We would like to congratulate Cyndi Ingle on her 20th. Anniversary of Cyndi’s List, an indispensable list of genealogical links that she has gathered and maintained since 1996. We wish Cyndi many more years of success. You can see Cyndi next year at SLIG when she will be teaching, “Refining Internet and Digital Skills for Genealogy”.
From Cyndi:
20 Years of Cyndi's List
A major milestone celebrating 20 years of service
EDGEWOOD, WASHINGTON (March 4, 2016) – Cyndi's List (http://www.CyndisList.com) was launched 20 years ago on March 4, 1996. What started out as a side-page in a personal genealogy web site has become one of the top genealogy resources online. The original site started on one web page with 1,025 links. By the end of that first year the site was sorted onto individual pages with more than 9,600 links in more than 50 categories. Just after its one-year anniversary the site had grown to 17,300 links in more than 60 categories on 195+ separate web pages. The site has continued to grow exponentially with the popularity of genealogy and the Internet. Today there are more than 330,000 links in 207 categories that point to an endless supply of related genealogy links online.
The purpose of Cyndi's List remains the same today, 20 years after its creation: to be a free jumping-off point and a catalog for the immense genealogical collection that is the Internet. And it is all done not by software, but by a live human being. Every link found on Cyndi's List is personally visited, titled, given a description, categorized, and cross-referenced across the site. Cyndi Ingle is the creator and owner of Cyndi's List. The site is a one-woman enterprise in which Cyndi often works 10-12 hours each day, many times 7 days a week. Users of Cyndi's List are encouraged to submit new links and report broken links, all in an effort to keep Cyndi's List as current as possible.
Cyndi's List has always been free for everyone online to use for their genealogical research. It remains free today. The site is supported by advertising and through the donation button found on each page on the site. Generous users of Cyndi's List have helped to pay for 86 percent of the major site upgrade done in 2011.
Cyndi's List is unique as a research tool because it has a genealogist, with more than 36 years of experience, behind the scenes maintaining the links. Cyndi urges users to ignore the search engine on the site and explore the categories themselves (http://www.CyndisList.com/categories/). The categorization is what makes the site unique and such a successful research tool. Cyndi works diligently to deep-link into sites that contain genealogical treasures and by doing so brings those links to the top of the heap, easier to for everyone to find. By browsing through the site users find web sites and resources they never thought to look for and break down those brick walls in their research.
Users of Cyndi's List explain why it is such a popular research tool:
"Cyndi's List was one of the first sites I found upon starting to do genealogy. I've been consistently impressed with the scope, organization and accuracy of the site. Bravo Cyndi and thanks."
"Cyndislist has always been my go-to source for researching new things and it is always first or second on my list for genealogy newbies (FamilySearch wiki and Cyndislist are invaluable)"
"Cyndi's list is a sledge hammer for brick walls. Your site has led me to find great resources just clicking around."
"I've relied on your website as THE best resource on the 'net to help with my research..."
"Where can you get at all things genealogical in one fell swoop? Everyone knows it's CyndisList.com. Every genealogist who uses the web MUST use Cyndi's List."
Join us on social networking as we continue to celebrate this incredible milestone of 20 years of helping millions of people worldwide with their online research.
