I would not be for “explosive” growth (which I would define as rapid growth of contributing users and of their content) and don’t think anyone on the iNat team is for it either. I can’t think of any social networks where explosive growth’s benefits didn’t outweigh its downsides unless you’re counting profit as a benefit, and iNat is not interested in profits (we’re a nonprofit org) but in building a strong community that helps people interact with nature and generates usable data. I also suspect iNat would not experience sustained rapid growth unless new observers’ observations are being identified, so the two kind of go hand-in-hand.
I’m definitely for growth if it’s sustainable, and especially among areas, communities, and taxa that are currently underrepresentated on iNat. That usually happens when communities are formed on or brought to iNat, either geographically or taxonomically or both. Usually one person or a few people do workshops, add IDs, provide resources, and build the community until it kind of has enough momentum and synergy to maintain itself on its own. It takes a lot of work and doesn’t happen overnight.
A very non-exhaustive list of some examples:
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mutolisp’s talk about how he and others built the Taiwan community on iNaturalist.
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groups of people making resources available for fly identification in North America or gall identification in North America and are also contiually engaged with observers of those observations.
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experts like jurga_li and amila_sumanapala spending time to make IDs and helpful comments to assist people as they grow as naturalists.
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Mexico and its system of tutors in every state who provide training and workshops.
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people like sambiology, cullen, and the late Greg Lasley helped turn Texas into an early iNat powerhouse by adding IDs and comments, and doing local outreach.
Yeah, I think it’s important to remember that none of us have to carry the weight of the entire site/community on our backs (and it’s also not really possible for anyone to do that).