I came across a strange case of a duplicate copy of one of my observations today. It was an observation I made and uploaded about 3 months ago, and a new duplicate observation appeared today. I noticed the observation because new identifications appeared in my notifications today. Clearly the observation is visible to others, because 2 people added IDs. I did not upload any observations today. I did not look at the original observation today, or open any view of my observations where it would be on the screen at all (until after I saw the notifications). I have logged into the iNaturalist website. I was working on identifications for other users today, but not during the time the duplicate appeared. I was active in the identify window about 40 minutes before the time stamp of the new duplicate, and again about 90 minutes after.
The new duplicate is not an exact copy, the photos are in a different order, but all the photos from the original observation are used. The date and time stamp are the same, but the location information is a little off. Before I delete the duplicate, I wanted to check and see if anyone had an explanation for what may cause this.
You say you are seeing this from the website/computer, but can you confirm whether the original observation was also uploaded via the website, or from the app?
When I’ve had similar things happen in the past, the issues have been with observations uploaded from that app. Glitches sometimes occur when the app tries to sync its data on an unstable and slow connection. I must say, it doesn’t seem to happen as much nowadays as it used to.
it makes more sense once you realise that you haven’t used the iNat Android app since 30th of August 2024 and have been uploading everything through the web since except for shortly using it on the 26th of March to upload the snake, which failed. If I were you, I’d check your android app because you may have a couple more observations that never made it out.
If ‘the system’ is effectively generating the duplicates - we need a better solution. We need iNat to recognise - you have already uploaded this obs. I often see duplicated obs, and perhaps this thread explains why and how.
