This is a discussion thread for the Early 2026 Curators Survey blog post, which was just published. We figure it might be best to host it here, as it’s much easier to have an organized discussion on the forum. If you have constructive questions or feedback about the survey, please add to the discussion.
Same thoughts on Qu.8 - so ordering “Moderately” prior to the last “Very”
But also on Qu. 6 - so ordering “Greatly Affects me” as the last (most extreme)
Thanks for posting this. I was happy to see a good number of responses and that some of the key themes that emerged from the survey were ones that seem to come up in the discussions I have had with other curators. I think the proposed changes will definitely move the needle in terms of improving curation. The onboarding/guidelines strikes me as the most challenging proposal, but also likely to have serious benefits.
Not related to the survey, but I am also happy/grateful to have seen a few key new moderation-focused curators jump in/ramp up their involvement this year, which I think has been very helpful. I think moderating content from many different societies/languages/cultures is one of the biggest challenges for iNat, and having a more diverse pool of curators doing moderation will be a major help.
This poll results bring up a question for me - I considered volunteering as a curator specifically for moderation around big events and the like, removing joke IDs on selfies, checking copyright violations, sock puppets, etc, but I saw that the requisites included listing one taxa change/addition that you would like to make.
It is not that I couldn’t figure out any (I have requested taxa additions several times), but this requisite gave me the impression that one should only apply as a curator if you intend to use it specifically for taxa curation work, with moderation as a side thing, or at least that only “non laymen” should moderate.
I can imagine I am not the only one that got that impression and it may be a reason behind the disparity between taxa curators and moderators. Is this intended? Does iNat want to have curators that focus on moderation without also being experts in some taxa?
yes absolutely
In that case - It would be a good idea to consider modifying the requirements, or at least adding a different avenue for moderation applicants, and rewording a bit the “Becoming an iNaturalist Curator” article (it currently focuses only on taxa curation and the ability to moderate the site is almost added as an afterthought)
As I mentioned it wouldn’t be hard for me to find a missing taxa to pull out of a hat for the requirement (I just need to give another look at rabbit-specific infectious diseases lol) but if I hadn’t accidentally crashed into that void of parasite taxa, I would have no idea what to do there and would be barred from even applying.
Hi. I’m a curator who has been highly focused on the “taxonomy curation” side only with almost zero involvement in the ‘moderation’ side. I see these two parts as functionally very divergent, but i think can be great of “moderator” can understand some core fundamentals of taxon issue and vice versa. To hit any requirements of “Taxon additions” of broader taxon issues, feel free to reach out.
On this
“we’re making a concrete investment in a new staff role dedicated to supporting curation and moderation on iNaturalist”
Great - i think tiwane has for an age has unfortunately experienced a massive un-needed burden for moderation issues in particular, and loarie had such for taxonomy, so a dedicated person as a point of contact really is welcome with their experience supporting. For next stage, i’ll be frank, in several decades, I don’t think i ever met someone who can deal with taxonomy, meaning e.g. the pedantry and nuanced precision and detail of nomenclatural rulings and balanced interpretation of specialist publications PLUS with moderation, across the seemingly divergent world of politics and in ethics, e.g. to my eye ideally striving balance within a world of differing interpretation and perspective, etc
That’s not the case, although I can see how it might be confusing. The curator application has a few questions, one of which is about taxonomic changes, but you don’t have respond to it if you are not interested in editing taxonomy. The last question is about moderation, which is what you should fill out if that’s what you’re interested in.
I enjoy the surveys.
My main comment is, it seems there is a small fraction of active moderation curators. Usually any moderation flag will have any number of the same about 20 quite active curators.
As a moderator I’ve learned to recognize and memorize usernames, profile pictures, just from how often I interact with the same curators.
Thank you Tony. I’d swear at some point I read the guides as saying something like “If you would like to become a curator, fill this form and add an example of a taxa you would like to add or modify”, but of course now that I look back on it there is nothing like that 
I will send an application and hopefully I can help with the moderation efforts :)