One World Tree is owned by myfamily.com, Inc.  OWT is
nothing more than a compiled version of all the family
trees that have ever been submitted, by people like
us, to any and all companies that myfamily.com now
owns.  Myfamily now owns Ancestry, Ancestry.co.uk,
RootsWeb.com and FamilyHistory.com, Genealogy.com,
Family Finder, World Family Tree, Family Gathering,
Family Tree Maker, Family Origins, Genealogy.com,
Family Tree Detective, All In One Tree, Internetree,
Family Tree Creator, Ultimate Family Tree, Family
Archives, and Your Family Story Is Waiting, 1-2-3
Family Tree package, among others.

If you ever submitted a tree to Roots Web or
FamilyTreemaker, your work has been acquired by
myfamily.com. All the work we thought we were sharing
with cousins was cleverly stolen. I say *cleverly*,
because there doesn’t seem to be anything we can do
about it.

They claim we still own our own work. They claim they
just acquired the work and came up with a super
merging system and search engine, for which they hold
a copyright. If you want to use anyone else’s work –
that they posted – you must get permission for use !
They are charging $40 a year for customers to simply
search our work from one location.   If you want to
challenge your copyright infringement, you must prove
you have the license.  [Did you pay $50 for a
copyright?]   This isn’t exactly the law, but it is
how they present it. They have cleverly made it
complicated enough that none of us will be able to
find an attorney willing to go up against a billion
dollar company.  The only way to do it is through a
class action suit.  You can bet they planned their
defense even before launching this latest rip-off.

There was a way to *opt-out* of having your tree
posted [another defence], but the deadline passed in
May.  I tried it and couldn’t get the site to work.  I
was furious that my work was stolen and I had to go
out of my way to opt-out.  And then it didn’t work.
AND you needed the email address that you used at the
time you posted the tree, which I don’t own anymore. .


Here is myfamily.com’s statement which you agree to
when you sign up to any company or service I mentioned
in the beginning.

A. by inputting, uploading or posting any family tree
information, data, family stories, ideas, drawings,
opinions, messages, eyewitness accounts, or any other
information or materials, or engaging in any other
form of communication (each, a "Submission") through
the Sites, you grant MyFamily.com, Inc. and its
Affiliated Companies a royalty free, irrevocable,
perpetual, non-exclusive, unrestricted, transferable,
worldwide license to (i) use, copy, sublicense, adapt,
transmit, distribute, publicly perform, archive, and
display any such Submission in any medium now known or
hereafter developed; (ii) exploit any proprietary
rights in such Submission, including but not limited
to rights under copyright, trademark, or patent laws
in any relevant jurisdiction; and (iii) sublicense to
third parties the unrestricted right to exercise any
of the foregoing rights.

But we still own our own work!
So my question is  - what do we do now?  If you try
the free trial version to see if your tree is posted,
please remember that they will automatically charge
your credit card on the 15th day, if you don’t cancel
by the 14th day.   I’m thinking of signing up for 1
day and then calling to cancel, so I can let them know
what I think.

Anyone up for a boycott ? Or a switch to GenWeb?
Nevermind – GenWeb is hosted by Rootsweb, which is
owned by myfamily.com.

Langdon Hagen-Long

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