Were you able to attend the recent RootsTech conference? If you were not able to go, it doesn’t mean that you have missed out on everything. You can watch some of the presentations online, right now, for free. You can also find some useful videos on YouTube from Genealogy Gems.
The most recent RootsTech Conference took place in February, 2011. This conference takes place every year at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, Utah. The purpose of the conference is to bring together genealogists and the creators of technology that helps genealogists to do their research. This is a good place for genealogists to learn about new, and useful, tools, and for the creators of technology to get some instant feedback about it from the group of people who are most likely to use it.
Right now, there are six videos of presentations that took place at this year’s RootsTech Conference. They are available online, for everyone who is interested in watching them, for free. It’s always nice when genealogy resources are free. Not every genealogist is going to have the financial resources available to be able to travel out to the conference itself.
Each of the six videos comes from a different presenter from the conference. One is from Jay Verkler, who is the president and CEO of the FamilySearch genealogy website. Another presentation comes from Brewster Kahle, who is the founder of the Internet Archive. The Internet Archive is another free genealogy resource. Curt Witcher also has a presentation that you can watch for free. He is the historical genealogy department manager for the Allen County Public Library. These are just a few of the six video presentation you can check out.
Thinking about attending the next RootsTech Conference? The 2012 one will happen February 2, through February 4, 2012. It is going to be held in Salt Lake City, Utah. This gives you slightly less than a year to plan ahead, and come up with the finances for travel, and to attend the conference itself.
If you would like to see more videos with the people who gave presentations at RootsTech, you can find those online, for free, as well. Genealogy Gems has a YouTube channel that currently has ten videos that seem to be interviews with some of the presenters. It also has quite a few other videos, that don’t specifically connect to the RootsTech conference, but are interesting and useful, nonetheless.
Image by Sheldon Photography on Flickr