This is maybe a silly idea, maybe been covered before but I couldn’t find it on search.
Just about every observation has something else in the background or around the edge of the image, often in focus and identifiable. Is there any reason not crop these out and make separate observations? Afterall the time and place are known already.
I do this sometimes with my own photos, but I’m talking here about other peopel’s photos. This seems like it might be rude, on the other hand it seems there is useful data going to waste in the peripheral of nearly all photographs on iNaturalist.
3 Likes
It’s done in some ways when associations are made using fields. We do it with plant associations with pollinators by noting what plant it is pollinating. Sometime associations are made between predators and prey. I wouldn’t call it rude. It is giving more depth to the observation.
2 Likes
If you crop my picture
Whose obs?
Whose copyright?
How do you know if my date and location are accurate?
I would see that as a - Flag for Copyright - situation.
What taxon specialists do is leave a comment - Please make another obs for the nightjar bottom left. Seldom unusual sp top right.
4 Likes
You can’t use other people’s photos, as that violates copyright, among other things.
However, you can add a note in the comments about the other things in the image and suggest they duplicate the observation to make one for those other things.
14 Likes
I think this is actually an interesting idea, when slightly modified! I won’t take your pic, I won’t take your obs, I won’t violate copyright, the new observation remains with the original observer, as his observation, his work, his copyright. But there will be a new observation on iNat, adding to the pool.
I wouldn’t know how to implement such a feature, but it should look somethink like this:
You post an observation of a fish.
I spot a sponge, a crab and a hydrozoan in the background of your fish.
I’ll add those as extra observations WITHOUT taking or changing your pic, but just by marking the new observation specimen in your pic and adding the ID.
Thus iNat creates a new observation automatically, your name, your pic, your copyright, your location, but without an ID of you. Just my ID will be visible in the beginning (you can add the ID later if you feel confident enough about that sponge I identified).
Yes. I think this is a great idea.
4 Likes
Everyone selects the license they want to use, so far as I know the default is a creative commons license. I wouldn’t dream of using anything else myself.
That would be perfect, that is how it should work.
Imagine the fun waiting ro be had going back through all the existing photographs 
1 Like
My own images are not copyrighted, they are under CC.
Do you copyright your observations? Personally I don’t think its worth it.
See some of the previous threads for discussion of this question (and why it isn’t going to happen – at least not in a form that anyone has proposed so far):
https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/revisiting-duplication-of-another-users-observation/56844
https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/duplicate-observation-of-another-user/6292
https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/add-a-request-duplication-button/52215/8
There might potentially be other ways to “salvage” the additional data connected with other organisms in observations (for example, creating a more robust, easily searchable version of observation fields with a community review process for “additional associated organisms” that would be linked to an observation but not separate observations themselves), but duplicating observations of another user is something a lot of us would be unhappy about.
4 Likes
To my mind it wouldn’t be duplicating the observation, as something in frame but not documented has not really been observed. Rather it would be using a photo and associated metadata to make a new observation. If such an observation were made from a CC licensed image and any required attributions made then maybe it wouldn’t break any rules (I don’t know).
1 Like
If the process could be made into a ‘suggestion request’ that would require original owner permission through a simple pop-up form from someone else, and they would retain all rights of the result refinement (crop, editing etc), or refuse the request.
This could be an interesting and potentily valuable function to add. Maybe when the original poster receives a request they also can choose to refuse it AND all future requests if they are totally against this, and the option for anyone to make such a request gets removed from the observation.
One of the problems I routinely see is the posting of uncropped images taken on a high rez camera where the downsizing of the posted image by the system kills the chances of even the main subject getting an ID.
Likewise with shots that are too dark, too bright, or too noisy. If there was a way for the original poster to temporarily grant ‘tinkering rights’ to a copy of the original image file with another user who knows how to extract a decent image, my guess is that many tech-challenged users would at least be willing to give that a try.
1 Like
This case seems pretty simple. The OP is talking about duplicating and cropping someone else’s observation. The primary purpose of iNat it to encourage first-hand interaction with nature. The OPs case is not much different from duplicating and posting any random image of nature from the internet, except that the metadata is “available”. Just…no.
3 Likes
Creating a new, independent observation based on an existing one is essentially duplicating that observation. Please read the threads I linked for more discussion about the sorts of concerns that people have about this (questions about rights to observations and the idea of an observation representing one’s personal interaction with nature are just a few of the potential issues).
1 Like
On a few occasions I discovered CC pics of mine in faulty context. I didn’t like that, so I switched my license to C. If you want to use my pics, no problem, a short pm will suffice, so you can tell me aforehand what content you intend to use my pic for.
But I think the copyright discussion is somewhat idle for this specific topic since simply adding an ((observation))* to another persons pic is what we are doing anyway. (And if you don’t want others to find anything in you pic (why??), I am sure it is easy to implement an opting-out feature.)
*EDIT: I meant identification. Sorry for my brain bug.
1 Like
Please don’t do this, regardless of license. iNat is for posting your own encounters with organisms.
Personally I use a text expander to add a comment that asks the person to duplicate the obseration to make one for another organism, with instructions for how to do it. Here’s my generic one for making an observation for a prey item:
Nice! You can duplicate this observation to make one for the prey. Here’s a tutorial for duplicating an existing observation: https://www.inaturalist.org/pages/video+tutorials#duplicate
And you can actually duplicate observations before uploading them on the web: https://help.inaturalist.org/en/support/solutions/articles/151000170790-duplicating-an-observation-on-the-inaturalist-website-video-tutorial
4 Likes
Can you say what you mean by this please? Who is doing it? I’ve never noticed.
No, there is absolutely no need to touch the other guys pic at all when adding an ID to it. No matter wether you add the ID to the object in question or to another background object. Of course it is neccessary that the posted pic is good enough in qualitiy to ensure an ID.
And getting people to encounter nature is a very good primary goal. But it is by no means to only goal on iNat. There are quite a few sick/ old people with tremendous knowledge on iNat, I daresay they spent a lot of time of their lives outdoors. Now they cannot do that any more, so this primary goal you mention is of no interest to those prechious users, isn’t it?
In general, I’d like to see people who contribute to any discussion to go more into the fine details of a proposal before they … “Just … no.” … ;)
1 Like
I don’t get what you don’t get about it. ;)
You post an observation, I add an ID. It is all what iNat is about.
So, posting a second ID to your observation for a background organism doesn’t violate anything, since posting the first ID didn’t, either.
EDIT. Now I get it: I wrote “observation”, I meant “identification”. Sorry!
Please look again at what is being proposed in the original post:
And if this is the case:
Then surely you do not think that for the proposal at hand
Because the proposal is not to add a mechanism to allow IDs for an additional organism to be associated with the original observation, but to create a new observation for the additional organism in the photo; if you are creating a new observation with someone else’s picture and modifying that picture, how is copyright not relevant?
1 Like
There has been more than one variant of the idea. In my variant the pic is never touched at all, no change, no crop, nothing. Just an additional ID added to an existing observation/photo.
This then should create an observation-like entry on iNat for this new ID.
But the rights remain untouched = the “new observation” is still with the observer, the pic, everything! The only thing that would have effectively happened is that someone IDed something in his pic. Still the whole thing remains his observation. Of course! It didn’t even occur to me that someone would then want to lay claim to this pic, just because he IDed something in it. That would be absurd, I totally agree.
I am confused since people seem to think that this procedure would create something “new” that should be copyrighted separately? While I think it would still fall under the copyright of the original uploader. That is why for this specific mechanism of adding an ID to a background organism I only see ups, but no downs so far (especially if users should be able to opt out of “additional IDs”, as they may opt out of community ID already).
So, please help me out: what am I overlooking copyright-wise?
1 Like