Community Notes
Community Notes
Add source-based context, careful questions, and correction suggestions without exposing private information.
How notes work
Community Notes are reviewed before publication. Use a pseudonym if you prefer, cite sources where possible, and do not include information about living people.
What a strong community note adds
- A better source trail, not just stronger confidence language.
- A missing date, place anchor, archive, institution, or wording limit that improves the page.
- A correction path that editors can act on publicly.
- A question that shows exactly where a public page may be oversimplifying, overreaching, or skipping context.
Good note examples
- “This page names the town but not the county boundary change; here is the public map or archive guide that clarifies it.”
- “This claim sounds broader than the source. The source supports a place connection, but not identity, descent, or legal status.”
- “This institution name changed over time. The page should preserve both names and explain the date range.”
- “This story may belong in Tales or community memory unless a source trail is added.”
What not to put in a note
- Private contact details, living-person records, raw DNA data, family disputes, or unredacted screenshots.
- Certainty claims without a source trail.
- Requests to certify identity, ancestry, tribe, nationality, legal status, descent, or membership.
- Harassment, status arguments, or pressure to publish a conclusion before review.
How editors can use a note
A strong note can become a page update, a source-review task, a correction, a claim-review label, or a held research lead. Notes are most useful when they make the next editorial action obvious.
Community Note
Add source-based context, a careful question, or a correction suggestion for editorial review.
Use a pseudonym if you want attribution. Do not include email addresses, phone numbers, addresses, private DNA data, or information about living people.
What this form adds
- It gives readers a public-safe way to add context, dates, place anchors, wording cautions, and source leads without editing pages directly.
- It moves useful community review into an editorial lane that can be checked, narrowed, and published responsibly.
- It keeps the project from relying on private inboxes for corrections and context.
Useful Community Note examples
- A public archive link that narrows a place, date, institution, route, or source holder.
- A wording caution that explains what a page can support and what it should not imply yet.
- A map, cemetery, church, school, newspaper, court, or directory clue that another reader can verify.
- A privacy warning that helps remove living-person details before public reuse.
Hold or decline reasons
- The note includes private contact details, living-person information, raw DNA data, or unredacted family records.
- The note makes an identity, ancestry, legal-status, descent, tribe, Nation, or membership claim without a reviewable source trail.
- The note argues from certainty or personal pressure instead of naming a source, page, sentence, or safer wording path.
Possible routing outcomes
A Community Note may become public context, a source-review task, a place-hub update, a correction lead, a fact-check request, or a held item if the public wording is not safe yet.
What remains open: A submission is a lead for editorial review, not an automatic publication or proof claim.
Published Community Notes
What this archive adds
- It shows how readers improve pages in public by adding context, dates, place anchors, source leads, and wording cautions.
- It makes editorial listening visible instead of hiding community review behind private inboxes.
- It gives future readers a record of which questions, doubts, and source leads have already entered the project.
You should leave with a better sense of where a page may need context, what kinds of public-source additions are useful here, and how community review strengthens the site without turning every submission into proof.
No Community Notes have been published yet.