The Puzzling DNA Genetic Communities/ Now you see them now you don't

 When the DNA communities first came out I was a little disappointed I had so few. I'm still disappointed. As a matter of fact I lost a community that was accurate for me, as did my mother. 

AncestryDNA, MyHeritage, and 23andMe have these genetic communities. I haven't been checking them so I didn't know my mother's, or mine had changed at AncestryDNA. 

These were our communities at AncestryDNA in March of 2017:

These are our current Genetic Communities at AncestryDNA:

Were the changes for the better? 

No. I lost the Connacht Community which was accurate for me. Evidently my connection wasn't strong enough. My great-grandmother Helen Mullen-Mason was born in Connacht, Galway, Ireland, so that was correct. 

I've gained, along with my mother, a large Upper Midwest & Western Settlers Community, which generally doesn't relate to our ancestry. Only one of our ancestors, Anderson Wray, lived on the fringe of the community in south east Kansas. He migrated there in middle age from Indiana without his late wife, our ancestor, and his daughter Elizabeth, also our ancestor. So we have only one direct ancestor who lived in that area. We do have many cousins who lived or currently live in the Upper Midwest & West. We have many relatives from all over the United States. I would say the Upper Midwest & Western US Settlers community doesn't reflect our ancestry very well. I would rather have communities that reflect our actual direct ancestry. 

According to AncestryDNA's Genetic communities I have Upper Midwest & Western US Settlers from both my mother and father's side. I'm not aware of any of my father's ancestors in that area? All of my close matches are in that community also. It's a way to vague, and broad, a community to be meaningful at all. It's also inaccurate. 

I've marked all of the counties my direct paternal ancestors lived in on the map below. You can see how there are no ancestors living in the community area. 

The first communities, still vague, were better reflections of our actual direct ancestry. My mother's earliest communities included Virginia and parts of Tennessee where many of her paternal ancestors lived. Below is a map of the counties my mother's ancestors lived in. 

I suppose it depends on where you live as far as how useful the communities are. For Americans a broad community in a foreign country is helpful. Connecting to another country is helpful. Broad genetic communities in the United States aren't very useful for Americans. We are a very mobile country, while some families have stayed in the same areas for generations, most Americans have genetic cousins all over the country making broad communities not very helpful. 

My broad Nicaraguan community would be helpful for an American cousin unaware of their connection to that country. My Quebec, Canada community is accurate. My great-grandfather Pierre Masson's family came from the Trois-Rivieres, and Maskinongé area of Quebec (oddly, I have no French admixture at AncestryDNA even though I'm in a French Canadian community there?). 

My Aunt's Burgenland community at MyHeritage is very helpful for cousins unaware of this connection. 

I would say that only fairly accurately pinpointed genetic communities in the United States are helpful for genealogists. At this point in time, for someone like me, their genetic communities only show a limited picture of our ancestry. I only have 3 genetic communities, only one inaccurate one covering the western United States. As you see in the map below my ancestors were from a different area in the United States than the Upper Midwest & Western Settlers group would indicate. 

Personally I have a good idea regarding where my family came from. I've been researching my family for over 20 years so I should. So far I haven't found any non paternity events DNA testing. I really don't need the communities. It is interesting, however, to see how they evolve, and how close they are to reflecting our true ancestry. If at some point these communities pinpoint my mother's family in Jackson County, Indiana, where our Forgey ancestors lived for generations, I would say they are now very accurate and useful for our American ancestry.