Gavatron's dashboard

So, in response to Adam's request for a life list, I suggested a ranking system of birders. I don't like the strict competitive nature that ranking would introduce, but I do like the idea of how moving up the ranks could be a fun way to interact with the sight and add impetus to bird and report my sightings.

I saw recently that the guys that started dodgeball.com started foursquare (http://playfoursquare.com/) where they've added "achievements" turning meeting up with friends into a game. What about implementing something like that in chirptracker?

Report your first woodpecker? Earn your "Picidae" badge and get 10 points. Report 50 species in 12 hours? Earn your "big day" badge and get 25 points. Users could then be ranked on achievement points rather than just strict sightings.

From my own birding research, some birders focus too much on "collecting" bird sightings and often ignore the usual and the common. So you could have some neat achievements that could counter that tendency, like the "Urban Birds" badge, that you get when you report, say, a European Starling, a Rock Pigeon & a House Sparrow in one 3 hour period.

Or, you could offer limited-time badges, like the "spring migration 2008" badge with different points for the number of migratory species you see.

I could go on... :)

I would like to be able to differentiate between seeing a bird and hearing a bird when I report. Perhaps adding the ability to H "species" and S "species."

Also, given the ability to add *exact* GPS coordinates (especially with the upcoming iPhone app), when you see a report that someone heard a bird vs. seeing one, you know that the birds might not be in such a geographically exact location. IMHO it adds to the richness of the sightings (although the term sightings looses its specificity) people are reporting.

I also don't see this implemented by other bird sighting websites, so this could be a nice way to initially differentiate Chiptracker.