really why does iNat put two powers that need separate qualities kept as one tag? why put two unrelated tool in one person’s hand who may not use one or even in cases misuse it? just asking.

There is an open request to split taxonomy queries from social media moderation.

I suspect it is more about the tremendous workload and the scarcity of those both willing and with the time to volunteer and capable of professionalism. They may neither need nor want both sets of tools but I suspect they are given both and guidance for both in the event they might need them, in th…

Probably just the same tendency toward conflation that still puts absurdly different categories such as cultivated plants, records missing information, accidental photo grouping, and outright data fraud under the lumpen header of ‘Casual Grade’.

A comment in another thread suggested there may be a staff position being created in these areas.

I think it’s a case where people know where they stand when they get curator status. If you’re a gastropod expert who gets curator status because you want to curate snail taxonomy, sure you could go and moderate comment threads if you wanted to… but you probably won’t. It’s easier to have one settin…

I suspect the reason is mostly something like “this is how the iNat curator role was created when iNat was quite small”. When iNat was smaller, there weren’t as many curators, content moderation was a smaller part of a curator’s “job” (there was a lot of basic taxonomic curation at the beginning, fe…

Why? The OP in the discussion you linked to (from 2019) talks about curators who were not doing any curating for a long time. The OP in this thread is only concerned about the potential of curators with two categories of power to abuse that power. But as others have replied, curators, by and larg…

? Why is in that thread. The initial request by bouteloa. And 2 of her requests were activated in January 2021. Then got stuck at the third step. [image] Remove all curators and start from scratch :radio_button: Send all users granted curatorship prior to January 2021 a message requesting they g…

[image] paul_dennehy: If you’re a gastropod expert who gets curator status because you want to curate snail taxonomy, sure you could go and moderate comment threads if you wanted to… but you probably won’t. I would argue that if you can’t be trusted to do only the part of the work that you’re…

Why are taxonomic curators and moderators under the same category etc.?

General

DianaStuder July 21, 2026, 8:05am 7

Start again ?

https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/remove-all-curators-and-start-from-scratch/140

Topic		Replies	Views
Should site curators be allowed to make another user a curator? Curators question	39	5356	February 1, 2021
Remove all curators and start from scratch Feature Requests web , under-review	72	7644	January 19, 2026
Early 2026 Curators Survey Blog Post Discussion Curators curation	10	309	June 19, 2026
Curators, what do y'all do? General web , question	15	1145	October 12, 2024
Curating taxonomy? Anyone there? Curators	16	1261	July 18, 2025

Why are taxonomic curators and moderators under the same category etc.?

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