Saturday RootsTech: Family Discovery Day

The first keynote today was A.J. Jacobs. He takes is projects pretty seriously:

Pretty awesome right?  I didn't expect it to be this entertaining

We welcomed him to the stage using these signs:

He took a selfie with us. He is another one of my favorite keynote speakers.

Donny Osmond was next:

"The bottom line about all this family history stuff is that its all about stories" -Donny Osmond

This is Donny Osmond singing Moon River for us.

Friday RootsTech

Joshua D Taylor spoke first, he spoke about the future of FindMyPast, and shared his cheese story: As a child he would steal cheese and the cheese grater from the kitchen, as he researched his family he discovered that an ancestor got thrown in jail for stealing seven pieces of cheese. Genes run deep apparently. FindMyPast has three goals, Data, Accessibility, and partnerships. Laura Bush (Former first lady) talked about her family, experience in the white house, and 9-11, followed by her daughter Jenna Hager for a Q&A session. Her keynote was one of my favorite. Friday night there was  a wonderful cultural event followed by the passport drawing. The innovators showdown happened at 10:30 in the morning. The winners are as follows:

1st: StoryWorth

2nd: Planet

3rd: GenMarketplace

4th: Lucid press

Peoples Choice was also StoryWorth

Evening event

The one voice childrens choir kicked off the Thursdays evening event.

They were joined onstage by Alex Boye

And his band

The choir, Alex, and his band preformed the final song "happy"

They did an amazing job.

RootsTech, Day One

The first keynote today was Dennis Brimhall, CEO of FamilySearch. He introduced family discovery centers, and partnerships. He also mentioned the FamilySearch app gallery. The URL is https://familysearch.org/apps/ . The second keynote was Mike Mallin the chief product officer of MyHeritage. He talked about his personal experiences in Genealogy. My favorite quote from him is: "Any sufficiently advances technology is indistinguishable from magic".  The final keynote speaker was Tan Le. She is a refugee from Vietnam with an amazing story. Her mother, grandmother, and sister fled the war shaken country together. They lived in fear of being caught by pirates, drowning, etc. Years later Tan Le founded emotiv. An amazing very techie company. I also went to a consultant class today and it was awesome! Check out a video from the class at FamilySearch.org/findnames. On that page click on grow your tree. I went to a genetic class followed by APIs 101. After that my dad and I wandered through the expo hall till dinner. In the expo hall we discovered the family discovery center put on by familysearch. We loved it! I discoverd the meaning of my name and looked at famous reletives. The story part would not load but I inteand to go back tomarrow and record my great great grandmothers story in their recording booth.


Tip: When we got here we went to the keynote right away because there was an hour long line to pick up our stuff. It most likely won't be as long as a line Friday and Saturday but its still nice to get here early. If you want a good seat when you come to the keynote get here early, with FGS and RootsTech it is crazy full!

Connect, Explore, Refresh

I did this last year to Roots Tech's theme and so I figured I may as well do it again:

Connect: To unite or bind
Explore: To range over an area for the purpose of discovery
Refresh: To provide new vigor and energy

So the the theme is: To unite or bind, To range over an area for the purpose of discovery, and, to provide new vigor and energy.

So in simpler terms: To unite, discover, and, to get energy (Ideas)

RootsTech is in 4 days

Sunday Quote

"Revelation comes to individual members as they are led to discover their family records in ways that are miraculous indeed."

-Elder Boyd K. Packer

RootsTech

I am in the countdown mode! RootsTech is this Thursday! I'm going to add a few tips of my own for this conference.

1st- I know everyone says to bring a different bag, and I agree with that. But I appreciated the over the shoulder strap. The first day last year, I brought a backpack, and I hated how hard it was to access. The expo hall gives you many papers and it is so much easier to put things in your bag when its over the shoulder. I think I might bring last years bag, so I can have the over the shoulder but it will look different.

2nd- You need to be able to drop off things. At either your hotel, or your car. I agree when everyone says that your bag magically gains weight throughout the day. That is why during lunch I drop my expo hall goodies in the car.

3rd- If you are a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, it is a great time to go visit the temple. The spirit is already strong after spending a whole day with your ancestors and going to the temple magnifies it and truly makes the trip better.

4th- Bring snacks, as a jr high student I understand how learning basically leaves you starving. By second period I always want a snack (lucky for me 2nd period is cooking class).  Food at the conferences is usually expensive and if your hungry its much easier just to pull out a bag of fruit snacks.

5th- If you are joining RootsTech over the internet, than plan a place where you can have quiet. If you tried to watch it at my house you would constantly be disturbed :)

6th-If possible plan to come next year!!

5 more days till RootsTech!!!