[Taxacom] Filling the world with biodiversity data errors

[Richard Pyle]

Two guys walking through the woods.  A huge bear starts to charge them.  The first guy sits down to put on his running shoes.  The second guy says, "Are you crazy?!? You'll never out-run that bear!" The first guy says, "I don't have to out-run the bear. I just have to out-run YOU."

Moral of the story: You don't need to perfect.  You just need to be better than the alternative.  From where I sit, what PLAZI is doing is far, FAR better than the alternative!  

Keep those running shoes on, Donat!

Aloha,
Rich

Richard L. Pyle, PhD
Senior Curator of Ichthyology | Director of XCoRE
Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum
1525 Bernice Street, Honolulu, HI 96817-2704
Office: (808) 848-4115;  Fax: (808) 847-8252
eMail: deepreef at bishopmuseum.org
BishopMuseum.org
Our Mission: Bishop Museum inspires our community and visitors through the exploration and celebration of the extraordinary history, culture, and environment of Hawaiʻi and the Pacific.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Taxacom <taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu> On Behalf Of
> Stephen Thorpe via Taxacom
> Sent: Thursday, December 3, 2020 5:27 PM
> To: Donat Agosti <agosti at amnh.org>; Taxacom
> <taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu>
> Subject: [Taxacom] Filling the world with biodiversity data errors
> 
> Hi Donat and Taxacom,The attempt to automate data harvesting, without
> human scrutiny, continues to fill the world with biodiversity data errors.
> Specifically, on zenodo, for Zenascus luniger, if you click on 'specimens', you
> get
> trash: http://tb.plazi.org/GgServer/html/03A48794FFF8FFC66F8549E97070F8
> F1
> It is garbage for the following reasons: (1) The species is endemic to N.Z., but
> the 4 specimens recorded are 2 from Iceland and the other 2 unknown, leaving
> Iceland as the only location on the map!(2) Of the 4 specimens, 2 are
> supposedly lectotypes (no, there is no synonymy)!(3) The treatment upon
> which this data is based only mentions 2 specimens (lectotype and
> paralectotype), both from New Zealand.I'm not sure how widespread such
> problems are on zenodo, but there seems to be little reason to think that this
> is a rare case, is there?Cheers, Stephen
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> Nurturing nuance while assaulting ambiguity for about 33 years, 1987-2020.