Database Errors -- Why can't I find my ancestors?

Some folks are lucky! They can type a name in Family Search and get all kinds of records with event dates. Poles are generally unlucky because we live in an Anglo world. The problem is that records are often indexed by Anglos who do not have any knowledge of the Polish alphabet or language. When we can't find information, it is likely due to bad indexing. See Indexing Errors for a summary of the most common indexing errors. While some of the indexed material on Family Search allows users to correct errors, it is a lengthy process. It's only something you would do for one or two records.

Why am I fussing about this? Let me illustrate with a concrete example of how poorly done one parish index is. I doubt it's an exception. I copied the LDS index of births for 1862 in the parish of Mrocza in Poland. The handwriting in the record was not perfect but it is readable. I independently read and entered the surnames of the fathers and mothers and later compared them with the LDS index. By my calculation, the LDS index was only about 19% accurate! To be fair, any difference was counted as an error even if the LDS entry was reasonably close. Am I asserting that my 'correct' entries are 100% accurate? No! But I think I did MUCH better that 19%.
Here's the URL to the first page of the records I examined. Mrocza births for 1862

For display below, I left out some of the LDS columns because they seemed nonsensical. The Baptism Place was given as Posen, Preußen, Deutschland. It would have been much more helpful had they said it was Mrocza. Father's Sex was all male. Mother's Sex was all female. It made me wonder if the LDS got 'woke' that they included those two columns. I added a column of my own. The LDS Image is the image number you could use once you are in the Mrocza records following the above link. You are invited to compare father or mother names against the column that follows it. Some significant differences!

Names that appear in italics are corrections to my original readings. How did those corrections come about? The LDS treats each record as a 'one of a kind' entity and so is easily subject to errors. My approach is to analyze the handwriting of one record against others on the same page. For example, if I know how the recorder wrote their B's, I can more confidently pick out all the other B's. I also enter data from multiple years of records. So while the writing may be uncertain in one instance, it may be clearer in other years. If I have recorded the same parents for say five children, I can feel more confident I have the right spelling of the parent names. I also sometimes use other sources to check surnames if available.