I just checked for Holland for observations and only found 15 i know inreal life but i know several with accounts and no observations or with only identifications.But that is less than i expected.
And one, who withtracted his id’s , but that is documented.
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I actually carpool with two iNatters – one very active, one a more casual user. I work with another one. And I’m also married to one and related to still another one. I know they all are real. Or are they? ;-)
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I would encourage everyone to remember that nobody is obliged to share their traumas or secrets to be considered and treated as a real person. Behind every keyboard, every username except for bots of course is a person who brings their own strengths and frailties and humor and history. Nobody should feel they have to prove their existence to be considered real; that is how people end up feeling taken advantage of.
When someone unexpectedly disappears, be it to death or disinterest or whatever, the feeling of absence is real because the person is real, even if that person did not meet everyone or anyone in person.
Nobody should share more information than they feel comfortable sharing nor develop relationships more than they feel comfortable, nor should anybody decide the threshold for anyone else.
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Fair, but there is lots of overlap. Like, we follow each other on Mastodon, and interact here as we are both active on forum & a bit on iNat proper even. I’m pretty dang sure you are a Real Person!
Then there’s folk like who I initially met on iNat looking at stereum sp in NA, have emailed back and forth even about topics not iNat or nature related, and seen on zoon for presentation for AMS. Never met, but damn sure real there too. Or what about a published author of mushroom ID books, who I missed meeting since I didn’t go to the AMS annual event but folk I do know in person know them in person. A lot of people fall into this type category for me as well. I would consider them just as real as someone I met in person even though our interaction has never been in person (yet, but actually likely to be at some future point).
All of these types I would consider real without hesitation.
I guess my default is “you’re real until you prove otherwise” :)
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Perhaps some are just putting another mask on.
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Agreed. This thread lost sight of its purpose real fast. Not to say that problem resolution isn’t welcome on the iNat forum, but I was looking forward to a casual conversation, as opposed to a discussion of the legal implications of an iNat user deleting their account and its associated data.
Edit: Looks like the thread is back on track
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And this link belongs on this thread. A kind, helpful, thoughtful man who has left a gap on iNat.
https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/in-memoriam-ian-toal-mamestraconfigurata/34998
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Weeell, the thread creator may feel otherwise, but I don’t actually see the practical discussions as being inherently unrelated to the emotional aspects.
Part of the particular impact that the disappearance of a user has is connected with the way iNat handles deletion of accounts. A user disappearing along with all the thousands of instances in which they have touched and interacted with other people’s observations has very different repercussions than if they and their user name simply become inactive while their contributions remain.
Mourning is a very different experience when one isn’t sure what happened in the first place. There is no official announcement as there often is after the death of a user, nor is there any way to remember them through their legacy, because this has been erased. It is disturbing and there isn’t a good way to find closure.
And on top of that, users of the website suddenly find themselves dealing with a real, tangible gap in the form of thousands of IDs and comments lost. For those who are affected by this, it has an emotional impact as well. (IDers in certain taxa suddenly grappling with their “needs ID” pile exploding overnight; observers trying to reconstruct missing information about their observations.)
So one emotional response is also frustration, and the urge to prevent this from happening again. An attempt to take back control where we feel helpless, if you will. The degree of uncertainty and chaos that accompanies the departure of a user isn’t inevitable. And this leads us to the plea to find another way to handle account deletion, and to practical reflections on what this would need to look like.
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I do not understand. iNaturalist should be like any institution where once deceased or chose to leave on there own, I believe the entries should remain with iNaturalist. I’m no scientist but citizen science 
has wholistic value. But if active I think observers have the right to manage observation as they see fit. Bodies of works are impressive and fun to see grow. When I die, I’m gonna make this clear, please keep my observation.
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Researchers regularly cite Internet resources in publications these days. And Internet URLs frequently change or disappear. Whether for iNat data or anything else, to me it is only prudent and best-practice for researchers to download and preserve the resources that they cite at time of access. And if copyright permissions allow, to post those resources in another publicly accessible place (like one’s researchgate pages for example) to support open scientific repeatability and falsifiability.
is definitely one good and convenient way to do this. Until DOI references have a track record of durability comparable to that of preserved specimens and paper libraries, though, I would even want to create hedges against their possible loss too.
All this by way of saying, I don’t think the ability to delete one’s iNat account needs to be a serious hindrance to the use of iNat data for research, if normal research precautions are taken.
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Upon further reflection, I think I want to add concern and alarm to my list of emotional responses, since I think this is what I am struggling with the most.
Concern about the unexpected and unexplained departure of valued community members. Worrying what motivated this action.
Alarm at the sudden disappearance of thousands of pieces from the collection of data that makes up the heart of the website. With no way to even determine what was lost, except one’s own recollection that something was there. And the realization that this can happen again at any time with anything on the website.
I’m well aware of the impermanence of the internet, but this has an unnerving quality I haven’t experienced before, perhaps because of the sense that we are participating in a collective endeavor – one that now seems far more fragile and instable than imagined.
And there is concern also as a result of the uncertainty this produces, and the fact that we have been given no indication about whether this status quo of account deletion is going to change anytime soon – or at all – or whether it is even felt to be a matter of urgency and priority.
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Yes, same here - the two are linked. I’m pretty shy about starting topics on the forum that aren’t about technical aspects, but one of the reasons to start a conversation on a more complex or nuanced topic is to see where the discussion will go. A lot of excellent concerns have been raised here, in addition to the sharing of emotional responses to the topic.
Regarding the “real people” side of the conversation, I found a whopping 38 people in my “following” list whom I know in real life; admittedly, I did personally badger a couple of them into joining iNat, but I suppose that still counts!
It is often surprising (and sometimes very disappointing) when you meet someone in person and then check out their social media and find out who they (evidently) really are. I try to be WYSIWYG as much as possible, but I often feel I express myself better online (and swear less often).
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This is an important query, I also agree that the pictures / sound posted are only one part of the “observation” and identifications by “others” add information and value that is essential to that observation.
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Yes,
My heart is sinking a bit - i know many people are invested in this process and now starting to think of all the (so) many people we depend on to raise the quality of our information.
Good point - may be needs to be factored into future system upgrades. However it still will “never” factor in multiple exits from inat.
Maybe so. As you say, lots of internet sources are referenced in papers nowadays and those are prone to disappearing or being moved to other addresses. I have not tried downloading data from iNat or GBIF. However, it strikes me that if someone can erase their information deposited on iNat, and GBIF follows in doing the same, those data are not really available for use anymore. Maybe I have a copy of that person’s data but it’s gone from public access and I might not have the right to use it if the creator has decided to make it disappear. Quite different from information sources archived and publicly accessible in a research museum or in a published work.
Even if online museum databases like ARCTOS or VertNet were to vanish tomorrow, the specimens on which that database was created still exist … unless physically destroyed, of course. And if the specimens were destroyed, but the institutional databases still exist, the data are still there. Similarly, published works are replicated in many places so that information can persist even after catastrophic loss at one or more locations. I just don’t see the same resiliency in iNat data.
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This is why I recommended to
GBIF only ingests iNat observations with compatible CC licenses, so the data downloaded for use can be reposted in a repository (choose your favorite) appropriately, even if the original observer or IDer deletes their content on iNat itself. This is really similar to a dataset pulled from VertNet, etc. (Side note: there are also instances of institutions/NHCs removing their data from portals as well, which isn’t quite analogous to iNat account deletion as those specimens still exist, though the portal removal means that datasets are not replicable).
Is this solution as good as an NHC with physical specimens whose digital data is posted in a portal? - no. But I’d argue it’s probably more useful overall than an NHC with physical specimens whose data are inaccessible digitally. Those physical specimens may be high quality, but the inaccessibility makes them much less valuable overall.
NB: My argument/comparison above really only applies to the types of data that are generally available for iNat observations (date, location, etc.). Physical specimens obviously have types of data that can be associated with them (morphology, stomach contents, age, isotopes, DNA, etc.) which increase their value.
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I understand that the right to privacy protection and the right to “be forgotten” are different concepts. But I am a little concerned that they both may limit or alter my explicit and consciously expressed will regarding the content I have created. “By default” it seemed to me that this agreement (under the CC license) could only be invalidated whether it was improper or not voluntarily acted upon by one of the parties, as with any other transaction.
Moreover – there were times in my life when I regretted publishing my content under a free license. That said, I knew it was the same as being wrong about the price when selling property. Whether I like it or not, once a deal is closed, it can’t be undone.
So, it somewhat surprised me that when a user’s account is deleted, all the content posted under the terms of its free use, confirmed by the explicit will of the user, “vanish” as well. I certainly wouldn’t want that to happen to my content. So, it would seem most appropriate to me to have a “default” option - "forget me, but I confirm my decision to freely use my content”. It seems to me that even if a user really wants to change the terms of use of their content – it should be expressed explicitly for their removal.
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ND and HoH here and totally agree…I can think through things better in text. I’m not distracted by trying to figure out a) what is being spoken (the new added step, with hearing loss!) and b) process it timely (which takes longer now too - sound + integrate lip reading and THEN have to process through my “NT communication” mental algorithms) and c) formulate a reply
The exception would be in naturalist or other special interest situations - that makes it easier as I a) know the topic which helps speed up processing a lot and b) i have lots of info to dump :D
Oh the other thing is too…one of the side effects from long term lyme is loss of nouns. I can see the word (like a name - proper nouns are worst, and this is actually a documented issue) in my head…but I can’t…focus it enough to say it. In text, I can quick google it. I sometimes feel very ‘dumb’ when speaking in person due to this.
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I don’t have as much problem as you do, @sunguramy , but I do find I’m must more fluent, coherent, clear in writing than talking.
As to how many iNatters I know “in real life,” well, not counting the two dozen students I required to post on iNaturalist, maybe 20, partly because most of the workers in the herbarium are on iNaturalist and partly because I recruit people when I can.
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