I quit my job at #iNaturalist, the product I co-founded. If you'd like me to keep working on natural history software, support me on Patreon: https://patreon.com/kueda. FWIW, I'm building an iNat backup tool and an app for viewing geologic maps.
Or, if you think you'd like to hire me, get in touch!
After almost 18 years, I left iNaturalist, the product and organization I helped create. I left because I don’t believe the current Leadership team is pointing the product in the right direction, and I don’t think they are managing their talented staff in an empathetic or effective way. If you’d like me to continue working on natural history software, support me on Patreon.
Thanks Ken-Ichi. I'm sorry for the challenges you've faced through all this and hope the Patreon-based model works for you (redirecting my iNat-oriented contributions now...).
My own feeling regarding the Google AI debacle has been both that iNaturalist has been seduced into helping the current web-wide degradation of information and evidence and also that Google is paying peanuts to leverage expert naturalist knowledge to develop "AI" tools that will ultimately devour iNaturalist for commercial gain.
I definitely like the idea of a decentralised "iNat". I've thought for a long time that citizen science platforms could all share a common underlying interchangeable model for Observation records and Identification records and leverage a federated information space to allow anyone to use any compliant app to supply identifications to observations in any other app. It would be an opportunity also to think about a common provenance model for documenting externally how each community identification was produced.
But work on what makes most sense to you.
Take care.
@kueda
So on one hand, you say to keep contributing observations and funds, but then right afterwards say that withholding those is a form of power. So I guess, when do we collectively start withholding them?
This whole google AI debacle bums me out. I had just started really getting into iNat, adding over 500 observations from several countries in a short period of time. I haven't deleted my account yet, but I'm not posting anything more. I've currently got several hundred unposted observations from biodiversity surveys in Mexico, including some range infills. I would love to share it.
Any suggestions on organizing strategies for forcing a more democratic governance structure on iNat? Especially for us nobodies? To be honest, this feels like a good learning moment and people who value this sort of data collection should be looking at an alternative decentralized model while data can still be potentially exported to it.
@Mikal take this with a grain of salt because I don't know what I'm talking about and I have no aptitude for this kind of thing, but here's an idea I've thought about for a while:
Throw a big party.
Like, iNat-a-con North America, with workshops on beetle ID and performances by nature-themed bands. Get Pattie Gonia and Steven Rinella to show up. Build organizing muscle in the name of something fun and joyous, and then stay in shape with more events. Keep it independent and user-organized. Then you're definitely organized enough to act at a meaningful scale.
Or, get involved with existing groups. The biggest independent iNat-related group I know of is the iNat Discord: https://discord.com/invite/uskv2yx. In the Bay Area we've also got https://www.bioblitz.club.
And, as discussed, try out alternatives, or think about what you'd want in an ideal alternative.
@kueda I had a good friend in grad school who left “to save his soul.” He read widely, wrote poetry & prose, started a press to publish authors he admired, and published his own works in a vanity press (bc he didn’t want to turn his main press into a vanity press).
In 2017, he uploaded at least 1 iNaturalist observation every day of the year. Then published a book about it: observations, science mentions, poetry, etc.
https://booksrun.com/9781545508404-following-the-earth-around
@kueda Thank you for your work, and for sharing publicly your experience. As someone who's worked for 13 years in the video game industry, I'm sensing a lot of parallels in terms of concentration of decision-making leading to poor decisions and ultimately poor product design.
iNaturalist isn't a bad product yet, but I've noticed a stagnation in feature development and a reorientation of priorities that deeply concerns me.
@kueda If you or anyone reading is or would like to organize iNaturalist users in a collective effort to open up the organization (it's galling to me that the board isn't elected by members) or to develop decentralized alternatives, please contact me.
Getting a community of people together who want to collectively act for change would be powerful.
@kueda Folks, dont overlook the part where he says...
"...I do not advise stopping your use of iNat, and I definitely don’t advise deleting your account. I’m certainly not doing either. I was appalled at the number of people who went nuclear and deleted their accounts during the gen AI debacle.....destroying existing data that can’t be retrieved hurts everyone."
@kueda, Thanks for your role in iNat. It has changed my interaction with nature and resulted in me describing several new species!
Kirk van Gorkom
Ken-ichi
eswillwalker
soaproot
Jon Sullivan
Ms. Que Banh
Donald Hobern
My camera shoots fascists
Polly Kraisus
Mark
Guerric Haché
rsp