I turned 50 yesterday. So Happy Birthday to me. It was in fact a fun birthday. My wife and children gave me presents, made me my favorite dinner, and we watched a movie together. When they handed over the goods, my wife even took some short videos of me opening the gifts. She said, “The kids are going to want to watch this in a year or so.” And they really will. I often find them lying next to my wife in our bed watching videos of good times we had in the past.
In other words, we made family history. We enjoyed being together. Being a family. And I loved it.
But now that it’s a day later, and I’m thinking about being 50, I realize I’m getting to be an old curmudgeon in some ways. You see, I like to keep tabs on the genealogical world. I try to keep abreast of things happening in the community. Trends, fads, skills, and more. I’m not the best at it because I like to spend time with my family and because I’m not a professional genealogist. So, I’m not always immersed in the genealogical realm.
One thing I’ve noticed that’s becoming more and more prevalent in genealogy is AI. (Yes, everyone has noticed how prevalent AI has become in every sphere.) But here’s where I’m feeling like a curmudgeon. I’m not fully accepting of AI in the genealogical community yet. There are a few things that AI is doing that I absolutely love. Family Search’s beta tool for full text search and recognizing handwriting is a game changer when searching for your long-lost relatives. Utilizing AI as a notetaker and for creating certain kinds of surveys, tables, and even generating ideas for more research can be helpful and less time consuming.
I get it. AI is a tool like any other tool. A tool that should be used. Sure. There’s a lot of arguments for the use of the tool that I agree with.
Unfortunately, when I start looking at social media, blogs, or videos that promote AI helping with genealogical writing and even some other tasks, my interest wanes immediately. I even cringed a little inside when I said AI could be used for creating tables just a moment ago. I understand how time-consuming certain tasks are. Especially writing. I understand the concept “time is money.” I understand how people often want to get on to the next thing on the list of things to do.
I also understand how fulfilling it is to write and create something on your own. I understand the peace of mind and confidence I get when I struggle through a task on my own. I also see how my thinking changes, how I learn, and how inspiration comes to me when I perform the task myself.
Like any other technology today, from the developer’s standpoint, part of the purpose of AI is to gain your attention. The tech companies are competing for your attention. The longer you spend on their platforms, the better it is for their bottom line. Never mind the impact they receive from gathering so much information because people are freely feeding them more data.
Now I’m not here to preach against AI. If I was, I’d probably bring up the controversies about energy use and water consumption. I am only pointing out that as I grow older, I’m a bit more interested in a return to the idea that the work itself is rewarding, that we can take pleasure in the job itself. That might make me a curmudgeon. If so, I will own it.
When it comes to writing of any sort, I like to sit down with a good old pen and paper and have a tactile experience thinking and writing. I enjoy the struggle and ultimately the creation. I enjoy the process. What will happen if we automate the process of genealogy so much that we don’t enjoy the hobby/profession anymore? So much of family history is about kinship and identity and discovering the impact of family on our lives that it makes the process worth it, the process becomes a human experience. What happens if we strip genealogy of the human experience because we want something done or because it is easier?
I don’t know. I don’t have the answers.
But since I’m one day into 50 and starting my life as a bona fide curmudgeon, I think I’ve got plenty of time to struggle through and shape my ideas about AI in genealogy. But please, can we stop with the AI generated photos already?
P.S. AI tried to give me a number of suggestions on how to write this blog. I ignored them all.
If I made a grammar mistake, or if you didn’t like the blog itself, we’ll both live.

Photo via Andrew Neel