This week’s news items include: James LeVoy Sorenson, renowned medical device inventor, entrepreneur, and philanthropist died on 20 January 2008 at 86 – his companies list includes the  non-profit Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation which provides DNA testing; Genealogical.com has launched a new blog at http://GenealogyandFamilyHistory.com; a wiki is available for users of FamilySearch and the LDS Family History Centers, at http://www.familysearchwiki.org.

The Guys respond to listener e-mail, including: genealogy software questions about DNA information and the GEDCOM 5.5 format standard; a site for sharing serialized family history information, with a sample at http://wwar1.blogspot.com; a suggestion to visit the extensive Genealogy and Family History Links Library at http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~genealogylinks/; Bryan Mawer’s Sugar Refiners and Sugarbakers website at http://home.clara.net/mawer/intro.html about the sugar industry, primarily in the UK (16th-20th centuries); and a question about when ships’ crew were included on manifests (and other forms), including information about INS requirements – at http://www.archives.gov/genealogy/maritime/great-lakes-crew-lists.html.

Drew and George discuss the explosion of social networking sites for genealogists and some of the issues regarding choosing one or more to use. The list includes: Geni.com (http://www.geni.com/), Famillion (http://www.famillion.com), Ancestry.com (http://www.geni.com/), OneGreatFamily.com (http://www.onegreatfamily.com), FamilyTreeDNA.com (http://www.familytreedna.com/), MyHeritage.com (http://www.myheritage.com/), 23AndMe (https://www.23andme.com/), MyHeritage.com (http://www.myheritage.com/), ItsOurTree.com (http://www.itsourtree.com/ and available in multiple languages), Amiglia.com (http://www.amiglia.com), Kindo.com (http://kindo.com/), and TreeX.com (http://treex.com/tree/). Others include KinCafe (http://www.kincafe.com/), FamilyLink (http://www.familylink.com/ - formerly WorldVitalRecords.com), OurStory.com (http://www.ourstory.com/), WeRelate (http://www.werelate.org), and Famiva (http://www.famiva.com/).

Drew has revived his personal blog with a new name, Internet domain, and a new look. The blog, called Rootsmithing, can be found at http://rootsmithing.com.