Where I’ve BeenHi everyone! These past few months have been a whirlwind—between learning to create and edit YouTube content, launching a newsletter, and developing in-person presentations, I’ve had my hands full! Add some website technical challenges (which we’re still working through), and you can see why I’ve been quiet here on the blog. (For example, I’m still not receiving notices of your comments!)Exciting DNA Research ProgressThe best news? I’m actively pursuing DNA research again, and I’ve recently broken through several brick walls! I’ve already shared one success story in this video, where I share how DNA helped crack the case....
I’m thrilled to share that I’ve started my own YouTube channel focusing on genealogy, with a special focus on AI and DNA! (I’m still working on the perfect tagline.) My first two videos focus on the fascinating world of AI. AI in Genealogy: A Follow-Up Discussion In the first video, Blaine Bettinger, Steve Little, Mark Thompson, and I reunited to discuss some of the questions raised in our panel discussion during the NGS plenary session. We covered five key questions: What is one of your top AI tool recommendations for genealogy? How can my content still be my content, and...
Introduction In genealogy, legal battles can provide fascinating insights into the lives and relationships of our ancestors. One such case, titled “Jackson v. Grissom,” unfolded in the late 19th century and revolved around the estate of John H. Horner, who died in Stoddard County, Missouri, on 2 January 1877. This blog post will explore the intricacies of this case, which I discovered after watching Judy Russell’s NGS Conference presentation, “In that Case: Using the Caselaw Access Project.” Discovering the Case Judy taught us how to use CourtListener and case.law. Starting with CourtListener, I searched for cases involving the Whitwell surname...
Introduction My ChatGPT wasn’t showing the new memory feature until sometime in the past few hours. And I have to share! Notification After reading about this new memory feature, I logged onto ChatGPT 4 and got the above notification. Interesting! Accessing the Memory Feature To access “memory,” click on your name and photo in the bottom left corner, then go to “settings” and then “personalization.” You should see the screen above. Managing Memories Clicking on “Manage” brought up this box where you can view ChatGPT’s memory or delete it. Since I hadn’t used it yet, it was empty. Testing the...
Introduction to NotebookLM Today I tried out Google’s “experimental” tool called NotebookLM. I learned about it from a YouTube video: “Google NotebookLM Just Changed Note-taking Forever.” Google describes NotebookLM, powered by Google’s Gemini AI, as an experimental product designed to leverage the power of language models along with your existing content to gain critical insights faster. It acts like a virtual research assistant that can summarize facts, explain complex ideas, and brainstorm new connections—all based on the sources you select. The ability to enter sources and receive summaries, ask questions, and forge new connections—as described by Google—highlights one of the...
I recently discovered an amazing way to organize my ancestor Matthew J Dickson’s family census data using ChatGPT 4. The process was quick, easy, and the results were impressive! Step-by-Step Guide: Turning Census Data into a Spreadsheet Here’s how I did it: Access the data: I used the original census images on Ancestry as my source. Input the data: Utilizing the dictation tool in the ChatGPT mobile app, I transcribed the census information by speaking directly into the app, which converted my words into text. Create the initial file: I instructed ChatGPT to generate a spreadsheet with columns for year,...
Earlier this week, ChatGPT introduced DALL-E 3’s new editing tool. Today was the first day I had access to it, so I was eager to give it a try! I started by generating a picture of a man from the 1870s, dressed in period-appropriate clothing and setting. Curious to test the tool’s capabilities, I decided to remove a candle in the foreground from the image. Image 1: Editing Tool Accessing the Edit Tool To access the edit tool, you first click on the image, then on the paintbrush icon next to the save icon. Your cursor becomes a circle, and...
Are you looking to improve your interactions with AI systems? One key aspect to consider is the type of prompts you use. In this post, we’ll explore five essential prompt types: Vanilla Prompting, Few-Shot Prompting, Chain-of-Thought Prompting, Role-Based Prompting, and Multi-Modal Prompting. By understanding these different approaches, you can communicate more effectively and get the most out of your AI conversations. Let’s get started! Vanilla Prompting: The Straightforward Ask Vanilla prompting is the simplest way to communicate with AI. It’s like asking a direct question or giving a simple command. Image generated by Dall-E Example: Prompt: “What is the capital...
I hope you’ll join me, today, as I present “7 Tips for Using AI as Your Genealogy Assistant” on Legacy Family Tree Webinars. The talk is FREE and will be free for the next 7 days! You can click here to register. If you enjoy it and want to learn more about how you can use AI for genealogy and other tasks, please consider joining me for my 8 week course: “AI Explorations in Genealogy & Beyond: A Course of Discovery & Application.”
The Debate: Simple Prompts or Prompt Engineering? There’s currently a debate about how helpful prompt engineering is—where you work hard to craft prompts to get the best results out of generative AI. Others think this is quickly becoming a non-issue for most users and we can talk to AIs—like ChatGPT, Claude 3 Opus, and Gemini Advanced—using “plain English.” I decided to test this. The Project: Summarizing a 107-Page Pension File When my niece was a freshman in college, I hired her to be my genealogy assistant. One of the projects I had her do was to summarize my great, great-grandfather’s...
