just to clarify, the location saved on the observation exists separately from what i’m referring to as the photo metadata.
here’s the location saved on an observation:
here are the coordinates that came from the associated photo’s metadata (EXIF):
notice that the coordinates are different between the observation and the photo record.
(note: the above example observation was discussed in another topic https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/how-can-i-revert-to-the-actual-location-in-photo-metadata/19292/7. that topic is sort of unrelated, but since folks seem to really interested in these kinds of things, some might find something interesting in it.)