, solving mysteries, and all the other things that make my life worth living. They especially have no need or desire to pay Big-Pay Website for the privilege. However, they are very interested in the family’s history if I don’t bog them down with too many details or processes and if I don’t go on and on for hours about it, or talk about it every single time we are together. Aside from loving it myself, I also do it for them.
One of the greatest joys I have known was being able to tell my 89 year old great uncle which Civil War battle took the life of his great grandfather, what unit his ancestor fought with, where on the battlefield map his ancestor’s unit fought, and show him copies of the military records and a picture of his great grandfather that had been handed down through another branch of the family. Until I found the information, nobody living was aware of this ancestor’s service and death, but when I asked my great uncle about it, he remembered his grandfather telling him when he was a boy that the grandfather’s father had been killed in the Civil War. That is all he knew, and it was more than anyone else knew until I made the discovery. I love seeing the look of amazement on their faces.
My problem is this- how do I legally make my work on Big-Pay Website available to the rest of the family? It seems ridiculous that my elderly mother should have to buy a Big-Pay membership just to look at the family tree I built, or to print out a picture of great, great, granddad’s headstone, when she has no desire to do actual genealogical research herself. I know that I can self-publish pre-formatted charts and posters and books through Big-Pay website or their software product Big-Pay Moneymaker, but I don’t want to be limited to those formats. I want to be able to share the results of my efforts with those that I am doing it for. Imagine a world where you had to pay a stiff fee to enter any library, and once inside, you could read and look and listen to your heart’s content, but you could not copy anything nor take anything out of the library, Those who enter, learn. But what they learn dies with them. They cannot share it. What would be the point? That is what Big-Pay Website is like. It is like a world where musicians can play for their own enjoyment, but are not allowed to play for others. Don’t get me started. Too late.
You could put your family tree on a site that isn’t subscription based. If you choose to use a subscription based site, it makes no sense at all to complain about the fact that it is subscription based.
All someone has to do to see your tree is get a user ID and be invited to join your private tree. Big-pay allows this if you are talking about theUS based big pay.
There’s a difference between accessing someone else’s tree at their invitation and downloading and reusing documents and images from that tree (or any online site).
Wow, all I can say is that it’s selfish to keep information that someone else might want to know and have verified….it’s NOT like stealing a pencil from work…I’m not getting paid to research my family, I AM PAYING a site for information I want to help verify the people to MY family tree…whether I decide to share that information to others or in a book I’m writing is my business and not the site I’m paying for….the illustrations used about allowing others to use your internet without paying has NO COMPARISON! If I want to be selfish and keep all the information to myself, then I would have made the tree private…but that’s what PUBLIC means and SHARING a family tree with other family members…whether subscribers or not….it’s my choice and if it’s not then I no longer pay for it then! Very sad…I didn’t see much legality words mentioned in the article, just some selfish opinionated hoo haa….sorry. Would like to add Judy that you could have put in some examples of legalities from certain big pay websites that state that information cannot be shared….I was very unaware of this…..I totally agree with Tim Campbell’s comment at the start…
I’ve written about the restrictions on the pay websites many times. Read the terms of use of the websites you use. They’re contracts you agree to when you choose to use those sites.
Thanks for all the good work, Judy.
Do you think there is a difference (ethically) between sharing a document found on a Big-Pay-Website with another researcher and sharing a copy of a document obtained at a library or archive? The document was paid for in both cases – through a subscription to Big-Pay or through a copying/mailing fee if ordered from the archive or a copying fee if the researcher was personally at the library/archive. If sharing in the first case (Big-Pay) is unethical, is the second case unethical as well? Thank you.
I realize the post has been here a while, but was quoted in a recent discussion in a closed group on Facebook.
Your logic is flawed. When you purchase an account at mega everything genealogical under one roof site, your are purchasing a connection to the data they have there with a single device. There are no restrictions on what you can view or copy or share, because they are not selling the information; just the connection. Nor are there any restrictions on who can benefit by the use of that connection.
In your two examples: would you look this up for me and can I use your login, assumes party a and party b have nothing in common research wise. This may be an abuse of a friendship if there is no compensation for your time or lack of access while your connection is tied up, and thereby be perceived unethical.
What you fail to address is a collaborative relationships or a professional relationships. In which case, by your logic, non account holders of the collaborative or the customer of the genealogist would be behaving unethically and freeloading and the fruit of the account access would be tainted.
I think you were groping for a way to justify telling abusive friends to go get your own account.
You’re neglecting one “minor little detail” — the terms of use of the particular website.
No I am not. See my postEthics at my blog.
You selectively reviewed the terms of use of one website but appear to have extrapolated to all pay sites. That, in my book, is not adequately considering the issue of terms of use. Take a look, for example, at the terms of use of GenealogyBank. The end result there would be vastly different.
You painted with a broad stroke, lumping every website together. You mislead your readers by inference that it is unethical always at every site. Then you turn around and offer an example of a site that has a terms of service that fits your needs. When you state that it wrong (period), you cannot come back and defend that with a most of the time or some of the time or in this instance. To disprove your statement all I have to do is give one example of where it is not true.
I am the administrator of a website that supports collaberation and research on a single surname. Where your article comes in is, when I tasked a researcher to use a specific site, which permits such collaberation, to find information related to a new discovery. One of our members cited this article as if it were the Holy book.
The title of your website gives weight to what you post; therefore you must avoid ambiguity. In this post you opine and use nothing to back it up but your moral compass.
I don’t disagree that under many conditions your moral compass points in the right direction. As a writer with a any following, you have a responsibility to ensure that you are not misunderstood or confusing.
I salute you for being willing to respond, debate, and allow comments of all views.
In recent discussions in about this topic on some Facebook groups there are people who are arguing that since Newspapers.com allows clipping of articles and sharing them on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest that they are allowed to do look ups for anyone they choose and post those images. What are your thoughts on this?
My thoughts center on the word “dumb” and the phrase “cutting off our noses to spite our faces.” Bottom line is that Ancestry.com (owner of Newspapers.com) currently has very generous terms of use that allow us to use these images for personal and professional use and to share them in connection with our own research. If we start cutting into their profit margin by making it possible for others not to subscribe, just what do folks think Ancestry is going to do with those terms of use?
Thank you! I find it interesting that many of the people who are expressing that opinion don’t use the clip and share option when they are doing “look ups” for strangers/fellow group members. They are posting images of the article without stating which newspaper the article is in, the page number the article can be found on, the date it was published or where it was found. That makes me think they know they are doing something wrong and trying to hide it.
Ooooh… compounding the ethical sin by the genealogical sin of not citing their sources!! đŸ™‚
I am compelled to insert my opinion here. I have been fortunate to work in a few industries where this issue rears its ugly head;
Photography, System Administration ( Software ), Real Estate Broker ( Marketing Material ),
Here is my version of the human understanding of wants, needs and ethics.
It starts out as just one little thing a picture, a single function of a software application or a discription of a property. Bottom line is someone originally had such great interest or was paid to performed their job. This original person spent their time energy and love of their craft to refine their skills to produce that ” one little thing”.
I suggest that the only the people who are themselves willing to work for free and still feed their families should be able to get their “one little thing” for free.
Judy How to many FB groups get around this? There are groups for sharing Newspaper articles and there is another group Random Acts of Genealogy Kindness that also allow people to share articles upon request. They actually encourage this type of thing. So are they doing this legally? or Against TOS with Newspapers website? I would really like to know the answer or your opinion on this.
The FB groups that do this are (in my personal opinion) violating the terms of service.