How to eliminate private as a title in Dorothy’s name

+3 votes
300 views
WikiTree profile: Dorothy Meserve
in Genealogy Help by Linda Gonzalez G2G Crew (470 points)
It looks like you entered "Private" in the name fields.  That isn't necessary because living people's information cannot be seen by anyone not on the trusted list for that profile.  Your mother will only appear in searches as "Living Surname" or you can make the profile completely hidden by choosing "Unlisted."

2 Answers

+6 votes
Have you tried different privacy settings? Have you checked what's in each of the name fields?

Sorry that's not much help. Hard to tell without the ability to edit the profile.
by Peggy Watkins G2G6 Pilot (850k points)
+8 votes
Linda, Private is not a title.  It is the First Name and also the Current Last Name.  You are profile manager, so you can edit it and change those names.  When you are logged in, go to the profile page and click the Edit tab.  You should then see the name fields and can change them to the correct names.

If you have a problem, post back here for more assistance.  Welcome to WikiTree.
by Gaile Connolly G2G Astronaut (1.2m points)
I’m messing it up even more. Just trying the various suggestions the was I understand them . Dorothy Ruth (Campbell) Meserve passed away 12/25/2015 . How private should this be?

Linda, there are 2 completely different kinds of things - 1 is the person's name and the other is the profile's privacy level.

The name should be the person's actual name, not something like "Anonymous" or "Private".  Right now the person's first name and current last name are both "Private".  This does nothing to make the profile private.

The privacy level of the profile is "private with public tree".  You can see that by hovering your mouse over the gold color lock icon at top right of the profile page.  If you click the Privacy tab you'll see at top of the profile, you will see what privacy levels there are, the description of what gets displayed to the public for each level, and there will be little round circles (we call these "radio buttons") that can be clicked to select the privacy level of the profile.  Right now, the gold lock button will be solid black, since that is the currently selected one.

As to how private this profile should be, that's a question that only you can answer.  The choices you have are:

  • open - white lock - any WikiTree member can edit and the public can see everything that's there - data, biography, and family tree
  • public - green lock - the public can see everything that's there, but only members of the trusted list can edit
  • private - only trusted list can edit, but there are 4 types of views - 
    • public biography and family tree - yellow lock
    • public biography - gold lock
    • public family tree - dark gold lock
    • private family tree and biography - red lock

Another privacy level, Unlisted, won't be an option for this profile - it is only used for living persons.

For persons who died less than 100 years ago, the general thinking here is that if there is any sensitive information in their profile - either something derogatory or anything that a living family member might be embarrassed to be publicly available, then you want to keep the biography private.  If you keep the family tree public then relationships for any family members whose DNA tests are entered on WikiTree will be shown to and beyond this person, otherwise DNA relationship tracing will stop at this person.  I hope this information helps you make a decision you are comfortable with.

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