For the vast number of amateur historians researching their genealogy, the nineteenth-century censuses offer a first insight into dealing with historical records. Yet the issues which face them are indicative of common issues which face all historians using digitized resources. These are the familiar issues of access and user friendliness: what fields you can search and what are the limitations of the search engine? Is it free, by subscription or pay as you go? What is the reliability of the information? Identifying and resolving inaccuracies in transcription is one of the bugbears of the censuses online, and it is true of other digitization projects as well. Similarly the extent to which the publisher has compromised the resolution of the digital image of the original document in order to provide access via the web; the ease with which the user can navigate the image and how long the researcher can access it are all important considerations in how the researcher – genealogical or academic – assesses the digital resource.