IMPORTANT: Carnyx question

I vote the second option.

I think that with bad pictures we won't be able to distinguish one chick from another, knowing that the differences between them are small and subtle.

I too am happy to go with the majority

Mike B said:

"However, I feel that those who provide us with such brilliant videos for close scrutiny and analysis should definitely have the final say."

I think that says it all and I would agree and trust their decision.  

Well said Mike, I agree with this

Like Sheila, I find the stop/starts irritating, yet think #2 the lesser evil. But I give the decision up to those who do so much recording/capture that help us understand the events.

No matter what the decision, I still consider it privilege to see in to the birds' lives, and thank you to Carnyx for explaining the problem and giving us a voice.

Limpy has just spoken to Scylla - she will email Peter at Carnyx on Sunday, which means this thread will be open to responses for another two days.  They are hoping to have as many responses as possible so please don't miss an opportunity to have a say - even though neither solution is ideal.

Thank you Clare. This is such a civilized way to handle the problem, I must say.

I'm with Lmac & Mike on this one, that those who follow most closely and record videos for the rest of us to watch, are best placed to make this call with Peter at Carnyx. And I'm happy to trust you!

In doing so, I'm sure you will check with him the question of the degree of frame reduction, and whether this increases freezing or the dropouts people were concerned about - so as to make the best and most informed decision.

Thanks for checking with us all! Much appreciated :)

As can be seen from the replies this issue affects the whole community of "Osprey" watchers which is worldwide !!! This audience is very influential and encourages a LOT of tourism to the highlands of Scotland.

I must agree that the infrastructure needs a massive upgrade and the likes of BT should be prioritising this broadband connection - the immediate result would not be a big increase in profits but the long term effect would be a massive increase.

That all said - I prefer to see the better quality picture and unfortunately miss a few frames.

I'm very conscious of not having given my preference yet, and to be honest I'm very torn so have been sitting on the fence until there are enough "votes" to judge which is the more popular option and people's reasons* for choosing it.

However, today's experience has taken away the argument for Option 1 "continuous but unclear", because it's been buffering very frequently and significantly and we've missed action that's important to us.  The scales are now tipping on the side of Option 2 "gappy but clear".

I wanted to give us a couple more days to see how the current setting performs, and it's not doing well so far.  Pity that Limpy isn't here today.

*CIRRUS's reason must be a powerful one - watching Option 1 is physically and mentally stressful, and emotionally too because we (some of us) do get very upset that we can't see our birds or their activities reasonably clearly - it doesn't have to be HD.  How many are not watching at all because of the poor experience?