Ethical Ancestry

Ancestry.com is arguably the best online family history database, and the best always comes with a price. I believe this price is higher than it needs to be and that Ancestry.com is taking advantage of its customers. In a market where many other services are completely free such as FamilySearch you would think similar services wouldn't be able to charge much, but somehow this is not the case. Using Ancestry.com costs hundreds of dollars per year for full access. I believe the main reason for this high price comes from the nature of family history research itself. When performing this kind of research, it is quite common to reach a point where it seems like there is no more information to be found. When people reach this brick wall, they are willing to pay more to get unstuck than they would be otherwise. Ancestry.com takes advantage of this brick wall and the fact that their customers don't have to pay anything for similar services to charge a higher price than necessary.