Is there a way to blanket obscure all historical observations? And a way to auto obscure all observations so that I don’t have to manually obscure my observations every time I post? TIA!
Certain rare species are already automatically obscured on iNaturalist. The obscuration is applied to all observations of that species in the area (state or country) where it is listed as rare.
openness is in the ethos of iNaturalist. although there’s functionality in the system to obscure sensitive taxa, it’s unlikely that there will ever be any functionality built into the system to allow users to blanket obscure their observations.
it’s possible to do it on your own manually one observation at a time or using the API, but if you’re going to do something like that, i would simply ask you to consider why you’re posting observations in iNaturalist at all, especially considering my reply to your other question: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/concerns-for-protected-species/79126/2.
I believe you answered/resolved a few of my concerns with your other reply. That said, I do like documenting in iNaturalist because I can use it to track my findings, compare species, note changes, get help with IDs, etc. My phone alone doesn’t have a great system for that. I also like being able to provide location data to specific individuals (ideally scientists or other trusted individuals) and not everyone.
If you don’t want to share location then iNaturalist is not for you. Also, what does “TIA” mean? Transient ischemic attack? It’s really rude to not bother to write out the whole phrase.
Thank you in advance …
@drowningcreek if you want IDs, identifiers use the location to make an ID. But it is your choice.
TIA is a commonly used acronym for “thanks in advance.” It’s not rude not to spell out every acronym.
I hope to share location data with scientists and trusted individuals. It is also nice to be able to document my findings so that I can go back to a location or easily compare numbers over time. Most of my observations are on private property or when working with scientists and we do not want poachers.
TIA means “Thank you in advance.” It is an acronym commonly used online and not typically seen as “rude.”
Good point, thank you!
it’s possible to develop relationships with folks who are studying or conserving particular taxa or places, and you can send stuff directly to them. that’s going to make the information available to fewer people, which of course comes with pros and cons, and it’s up to you do decide whether or not it’s better in your particular case(s) to share with more people.
I’m not sure what that means, “historical observations”, do you mean your old(er) observations?
Not sure what the goal would be, but you can use “batch edit” to do that (click on your avatar > “edit observations” > “batch edit” > “select all” (or only observations to be edited) > click on “edit selected” > then on “more fields”… and there you have it, *geoprivacy".