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Archiver > APG > 2001-04 > 0987734104
From:
Subject: Re: [APG] Digital v. paper reports (formerly Beware!)
Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2001 22:35:04 EDT
In a message dated 4/18/01 9:08:15 PM Eastern Daylight Time, Ben Hines
<> writes:
<< If i pay you, it becomes mine. In effect, I am buying
the information from you. >>
This statement fails to recognize that professionals furnish two things--(1)
information, in the form of records copies, extracts, abstracts, etc., and
(2) their conclusions drawn from that information, which are professional
judgments.
I may furnish six documents, none of which say that a particular individual
is the son of another, but I have drawn that conclusion from the information
and reported it to the client. The document content is information, and the
client is free to use it, even to draw a conclusion different from mine. My
conclusion about the father-son relationship, however, is my personal
work-product, uninfluenced by financial considerations, and I don't sell it.
I only share it, subject to whatever restrictions the client and I may have
agreed upon beforehand, and with the expectation that if it is used, the user
will follow accepted standards of scholarship by reporting it accurately and
crediting it to me.
Yes, the client has bought, and is free to misuse, the information part of
what I supplied. Just don't mention my name, please--or my conclusions,
which if accurately reported, usually won't fit within the confines of the
GEDCOM format.
Donn Devine, CG, CGI
2004 Kentmere Pkwy, Wilmington DE 19806-2014, USA
Phone 302/656-7233 FAX 302/656-0315
CG, Certified Genealogist, CGI, and Certified Genealogical Instructor are
service marks of the Board for Certification of Genealogists, used under
license by board-certified associates after periodic competency evaluations,
and the board name is registered in the USP&TO.
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