Hi - I chose the words “find ways to talk about the philosophy that is more welcoming” intentionally. There are dedicated, generous specialists who clearly feel welcome here. As discussed on this thread, there are others who have reservations.
In regard to the particular expert who closed their account, I was so sad to see that knowledge that they had already shared - specialist ids - go missing, and this does have an impact on the wider community. But I see that there is a whole thread on this: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/dealing-with-account-deletion/93
I’m thinking about preparing some unofficial materials to promote taxon experts’ engagement with the site, thinking about people who are very focused on a particular group (e.g. for Red Listing). Including tips for when and how iNat data can be useful, and for getting involved with id, with links to the growing collection of tutorials… Maybe a workflow for finding observations that could be your focal species starting with verifying any at RG and working outwards. There is lots of good stuff to build on, and I think there’s a niche. But perhaps this too belongs in a different thread!