WARNING AND SUGGESTION FOR CONCERTED ACTION
I have just been informed by a collaborator, that Bjørn P. Brox, who is member of the collaboration pool, who also works for Geni Inc, who administer more than 140.000 profiles, and who have large number of collaborators, and who therefore each day receive a large number of requests for mergers, while he is on holiday, using a new feature in Geni , automatically agree to all request for megers (i.e. whether a requested merger is justified or not, even if it will create total confusion by merging profiles 10 generations apart, as I have just seen in the Danish branch of the Big Tree).
The new feature in general will significantly contribute to increase the mess on the Big Tree. However, it will undoubtedly for newcomers to Geni, who in good faith have spent hours to put their family tree on Geni, establish some bogus links (to Barack Obama, QEII, Caesar, Muhamed, Jesus to whom I recently have seen some of my collaborators linked, and to God knews who) which may induce them to pay to become Pro members. This may contribute to satisfy Geni's short term profit target, but is definitely not in our interest, and probably not in the company's long term interest either.
This is American business at its worst!
May I ask for your suggestions for how we limit the damage of this new feature to our work, and for suggestions for a text to send to Geni and to publish at appropriate fora to persuade the company to discontinue this facility immediately. Shaming the company seem to be the only measure we can take, unfortunately we cannot as for the banks hope for Barack Obama to introduces a proposal in the US congress for regulation to protect us against and this other abuse by Geni Inc.
A merger of two profiles should in general only be undertaken if it contributes a well documented new link to the Tree (in most cases additional information about a profile can be added with little effort without creating a new profile for the same person). Furthermore merge issues created in the two branches being merged as a result of the merger of two profiles should be solved without delay.
I hope all members of this Collaboration Pool (hopefully after reflection including Bjørn Borx) subscribe to this essential code of conduct.
Best regards,
Knud Munk