I fully agree with you on that you can use a video for ID, and that a video can be more useful for ID than photos and/or audio, while your example is a good case in point.
Since you mention animated GIFs again, let me see if I can make a GIF from a video on my phone and upload it to an existing observation, then post back my findings. As mentioned, I prefer to do uploads on my phone. I installed a GIF Maker-Editor app, created a GIF from a video, and tried to upload it to an observation, but got the error: "Error importing photo(s): Can only import photo files with JPG/JPEG/PNG extensions. I have just created a separate feature request for that, which is here: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/upload-gifs-from-the-android-app/8444/2.
I would like to add that:
- the ability to embed a video is not that useful in itself, as it is not that hard to click on a link
- adding support for including animated GIFs, videos, etc. in observations (as evidence) does seem useful
While I agree that if a Youtube user (or user of whatever the site that the media is hosted on) is banned, or there is a change in the terms of service of that site, this would be a pain. Nevertheless, I still think being able to include videos as evidence would be an improvement on the status quo, and backing up the video on Wayback Machine, iNat servers, or other solutions can help to remediate this problem.
I also agree that users can tend to base IDs not only on the evidence shown on iNat. I was trying to be diplomatic and agreeable. Yes, these issues should be considered together, holistic thinking is better than tunnel vision. Here is one example of that: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/35000448.