True that you can't keep people out without password protecting it, 
but typically people won't find your site unless you advertise 
somewhere.  Believe me, I've set up a couple of sites and monitored 
the activity and the only people that accessed the site were those 
that I gave the URL to.  One site was for a family reunion and 
another was for my daughter's girl scout troop.  People were not 
exactly flocking to those sites.

I don't know if you read the bottom of the info page on genealogical 
society pages, but here is what it says:

"IMPORTANT: After you have your site up and operational, please send 
the URL of your homepage to websites@.... The Websites 
Webmaster will add you to the Guest Pages Index at RootsWeb, which 
should help increase the amount of traffic your page receives." 

The above implies that unless we give Rootsweb the URL to our site we 
would not be added to their index.  That means that doing a search on 
the Rootsweb pages would not find our site.  The only people who 
would be able to find the site are those who know the URL (us 
members).  I did think about keeping non-members out and don't think 
this would be a problem.

Maria


--- In ranchos@yahoogroups.com, Joseph Puentes <makas@n...> wrote:
> 
> 
> Arturo Ramos wrote:
> 
> >The problem with everybody hosting data on their own sites is that 
it
> >is not possible to make it freely available to members and keep it
> >from being accessible to the public in general.
> >
> yup
> 
> >  The Rootsweb web
> >space is simply to put up informational information.  I don't think
> >they have facilities to have member-restricted file access, etc.  
They
> >don't allow any scripts--only static pages on the site...
> >
> >Though, Joseph, it would probably be worthwhile putting up a page 
for
> >our group there that then leads people back here so that we can 
use it
> >to possibly recruit new members.
> >
> I'm not wanting to wholesale attract rootsweb people. We are 95 
members 
> strong. We could be 150 strong in 6 months if 1/2 of us picked one 
or 
> two people to recruit from rootsweb who gave the strong impression 
of 
> being very very serious. None of this "do you know Maria Garcia 
from 
> Zacatecas? If so send me her whole genealogy. . .thanks in advance" 
kind 
> of people.
> 
> >
> >Would people be willing to do a site on a donation basis?
> >
> you mean two sites? I would be willing to donate $20 a year. You 
build, 
> moderate,  and webmaster the site and copy the info out of the 
Ranchos2 
> files area and of course add your own.  Those that want to have 
dual 
> memberships can join. That way as we start growing bigger and 
bigger and 
> bigger the infrastructure for the new group would be laid and the 
> transition to that group only would be less painful. If we see what 
you 
> create and its not to our liking well people always have the option 
not 
> to join.  I firmly believe that a group can be created with the 
same 
> format that we have now, tell me Arturo, Am I right? We'd be able 
to 
> message each other and archive the messages. we'd be able to have a 
file 
> area, we'd basically have everything we have now except much much 
much 
> more file space to put things. We really do need to start looking 
to the 
> future.  .  .me estoy haciendo viejito, es tiempo hacer lugar para 
los 
> jovenes.
> 
> joseph