Are Mormons "super mad" about this?

[Stargazer]

About 11 days ago, some YouTube pundit calling himself Anti.Prophet published a short video called "Blackstone Now Owns Your DNA" in which he claimed that Mormons were mad because Black Rock now owns 70% of their DNA. It's just a short video, which you can watch HERE, but you don't need to watch it because here's the transcript:

"Dude, Mormons are super mad because Black Rock owns all of their DNA now because they bought out ancestry.com and honestly it's kind of because Mormons are told by their church leaders that they need to do their family history in order to get into heaven and ancestry.com originally sold itself to Mormons as a Mormon-owned company that wanted to help these guys find their ancestors for their Eternal salvation and now because of a bait and switch one of the shadiest companies in  America owns like 70% of Mormon DNA -- it's actually kind f'ed up."

Whether or not you're a member of the church, my questions are these: 

1. Did you even know that Black Rock now owns a majority stake in Ancestry.com (actually, it's Blackstone)
2. Now that you know, are you super mad about it?

Edited to Add:

The pundit actually erred in claiming that Black Rock now owns a majority stake in Ancestry.com, because it isn't Black Rock, it's Blackstone, Inc, a smaller but similarly named outfit. Perhaps both are shady, but...

 

Edited August 26, 2024 by Stargazer

[ZealouslyStriving]

1. No.

2. No. Should I be?

[bluebell]

I did know because it was on the news, but the DNA service Ancestry provides is used by a lot of people, not just members.  I only know one member personally who has done it though.  I haven’t and neither has anyone in my family so there’s no reason for me to be upset.

This guy doesn’t know enough about this topic to be talking about it. 

[Stargazer]

9 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I did know because it was on the news, but the DNA service Ancestry provides is used by a lot of people, not just members.  I only know one member personally who has done it though.  I haven’t and neither has anyone in my family so there’s no reason for me to be upset.

About 90% of what he says in the video is balderdash. 

I did mine and my wife's DNA thing through Ancestry. I didn't know who owned it at the time, didn't care, and still don't.

9 minutes ago, bluebell said:

This guy doesn’t know enough about this topic to be talking about it. 

Doesn't stop him, though. I watch his channel from time to time, and he sometimes says sensible things, but if I were him, I'd keep that bead facemask on because the stupid things he says he might prefer not to be attributed to himself. He usually blathers on about politics, but sometimes culture as well. He's an American living in Bali because it's cheaper, he says. Given the number of subscribers he has, he could very well be making his primary living through YouTube. 

For some time I've been wanting to start a new YouTube channel dealing with LDS matters, and I may make a response to this dumb video my first entry. Not entirely sure as of this moment.

[Dario_M]

Question 1: No i didn't knew that.

Question 2: Yes i kinda am a bit i admit. 

[Rain]

I don't even know what Black Rock is.

I can't be mad because I don't know what it is. 

I purposely didn't do ancestry.com because I am not comfortable with legalities and insurance at this point. But both my parents did it so I guess it doesn't matter. 

[InCognitus]

23 minutes ago, bluebell said:

This guy doesn’t know enough about this topic to be talking about it. 

That's the only part of this story that makes me "super mad".

[Malc]

37 minutes ago, Stargazer said:

... 

For some time I've been wanting to start a new YouTube channel dealing with LDS matters, and I may make a response to this dumb video my first entry. Not entirely sure as of this moment.

If you do, will you let us know here at MD?

[Tacenda]

My children have brought up Black Rock to me, but that's all. They just give me a look.

[Calm]

2 hours ago, Stargazer said:

About 11 days ago, some YouTube pundit calling himself Anti.Prophet published a short video called "Blackstone Now Owns Your DNA" in which he claimed that Mormons were mad because Black Rock now owns 70% of their DNA. It's just a short video, which you can watch HERE, but you don't need to watch it because here's the transcript:

"Dude, Mormons are super mad because Black Rock owns all of their DNA now because they bought out ancestry.com and honestly it's kind of because Mormons are told by their church leaders that they need to do their family history in order to get into heaven and ancestry.com originally sold itself to Mormons as a Mormon-owned company that wanted to help these guys find their ancestors for their Eternal salvation and now because of a bait and switch one of the shadiest companies in  America owns like 70% of Mormon DNA -- it's actually kind f'ed up."

Whether or not you're a member of the church, my questions are these: 

1. Did you even know that Black Rock now owns a majority stake in Ancestry.com (actually, it's Blackstone)
2. Now that you know, are you super mad about it?

Edited to Add:

The pundit actually erred in claiming that Black Rock now owns a majority stake in Ancestry.com, because it isn't Black Rock, it's Blackstone, Inc, a smaller but similarly named outfit. Perhaps both are shady, but...

 

Didn’t have a clue.  Now that I do, still feeling mellow. 

If it screws up the service, I can see people getting upset, but otherwise….

How do they own our DNA?  It doesn’t make sense.  I know my DNA is laying somewhere around my house if I can just find it, not off stored in the ancestry.com vaults.

 Just because people get their DNA tested doesn’t mean they give up any right to trademark it as far as I am aware (I am thinking of something like medical testing on clones of someone’s cancer cells without paying them for the rights or even telling them about it as has happened).  Does someone know the law on that?  The only DNA testing I got done was for drug compatibility.

Is the claim just that they can sell the DNA info to others?  Or use it to track people down like law enforcement does at times.

So no more freebie deal with ancestry.com?  Was wondering if that was still a thing anyway. 

Edited August 26, 2024 by Calm

[Tacenda]

10 minutes ago, Calm said:

Didn’t have a clue.  Now that I do, still feeling mellow. 

If it screws up the service, I can see people getting upset, but otherwise….

How do they own our DNA?  It doesn’t make sense.  I know my DNA is laying somewhere around my house if I can just find it, not off stored in the ancestry.com vaults.

 Just because people get their DNA tested doesn’t mean they give up any right to trademark it as far as I am aware (I am thinking of something like medical testing on clones of someone’s cancer cells without paying them for the rights or even telling them about it as has happened).  Does someone know the law on that?  The only DNA testing I got done was for drug compatibility.

Is the claim just that they can sell the DNA info to others?  Or use it to track people down like law enforcement does at times.

So no more freebie deal with ancestry.com?  Was wondering if that was still a thing anyway. 

I thought of that same thing, that it may not be free to members any longer. 

[Stargazer]

26 minutes ago, Calm said:

So no more freebie deal with ancestry.com?  Was wondering if that was still a thing anyway. 

15 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

I thought of that same thing, that it may not be free to members any longer. 

As far as I know that freebie deal is still in effect. I have the freebie membership, but I mostly use FamilySearch.org anyway, so it doesn't matter much to me:

[Stargazer]

2 hours ago, Dario_M said:

Question 1: No i didn't knew that.

Question 2: Yes i kinda am a bit i admit. 

Blackstone is just an investment company, and it will likely let the current management of Ancestry.com run things the way they want, as long as they continue to make money. They bought only 70% of Ancestry.com, and it cost them around $4.7 billion dollars. 

The founders of Ancestry.com were LDS members I believe, and it's possible that the Church may have owned a slice of it at one time or another, but that 70% bought by Blackstone was actually previously owned by several other investment firms. So Ancestry's majority owner slice only changed from several firms to a single firm.

Nothing to worry about. 

 

[Stargazer]

46 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

My children have brought up Black Rock to me, but that's all. They just give me a look.

That's part of the silliness in the guy's video. It's not Black Rock. It's Blackstone. They are much smaller than Black Rock, like 1/10th size in investment portfolio. Of course, that 1/10 is still $1 trillion, so it's more money than the usual.  

[bluebell]

47 minutes ago, Stargazer said:

About 90% of what he says in the video is balderdash. 

I did mine and my wife's DNA thing through Ancestry. I didn't know who owned it at the time, didn't care, and still don't.

Doesn't stop him, though. I watch his channel from time to time, and he sometimes says sensible things, but if I were him, I'd keep that bead facemask on because the stupid things he says he might prefer not to be attributed to himself. He usually blathers on about politics, but sometimes culture as well. He's an American living in Bali because it's cheaper, he says. Given the number of subscribers he has, he could very well be making his primary living through YouTube. 

For some time I've been wanting to start a new YouTube channel dealing with LDS matters, and I may make a response to this dumb video my first entry. Not entirely sure as of this moment.

It sounds like he thinks that everyone who has used ancestry.com to do genealogy work has given them their DNA, which is a really stupid thing to think since most members might access it from time to time but we generally do our stuff on the church's family search site.  Plus, ancestry.com was huge before it was owned by the church and many many many non members utilized it.

My husband hasn't wanted me to do any DNA stuff, regardless of what company it is, because he's always thought eventually the information would be sold or not be controlled very well.  If I wanted to do it, he wouldn't stop me or be all the worried, but it would probably annoy him. 

But it's been a concern for a lot of people in general for a while. 

[Stargazer]

41 minutes ago, bluebell said:

Plus, ancestry.com was huge before it was owned by the church and many many many non members utilized it.

Actually, Ancestry.com was never owned by the Church. It was founded by two guys in Lehi, Utah in 1996. But not only has the Church never owned it, Ancestry.com was a competitor to the Church in terms of software. Ever hear of Personal Ancestral File? It was a free standalone software product that was developed and distributed by the Church to anyone who wanted it. And a lot of people did use it. It was available and maintained from 1984 to 2013 when it was discontinued. 

Ancestry.com has something like 25 million members. That's a huge user base! No wonder a 70% stake in it sold for $4.7 billion.

[CV75]

4 hours ago, Stargazer said:

About 11 days ago, some YouTube pundit calling himself Anti.Prophet published a short video called "Blackstone Now Owns Your DNA" in which he claimed that Mormons were mad because Black Rock now owns 70% of their DNA. It's just a short video, which you can watch HERE, but you don't need to watch it because here's the transcript:

"Dude, Mormons are super mad because Black Rock owns all of their DNA now because they bought out ancestry.com and honestly it's kind of because Mormons are told by their church leaders that they need to do their family history in order to get into heaven and ancestry.com originally sold itself to Mormons as a Mormon-owned company that wanted to help these guys find their ancestors for their Eternal salvation and now because of a bait and switch one of the shadiest companies in  America owns like 70% of Mormon DNA -- it's actually kind f'ed up."

Whether or not you're a member of the church, my questions are these: 

1. Did you even know that Black Rock now owns a majority stake in Ancestry.com (actually, it's Blackstone)
2. Now that you know, are you super mad about it?

Edited to Add:

The pundit actually erred in claiming that Black Rock now owns a majority stake in Ancestry.com, because it isn't Black Rock, it's Blackstone, Inc, a smaller but similarly named outfit. Perhaps both are shady, but...

 

YES< YES WE ARE!!!

[LoudmouthMormon]

In general, whenever I hear Blackrock, Blackstone, or Blackwater, it's because someone is drumming up outrage.  Often against capitalism in general or global war for profit specifically, sometimes against this or that political party, occasionally by someone sad about rent being too expensive.  

Anyway, this might help:

https://www.benzinga.com/money/blackrock-vs-blackstone

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_(company)

[Calm]

1 hour ago, Stargazer said:

The founders of Ancestry.com were LDS members I believe

Yep

[bluebell]

26 minutes ago, Stargazer said:

Actually, Ancestry.com was never owned by the Church. It was founded by two guys in Lehi, Utah in 1996. But not only has the Church never owned it, Ancestry.com was a competitor to the Church in terms of software. Ever hear of Personal Ancestral File? It was a free standalone software product that was developed and distributed by the Church to anyone who wanted it. And a lot of people did use it. It was available and maintained from 1984 to 2013 when it was discontinued. 

Ancestry.com has something like 25 million members. That's a huge user base! No wonder a 70% stake in it sold for $4.7 billion.

I thought the church bought it and that’s why all the members can use it for free. But I’ve never looked into it.

if ancestry.com has no connection to the church, why does this guy think that all the Mormons are mad??

[Tacenda]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

It sounds like he thinks that everyone who has used ancestry.com to do genealogy work has given them their DNA, which is a really stupid thing to think since most members might access it from time to time but we generally do our stuff on the church's family search site.  Plus, ancestry.com was huge before it was owned by the church and many many many non members utilized it.

My husband hasn't wanted me to do any DNA stuff, regardless of what company it is, because he's always thought eventually the information would be sold or not be controlled very well.  If I wanted to do it, he wouldn't stop me or be all the worried, but it would probably annoy him. 

But it's been a concern for a lot of people in general for a while. 

I did 23 and me. It's pretty worthless, generally. I was so disappointed to find out that I don't have Cherokee in me. My mother told me I did. But maybe I shouldn't say it is worthless I guess, because it can predict different health issue in my genes. 

[bluebell]

Just now, Tacenda said:

I did 23 and me. It's pretty worthless, generally. I was so disappointed to find out that I don't have Cherokee in me. My mother told me I did. But maybe I shouldn't say it is worthless I guess, because it can predict different health issue in my genes. 

What makes it worthless?

I’ve been told that I have Cherokee letting me as well. I think everybody who has family that’s been here for a long time assumes that. I’ve never checked to see if it’s true. Though, I have maternal grandparents and paternal grandparents who came over on the mayflower so my family has definitely been here long enough to get some Native American DNA in there somewhere.

I haven’t ever done one of those DNA tests because I’ve heard they’re not very accurate. The more people that do them the more accurate they get I guess but they’re only as good as their sample size. That’s what I’ve read anyway.

I’ve also read that it’s completely possible for your grandmother, for example, to have Cherokee DNA, but for you not to get any.  It turns out that DNA isn’t a 50-50 thing when it comes to inheriting stuff from our parents.

I read an article about siblings where one was like a majority French or something, and a little bit of Spanish, and then the other one was like mostly Spanish with a tiny bit of French and then with other stuff mixed in. So even siblings can end up inheriting different mixes of DNA.

I was watching a show where this one person considered themselves 100% French because all of their maternal ancestors and all of their paternal ancestors were French back like four or five generations. And then they did a DNA test and though they were majority French, they actually had a lot of other stuff mixed in. They were shocked. And kind of upset.  I think being French was very much their identity. 

[Calm]

8 minutes ago, bluebell said:

have maternal grandparents and paternal grandparents who came over on the mayflower

Your family must have very long lives.  

Edited August 26, 2024 by Calm

[Calm]

8 minutes ago, bluebell said:

as good as their sample size

Also selection.  If you have a massive database, but most are European heritage, it wouldn’t be that accurate for Asians or Africans.

[Tacenda]

7 minutes ago, bluebell said:

What makes it worthless?

I’ve been told that I have Cherokee letting me as well. I think everybody who has family that’s been here for a long time assumes that. I’ve never checked to see if it’s true. Though, I have maternal grandparents and paternal grandparents who came over on the mayflower so my family has definitely been here long enough to get some Native American DNA in there somewhere.

I haven’t ever done one of those DNA tests because I’ve heard they’re not very accurate. The more people that do them the more accurate they get I guess but they’re only as good as their sample size. That’s what I’ve read anyway.

I’ve also read that it’s completely possible for your grandmother, for example, to have Cherokee DNA, but for you not to get any.  It turns out that DNA isn’t a 50-50 thing when it comes to inheriting stuff from our parents.

I read an article about siblings where one was like a majority French or something, and a little bit of Spanish, and then the other one was like mostly Spanish with a tiny bit of French and then with other stuff mixed in. So even siblings can end up inheriting different mixes of DNA.

I was watching a show where this one person considered themselves 100% French because all of their maternal ancestors and all of their paternal ancestors were French back like four or five generations. And then they did a DNA test and though they were majority French, they actually had a lot of other stuff mixed in. They were shocked. And kind of upset.  I think being French was very much their identity. 

Wow, thanks bluebell. You're much more knowledgeable than I on this and other matters. I shouldn't have said worthless, sometimes I exaggerate. Good to know that my great grandmother could still be part Cherokee. She is from Kentucky, and all. She is why I'm born in the covenant I believe. She had an illegitimate child in Kentucky with a high ranking colonel there. But she happened to have met the LDS missionaries and listened to their singing/teachings and she felt the spirit strong that she should join the church. Well, the father of my grandmother wouldn't join. And my great grandmother wanted to come to Utah and leave him and rode the train with her little 3 year old daughter, my grandma, to Fayette Utah!  She had long black hair and dark brown eyes, and the high cheek bones. Good to know that she still could be Cherokee even though me, her great grand daughter doesn't. I'll let my daughter know, since she had her DNA done and it showed the same thing, so she'll be happy to know that!