It must be Spring, or that time of year to discuss this topic again.
The overlapping roles of the Chatline, the COG database and Birdline/Eremaea
(web-based bird reporting system) must inevitably lead to calls for
rationalisation of them (even if we disregard the twitch-line, Birds of
Canberra Gardens and the BA and other databases that are either for
different purposes or outside our control). I know that if I report
something interesting I want to do it only once, not twice or more, and I
assume others might feel the same.
For reporting interesting bird sightings:
- the Chatline is immediate and it is a push system so you don't have to go
to a website to view the latest, it appears before you as email in semi-real
time. It is informal and therefore easier and perhaps more inviting to use
and is viewed by the widest regular audience. As a means of notification
and education re local bird happenings it is (or could be) brilliant, but as
a bird database it is almost useless because it only contains a few highly
selected sightings.
- the COG database is slow to enter and difficult for normal people to
retrieve data from. It is the most formal and complete repository, but is
accessed for information (such as the monthly reporting rate of Leaden
Flycatchers) by very few members. It does contain reasonably complete data
because many of the inputs are exhaustive bird lists rather than incidental
reports of interesting birds, but the information is difficult to retrieve
for most members and it certainly is not a means of learning what's hot in
the Canberra area. It also contains much less data than it would if
notification of sightings, data entry and data access were easier.
- the Eremea database / Birdline system seems to be half way on all things
but the best compromise for many purposes if only one system were to be
allowed. It is not immediate and you have to deliberately access it to know
that same day that a rare bird was seen at wherever since a) there's a delay
before your entered info is posted to the database, and b) it is not an
email push system, other than the weekly summaries (it might have newsfeeds
but many people don't use them). As a database it suffers from the fact that
most people only enter interesting sightings, not complete lists, so it can
never be considered a true reflection of abundance or occurrence, and there
are no standardised survey parameters.
A personal view
I believe the whole business is unnecessarily inefficient to the point that
it limits my participation and I know others who think the same. Wouldn't
it be sensible to have a COG-type database that has the entry and access
ease of Eremaea? Then I could easily come home from the sewerage ponds and
quickly enter everything I saw to a single point, knowing that:
- my sightings accurately add to the sum of local bird knowledge in a
formalised place and in a formalised way.
- they will be passed on to the BA database and become part of the national
statistics.
- if I wonder when a musk duck sighting there is interesting, or when one
was last seen at the sewerage ponds or what their seasonal distribution is
or if there were any breeding records, I could interrogate the database
myself without having to make a request to a possibly busy or absent person.
The database would be much more useful to many more people, one thing that
COG should be about.
- if we wanted to, we could have a means of identifying 'notifiable'
sightings that would be automatically be passed to a rejuvenated Chatline.
That is, when I entered my data and if I'd found out that musk ducks were
actually interesting at that location by interrogating the database, I would
click on a box which says "send this to the Chatline" and a standardised
message would appear on the Chatline.
- the number of records would be far greater than we currently get to either
of the current local databases because it would be easier to do and does not
require duplicated entry. This would significantly increase the usefulness
and integrity of the data available.
To raise the efficiency further, we could make an interface available so
that I can initiate the entry to this on-line database just by pushing a
button after entering into my own personal bird list, the one I keep on my
own computer. Alistair likes to keep his personal records on Birdline, but
I have recently acquired a fantastic bird database that is easy to use and
provides many useful tabulations and records and holds and keeps track of
the photos I take, and I prefer to have it with me rather than in the cloud.
A combination of local database of your own information that can
automatically send data to the new COG database would seem to have the best
of all worlds and still allow people to keep their own records on Birdline
alone if they wanted.
Under this proposal, I'd enter my sightings only once, ever, on the best
and fastest user interface available, and I would know that the info was
safely recorded in my own database, also in the COG=Eremaea=local database,
and in the BA Australia-wide database. At the same time any interesting
sighting would be communicated to the Chatline readership quickly without
writing a separate post. I could make use of the data-mining capabilities
of my own software and also any functionality built into the new
COG=Eremaea=local database or the BA database.
There is nothing stopping this happening and I believe it is the single most
useful thing COG could do in the near term. I don't know about the politics
or technicalities of the Birdline/Eremaea system, but it would seem to offer
a good starting point for such a system. Alternatively a re-vamped COG
database might be more feasible since COG owns and runs it, and it could be
arranged to provide everything suggested above, including, if necessary,
passing info to an unchanged Birdline/Eremaea.
Then we could leave the Chatline to be a more open, less restrictive line of
communication than it is now, where members themselves continue to determine
what they read and what they post by common sense and good manners, as on
other forums. At the same time it can continue to be an excellent way to
spread the word about today's interesting sightings.
Having to enter sighting info two or three times will always mean less
information will be filed in the first place so much potential data is lost,
and the information that is filed will be spread over different locations.
This makes it harder for Jack or anyone to assess what's going on bird-wise,
a lot harder than it needs to be. Time to rationalise...
- make data entry much easier
- make data access easier
- make notification of interesting sightings easier and more certain
- greatly increase the data stored
- share data automatically between databases
- and in the process give the Chatline a chance to breath.
Just my 2c,
Julian Robinson
-----Original Message-----
From: Geoffrey Dabb
Sent: 09 November 2011 10:49
To:
Subject: FW: Chatline and Birdline
This exchange does raise the relationship between the two services. No
clear explanation has been given of this, so I shall offer my own.
Some years ago there was an exchange about the purpose of the chatline
(properly, the COG email announcement and discussion list). It had begun as
a digital extension of a weekly telephone tape that COG members used to
report rarities and other interesting or unusual observations. Initially
the chatline served that purpose well. However gradually the content came
to consist of only a small proportion of the interesting and unusual.
Suggestions by some participants, including myself, that the chatline be
used to build up information in some kind of cumulative (or better, linear)
fashion were not accepted. Those of us of that viewpoint thought that the
excellent archive should be used more by those seeking information, and that
contributors should at least own a field guide that would be used
appropriately. That viewpoint was firmly rejected, and the committee, which
has the right to make the chatline anything it wants, stated that the
chatline was just a chatline, open to any kind of contribution on local
birds, provided basic conditions of politeness and size of message were
respected.
So invited, I must say that I as much as anyone else have been quite
self-indulgent in my own contributions. Many of the contributions offered
have been of little or no interest to me, but I have no right to expect them
to be. Conversely, I have not felt constrained by the thought that my own
contributions might be of little or no interest to most, or indeed any, of
the readership. That is our chatline, take it or leave it. The options
remain to unsubscribe, or to delete without reading some or most messages -
or not to take the messages at all but simply to dip into the archive from
time to time, either generally or selectively.
Now, I know that Alastair had for some time thought that something better
could be done from a structured viewpoint. He will be able to tell you the
story of the splendid Eremaea service - and its advantages in providing
all kinds of information, including recent interesting and unusual
observations. For basic information about it, just bring up one of
Alastair's messages about this from the chatline archive.
I expect that the separate role and function of the two services will become
clearer over time. Eremaea as a facility for sharing interesting and
unusual observations, and the chatline for other stuff. For myself, being a
retired person with plenty of time, I am happy to use both. However, if you
want to be sure of keeping up with anything recent on the local scene you
should certainly subscribe to or regularly consult Eremaea.
Thanks to Alastair and Frank for their work on this innovation.
And of course thanks to David for maintaining our chatline over such a long
period, while pursuing his busy professional career..
-----Original Message-----
From: David McDonald
Sent: Tuesday, 8 November 2011 11:11 PM
To:
Subject: Apology: Re: Fwd: [canberrabirds] Fwd: Birdline ACT
Weekly Update
Hello to all 260 CanberraBirds subscribers. I am sorry you received three or
four copies of my email in which I forwarded last week's Birdline ACT weekly
summary. I thought it might be of interest to list subscribers who are not
on Birdline ACT to receive this each week.
But ... I have now learned how our email server handles (or does not handle
well) forwarded email loops. I trust it won't happen again.
Thanks to those of you who alerted me to the repeated postings.
Regards - David
--
David McDonald
Canberra Ornithologists Group email lists manager
1004 Norton Road, Wamboin, NSW 2620, Australia
Tel: (02) 6238 3706
Fax: (02) 9475 4274
Mobile: 0416 231 890
E-mail:
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