UpFront with NGS: Rootstech

Showing posts with label Rootstech. Show all posts

04 October 2017

Nominations Needed for RootsTech 2018 Innovation Showcase (deadline 15 October 2017)

Nominations Needed for RootsTech 2018 Innovation Showcase (deadline 15 October 2017)

From our friends at RootsTech …

RootsTech, the world’s largest family history and technology conference, hosted by FamilySearch, announced exciting changes to its 2018 conference schedule. The popular conference is expanding to four full days starting Wednesday, February 28, to March 3, 2018, to allow for more in-demand class offerings for all attendees while still offering content useful for innovators. First day highlights will now include the opening General Keynote Session and the new Innovation Showcase on stage. Find out more at RootsTech.org.

“Our guests have spoken, and we listened, so we are expanding RootsTech to a full four days!" said FamilySearch CEO Steve Rockwood. “Wednesday has been, and will continue to be, all about the amazing technical and scientific innovations that are transforming our industry. This first day of innovation has its own unique vibe, and we want everyone to feel it! This honors the original intent of RootsTech by bringing entrepreneurs, technical innovators, and interested parties from other industries together with those engaged in family history. It will now feature the general opening keynote to kickoff the conference and be filled with appealing classes for attendees and innovators combined."

“There are so many new cool, exciting developments in the family history industry from year to year that we want to highlight them on the main stage in a way we’ve never done before,” said Jen Allen, RootsTech director. “Making the the new Innovation Showcase part of the conference’s general opening ceremonies will give these leading technologies and products the visibility they deserve.”

Allen said the new Showcase will feature the best new technology in the industry from around the globe. She expects a number of companies, from small startups to large organizations, to clamor for the opportunity to present their newest product or service on stage before a large online and in-person audience. Each participant will be heralded as a “RootsTech 2018 Innovation Showcase Winner.” Also during the Showcase, a Peoples’ Choice award will be presented as a result of live text voting.

RootsTech is now accepting nominations for the 2018 Innovation Showcase from the public. The public can nominate its favorite family history related app, product, or service by using #RootsTechInnovation on Facebook or Twitter, or visit the Innovation Showcase page at rootstech.org. The submission deadline is October 15, 2017.

What genealogy-related innovations would you like to see?

What existing innovation do you think should be showcased?

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NGS does not imply endorsement of any outside advertiser or other vendors appearing in this blog. Any opinions expressed by guest authors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of NGS.

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Suggestions for topics for future UpFront with NGS posts are always welcome. Please send any suggested topics to UpfrontNGS@mosaicrpm.com

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Unless indicated otherwise or clearly an NGS Public Relations piece, Upfront with NGS posts are written by Diane L Richard, editor, Upfront with NGS.

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20 February 2017

RootsTech 2017 Session Videos NOW Available! #rootstech

RootsTech 2017 Session Videos NOW Available – FREE to Access!
#rootstech

Videos of select RootsTech sessions are now available for you to enjoy at home.

They are organized by day – just click on the day that interests you.

Thomas MacEntee has kindly created a list of which sessions were taped for each day. You can access it here on his GeneaBloggers blog.

Which presenter cannot you not wait to listen to?
What was your favorite talk that you did listen to?

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NGS does not imply endorsement of any outside advertiser or other vendors appearing in this blog. Any opinions expressed by guest authors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of NGS.

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Think your friends, colleagues, or fellow genealogy researchers would find this blog post interesting? If so, please let them know that anyone can read past UpFront with NGS posts or subscribe!

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Suggestions for topics for future UpFront with NGS posts are always welcome. Please send any suggested topics to UpfrontNGS@mosaicrpm.com

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Unless indicated otherwise or clearly an NGS Public Relations piece, Upfront with NGS posts are written by Diane L Richard, editor, Upfront with NGS.

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17 February 2017

OldNews USA Wins Top Honors at RootsTech 2017 Innovator Showdown

OldNews USA Wins Top Honors at RootsTech 2017 Innovator Showdown

From our friends at FamilySearch …

Old news, it seems, is actually “new” news. Very innovative news in fact. Today at RootsTech, the world’s largest family history technology conference, OldNews USA took top honors in the 2017 Innovator Showdown, walking away with $95,000 in cash and in-kind prizes. OldNews is an android app designed to help users quickly discover their family in historical US newspapers. The app uses the Library of Congress “Chronicling America” collection of more than 11 million newspaper pages from 1789 to 1922 to deliver its results.

In front of a crowd of close to 14,000 live and online viewers, the six RootsTech Innovator Showdown finalists battled for $199,000 in cash and prizes and bragging rights in the rapidly-growing, multi-billion dollar family history industry. An experienced amateur genealogist, Bill Nelson of Auburn, Massachusetts, designed the program as a solution to tedious, difficult online newspaper searches. The OldNews USA app was designed to simplify and streamline the search process.

Using keywords, users can look for newspaper accounts of a person or topic with the option to look at articles of historical events. In a person search, you type names and dates into your mobile device and choose a location on Google Maps which produces a list of newspapers in the targeted geographic area for a time period. It brings up images of the actual newspapers with the name or event you are seeking highlighted so you can quickly locate it on the page. Images can be enlarged for easier access to detail.

Nelson is a software developer by trade. “I was new to android and needed something to practice on. I had felt the pain points of newspaper research and thought ‘this would be a good project,’” he said. Initially he developed the app for his own use, then realizing it could help other researchers, he expanded it into a mobile app.

OldNews is compatible with Android devices, but Nelson is working to create an app for IOS devices and computers. With his winnings, he can now get business and technological assistance to accelerate development. While OldNews USA is designed to search US newspapers, he hopes to adapt the app for other countries.

The 5 finalists were whittled down from more than 40 applicants from around the world. Each took three minutes to convince the panel of five judges and live audience that their product was deserving of a chunk of the $190,000 in cash and prizes.

The major sponsors of the Innovator Showdown this year included Amazon Web Services (AWS), Kickstarter Seed Fund, Sorenson Legacy Foundation, and others.

After each presentation, there was a four-minute question and answer period between each contestant and the judges. The judges then selected the top three winners, and the viewing audience selected the People’s Choice Award winner.

With $190,000 in cash and in-kind prizes and services from sponsors at stake—an increase of nearly $100,000 from the original projection—the pressure, tension, and energy of the event was tremendous.

2017 RootsTech Showdown Winners

· First Place Judges’ Choice ($90,000 cash, AWS credits, and an investment from Kickstart Seed Fund), Bill Nelson of OldNews USA.

· Second Place Judges’ Choice ($44,000 cash and AWS credits), The Qroma tag mobile app for embedding stories into pictures, tagging them by voice commands, and making the data accessible on various platforms.

· Third Place Judges’ Choice Award ($26,000 cash and AWS credits), Louis Kessler, Double Match Triangulator, an app to help sort DNA matches into groups of relatives.

· People’s Choice ($25,000 cash and AWS credits), Kindex, an app designed to help users create searchable, shareable archives of family letters and other documents using tags to help users easily locate information.

Emberall was the other finalist. It provides a method to capture and store pictures and videos creating an accessible archive.

The judges for the final round included Alan Doan, CEO of Missouri Star Quilt Company, John Richards, Founder and CEO of Startup Ignition, Kenyatta Berry, host of The Genealogy Road Show, Thomas MacEntee, founder of High-Definition Genealogy, and Dalton J. Wright, partner in Kickstart Seed Fund.

The Innovator Showdown, now in its third year, was designed to foster innovation in the family history industry.

On this page, you can see who the semifinalists were.

Which is your favorite innovation from the Rootstech Innovator Showdown?

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NGS does not imply endorsement of any outside advertiser or other vendors appearing in this blog. Any opinions expressed by guest authors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of NGS.

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Think your friends, colleagues, or fellow genealogy researchers would find this blog post interesting? If so, please let them know that anyone can read past UpFront with NGS posts or subscribe!

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Suggestions for topics for future UpFront with NGS posts are always welcome. Please send any suggested topics to UpfrontNGS@mosaicrpm.com

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Unless indicated otherwise or clearly an NGS Public Relations piece, Upfront with NGS posts are written by Diane L Richard, editor, Upfront with NGS.

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Want to learn more about interacting with the blog, please read Hyperlinks, Subscribing and Comments -- How to Interact with Upfront with NGS Blog posts!

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03 February 2017

RootsTech Streaming Schedule

RootsTech Streaming Schedule

As it has in the past, RootsTech (8-11 February 2017) #rootstech will have FREE Online Streaming available.

Not able to attend in person? Several sessions at RootsTech 2017, including the general keynote sessions, will be streamed live on the home page of RootsTech.org. After the conference, recordings of these sessions will be posted on the website for a limited time.

See the streaming schedule below for times, session titles, and presenter names.

Wednesday

9:00 a.m.–10:00 a.m. | Innovator Summit General Session
Speakers: Steve Rockwood, Liz Wiseman

10:15 a.m.–11:15 a.m. | Industry Trends and Outlook
Speakers: Craig Bott and Guest Panel

11:30 a.m.–12:00 p.m. | Innovation—Best Practices and Applications
Speaker: Cydni Tetro

Thursday

8:30 a.m.-10:00 a.m. | RootsTech General Session
Speakers: Steve Rockwood, Jonathan and Drew Scott

11:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. | Getting Started in Genealogy
Speaker: Kelli Bergheimer

12:15 p.m.–1:15 p.m. | DNA: The Glue That Holds Families Together
Speaker: Diahan Southard

1:30 p.m.–2:30 p.m. | DNA Matching on MyHeritage
Speaker: Dana Drutman

3:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m. | Jewish Genealogy: Where to Look and What’s Available
Speaker: Lara Diamond

4:30 p.m.–5:30 p.m. | Family History Is Anything but Boring
Speakers: Crystal Farish and Rhonna Farrer

Friday

8:30 a.m.–10:00 a.m. | RootsTech General Session

Speakers: Levar Burton, Special Guest Panel

10:30 a.m.–11:30 a.m. | RootsTech Innovator Showdown Finals

12:15 p.m.–1:15 p.m. | Mothers, Daughters, Wives: tracing Female Lines
Speaker: Judy Russell

1:30 p.m.–2:30 p.m. | Censational Census Strategies
Speaker: Mary Kircher Roddy

3:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m. | Big 4: Comparing Ancestry, findmypast, FamilySearch, and MyHeritage
Speaker: Sunny Morton

4:30 p.m.–5:30 p.m. | Cross the Atlantic with Religious Records
Speaker: Jen Baldwin

Saturday

8:30 a.m.–10:00 a.m. | RootsTech General Session
Speakers: Cece Moore, Buddy Valastro

11:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. | Journaling Principles That Work
Speaker: Steve Reed

1:30 p.m.–2:30 p.m. | Don’t Just Be a Searcher, Be a Researcher
Speaker: Crista Cowan

3:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m. | Creating Google Alerts for Your Genealogy
Speaker: Katherine R. Wilson

Streaming Help

The stream will automatically refresh at the beginning of each session. If it does not, you will need to refresh the page manually by clicking the Refresh button on your browser.

What are the programs you’d most like to attend/hear?

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NGS does not imply endorsement of any outside advertiser or other vendors appearing in this blog. Any opinions expressed by guest authors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of NGS.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Think your friends, colleagues, or fellow genealogy researchers would find this blog post interesting? If so, please let them know that anyone can read past UpFront with NGS posts or subscribe!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Suggestions for topics for future UpFront with NGS posts are always welcome. Please send any suggested topics to UpfrontNGS@mosaicrpm.com

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Unless indicated otherwise or clearly an NGS Public Relations piece, Upfront with NGS posts are written by Diane L Richard, editor, Upfront with NGS.

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Want to learn more about interacting with the blog, please read Hyperlinks, Subscribing and Comments -- How to Interact with Upfront with NGS Blog posts!

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28 December 2016

Rootstech Innovator Showdown Announces 10 Semi-Finalists

Rootstech Innovator Showdown Announces 10 Semi-Finalists

Back in October, we announced 3rd Annual 2017 Rootstech Innovator Showdown Accepting Submissions.

… a “Global Innovation Competition” for developers and entrepreneurs seeking an opportunity to impact the growing multi-billion dollar family history industry while competing for $100,000 in cash and prizes. The Innovator Showdown seeks to support, foster, and inspire innovation within the family history marketplace.

The competition has now been whittled down to ten semi-finalists.

After a rigorous judging process, the semi-finalists have been selected. Congratulations to those who have made it this far! Each of the semi-finalists is invited to travel to Salt Lake City, Utah, where the final round of judging will take place in front of a live audience and a panel of judges. We look forward to seeing who comes out on top!

The 2017 semi-finalists are:

Champollion 2.0

CSI: Crowd Sourced Indexing

Cuzins

Double Match Triangulator

Emberall

JoyFLIPS

Kindex

OldNews USA

QromaTag

RootsFinder

You can check out each project here.

The winner will be determined via judges, a live audience and remote participants …

See Innovators from around the world compete for $100,000 in prizes as they pitch their innovative ideas on stage before renowned judges, industry influencers, a live audience, and you. See them live on Friday, February 10, 2017 at 10:30 a.m. MST. Can’t be there? Watch it live at RootsTech.org.

Which “innovation” would you like to see win?

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NGS does not imply endorsement of any outside advertiser or other vendors appearing in this blog. Any opinions expressed by guest authors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of NGS.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Think your friends, colleagues, or fellow genealogy researchers would find this blog post interesting? If so, please let them know that anyone can read past UpFront with NGS posts or subscribe!

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Suggestions for topics for future UpFront with NGS posts are always welcome. Please send any suggested topics to UpfrontNGS@mosaicrpm.com

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Unless indicated otherwise or clearly an NGS Public Relations piece, Upfront with NGS posts are written by Diane L Richard, editor, Upfront with NGS.

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Want to learn more about interacting with the blog, please read Hyperlinks, Subscribing and Comments -- How to Interact with Upfront with NGS Blog posts!

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04 October 2016

3rd Annual 2017 Rootstech Innovator Showdown Accepting Submissions

3rd Annual 2017 Rootstech Innovator Showdown Accepting Submissions

From our friends at Rootstech …

RootsTech, the world’s largest family history and technology conference, is now accepting entries for the 2017 Innovator Showdown—a “Global Innovation Competition” for developers and entrepreneurs seeking an opportunity to impact the growing multi-billion dollar family history industry while competing for $100,000 in cash and prizes. The Innovator Showdown seeks to support, foster, and inspire innovation within the family history marketplace. The deadline for submitting to the 2017 Innovator Showdown is December 1, 2016. The winners will present on stage and be selected by judges and live audience voting at RootsTech 2017 on Friday, February 10, 2017. Go to RootsTech.devpost.com for more information.

Last year, 50 contestants, including six international applicants, competed in the Innovator Showdown. In 2017, the total cash and in-kind Innovator Showdown prizes will again be $100,000—making it one of the most attractive innovator contests in the nation.

Showdown Calendar:

· Submissions will be accepted: ... through December 1, 2016

· Online Judging: December 1–20, 2016

· Semifinalists Announced: December 20, 2016

· Showdown Semifinals: February 8, 2017

· Showdown Finals: February 10, 2017 at RootsTech at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Out of all applicants, the field will be narrowed to 10 semifinalists. Showdown semifinals will be held during lunch at the RootsTech Innovator Summit in the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, Utah on February 8, 2017 where we will introduce the semifinalists and their products. Five finalists will be announced that evening.

The exciting Showdown Finals are held during RootsTech before a panel of industry judges, including genealogy, technology and business gurus, and a live audience of 3,000 family history consumers, making the Innovator Showdown arguably one of the largest live audience tech competitions in North America. Finals will also be streamed live through RootsTech.org to tens of thousands of online viewers. This year, five finalists will pitch their innovations, field questions from judges, and await the announcement of the winners, while real time audience voting is taking place via texting to determine the winner of the People’s Choice prize.

Cash Prize Breakdown for Finalists:

· Judge’s 1st Choice: $20,000

· Judge’s 2nd Choice: $14,000

· Judge’s 3rd Choice: $6,000

· People’s Choice: $10,000

Besides cash prizes, winners will receive fabulous in-kind prizes from sponsors to assist in successfully launching their products to the awaiting world of family history enthusiasts, bringing the total prize value up to $100,000.

What would you like to see submitted as an idea?

Editor’s Note: Other posts about Rootstech can be found here.

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NGS does not imply endorsement of any outside advertiser or other vendors appearing in this blog. Any opinions expressed by guest authors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of NGS.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Think your friends, colleagues, or fellow genealogy researchers would find this blog post interesting? If so, please let them know that anyone can read past UpFront with NGS posts or subscribe!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Suggestions for topics for future UpFront with NGS posts are always welcome. Please send any suggested topics to UpfrontNGS@mosaicrpm.com

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Unless indicated otherwise or clearly an NGS Public Relations piece, Upfront with NGS posts are written by Diane L Richard, editor, Upfront with NGS.

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Want to learn more about interacting with the blog, please read Hyperlinks, Subscribing and Comments -- How to Interact with Upfront with NGS Blog posts!

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