With the New Year upon us, the JewishGen Moderators would like to share a few tips on ways to avoid your potential message being rejected and sent back to you. Our mission is to make certain that the JGDG Guidelines   https://groups.jewishgen.org/g/main/guidelines are followed with each message posted.

There are three main reasons why messages are rejected and how you can avoid this:

1. Since this is not an anonymous forum, all posts must include your FULL NAME at the end of your message. Just having your first name or even an e-mail address is not sufficient. You might want to create an automatic signature so you don’t have to remember every time, you can do that by going to: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1MkzgjW2aLkLg-JVUnkTtBrosaKf53gtwJBmcYPauaIk/edit        You can add not only your name but surnames and places that you are searching. This is the number one reason for message rejection.

1. The number two reason for message rejection is that your message should go back to the individual who posted it as opposed to the entire JGDG. Think…is your message personal? Is it for everyone single member to view? Is it a question about an upcoming program that only the person who initially posted can answer (is it being recorded? I can’t seem to log in, etc.?) Your question now is: How do you respond privately? The answer is: it depends which method that you receive your notifications. Here are the instructions on how to “like” a message or reply privately:  https://docs.google.com/document/d/1W1tIJXY80vSMUUCbifHcUFa9ao3o8MzZ7kHAGbY_qE8/edit

1. The third reason is a poor subject line or a subject line with hashtags only or a single word or two. As per the JGDG Guidelines, your subject line should be descriptive so that other subscribers can determine if your message will be of interest to them. If your subject line is not interesting or vague, no one will open it! Also, only surnames should be capitalized, nothing else! Look at other subject lines so you have an idea what will work. Hashtags by the way are used to classify messages. Please add the appropriate hashtags at the end of your descriptive subject line. Just inserting hashtags for a subject, without a descriptive subject line, is not acceptable. Please check out the JGDG Guidelines for more on subject lines. https://groups.jewishgen.org/g/main/guidelines By the way, there are 45 approved and authorized hashtags (note that they are all in lower case for uniformity except for one): https://groups.jewishgen.org/g/main/hashtags        Do not make up one on your own!

A tip for the New Year. Have you checked out the JGDG archives?? As a member of the JGDG you can search the number one Jewish message archives in the world going back to 1998 with over 664,700 messages that you can explore by family name, town, village, or shtetl! Go to:   main@... | Messages and go to “search.” You can also search the Archives by hashtags (another reason why hashtags are important!). Go to https://groups.jewishgen.org/g/main/hashtags

A very Happy and Healthy New Year to all! Thank you again for participating in the JewishGen Discussion Group and we look forward to helping you make 2022 a great year for genealogy research.

Phil Goldfarb

Lead Moderator, JGDG

President, JGS of Tulsa

Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA

Jessica Feinstein

Moderator, JGDG

Oxfordshire, England

Stephen Jones

Moderator, JGDG

Weston, Florida, USA