Frequently asked questions
Who has access to what I post? Your private information, including your full name and contact details, will be kept confidential at all times. Any posts that you tag as 'public' will be visible on this website, along with your user name. See our Terms of Service for more information.
Is the government involved in Fishtory? No. Fishtory is a collaboration between Rhodes University and WWF South Africa and is entirely independent of any government involvement or funding. Your personal details will not be made available to any government departments or authorities. The data gathered from the fish in the images however will be analysed and presented to decision-making bodies, but will not contain any reference to individuals users.
If I have lots of photos, what are the quick options?
- Upload directly onto the website using only Step 1. This provides us with the basic information we need for analysis. If you use this option, we will fill in Step 2 (species and size estimates) for you.
- Download this form, add the details of each image, and return to us with the photos. We suggest using either online file sharing (for example WeTransfer), email or by posting photocopies (please do not post originals as we can not guarantee their safety) to this address.
- If you have extensive collections of images, please contact us and we may be able to visit you.
What quality does an image need to be? There are no hard and fast rules for image quality. For valid scientific analysis, the species, weight and size information must be verified by a scientist or another expert on fish identification, so we need photos of sufficient resolution and quality to identify the featured fish. We suggest that you submit what you have and we will get in touch if we need more information. Most file type are acceptable: jpeg, jpg, gif, png, tiff.
Remember that Fishtory is your online photo album, so if you have images which do not meet the requirements above, we encourage you to post them anyway. These photos will not be made public or used for analysis, but you can store them with us and access them through your Dashboard, anytime and from anywhere.
What if I am unsure about the details of the image? The minimum information we need for analysis is the general location of the catch featured in the image and the date (ideally an exact date, but the decade works too). When submitting your photo, you will be asked for this information and we have provided options to select if you are not too confident about the details.
How can I support Fishtory? We are currently conducting the pilot phase of the project and in order to continue into the future, new funding sources will be welcomed. If you would like to make a donation to Fishtory, please contact us. Thank you for your support!