Hello, I'm Paul Rowan.
I write about getting family stories out of people's heads and into something that lasts. Methods, tools, and the ones that turn out not to work.
This started because I left it too late with one grandparent and only just managed it with another. The difference between those two outcomes was not money or skill. It was knowing what to do on the first afternoon, and I could not find that written down anywhere useful.
What you'll find here
Four areas. Trees & Records for mapping ancestors and reading documents without over-trusting them. Voices & Stories for interviewing relatives and turning what they say into something readable. Photos & Film for scanning, restoring and organising visual media. Tools & Reviews for the software, including the parts that don't work.
The AI thread runs through all four rather than sitting in its own corner, because that's how it actually shows up: in the transcription, the restoration, the translation of a parish record.
How I write about tools
Nothing here is recommended on a specification sheet. Where a post reports a result, it says what the tool was run against. Where something can't be verified, it says that too, which happens more often than the marketing pages would suggest.
Sponsored posts are welcome
If you make something for people researching family history, I'm happy to talk about a sponsored post. This is a small audience but a specific one, and they are actively looking for tools that work.
Every sponsored post says so, at the top. Not in the footer, not in small print. You are paying for attention and a fair hearing, not for a good review.
The rest of the terms are short. I will write about what your product actually does, including the parts it does badly, because a review that only says nice things is worth nothing to a reader and therefore worth nothing to you. If I can't get it to work, the post says that. If it turns out I can't recommend it at all, we agree beforehand that I can decline to publish rather than write something I don't mean.
Nothing else on the site is paid for. No affiliate links at present, and if that changes it will be labelled on every post it applies to.
Getting in touch
If a method here worked, or failed, I'd like to know which. The failures are more useful to write up than the successes.