Cyndi's Speaking Schedule & Calendar - Available Topics
Availability on my lecture and travel calendar is currently on a very limited basis only. At this time, I am not able to travel too far beyond Washington state. Thank you very much for your interest and your thoughtful invitations.
More topics can be created upon request, with advance notice.
The topics below can also be customized to fit the needs or the theme of your seminar.
- Evernote for Every Genealogist
Evernote is a free software tool that is a dream come true for the online researcher. Clip notes from the web, write notes, record audio or webcam notes, and more. Sync your research notebooks on the web, with your computer and every mobile device you own so that your research notes are with you everywhere you go. Learn the ins and outs of this valuable tool for your daily research routine. - Evaluating Web Sites: 13 Years Later
13 years ago I presented a new lecture titled Evaluating Web Sites. All these years later several things have changed, while many things have stayed the same. How can you know whether what you find online is accurate and reliable? We'll discuss how to delve into online datasets and determine the original source of the materials, and then how to evaluate the material you find there. - A Guided Tour of Cyndi's List 2.0
This begins with a brief history of Cyndi's List, followed by an overview of how to navigate the newly updated site and how to tell when the site is updated. Learn how to effectively use this valuable resource tool to as your jumping-off point onto the Internet. - Googling for Grandma
Everyone loves Google, the most popular search engine online. Now learn all the secrets and tricks, hidden within this tool and find out how to optimize them for genealogical research. - Advanced Googling for Grandma
Chances are that you are using Google on a daily basis. Chances are even better than you aren't using it to its full potential. Learn about Google's advance search options, as well as several more tools offered by Google that will enhance your research. We'll dig deep into a variety of Google's free resources and learn how to make them work for you. - Social Networking: A Genealogist's Water Cooler
It seems that the Internet and social networking both were made just for genealogists. By nature, genealogists are social and we love to share what we have learned about our families and about how to research. Services like Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ give us wonderful new tools for connecting with family members, long-lost cousins, and fellow genealogists. We will explore the various ways in which social networking can be a useful research tool and can help make valuable family connections. - The Internet: A Genealogist's Printing Press
Did you know you have become an author and a publisher? For a genealogist, writing and publishing online takes many forms: e-mails, message boards, mailing lists, social networking sites, blogs, wikis, web sites, and any forum/form in which you write something for the public to see. As an author and a publisher you have certain responsibilities to yourself and to other researchers to write clearly and with care. A well-written query, or reply to a query, can make all the difference in growing your family tree. We will discuss the ins and outs of various forums, along with how to make the most of your writing and publishing opportunities online. - Find the Silver Lining In the Cloud
The cloud is becoming home to many tools and functions that make our computing life easier every day. Learn which tools are useful for your genealogical research and how to implement those tools for optimum productivity. - Pin Your Ancestors Down with Google Maps & Google Earth
Google Maps and Google Earth provide two wonderful sources for geographical assistance in tracking your ancestors and pinning them down for your research. Combined with other mapping resources online we will demonstrate how using these Google tools can give you a visual aid for your research. Follow migration paths, historical routes, and your own family’s path, marking them on the maps with information, photos and documentation. - Plotting, Scheming, and Mapping Online
The Internet is a source for a variety of maps and geographical tools that will help you in your research. From new maps and atlases with online driving directions to old gazetteers with county lines and ancient place names, the Internet has them all. We'll explore those resources, ideas for using them, and integrating them into your research routine. - Enumerating the U.S. Census Online
The U.S. Federal Census is an important set of records that we must all use to track our ancestors in the United States. The Internet has a variety of sources available for genealogists to help them use the census, including commercial databases, volunteer transcriptions, and numerous tutorials. What is the difference between all the offerings online? How do you best use these online tools to maximize the benefits without duplicating your efforts on different Web sites? This lecture will answer those questions and also demonstrate online databases and the software interfaces needed to view scanned images of the census online. - How to Cite Your Internet Sources
Source citation is a necessity to support quality genealogical research. We will discuss the necessity for citing your data sources, followed by a demonstration of creating citations for a variety of Internet sources. - The Great URL Hunt
URLs (web addresses) are one of the big mysteries of the Internet. Domain names, directory structures, file names, file types and broken links can all create confusion and roadblocks for the average web surfer. We will discuss how to read a URL and how to locate URLs within a web site during a visit. We will walk through the creation of a new URL and demonstrate how to track down new addresses for broken links. - Organizing PC Files
Files here, programs there, lost bits and bytes everywhere. Are you tired of searching your computer fruitlessly? Frustrated when you can't find the notes you created in your word processor? Learn how to set up a foolproof filing system and an electronic workbook to correspond with your offline research. - Planting Your Family Tree Online
We won't discuss the technical methods of creating a personal home page for genealogy, but instead will focus on what things you should be sure to include on your home page to make it a helpful research tool. Learn how having a home page of your own will enhance your research, as well as what things to avoid and how to attract visitors to your web site in order to reach that distant cousin out there in genealogical cyberspace. - The Internet Communications Depot
On the Internet, genealogists come and they go. They leave trails of breadcrumbs behind them in the form of queries, surname postings, and Web site announcements in every nook and cranny. But are they using the various Internet communications tools to the fullest potential? And do they remember which mailing lists, message boards and Web sites they used when they posted their messages? We will discuss each of these tools and methods for using them properly and effectively. - The Ups and Downs of Uploading and Downloading
Do zip files and e-mail attachments give you fits? Does FTP sound like some brand of motor oil? Do you know where your downloaded files have ended up in the mysterious caverns deep within your computer's hard drive? Now that you have them, what do you do with them? We'll take the mystery out of file transfers online and give tips and shortcuts you can use to make this part of your online research a breeze. - Question and Answer Session
We invite the seminar attendees to ask questions about any aspect of using the Internet for their genealogical research. I recommend a Q&A session at the end of any all day seminar to give people a chance to clarify anything that they learned during the other sessions presented that day.
