A Segment-ology TIDBIT

ThruLines is based on genealogy – it finds Common Ancestors based on your Tree and the Trees of others. However, it only reports Common Ancestors with your DNA Matches. So, in a sense it has a DNA component. But the connections TL finds are not based on shared DNA cMs, Chromosome location, segment Triangulation, Clustering or Shared Matching – it is based only on connections found through Trees (only on genealogy). And ThruLines only reports Common Ancestors with your DNA Matches.

This is a two edge sword:

1. If you only want to work with DNA Matches, it’s a good thing.
2. However, if you are a genealogist looking for cousins who might share records, pictures, stories, analysis, new branches, etc., it leaves something out. Remember that roughly half of our 4th cousins (4C) don’t share DNA with us, and roughly 90% of our true 5C don’t share DNA with us, and the vast majority of our more distant true cousins don’t share any DNA with us. This means that, although a program like ThruLines could find those non-DNA-sharing cousins for us, it doesn’t. Think of all that we are missing – think of all the lost opportunities.

Well… looking back on the #1 cutting edge of the sword – I’ve got to be a happy camper. I’m finding more ThruLines Matches than I can keep up with. By adding children and grandchildren of my Ancestors in my Tree, ThruLines is finding more Matches with Common Ancestors. And these Matches and their Trees are reinforcing my Tree (and pointing out a few soft spots…)

Back to work… Stay safe!

[22AR] Segment-ology: AncestryDNA ThruLines Missing Out – TIDBIT by Jim Bartlett 20200326