VGS News Special Edition: 26 March 2017

Family Tree Maker News:

Software MacKiev
The following is written by Software MacKiev:

It's hard to believe a year has gone by since we took over as publisher of this grand old Family Tree Maker brand, but here we are. With a new edition about to launch. And an old technology about to retire. So much to tell! Let's get started.

INTRODUCING FTM 2017
A month ago at RootsTech in Salt Lake City we showed off a preview of FTM 2017 for Mac and Windows. A brand new edition. The first under our own steam! FTM 2017 has state of the art syncing technology, integration with FamilySearch®, color-coding, a photo repair tool and much more! It will be released in a week on March 31st and it's available to pre-order today. Have a look at the flyer from the conference which pretty much tells it all.
http://www.mackiev.com/RootsTech/FTM_flyer.png 

PRE-ORDERS ARE OPEN! 
First question — what's it cost? Well, it depends. First of all we wanted to say thank you to all those who took a chance on us by buying a MacKiev edition during our first year as publisher. If you PAID for a copy of FTM 2014.1 or Mac 3.1 (both introduced in March 2016), your copy of FTM 2017 is FREE and you will be notified by email when yours is available. In case you're not sure whether you purchased a copy from us or not, we've set up a verification center so you can find out.

For the rest of you who own an older edition of Family Tree Maker, if you are ready to jump on in, now's the time to do it. For just one week, we are offering a pre-order price of $29.95, just until the launch on March 31st. After that it will be $39.95 for upgrades for a limited time. Click here to pre-order now! The full price, which is only for newcomers, is $79.95. All installers of FTM 2017 now contain a choice of editions — US, Canadian, UK and Australian so you don't need to worry about what edition you are getting.

GOODBYE TREESYNC. HELLO FAMILYSYNC! 
Some more big news. To make way for our new FamilySync technology, Ancestry's award-winning TreeSync® will go offline forever next Wednesday, March 29th at midnight Utah time (where Ancestry lives). Then for the next two days we will be working together around the clock to deploy FamilySync so that it will be all set up and ready when FTM 2017 is released on March 31st.
So what should you be doing to get ready? Not much, really. FTM 2017 will open with your trees showing, and any linked Ancestry and FTM trees will still be linked — but with FamilySync. No breaking of links. No upload or download. Just pick up right where you left off. About the only thing you should do is make a manual Backup (File>Backup) with the “include Media” box checked. What else — well maybe have a cup of tea? Really that's it.

LEARNING MORE ABOUT THE NEW EDITION.
A little nervous? Got tons of questions even though it sounds simple? Well we were thinking that might be the case so we've put together an FAQ page for FTM 2017 that we hope you'll find helpful. Just go to support.familytreemaker.com and enter FTM 2017 in the search field. And if the FAQ still doesn't tell you what you need to know, then you can start a live chat. We know its going to be busy so we've put on extra agents through this weekend. We only ask that you do read the FAQ's first.
So wow. That's it. We are so excited to be turning an important corner here. This is where we go from rescuers to pioneers. Forging a new road ahead for Family Tree Maker. This is just the beginning. Stay tuned!