Three prompts. Four dimensions to compare: Before-and-After that cuts through the hype. The experiment that reveals whether this upgrade changes what you can actually do the morning after—not what benchmarks claim it should do.

Full protocol from AI-Jane: aigenealogyinsights.com/2025/11/17/y...

This principle—"Know Your Model" or testing AI on actual tasks rather than trusting general capability claims—is fundamental to best practices in responsible use of AI in genealogy. Highly recommended read:

www.oneusefulthing.org/p/giving-you...

You can't read your way from the kiddie ride to the fighter jet cockpit. You have to put in the hours. Make mistakes. Learn by doing. The only way past the slop is to accumulate flight time. The learning is in the doing. So stop reading about it. Go do.

aigenealogyinsights.com/2025/11/10/f...

Understood. I get lots of questions from professional genealogists and casual family historians who echo the issues raised by these communities of negative affect, so even if I'm not engaging them those communities, I like to know how to respond to my peeps questions, so I watch, listen, and think.

And they don't seem to have used the tools, much less talked to the many, many folks who are finding value with the tools, even when restricted to their strongest and most responsible use cases. The US federal minimum wage is about $8/hour, ChatGPT cost $20/month; save 3 hr/month is value, right? 🤷‍♂️

Source: x.com/Pontifex/sta... (4/4)

A personal statement from a unique perspective:
• Inaugural AI Program Director, National Genealogical Society
• 18-year appointed United Methodist clergy
• 40 years experience with technology, language and linguistics, #genealogy (3/4)

Better would be: democracies strengthen themselves to legislate AI guardrails. People of good conscience—secular and religious—have common cause: recognize that. Church leaders, follow the Pope’s lead and lead.

—Rev. Steve Little (2/4)

Expert genealogists responded. Today the Coalition for Responsible AI in Genealogy released practical guidelines:

1. Label modified/generated images.
2. Cite originals.
3. Use as illustration, not evidence.

The full story: aigenealogyinsights.com/2025/11/07/w...

For practical examples on how to apply these recommendations, please see the detailed educational articles linked at the bottom of the statement.

craigen.org/protecting-t...

To protect the integrity of our shared history, this statement establishes three simple, neutral guidelines:

1. Always Label modified images.
2. Always Cite the original source.
3. Use as Illustration, Not Evidence.

These practices help us all use AI responsibly.
Link and more ►

Find here a comprehensive step-by-step guide to the process described in this episode. This is the type of help that Mark Thompson and I talk about and teach, and which we’re glad to share with you. #familyHistory

aigenealogyinsights.com/2025/11/03/c...

Your Halloween treats await! 🎃 Grab the full collection of prompts and AI insights here: 👉 aigenealogyinsights.com/2025/10/31/f... 🍬👻

Link to all your Halloween treats in the first comment: ►

Best wishes, Steve 🎃
Halloween Friday, October 31, 2025

I'm proud to share this collection with you. I hope you get as much fun and value out of using them as I had discovering, crafting, and collecting them. It's hard to believe this is our third Halloween together. Can't imagine what comes next. I'm glad to be on this journey of discovery with you.

I've made my share of real discoveries and innovations over the past 35 months. The summarization work in particular has been rewarding, so I'm glad to collect the semantic density prompts here, meaningfully distilling texts and whole chats—something I've never seen documented elsewhere.

The post closes with a thorough step-by-step explainer on which AI-Jane and I collaborated to unpack each prompt, and it becomes a solid introduction to AI research best practices: Know Your Data, Know Your Model, Know Your Limits.