A recent survey found that 35 million Americans had used the Internet to research their family history. The boom in Internet genealogy worries some veteran genealogists, who rightly fret that it will lead to family trees not rooted in the right research. On the other hand, some dabblers in online genealogy find themselves frustrated: Unable to simply download their whole family tree from some magic Web site, as easily as they can get stock quotes or the weather forecast for Abu Dhabi, they give up on the whole thing.

Does the Internet really offer nothing but fool's gold for genealogists? Is it just a tease that will wind up turning off as many would-be family historians as it entices?