It would be nice to have a notification like ”hey, this observation appears to be out of range, please double check the ID” when uploading observations. Perhaps how it could be done would be by - if the species has over 200 RG obs - taking the distance of the nearest RG ob and if it’s more than 1000 miles from the ob being uploaded, then show the message or something like that.
An example of when it would have been nice to have that would be like today I was uploading a batch of 40 or so obs and accidentally put in Pied Stilt instead of Black-necked, a popup like that would help prevent mistakes like these from becoming RG from other users simply clicking ”agree” to every observation.
If such a feature is feasible it would be useful not just for uploads but for making any ID, including on existing obs, and especially when a user is using the CV.
I believe now it will make a mess in many groups for new users, there’re species with a few observations and often the nearest RG is on the other side of the continent.
I think it would only be worth doing for species where there are hundreds of observations, for this reason. Or else be very obtrusive. I think it would be neat to have a little icon or something when I find something that is far from other known observations, it tells me to check my ID but also that I might have found a neat outlying population.
On the other hand it will prevent that making of a mess in many groups, especially for new users, where the reason for their being few observations and the nearest RG is on the other side of the continent is because they dont occur on this side of the continent.
But change the message: instead of
“out of range, please double check the ID” change it to
“first record in this area, please double check the ID”. One could even get more sophisticated:
“The first record for this taxon in 2,500 km, congratulations, but please double check the ID”.
I 100% support such a feature. Computer vision results often lead inexperienced users to pick species that are waaaay out of range. This happens all the time with spiders, where I spend most of my time on iNat.
I think including a suggestion to back off a taxonomic level or two (i.e. to the genus or family level) would be good.
Another reason for out-of-range observations may be that it isn’t wild, e.g. observed in a zoo or botanical garden, and should be marked captive/cultivated. Maybe a note about that could be included in the message.
For what it’s worth, iNat used to have an “out of range!” label many, many years ago. But the range maps that were used, like many range maps, weren’t accurate, which caused that label to be used far too often. Also, if i remember correctly it stayed on your observation and there was nothing you could do about it. I found it more vexing than useful. Ah, those were the days.
We now have a ton of observation data on iNat, which might make something like this more feasible, for taxa on which there are enough observations. As for CV, I think showing more coarse suggestions and limiting suggestions to “seen nearby” would be a good way to prevent these wildly out of range IDs.