RootsTech

Last updated
RootsTech
RootsTech 2010 logo.svg
StatusActive
GenreFamily history and technology, genealogy
Venue Salt Palace Convention Center
Location(s) Salt Lake City, Utah
Country United States
Inaugurated2011
Attendance28,000 (2018)
Organized by FamilySearch International
Website www.rootstech.org

RootsTech is a family history and technology conference and trade show held annually in the Salt Palace Convention Center, Salt Lake City, Utah. It first debuted in 2011 having been created from the ground up by a team at FamilySearch. The conference claims to be the world's largest family-history technology conference. [1] Over the years, RootsTech has welcomed a number of celebrities, television personalities, and actors as keynote speakers.

Contents

History

While some claim that RootsTech is an outgrowth of three former conferences, [2] the Conference on Computerized Family History and Genealogy, [3] the Family History Technology Workshop [4] and the FamilySearch Developers Conference, [5] these three conferences were invited to participate in the original 2011 RootsTech, but some of them remain in existence today. The RootsTech conference was an entirely new and different event.

Rootstech began as a concept discussed by former CEO of FamilySearch, Jay Verkler [6] and FamilySearch Chief Genealogical Officer David Rencher to help draw attention to the development problems faced in the world of genealogy. In July of 2010 Anne Teerlink, AG©, CG® (formerly Anne Roach) [7] was asked to design, roadmap, and develop the conference from scratch and have it ready by the beginning of February 2011. She was brought in to work on the conference because of her experience in both the fields of technology and genealogy. From the beginning of her work on the 2011 Conference, Teerlink claimed that she was designing it to operate without her and that she had no plans to continue as the conference chair in the future. She prepared the original budget plans, did user testing to come up with the name of the conference, selected the chairs for each element of the conference, met with and selected the venue designers and food vendors, designed and created the entire roadmap for RootsTech, and incorporated elements not currently present in any genealogy conference in the world.

According to Teerlink, she designed RootsTech was after the JavaOne conference, including the elements of unconferencing, gaming and fun in the expo hall, competitions and prizes offered to developers for solving genealogy-related problems, and primarily unpaid presenters. In order to help meet the initial desired attendee numbers, Teerlink met with BYU's manager of Conferences and Workshops and offered remuneration for the use of their mailing list for their genealogy conference attendees. In return, John Best who worked for BYU's Conferences and Workshops organized and printed the syllabus for RootsTech 2011 and Teerlink named Best as co-chair of RootsTech 2011.

Teerlink was already working closely with Gordon Clarke who held an annual FamilySearch Developer's Conference, a small-scale yet important event directed only at developers using the FamilySearch Platform. [8] The FamilySearch Developer's Conference was easily incorporated into RootsTech since Gordon Clarke became a critical part of bringing in software developers who trusted him to participate in RootsTech. Clarke was at every meeting of the inaugural RootsTech and developed the initial call-for-papers system for speakers overnight among other essential roles.

Teerlink had previously worked with Christophe Giraud-Carrier, [9] who chaired the annual Family History Technology Workshop. [10] Teerlink invited the students and developers from that conference to present their new developments and receive awards at the inaugural RootsTech 2011. The Family History Technology Workshop continues to operate separate from RootsTech as of 2023.

Teerlink built a business model for RootsTech that was not common in 2011, forever changing the face of genealogy conferences. She knew that the best way to boost the number of conference attendees was to provide a free sample of the sessions by broadcasting select sessions for free. "Sometimes the only way to sell a delicious peach pie is to give everyone a free sample so that they want to buy more," Teerlink said, using Chick-fil-A as a model. Teerlink worked with Speaker Coordinator and Session chair Devon Ashby and monitored the enrollment of each course. She chose to stream those sessions with the highest enrollment in order to provide the best possible experience for skeptics of this new conference. The free live-streaming of sessions has continued to be a successful element of the RootsTech Conference.

Working with Family Search's strategic relations team, Teerlink helped define sponsor packages at Silver, Gold and Platinum packages. These included sponsors for prizes, speaker gifts, and special events that were not common to genealogy conferences. To the delight of conference attendees Novell donated hundreds of bags and allowed Teerlink to select remnants from previous Novell conferences. Novell also added the RootsTech logo to the bags. Microsoft set up a gaming station working with Expo Hall Chair Carol Smith, and offered free operating systems and prizes for drawings. iPads were hot items that were offered as prizes for conference attendees. A Blogger's Booth was established for the first time in genealogy history, using genealogy bloggers as a primary source of communicating the events surrounding RootsTech 2011.

Chris Van der Kuyl of BrightSolid sponsored an evening event at the Clark Planetarium. Matthew and Brian Monahan, owners of Inflection offered leather journals and pens as speaker gifts. Additional sponsors for luncheons and other items included Ancestry.com, Federation for Genealogical Societies, New England Historic Genealogical Society, SharingTime.com and the BYU Computer Science Department. [11] Cash prizes were also available for student computer science contests. Class tracks included Technology Users (TU) and Technology Creators (TC) although anyone was welcome to attend either track. Also, since technology submitted up to a year in advance can become outdated, the "unconferencing sessions" allowed anyone to sign up the morning of each conference day to present their newest cutting-edge technologies and methodologies presented in 15 minute speed sessions.

Meetingplaces were set up in the expo hall where genealogists and software developers could meet on equal ground to try to find solutions together. Computer labs, scanning stations, and research consultants were also incorporated in the expo hall to allow attendees to use the FamilySearch Library without leaving the conference. Keynote Speakers included Hewlett–Packard's Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy and Technology Officer Shane Robison, Internet Archive Founder Brewster Kahle, Allen County Public Library Historical Genealogy Department Manager Curt B. Witcher, and FamilySearch International CEO Jay Verkler. The 2011 conference was emceed by Anne Teerlink.

Additional team members of the inaugural RootsTech who helped shape the face of future conferences were: Shipley Munson, Vice President of Marketing Ann Harrison, RootsTech Marketing Manager Gordon Clarke, RootsTech Affiliate Manager Carol Smith, Expo Hall Chair Ransome Love, Strategic Relations Manager Devon Ashby, Speaker Coordinator and Session Chair


The first RootsTech conference was held in Salt Lake City in February 2011, [12] drawing around 3,000 people. It was held again in 2012, drawing 4,500 people. In 2013, it drew 6,700 registered attendees with over 13,600 remote attendees and many attendees and vendors coming from other countries around the world. RootsTech had become the largest genealogy and family history conference held in North America. [13] The 2014 event was held at the Salt Palace where nearly 13,000 attended in person with over 100,000 remote participants. [13] At the 2015 RootsTech conference, Laura Bush and her daughter were keynote speakers. [14] Over 25,000 people were reported to have attended the 2016 RootsTech from 50 US states and 30 countries. [15] In 2019 paid attendees dropped by 10% and live stream views dropped by 28% compared to 2018. [16]

In October 2019, RootsTech held a conference in London, with almost 10,000 people attending. [17] [18] [19]

RootsTech Connect 2021 was transitioned to a free virtual experience hosted online in 11 languages. It was attended by over 1 million participants from 242 countries who were able to watch approximately 2,000 genealogical class sessions on-demand taught by experts, archivists and companies. [20] The 2021 conference included a Genetic Genealogy track, [21] a song contest [22] and a virtual expo hall with 85 exhibitors. [23]

Related Research Articles

The Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) is an information technology conference held annually by Apple Inc. The conference is currently held at Apple Park in California. The event is used to showcase new software and technologies in the macOS, iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, tvOS, and visionOS families as well as other Apple software; new hardware products are sometimes announced as well. WWDC is also an event hosted for third-party software developers that work on apps for iPhones, iPads, Macs, and other Apple devices. Attendees can participate in hands-on labs with Apple engineers and attend in-depth sessions covering a wide variety of topics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">COMDEX</span> Computer trade show, 1979 to 2003

COMDEX was a computer expo trade show held in the Las Vegas Valley of Nevada, United States, each November from 1979 to 2003. It was one of the largest computer trade shows in the world, usually second only to the German CeBIT, and one of the largest trade shows in any industry sector. COMDEX exhibitions were held in many other countries from 1982 to 2005, with 185 shows altogether. The first COMDEX was held in 1979 at the MGM Grand, with 167 exhibitors and 3904 attendees. In 1981, the first COMDEX/Spring was held in New York City.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Game Developers Conference</span> Annual video game developer conference

The Game Developers Conference (GDC) is an annual conference for video game developers. The event includes an expo, networking events, and awards shows like the Game Developers Choice Awards and Independent Games Festival, and a variety of tutorials, lectures, and roundtables by industry professionals on game-related topics covering programming, design, audio, production, business and management, and visual arts.

FamilySearch is a nonprofit organization and website offering genealogical records, education, and software. It is operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and is part of the church's Family History Department (FHD). The Family History Department was originally established in 1894, as the Genealogical Society of Utah (GSU); it is the largest genealogy organization in the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">FamilySearch Center</span> Genealogical centers operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

FamilySearch Centers (FSC), formerly Family History Centers (FHC), are branches of the FamilySearch Library (FSL) in Salt Lake City, Utah, operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The centers supply resources for research and study of genealogy and family history. As of 2024, there are more than 6,316 FSC in 149 countries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Adobe MAX</span>

Adobe MAX is an annual creativity conference held by Adobe Inc. The event helps Adobe to present the new developments of its suite of applications and to build a community of creative professionals.

The Digital Game Xpo (DGXPO) was the Southeast U.S.'s largest game industry conference. The event was organized and hosted by Wake Technical Community College in Raleigh, North Carolina. The first event was held in 2005 and it was held annually until 2009. The event comprised an expo, career fair, student showcase, and a variety of tutorials, lectures, and roundtables by industry professionals. The expo also held a number of tournaments for popular games of the time like Guitar Hero, Super Smash Bros., and Halo 3.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Novell BrainShare</span>

Novell BrainShare was a technical computer conference sponsored by Novell during the years 1985 through 2014. It was held annually in Salt Lake City, Utah, most often in March of each year, and typically lasted for much of a week. During its early years it was held in a hotel; then for much of the 1990s the conference was held on the campus of the University of Utah; finally beginning in 1997 it was held in the Salt Palace Convention Center. During the keynote addresses for the conference, Novell would present its vision of the direction of the computer industry and how its products fit into that direction. There were then many highly technical breakout sessions where Novell technologies were explained in detail and customers and partners could engage Novell engineers regarding them. Typically some 5,000 to 7,000 attendees came to each BrainShare.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Megan Smolenyak</span>

Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, born October 9, is an American genealogist, author, and speaker. She is also a consultant for the FBI and NCIS.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Canadian Undergraduate Technology Conference</span> Canadian student-organized conference

The Canadian Undergraduate Technology Conference (CUTC) is a Canadian student-organized conference. It concerns itself with all sorts of technology-related fields, such as: engineering, programming, interactive design, electronics, biology, and chemistry. It aims to introduce undergraduate students to the future of technology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Microsoft Ignite</span> Annual conference for developers and IT professionals

Microsoft Ignite is an annual conference for developers, IT professionals and partners, hosted by Microsoft. The first conference, then known as TechEd, happened in 1993 in Orlando, Florida, United States.

SC, the International Conference for High Performance Computing, Networking, Storage and Analysis, is the annual conference established in 1988 by the Association for Computing Machinery and the IEEE Computer Society. In 2019, about 13,950 people participated overall; by 2022 attendance had rebounded to 11,830 both in-person and online. The not-for-profit conference is run by a committee of approximately 600 volunteers who spend roughly three years organizing each conference.

The Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing (GHC) is a series of conferences designed to bring the research and career interests of women in computing to the forefront. It is the world's largest gathering of women and non-binary technologists. The celebration, named after computer scientist Grace Hopper, is organized by the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology. GHC 2022 conference was held hybrid in Orlando and virtually at the end of September 2022.

The Ontario Genealogical Society, operating as Ontario Ancestors since early 2019, is the largest organization devoted to research into family history in Ontario, Canada. Founded in 1961 as a Registered Charity corporation, the Society has grown by 2020 to include 30 local branches covering all of Ontario and five Special Interest Groups.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">SCO Forum</span> Unix conference

SCO Forum was a technical computer conference sponsored by the Santa Cruz Operation (SCO), briefly by Caldera International, and later The SCO Group that took place during the 1980s through 2000s. It was held annually, most often in August of each year, and typically lasted for much of a week. From 1987 through 2001 it was held in Santa Cruz, California, on the campus of the University of California, Santa Cruz. The scenic location, amongst redwood trees and overlooking Monterey Bay, was considered one of the major features of the conference. From 2002 through 2008 it was held in Las Vegas, Nevada, at one of several hotels on the Las Vegas Strip. Despite the name and location changes, the conference was considered to be the same entity, with both the company and attendees including all instances in their counts of how many ones they had been to.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">EduTECH (conference)</span> Australian education conference

EduTECH is an annual two-day education and ed-tech conference and trade show launched in Australia in 2011 by Craig Macfarlane, co-founder of Association & Communications Events (ACEvents). ACEvents and the EduTECH brand was subsequently acquired by Terrapinn Limited in 2015. EduTECH brings together over 10,000 educators from pre-schools, schools, universities, vocational education, training organisations and corporate trainers, as well as Government education departments and a myriad of education products and solution providers, to discuss latest education trends and methods, and to find ways to improve teaching and learning. EduTECH is well known to be the largest education event in the Southern Hemisphere and APAC region. The conference is held annually between June - August. In 2023, EduTECH will run at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre on 24 and 25 August 2023. Previous events ran at the International Convention Centre Sydney by Terrapinn Ltd.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">DevConf.cz</span>

DevConf.cz is an annual, free, Red Hat sponsored community conference for developers, admins, DevOps engineers, testers, documentation writers and other contributors to open source technologies. The conference includes topics on Linux, Middleware, Virtualization, Storage and Cloud. At DevConf.cz, FLOSS communities sync, share, and hack on upstream projects together in the city of Brno, Czech Republic.

Tech Open Air is an annual interdisciplinary technology festival that takes place in Berlin, Germany. It started in 2012 as the very first tech festival organised through crowdfunding. The festival has developed into a well-known tech conference in and out of Europe. The main concept behind Tech Open Air is to bring together the areas of technology, music, art, and science by providing a platform for multi-disciplinary knowledge exchange, collaboration, and development. Tech Open Air is organised every year in June or July and gathers a number of influential speakers, entrepreneurs, artists, scientists, start-ups, and attendees from Germany and 55+ other countries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">VRTO</span> International exhibition and professional conference

VRTO was founded in 2015 by Keram Malicki-Sánchez as a Meetup group dedicated to virtual reality in Toronto. In June 2016, VRTO launched the VRTO Virtual & Augmented Reality World Conference & Expo, a professional event focused on exploring arts, culture, and science through immersive technologies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Unix Expo</span> Unix trade show in NY, NY, US (1984–1996)

Unix Expo was a conference and trade show that focused on the Unix operating system, and software based on Unix, in the information technology sector. It ran from 1984 through 1996 and was held in New York City during the autumn season. The show was owned and managed by the Blenheim Group.

References

  1. ↑ Griffis, Joan (2017-03-01). "Joan Griffis/Illinois Ancestors: RootsTech 2017 names prize winners". The News-Gazette. Retrieved 2017-11-14.
  2. ↑ Dobner, Jennifer (2010-03-21). "Genealogy Tourism comes to Salt Lake". Mail Tribune, Oregon. Retrieved 2020-02-05.
  3. ↑ Staff (2010-04-26). "BYU Conference on Computerized Genealogy and Family History kicks off". Deseret News. Retrieved 2020-02-05.
  4. ↑ "Family History Technology Workshop". Brigham Young University.
  5. ↑ "Conferences and Workshops". ce.byu.edu. Retrieved 1 August 2018.
  6. ↑ "Jay L Verkler" . Retrieved 4 September 2023.
  7. ↑ "Relive RootsTech 2011". FamilySearch . Retrieved 4 September 2023.
  8. ↑ "2008 FamilySearch Developers Conference". FamilySearch.
  9. ↑ "Christophe G Giraud Carrier". Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
  10. ↑ "Family History Technology Workshop". Brigham Young University.
  11. ↑ "RootsTech 2011". FamilySearch.
  12. ↑ Rasmussen, Geoff (2011-12-28). "A Year in Review - Legacy Family Tree in 2011". Legacy News. Retrieved 2020-02-05.
  13. 1 2 "RootsTech 2014 Wrap-up". Familysearch.org. 25 February 2014. Retrieved 1 August 2018.
  14. ↑ "RootsTech keynote speakers". Deseret News. December 12, 2014. Archived from the original on December 17, 2014.
  15. ↑ Anderson, Amy Rees (2016-02-09). "6 Rising Genealogy Apps From Family History Tech Conference RootsTech". Forbes. Retrieved 2018-09-25.
  16. ↑ Editorial Staff (2019-03-13). "RootsTech 2019 Report Card". Family History Fanatics. Retrieved 2020-02-05.
  17. ↑ Collins, Rosemary (2019-11-19). "Almost 10,000 attendees experience first RootsTech event in London". Who Do You Think You Are? (Pressreader). Retrieved 2020-02-05.
  18. ↑ Staff (2019-10-24). "RootsTech comes to London". AGRA (Association of Genealogists and Researchers in Archives). Retrieved 2020-02-05.
  19. ↑ "RootsTech London October 24-26 2019". Society of Genealogists. 2018-08-28. Retrieved 2018-09-25.
  20. ↑ "RootsTech Attracts Over 1 Million Participants Opening Week". RootsTech Attracts Over 1 Million Participants Opening Week. Retrieved 2021-03-05.
  21. ↑ "FamilySearch.org". www.familysearch.org. Retrieved 2021-03-05.
  22. ↑ "RootsTech Song Contest | Family History Song Writing Contest" . Retrieved 2021-03-05.
  23. ↑ "FamilySearch.org". www.familysearch.org. Retrieved 2021-03-05.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.