Geneanet

A few readers have taken us to task for not writing here about Geneanet, the largest and most successful of the French genealogy subscription websites. It has gone through a slight remodel, with a couple of new screens and a different colour to the logo. By many, it is considered to be equal to or better than the US version of Ancestry.com. It is multi-lingual, has its own blog, a newsletter, and different levels of search capacity for different prices.

The truth is,  it maddens us. We are maddened  -- and insulted -- by the way the screen is full of flashing sushi ads, under which is the plug to pay the subscription and have "ad-free browsing".  We are maddened by the "alert" programme which sends names from every search we ever made to our e-mail address, every time someone adds the name to their personal tree. We are maddened by the mess of the site, the mixed quality of the resources, the innumerable dead ends of so many of the "results" of a search. Why, when just about every Departmental archive has a beautifully organised website for free, is this subscription site such mayhem?

We do not mind so much the points system that is an alternative to a year's subscription (ten points to a euro). This actually seems rather a good idea. We like that it has a link to the collections of Geneaservice, saving us on at least one subscription. There is no doubt that we use Geneanet, and often, especially for the books in its "library", but we would love to see it tidied up and the quality of the information improved.

Feel free, Dear Readers, to post your defenses of Geneanet; perhaps we can be convinced it has some greater value than is apparent.

©2010 Anne Morddel

French Genealogy

Comments

[Monsieur C.]

Ouf ! I agree with M. d'Aïeux et d'Ailleurs. That was quite a post. Hopefully, you are just trying to generate some comments and web traffic (smile)!

GeneaNet SA is just a little, privately held business in Paris with about 6 or so guys!! It is certainly not comparable to Ancestry.com, a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange with 2009 revenue of about US$250 million, earnings forecasted at US$95 million, and 600 employees. Ancestry's huge subscriber base, the web site's sophistication, and broad range of offerings - especially its enormous variety of indexed images - is really unmatched. (For another comparison: NotreFamille.com is publicly traded on EuroNext-Paris with 2009 revenues of 12 million euros (US$16 million), and about 40 full-time employees.)

Personally, I think what the GeneaNet guys have accomplished in nothing short of amazing! -- Evidence of GeneaNet's success is proven by its world-wide appeal: more than 60,000 page views per day, 1.) 46% from France, 2.) 11% from Netherlands, 3.) 6% from U.S. (Belgium, Germany, and Spain follow.) It has the largest database of contributed family genealogies outside of the U.S.; almost **400 million** individuals!... I will not rattle on about its generally excellent range of contents and fee-based offerings (but I must note that I am particularly fond of its unique bookstore.) The developers are innovative, constantly finding ways to make improvements, and always releasing something new. Their well-written and concise newsletters and blog postings are essential to knowing what is going on and what is new in the world of French genealogy. (Second only to this blog, of course - smile!)

Goodness knows the whole site could use the services of a first-class graphic designer, and the genealogical software that runs on GeneaNet is not the least bit elegant (and yes, a bit « maddening »), but it works. I have literally made hundreds of discoveries and connections to researchers that would not be possible elsewhere. Despite its obvious weaknesses, GeneaNet deserves praise, not condemnation.

[d'aïeux et d'ailleurs]

Waouw, never read such a post about Geneanet ;-) ! It changes !
I'm not Geneanet huge fan, but I'm using it. Often.
Geneanet uses lots of ads, that's a point (the last Geneanet / HArris Interactive poll was talking about... ads on Geneanet. Really funny...). As a privilege member, I don't have sushi ads... BUT just to say a word on that ads point, if you're using some good Internet browser (in a word : not Internet Explorer) for Internet (not only for Geneanet, but for every commercial websites), you don't have pop ups. If you have some, then you have spyware :-)

I'm also using Geneaservice.. but not a lot. To expensive for 1 little information. Think I prefer points system (like Geneabank, or Geneanet) and filters possibilities.