Gotta watch ‘em all? Pokémon-style app for birdwatching launches | Birdwatching
A new app has launched that aims to gamify birdwatching by allowing people to collect digital cards when they record sightings of bird species in the UK.
Users Birdex They accumulate points for each bird they see, with less common and rare species yielding the biggest rewards. It is possible to add friends and compete in bird observations. The app allows bird watchers to talk online, but its use of AI-generated artwork has sparked backlash among some.
“Birds are amazing,” said Harry Scott, 24, who works in marketing and is one of the app’s developers. He and a collaborator developed the app as a side project over a six-month period, and he said the idea was to incorporate a reward-based experience into birding to connect young people with nature.
“I think birding and Pokémon share a lot of similarities,” he added. So, doesn’t using a smartphone to collect bird sightings mean that screens are getting in the way of nature? “I think it’s more about using technology as a learning tool,” he said. “Time spent in front of the screen [people are] It is much more positive to have.”
London psychologist Michelle Williams, a Birdex user, said she enjoyed using the app to record garden birds such as robins with her two children, aged seven and eight. “This is an opportunity to help them get outside and be in touch with nature,” he said. “There’s something nice about collecting sets, isn’t there?”
However, some criticized the app’s developers for using artificial intelligence to create depictions of birds. “If the art is AI, it will be removed instantly, sorry” wrote one Reddit user..
Scott said they used AI in various ways during development because they had limited funds, but they plan to hire artists in the future. The app is currently free to use, but some content or features may be paywalled in the future.
To date, Birdex users have counted more than 200,000 bird sightings. The trust’s science communications manager, Viola Ross-Smith, said these records could have a citizen science impact if made available to organizations such as the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO). BTO has its own app called BirdTrack for recording bird sightings.
Ross-Smith said Birdex was “pretty interesting” and that her son, a Pokémon fan, “looked pretty cool.” But he questioned whether encouraging people to seek out vulnerable species such as grouse, a rare, large grouse native to parts of Scotland, could introduce some risks to the birds.
It is illegal to disturb capercaillie during the nesting season, and visitors to the Cairngorms are often warned not to seek them out. Ross-Smith suggested that Birdex might include such warnings.
