Observations (data) are the unit of iNaturalist. If the community does not value the basic unit, it will become meaningless. That the data can be used by other people than the observer can be considered a byproduct, but should not be dismissed as a byproduct.
To loop back to the original questions,
Only suspending a user will remove their ability to identify. The site curators and staff make the decision whether a user should be suspended.
No.
- Add a disagreeing ID, if relevant
- Mark it as needing further community ID, if relevant
- Directly, politely address it with the user. Privately (message) is good, though sometimes publicly (comment) works better for certain people
- Contact help@inaturalist.org if the user is not engaging in a dialogue
Since the questions have been answered and the rest of this has been discussed at length here and in other topics, I’m going to close this topic for now. We welcome folks to continue the related discussions, such as the value and pitfalls of crowdsourced data, gamification, or the mission of iNaturalist, in separate topics, or propose relevant feature requests, but only after reading through the existing material. If you find yourself in a quick, heated back-and-forth, please consider stepping away or moving the discussion to private messages. Thanks!
See related topics:
- Identification Etiquette on iNaturalist - Wiki
- Agreeing with experts and “research grade”
- Issue with users automatically agreeing to an identification
- Changing the System to Limit the Ability to Confer Research Grade Status
- Feature request: Remove “Agree” button on Identify thumbnails in certain cases