I've found a chimpanzee, now what do I do?
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by
jwidness
moderator
Credit to @Quia for writing a large portion of this guide! All these steps are optional, but super helpful for the science team. If it feels a bit overwhelming, the single most helpful thing you can do is just add the tag #chimp to your video!
Go to the "talk" page for the video
The easiest way to do this is to click 'Discuss on Talk' when you finish the classification.
If you've already left that page, you can find the video again in your Profile. More videos load if you scroll down. When you mouse over the video, there will be a little speech bubble icon -- click it to go to the video's Talk page. You'll want to keep this page open!
Add hashtags
Look at the lower left to see what tags are currently on the video and apply any more you think describe the video. Popular ones include #chimp, #adult, #juvenile, #infant, #male, #female, #tool_use, #carrying_young. Please don't add tags if you're only guessing and are not reasonably sure they're correct. If you're not sure, you can just make a comment without a tag.
Find the other clips from your video
The videos are recorded 60 seconds at a time, but broken into 4 fifteen second clips for classification. Try to find the other three clips from your video by changing the URL of the talk page forward and backward (sometimes you'll need to go more than one video forward or back). The time stamp may help you recognize videos from the same set, though it's not always possible to find all four. The numbering goes from 0-9-a-z, so this is a sequence: ACP0003dpy ACP0003dpz ACP0003dq0, etc. Add appropriate hashtags to any other clips from your video.
Check for a previous discussion
While you visit the talk pages for the clips of your video, glance to the right to see if any of them have a discussion thread going already. It will be under the heading "Discussions Mentioning This". If so, you shouldn't start a new one, but feel free to add to the discussion!
Decide if an ID can be made
If there isn't already a discussion thread going, decide if your chimp is visible enough to be identified. This means at a minimum a view of the face, or a unique feature like a missing ear or limb, or a unique coloration, but the more you can see of the chimp, the better. You don't need to be able to ID the chimp yourself, just decide if it's possible for someone to ID it.
If your chimp is not visible enough for an ID, you can stop here and put the video in the chimp spreadsheet, with a note that there are no traits visible. To add a video to the spreadsheet, go to the tab that matches the site for your video and first do a search to check that your video isn't already in the spreadsheet. If it's not, scroll to the bottom of the list, and in the first column (ID), paste the ID of your video(s) -- the ID is 10 characters and starts with 'ACP'. If your video has a good view of your chimp, you can also put it in the spreadsheet, and then continue with the next step.
Try to ID your chimp
On the Talk page of your video, there are two pieces of information underneath the video. The first one is 'Group,' this is the name of the site. On the main Discussion boards under Science there is a separate board for each site. The chimp you found might already have been seen in a different video, so take a look in the pinned "Known and Prospective Chimps" thread and see if you can recognize your chimp! It's perfectly fine if you can't find a match. Some of the chimps will have names, some of them will have temporary IDs like 'QWFemale01'. Make a note of any you think look like your chimp.
Start a new discussion for your chimp video on the Site ID board for your video's site
Make the title as descriptive as possible, including things like the number of chimps, their gender and age if you can tell, and anything exceptional about them like a cut in an ear, or distinct coloration. If you think you found a match to one of the Known/Prospective Chimps, put that in the title too!
In the message, post a link to your video(s). Copy the ID of your videos, making sure to put a space between each ID. They will automatically link to the talk page for your video. For example:
ACP0003dpy ACP0003dpz ACP0003dq0Add any longer description you can think of of the chimp(s) in the video, keeping in mind features that help distinguish individuals. You can also include preview images of the best frames in your video.
To include a still frame from the video, go to the talk page for your video. Underneath the video there are 'Preview' links 0 through 15, one for each second. Choose the one(s) that show off your chimp the best. Click the numbers to open up the full image in another tab, and copy that URL. Above the text box for your discussion, there is a button that looks like a photo (a white square with blue, light green, and dark green stripes). Click on that button and paste in the URL. It should look something like:
For more on posting screencaps, see How to post video screencaps.
Check back later to see what other people have said
To make this easier, you can click on the "Follow" button and you'll be able to find the thread again easily by going to the page for all the threads you are following.
We always welcome your posts, whether you're a new participant, or you've been with us from the start!
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