From Newsgroup: soc.genealogy.medieval

Hi Joe, Peter and earlier SGM posters too numerous to mention.

Though I have been inactive the last couple years, I like many others
still monitor the group. I have also been horrified at the seeming
demise of an active soc.genealogy.medieval newsgroup. It in many ways
had become an important 'state of the art' medium for me, its postings
adding much new knowledge and valid sources. These in turn often
provoked further improvements as well as occasional deprecations. It has
been a wonderful community that would be a loss to current and new
medieval researchers were it to disappear.

This is not the first time that previously active posters have suggested
SGM is on its last legs. Some 10 years ago Stewart Baldwin agreed with
new poster W K Wood that SGM was a "ghost of its former self. " I
disagreed, and some notable names joined in the thread, most notably the
now departed Leo Van de Pas, but also Matt Tompkins, Vance Mead, Jose
Luis Fernando Blanco, Bronwen Edwards, Ian Edwards and others. See groups.google.com/g/soc.genealogy.medieval/c/RK-Wx3GVS4Y/m/ZRtpDOKixiIJ
The point being that while all the low hanging fruit was gone that
appeared in the 1990's due to the internet providing universal access to previously inaccessible sources, there was still much fruit left. I
labeled the period from SGM's origins until then the golden age for SGM
and medieval genealogy. During that time many Complete Perage entries
were corrected, Douglas Richardson released his many volumes of medieval ancestral histories, and Chris Phillips' medieval genealogy website
expanded into the great research tool it has become.

I would label the period from then until now the silver age for SGM,
because while the quantity of postings decreased, the quality and
diversity of postings still remained. Even so, more original posters
left the scene, fewer new ones appeared, and reaching the higher fruit
required more research time. While there were fewer discoveries for
Richardson and others to post about, they still were being found.

But then the google groups shock of canceling future posts came along.
All prior SGM posts went into inactive storage, new posts could not find
a tech friendly home, and things have gone quiet.

I believe it is important for SGM to continue. The main reason is it
provides a superior medium for many people to share the medieval
discoveries of active researchers, many of them amateurs like myself. A
post to SGM can be done in a day without negotiating and scheduling a
journal article to appear in half a year or more. Instead of an editor,
other posters become the editors of erroneous or incomplete postings.
And many posts include sources and insights treasured by others.

I have negotiated the clumsy Thunderbird program and instructions enough
to access the SGM newsgroup. But it is clear many others have been
technically challenged, and newbies have no idea the value of SGM.

Last month Joe Cook posted a link to an alternate newsgroup host -
Novabbs. It has easy web access and doesn't require Thunderbird. Like
google groups did, no logon is needed to read messages. URL = novabbs.com/interests/thread.php?group=soc.genealogy.medieval

Like googlegroups, a Username and password is needed to post to an
existing thread or a new one. To register a Username and Password, URL = novabbs.com/interests/thread.php?group=soc.genealogy.medieval. This post
was made using the novabbs website.

One novabbs shortcoming is that it only saves about 7,000 posts, the
earliest dated to April 2021. Thunderbird has more past posting (back to
about 2014), but still not back to earlier SGM dating to the 1990's. To
search earlier postings one therefore needs to search the google groups
files, still existing @ groups.google.com/g/soc.genealogy.medieval.
What a catastrophe if all those golden age SGM posts would be deleted.

Like 10 years ago, SGM needs to identify new ways to get prior posters
to return, and find new posters. Step one would be for existing SGMers
to adopt the novabbs website. Secondly, it would make good sense if
Chris Phillips' excellent medievalgenealogy.org.uk website would add a
page to its 'Resources' group outlining how to access both new and
historical SGM postings. Promoting it there would help newer medieval researchers understand what a great resource SGM was, and still can be.

TJ Booth
Chicago IL
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2