A blog post published yesterday by Judy G. Russell, The Legal Genealogist, caused several people to tweet that they’ve started removing their photos from their online family tree on Ancestry.
The reason for people deleting their photos is because Ancestry on Tuesday updated its terms of service and privacy statement and alerted subscribers about the change on its website. The update was likely ignored by a number of people because most of us rarely read the fine print. When we do read it, the legalese often confuses us and goes over our head.
But, as she often does, The Legal Genealogist explained the updated terms in a language the average genealogist can understand.
Ms. Russell wrote: “In plain English, the rights to use that family photo you posted, that story you wrote and uploaded, that snippet of family history you’ve shared basically now belong to Ancestry. You can continue to use it elsewhere if you wish, since you’re still technically the owner, but you can’t do anything to stop Ancestry from using it any way it wants, forever.”
Read Ms. Russell’s blog post, One big change at Ancestry, for the full story.
