More on the SCGS Jamboree: Free Live Streaming

Jun6

I am very grateful that Ancestry.com has sponsored live streaming of the Jamboree since my foot problems are keeping me home now. There is one selected presentation available in each time slot.

TriangulationSlidesSee the schedule here: http://genealogyjamboree.com/2015/schedule-streaming.html and how to get set up for it here http://genealogyjamboree.com/2015/streaming-overview.html

I really enjoyed my day and a half at the Jamboree. I discovered that most of the San Diego folk had come by train! There is a stop next door at the Burbank Airport and the hotel has a van that will fetch you. Next year …

As always I loved listening to Cece Moore. I learned a few things from her presentation about some of her adoptee success stories. Many more genetic genealogy stars were there: Blaine Bettinger, Tim Janzen, Angie Bush, Judy Russell, and Kathy Johnston. Sadly I had to miss most of their presentations since I gave two of my own.

I was pleasantly surprised by the full house at my triangulation lecture. It was exciting to be live streamed. A number of folk told me afterwards that they felt like they finally understood this concept. What I did was present a number of real life cases from my own research where I used DNA triangulation to figure out relationships. That seemed to work well.

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The SCGS Jamboree is this week! Including DNA day Plus!

Jun1

The fun Southern California Genealogy conference in Burbank starts this Thursday. It includes a whole day dedicated to DNA! Many talks will be live streamed. Plus there are a few DNA presentations on other days and, of course, an exhibit hall.

SCGS-Genealogy-Jamboree--20

I have been working hard on my presentations which are on DNA day Thursday, plus I will be at a round table on Friday. This has seriously cut into my making blog posts. I have no less than three in progress articles waiting for me to have more time.

See the schedule for DNA day here: http://genealogyjamboree.com/2015/DNAday.html

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New DNA Relationship Statistics from Blaine Bettinger

May29

The question I often see is are we really 2nd or 3rd or 4th cousins? The answer is usually “maybe.” A 2nd-4th cousin designation by your testing company is purposefully vague. Best to look at the amount of shared cMs in segments greater than 7cM, number of segments, and the sizes of those segments; plus, of course, who else this new DNA relative matches!

DNA inheritance gets more and more random the further away the relationship is. The amount of DNA you share with someone more distant than a 3rd cousin is impossible to predict and even those 2nd and 3rd cousins seem highly variable. So the statistical study conducted by genetic genealogist Blaine Bettinger is deeply appreciated by all of us hunting down the relationships with our DNA connections.

Shared DNA statistics from Blaine Bettinger

Shared DNA statistics from Blaine Bettinger, used by permission

Blaine has created this beautiful chart. His blog has several posts explaining the study which is the source of these new statistics. See http://www.thegeneticgenealogist.com/2015/05/29/the-shared-cm-project/ for all his posts on this study. I had previously discussed his project when recruiting people to add their statistics; apparently he is still taking in statistics so click here to add yours.

Would you like to hear me talk?

May13

If you would like to hear me talk, I am doing two presentations in the San Diego area this weekend. One is genealogy related and  the other is on Jewish DNA.

OWOTOn Saturday morning at 10:30, I am giving my talk about The Advantages of Working with a One World Tree  for the Computer Genealogy Society of San Diego  which meets over on the campus of UCSD, University of California, San Diego. Click on the image to get to my online slide deck. The notes and handout for this talk are in my downloads area.

I will explain why I think the best way to preserve your wonderful genealogical research is to contribute it to a One World Tree. Then I will tell you what I love about the trees at GENI, WikiTree, and FamilySearch, as well as what can be improved at each. Click on this link for more details: http://www.cgssd.org/

The other talk is on Sunday afternoon at 1:00 pm at the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center in La Jolla.  It is on a subject I find fascinating and difficult: how to use DNA testing for genealogy when you have Jewish ancestry. I will lead in with some basics about DNA testing. See the San Diego Jewish Genealogy web site at http://www.sdjgs.org/ for more details.

Frankly those of us that have even one Ashkenazi grandparent, like myself, look like a 4th or 5th cousin to almost every other person of European Jewish descent. This makes it very hard to work with these tests.

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