How Many People actually get Family Finder Results in the 3-4 week time Frame given..

[Sarmat]

If someone from any country, any language, asked someone else when they were born. They would not say (for example) 23 Jan 2015. The person would answer Jan 23, 2015 not matter what language.

Uh... That's just not true.

[grahcom]

Yes many of us would say 23 Jan 2014. It's mainly the USA that likes to be different and wont get with the rest of the world, just they do with miles, weights etc...

[Tenn4ever]

Yes many of us would say 23 Jan 2014. It's mainly the USA that likes to be different and wont get with the rest of the world, just they do with miles, weights etc...

I know people from many different countries and different cultures and when I ask them when their birthday is they don't respond my birthday is 1 May or 23 Jan etc. They always say 'my birthday is May 1st or Jan 23rd. They may write it on paper differently but they don't speak it that way.

[David Guetta]

This thread made me curious, if you want to go down a Wikipedia rabbithole: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Date_format_by_country

[dna]

I know people from many different countries and different cultures and when I ask them when their birthday is they don't respond my birthday is 1 May or 23 Jan etc. They always say 'my birthday is May 1st or Jan 23rd. They may write it on paper differently but they don't speak it that way.

I think they express a courtesy to you or they live in the USA .

W.

[Tenn4ever]

I think they express a courtesy to you or they live in the USA .

W.

Possibly, but I speak to people (in writing) from all parts of Africa, India, England, Slavic countries and the Far East. If I ask them when their birthday is they never write back using the designation of dd/mm/year. They express it by writing the name of the month and then the date. And, NO, these people I am writing don't know I'm from the U.S. Sometimes I write in other languages so they wouldn't know if I'm American or not.

[Dna-donut]

Possibly, but I speak to people (in writing) from all parts of Africa, India, England, Slavic countries and the Far East. If I ask them when their birthday is they never write back using the designation of dd/mm/year. They express it by writing the name of the month and then the date. And, NO, these people I am writing don't know I'm from the U.S. Sometimes I write in other languages so they wouldn't know if I'm American or not.

Well in my experience it is day/month/year. Besides, unless you are perfectly fluent in the language, I am sure they know you are from America.

As posted several times now we Americans are actually one of the few who use Month/Day/Year and even then when I am personally asked and depending on the phrasing and context there are many times I respond XXth of Month or sometimes I respond Month XXth. It just depends.

[loudam]

Interesting conversation!!!

But in terms of how dates etc are wrote, I I was asked my Date of Birth I'd say 23rd January 2015, if I'm writing the date to anyone via genealogy, I write 23rd January 2015 so theres no misunderstanding about months and dates!

I actually got an email today from FTDNA telling me they've received my kit, they received it on the 5th Jan and Received it in the Lab on the 13th Jan!!

[larzus]

I actually got an email today from FTDNA telling me they've received my kit, they received it on the 5th Jan and Received it in the Lab on the 13th Jan!!

Same here! Over the last two days I have received several emails about kits received, some of my kits adding the others to their family trees and about new cousins. None of it is actually new stuff but good to see the notification system kicking in again

[ShellyH]

I also received an email saying that a kit had been received. I was pretty excited, until I realized it was the kit that had been received 10 days prior, not the one from the other cousin who hasn't yet returned hers.

[Germanica]

Possibly, but I speak to people (in writing) from all parts of Africa, India, England, Slavic countries and the Far East. If I ask them when their birthday is they never write back using the designation of dd/mm/year. They express it by writing the name of the month and then the date. And, NO, these people I am writing don't know I'm from the U.S. Sometimes I write in other languages so they wouldn't know if I'm American or not.

I guess I was in some kind weird alternate universe for the 8 years I lived in England then, lol. Somehow I think my 8 years immersed in a culture amounts to more knowledge about it then your occasional letter. Also, if you're writing by email, your ISP and/or IP address can give your location away.

[Tenn4ever]

I guess I was in some kind weird alternate universe for the 8 years I lived in England then, lol. Somehow I think my 8 years immersed in a culture amounts to more knowledge about it then your occasional letter. Also, if you're writing by email, your ISP and/or IP address can give your location away.

For my part it seems to be a communication thing. When people write me and tell me their birthday I meant to say they don't say "my birthday is 1/12 or 12/1" They will say 1 December or December 1st. I guess that's more conversational. For instance, here in the States if someone asked my birthday in a social setting I would tell them December 1st not 12/1. If I asked an acquaintance or friend when her birthday was in a social setting it would be considered 'weird' to answer me 12/1. Now, if it was an occasion where someone is asking what to put on a form or application etc I could possibly answer 12/1 (for Dec 1).

As for your remark about emails/letters. They are not occasional messages to these other countries and cultures...they are daily and they are through a blind system. They have no idea where the messages are from. They could be from anywhere in the world because they come from all languages and cultures through the same system....one IP address. It's possible they can know the IP address for the server but the individual messages from all peoples go through that IP address so they have no idea where the individual message writer is located.

In the same vein as the first paragraph in a conversational message they would answer me 1 December or
December 1st no matter where they are from not 12/1 or 1/12.

On my family tree on Ancestry (and all the trees I've seen there) the dates are written dd/mm/year BUT the month is written out for instance 1 Dec 2000 NOT numbers for the month. This alleviates confusion for all cultures using the alphabetic description of the month.

[RandomGenie]

For those waiting for a cousin to return a kit:

One thing I've learned to do is snap a quick photo of the return envelope before I mail the kit to the cousin. The return envelope has USPS label on it that includes the tracking number on it. Then I enter that tracking number into an app called Deliveries that runs on my Mac. This app is normally used for tracking packages for items I've ordered online, to see where they are and what the delivery date is. I'm sure there's a Windows app that's similar, and probably a mobile app too.

Because I've entered the USPS tracking number up front, I can see exactly when the cousin finally mails the kit, watch it make its way across the country, and see when it's delivered to FTDNA.

Of course, I'm an obsessive freak who likes to track things and hates suspense, so your mileage may vary.

[Germanica]

For my part it seems to be a communication thing. When people write me and tell me their birthday I meant to say they don't say "my birthday is 1/12 or 12/1" They will say 1 December or December 1st. I guess that's more conversational. For instance, here in the States if someone asked my birthday in a social setting I would tell them December 1st not 12/1. If I asked an acquaintance or friend when her birthday was in a social setting it would be considered 'weird' to answer me 12/1. Now, if it was an occasion where someone is asking what to put on a form or application etc I could possibly answer 12/1 (for Dec 1).

The issue isn't whether the month is written out or abbreviate numerically, it's whether the day comes before month or vice versa. You were saying people from all over the world use month, then day - which is simply not true. It's mainly only the US which says/writes it in this order. The majority of the world says/writes it as the day first, then month.

[Tenn4ever]

Problem being is you can't change history and if you view many of the old parish records in various countries, particularly those in Europe, what do you see?

This has been the standard for many many years and is carried forward through today throughout much of the world far outnumbering the other.

Scroll down to listing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Date_format_by_country

I found this interesting from the article you noted above speaking under the UK discussion:


"Also, YMD is used increasingly especially in applications associated with computers, and per British standard BS ISO 8601:2004,[172] avoiding the ambiguity of the numerical versions of the DMY/MDY formats."

So, the indication is that DMY/MDY is ambiguous which I agree. However, note that the increasing usage is YMD with the M coming before the D a recognition that the month before the day makes more sense.