The term Gen Y identifies individuals born between 1976 and 2001. Totally connected to technology, they have grown up with email, the Internet, Google and all the different social media sites. This generation is a great boon for the future of using technology for genealogical research. Genealogical societies need to understand the Gen Y members to encourage them to be a part of the ongoing search for more genealogical information.
The big question is how to stimulate their interest. Genealogical societies have to look at what motivates Gen Ys. What do Gen Ys look for when they do genealogical research? According to Gen Y is motivated by the game mechanics of genealogy, having been raised with games. Similar to video gamers, genealogists play within their own online communities through genealogical societies, social media and even large-scale indexing projects, like what happened when volunteers indexed the 1940 census. Genealogists like to win the game, progress to the next level and knock down the brick wall when they make a new discovery.”