This week, the Rockstar Genealogist Award Winners have been announced. It has been great to see the genealogy community ‘come together’ and congratulate those who have been nominated, listed as Top Ten in their country, or as Medallists/Superstars across the globe.
The week of voting was an interesting one for me. As other genealogists have mentioned in various blogs and posts on Facebook, there is a fine line between promoting the awards themselves: highlighting their existence and encouraging others to vote in general, and shouting “vote for me” from the rooftops. Some people appear to think that telepathy is the best way to let people know that John D. Reid runs this poll every year. New people are coming into the field all the time and, when I was first nominated in 2013, I had no idea what the poll was all about. If it wasn’t for social media, I would have been totally oblivious!
Networking has massively helped us to grow Family Wise Limited. Without getting our name out there, no-one would know that Family Wise Limited existed. How do we do it? 4Networking has been crucial in spreading the word and, along with Facebook and Twitter, our involvement both in front of and behind the scenes in television shows in the UK and abroad, plus a few good decisions along the way, we’ve headed in the right direction.
It is a shame to read some of the write-ups about the awards being either obviously derisory to other winners or being bland enough in their comments for people to read between the lines. The Awards should be celebrated. In the past, I have seen someone refer to them as “The Genealogy Oscars”. There will always be people in life you don’t like, or don’t appreciate as much as you do others. The internet is not the place to express your marmite persuasions, in my humble opinion.
Celebrate success and be nice. The sand pit is big enough for everyone to play in. If you can’t say anything nice, say nothing.
Congratulations to the Top Ten International genealogists – an all-US list…. Clearly the rest of the world have some way to go to emulate the US genealogists. Next year…..?
