How long have you been on WikiTree?
I originally joined WikiTree in December 2013, as I like the concept of a shared tree as then you can help and be helped by others. However I found the GEDCOM upload and matching process a bit clunky, so I didn't actually start creating profiles on WikiTree until March of 2021.
What do you spend the most time doing on WikiTree?
Currently a mix between uploading Gedcoms and creating profiles from my research, I also take part in Thons and Challenges.
Which project or projects are you most involved in?
I'm involved in the Netherlands Project (formerly Dutch Roots), where the aim is to have accurate and good-quality profiles for Dutch ancestors. When I take part on Friday Date Night I search for dateless profiles in the Netherlands, and for Source-a-Thon and Connect-a-Thon I also target profiles for people from the Netherlands. I've also just become a Project Coordinator and have been involved in discussions as to how to progress the Netherlands Project and to make managing it less effort.
How can others help the Netherlands Project?
We can always do with more help creating Netherlands profiles, and finding sources for existing Netherland profiles, we are currently refreshing some of the Netherlands Project pages and provincial teams have been set up.
What inspires you to contribute so much of yourself to WikiTree's mission? Do you consider your work here to be part of your legacy?
As I've collected quite a bit of information over the years, yes, I consider it my legacy to leave it for others searching for their ancestors.
What is your favorite feature or function on WikiTree?
I like the new Living Cousins feature, but what I love most about WikiTree is the co-operative community.
What feature or function would you most like to see added or improved?
I think the duplicate matching when creating a profile needs a bit of improving, it quite often lists people that obviously can't be a match, but sometimes fails to list one that is actually a duplicate.
Do you have a story about how someone was helped through your participation on WikiTree?
For this week's WikiTree Challenge for Hasse Fröberg there was a family rumour that they were descended from a well known Dutch person Louis de Geer, however he and quite a lot of his family didn't have profiles, so I and a few others from the Netherlands Project created profiles and added sources. There are indications that this may actually be true, so we will see later on this week if that helped there. Other than that I've been adding dates and sources to profiles that are missing them, or adding templates to indicate the need for further research.
Do you have any tips for someone who wants to get more involved in our community?
Joining a project or projects relevant to your ancestry helps, as then you have a group of people you can ask questions of on Discord.
What could we do to inspire more people to participate in our mission?
Possibly it is more a matter of reigniting the interest of existing members. We've observed that 37% percent of people in our Netherlands Project have not made any edits in the last 3 months.
So re-igniting those members would get more people participating. Maybe we send out an email survey to inactive members to find out why they are no longer participating.
