Monday, January 27, 2020

Virtual Pass Schedule and FREE Live Streams for RootsTech 2020



Live Streaming Sessions


I hope many of you will be able to join me at #RootsTech in four weeks in Salt Lake City. If you are there I hope we get a chance to meet. If you are not able to work this into your travel schedule, the live streaming schedule has now been announced. For four days from Wednesday, February 26 to leap day on Saturday, February 29 you will be able to watch live at least five sessions from where ever else you are. Several of the best programs will be live streamed FREE of charge but you must register to get login information. These will include presentations by recognized experts on a wide variety of genealogical topics. Also celebrity key notes are included:


Virtual Pass Classes

Even if you are able to be in Salt Lake City, you may want to multiply your number of learning experiences and your options by purchasing a Virtual Pass. This will allow us to attend one session live and others from that same time slot at a later time. The 30 sessions covered by this pass will be available for a year after you have been notified they are available. This pass is available for $129 (US) if you are not attending the conference and for only $79 as an add on if you are already registered for RootsTech. A list of the presentations covered by this pass are available on the Virtual Pass page.   

Virtual Pass Classes (Beyond the Free Streaming classes)

















































































Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Genetic Genealogy identifies parent of fetus?


If you are looking for a medical science fiction thriller, Genesis may be of interest. This would be particularly true if you are a fan of Robin Cook from reading some of his earlier thirty or so medical crime novels. Published last month Genesis can stretch your mind a bit about the potential of genetic genealogy to solve crimes and not just cold crimes.


If you are not familiar with Cook's genre, he takes an emerging technology and fictionalizes its use or abuse when applied to medical practice. For example about five years ago he wrote Cell about using cell phones to advance personalized health care.  


In Genesis his protagonist is a brilliant but antisocial pathology resident who stumbles into genetic genealogy as she tries to identify a killer who has attempted to cover his tracks by masking them as fentanyl laced opioid overdoses. Armed only with Blaine Bettinger's The Family Tree Guide to DNA Testing and Genealogy and Tamar Weinberg's The Adoptee's Guide to DNA Testing: How to Use Genetic Genealogy to Discover Your Long-Lost Family she steamrolls in search of her killer who may be the father of a 10 week old fetus discovered during the autopsy of his mother.



From Cook's epilogue:

“Let’s look on the bright side,” he said.”
“I’m having trouble seeing the bright side,” Laurie said.
“It seems that you and Aria Nichols have added genetic genealogy to the forensic grab bag of tricks to make it possible to construct a perpetrator’s genome. If that’s not a bright side, I don’t know what is.”
That's enough of a spoiler.