[Taxacom] Is it possible to create easy-to-use, accurate and rapid keys for species identifiation?

Mon Aug 31 19:56:00 CDT 2009

Here is a rather nice locally produced Lucid key which uses distribution as a key character (nicely illustrated too):

http://www.landcareresearch.co.nz/research/biocons/mollusc/Allodiscus_key/Allodiscus_key.html

________________________________________
From: Jim Croft [jim.croft at gmail.com]
Sent: Tuesday, 1 September 2009 12:35 p.m.
To: Robin Leech
Cc: Stephen Thorpe; Dean Pentcheff; Taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu; DELTA-L
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Is it possible to create easy-to-use, accurate and       rapid keys for species identifiation?

Robin, Dean, Stephen and all

I went through this patent spec as well and I was hard pressed to find
justifying innovation.  The claim was very poorly presented in that it
was a rambling essay mixing historical background (prior art) and a
particular implementation of existing technologies.

In fact, there is so much prior art and existing practice claimed as
part of the application I am surprised it got up at all.

DELTA and Lucid (and others) have been using spatial occurrence for
decades to subset taxa, images and diagrams are routinely used to
filter remaining taxa and numerous online keys have used in various
internet applications, including portable devices with 3G modems, etc.
 Handheld GPS-enabled devices are routinely used to insert and
transmit geolocation in biodiversity documentation and analysis.  The
layered architecture described does not seem to be fundamentally
different to what already takes place, and the client-server backend
database model is commonplace in this arena. Pattern recognition is
nothing new, although it still has a long way to go to be ubiquitously
useful in taxonomy.  Uploading images to be managed on the server is
widespread these days.

Having said that, the NatureGate website really is very elegant
visually, and some of the photography really is magnificent.  But from
what I could see, there is just not all that much (if anything) that
is new.

jim

On Tue, Sep 1, 2009 at 9:49 AM, Robin Leech<releech at telus.net> wrote:
> Nothing new to having geographical locations in a key.
> Couplet 1 reads:
> 1a.  California north to southern Oregon........................2
> 1b.  British Columbia south to northern Washington......4
>
> Usually, however, for spiders, there may be anatomical features given first,
> then
> the geographic distribution is given for back up or confirmation.
>
> I believe that if someone made a key to the pigeon family, that the dodo
> would have had an exclusive geographic location.
>
> Robin
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Stephen Thorpe" <s.thorpe at auckland.ac.nz>
> To: "Dean Pentcheff" <pentcheff at gmail.com>; <Taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu>
> Sent: Monday, August 31, 2009 5:34 PM
> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Is it possible to create easy-to-use, accurate and
> rapid keys for species identifiation?
>
>
> I'm darn sure that keys have been using geographical location for as long as
> there have been keys! I doub't if anyone even thought to patent the idea!
> But then, nobody has probably thought to patent the wheel either. Bye for
> now (I'm just off down to the local patent office!!!) ...
>
> ________________________________________
> From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
> [taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Dean Pentcheff
> [pentcheff at gmail.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, 1 September 2009 11:23 a.m.
> To: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Is it possible to create easy-to-use,    accurate and
> rapid keys for species identifiation?
>
> I am fascinated by this posting.
>
> The claim appears to be that using geographic location to aid
> identification in an interactive key (if used on a mobile station) is
> now patented.
>
> Does anyone know what the implications of this claim are? I don't know
> enough about the EU intellectual property regime to even begin to
> evaluate what this means.
>
> If, in fact, EU patent regimes consider using an organism's range to
> help identify a specimen as sufficiently non-obvious that the idea
> deserves patent protection, I'm appalled.
>
> -Dean
> --
> Dean Pentcheff
> pentcheff at gmail.com
>
> 2009/8/31 Mauri Åhlberg <mauri.ahlberg at helsinki.fi>:
>> I read with great interest Steve Marshall's and John Grehan's messages
>> about difficulties of using keys, even interactive keys.
>>
>> NatureGate Online service for species identification is designed to be
>> easy-to-use, accurate and rapid. It is based on patented system and
>> method for object idenfification (Lehmuskallio, E. & Lehmuskallio, J.
>> 2008, http://www.wipo.int/pctdb/en/wo.jsp?IA=FI2008000039 )
>>
>> NatureGate is looking for partners to expand this system to new
>> organisn species and new regions: http://www.naturegate.net
>>
>> * IUCN: http://www.iucn.org/about/union/commissions/cec/?2614/
>>  * The Finnish Institute of Environment (SYKE), and Ministry of
>> Environment:
>>       http://www.ymparisto.fi/default.asp?contentid=298951&lan=EN
>> * Biodiversity Information Standards (TDWG):
>>
>> http://www.tdwg.org/biodiv-projects/projects-database/view-project/1550/
>>
>> http://www.tdwg.org/biodiv-networks/networks-database/view-project/56/
>> •       Poster at the e-Biosphere 09 conference, June 1 – 3, 2009, London,
>> UK. In the category: New Tools, Services and Standards for Data
>> Management and Access, http://www.e-biosphere09.org/posters/D1.pdf
>>
>> Mauri Åhlberg (in English: Ahlberg) FLS
>> Professor of Biology and Sustainability Education
>> http://www.helsinki.fi/people/mauri.ahlberg
>> http://www.naturegate.net
>>
>>
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