Photo not on photo of the day....

To whoever is responsible for accepting photo's on Mindat.
Yesterday I posted this photo on Mindat:
[www.mindat.org]
As I notice once again -this is the 3rd time recently that I post a "Kalahari Manganese Fields" mineral on Mindat -that it is not accepted and only shown in "My photo's"
The 2 others before were Olmiite and Orlymannite, both N'Chwaning mine.
I am 100% sure of the ID of the gageite on the photo I posted yesterday as I suspect that is the reason why it is not being shown.
Can I ask who decides to reject it and on what grounds?
I know that gageite is not the easiest mineral to recognise but that can be said about hundreds of other photo's that I encounter here, have they all been analysed?
Anyway:
I have put in a request to delete it as it is of no use on Mindat at all when nobody will ever find it here.
What disappoints me most of all is the fact that I must be one of a very rare breed of collectors who has had hundreds of "difficult" minerals analysed, both EDX and XRD, plus also hundreds of SEM photos taken of extremely small crystals.
Well, so be it, from now on: only photo's of the easy ones so you will have no problem with recognising them........
Pierre Rondelez



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/2012 09:40AM by Pierre Rondelez.

Relax, Pierre! I am sure there is an explanation for this one! If I am correct, either all of your photos get accepted right away, or none at all. Nobody verifies them before they are added, mistakes are reported afterworths.
And I understand your point, but you are not completely correct... I do visit your personal photos from time to tim, because I do not check added photos every day. So I would have seen it after all. I have a number of people from whom I enjoy their pictures, from an aesthetic and scientific point of view. And you are certainly one of them! So keep em coming please!

Greetings from France,

Eddy

It often takes many days for a photo to be approved, it is necessary to wait.

Eric

United Kingdom, Cornwall

Pierre just because you post a photo does not mean it will be a photo of the day ive been here and i have quite a few photos and none have ever been a photo of the day. Don't take it personally, you have to remember there 10's of thousands of photos on mindat and there is only 365 days in a year. So that means that 9635 photos wont be shown.

Personally i think the photo you have linked is a very nice photo and a very nice specimen.


Byron

That is not what Pierre means, Byron. He is talking about the photo's 'new added today', or 'new added yesterday'.

Greetings from France,

Eddy

I've had similar problems that when I upload a photo it sometimes does not appear in "new photos today" section. I've put it down to the fact that Australian time is a day ahead of GMT and the system must be confused... perhaps there should be a section for "new photos tomorrow"

One day, I might even make it into the elite club of those who have had their photo chosen for POTD. Mine have so far been in the 9635 that didn't make it. However, I still have a lot of samples as well as places of interest to photograph and post on mindat...

Cheers Trev

Pierre,

your photo has not been rejected (what makes you think so?)
It has simply not yet been approved.

As you certainly know, the photo approval process can be slow at times, however much we'd like to speed it up.
You have just uploaded the photo yesterday afternoon.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/2012 12:29PM by Amir C. Akhavan.

Yeah I know what saying Trevor, it really is a honour to have one of your specimens displayed as POTD

Keep trying Pierre, keep trying.........

[www.mindat.org]

You've uploaded several olmiite photos and all have been approved and are shown on the locality pages.

Not sure what happened to the orlymanite photo.
I can't see anything in your personal gallery.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/2012 12:30PM by Amir C. Akhavan.

Yes Amir,
All my olmiite photo's have been approved but not without a struggle!
This one:
[www.mindat.org]
was at first rejected and it took me a lot of mailing back and fro + mailing other photo's from the same specimen before approval....
About orlymannite:
On the capture of this photo:
[www.mindat.org]
I had to change to "Calcite" and leave the name "orlymannite" only in the text so anybody looking for orlymannite will indeed never come across it.
On what basis do you ask: because " there is no mention in the literature of orlymannite from N'Chwaning II", now how silly is that...........
Because it is not published, it doesn't exist!!!!
And yes guys, I know that sometimes it takes time but the mere fact that it was not in yesterday's photo's means there is trouble......
Cheers for now,
Pierre



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/2012 12:46PM by Pierre Rondelez.

Pierre,

you are not the only one to "struggle", many others have to discuss the ID of their minerals with whoever in the management has a question about it.
And some people do not get their photos approved for general view on the basis of the information they could give.

And that is a good thing.

Mindat does certainly not claim that something that is not in the literature or on Mindat does not exist.

> And yes guys, I know that sometimes it takes time but the mere fact that it was not in yesterday's photo's means there is trouble......

I don't think there's any trouble, but you can help us speeding up the approval process:
If you have information that could help or that substantiates the ID, provide it!
It does not hurt to put a note on how the minerals were identified in the photo description (and you have done that already for some photos).



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/2012 12:54PM by Amir C. Akhavan.

To Graig,

I know perfectly well it's an honour Graig to have a photo selected to be 'POTD", I had the honour 8 times !
but as you mentioned: I will keep trying..........
Cheers,
Pierre

Pierre
its been approved (site-wide) now, and I see now reason to delete it. I'm not sure why your other photos were not approved for site-wide, if you tell us the numbers we could check them. You do have a few olmiites approved, maybe the other was similar but poorer? We sometimes make them user only if they are poor photos.

Regards,
Ralph

To Ralph:
Thanks, please do not delete the photo....
To Amir:
How am I sure it is what I say it is?
Here goes:
Some time ago I bought 2 specimens from a South African dealer, they had on the label:
Rhodochrosite+Manganite on Gageite from KMF/South Africa.
Beautiful specimens but with no specific location.......
Last Friday I received the book "The Manganese Adventure" by Cairncross Bruce et al.
Lo and behold: on page 171 is a photo of exactly the same specimen with:
"Wessels Mine, Rhodochrosite + Hausmannite on Gageite matrix, collection Cairncross".
Bingo: the exact location+ Manganite was wrong should have been Hausmannite.
So now I can upload a photo on Mindat, being sure of the identity of the 3 minerals (who am I not to believe Prof. Bruce Cairncross) and also to at last have the correct location.
Should I have mentioned all of that on the text with the photo, I think not................
Cheers again,
Pierre

(I was beaten to the gun with my last post).
If you have any published report or analysis of orylmandite we are very happy to add it to the list, or we can sometimes even quote it as from someones collection if need be, if its something common - it does look right, but rare minerals usually requre some evidence. We try to avoid adding any mineral to a location that someone thinks just looks right.

Regards,
Ralph

> Should I have mentioned all of that on the text with the photo, I think not................
No.
If you have useful general information like "identified by method X" then, of course, put it in the photo description.
Other stories whenever a discussion starts.
Arguing by authority will not really help, though.

First of all I am the one that is looking at South African mineral photo's approval since November last year. I had no dispute that it was Rhodochrosite & Gageite, as Amir stated it was only loaded into the database around 2.30pm GMT, I am sorry I did not approved it quickly enough for you.

Regarding the Orlymanite, yes I did question this, I said it might not be the mineral stated & that it again might not be the locality, as far as I know it remains unique to the deposit according to the author mentioned above in another of his books.

I did do a little research prior to sending the complaint & found this specimen was originally sold on an auction site in SA, nowhere in the title or description states it is from N'Chwaning II Mine. I am not saying you are wrong or that I am right but you did not reply, we could have discussed this further but you made the edit & removed the Orlymanite.

A streak test may help to clarify this matter.

Regarding your comment "so anybody looking for Orlymanite will indeed never come across it" is not true, enter it as a 'keyword' in search boxes & it does show up.

Good morning Debbie,

"I am not saying you are wrong or that I am right but you did not reply, we could have discussed this further but you made the edit & removed the Orlymanite. "
In all fairness: I was the one who answered your mail and never got a reply, that's why I edited the Calcite/Orlymannite photo and left the name Orlymannite only in the text.
You see: I can not prove 100% that orlymannite indeed is correct, I only have 1 specimen and will not have it analysed

"A streak test may help...."
I seriously think not, streak colour should be "light brown" but as good as all the other suspects such as Goethite, Caryopilite and others all have shades of brown as streak colour.........
In the past 35 years of mineral collecting I have never identified a "difficult" mineral by means of streak test, always by analysis: XRD or EDX !

Indeed, the seller only mentioned KMF as the location on that auction site but in an email to me (before posting the photo on Mindat) he stated that specimen coming from N'Chwaning II.

"as far as I know it remains unique to the deposit according to the author mentioned above in another of his books".
As I told you in my mail: when the miner who sold the specimen to the South African dealer states it comes from N'Chwaning II, so be it.

Pierre



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/09/2012 10:45AM by Pierre Rondelez.

Hello Pierre,

I have not received any emails from you, did you use the private message service or the contact form via my homepage ?

I do not think that the ID & locality can always be trusted/relied upon by a miner in South Africa.

If you are not 100% positive on the accuracy of the ID or locality of a specimen it is my understanding that it is not included as a mineral on the upload form, only in the description.

Debbie

From an outside view we have two statements:

1. From a miner, information that the specimen came from N'Chwaning II.

2. From a published reference stating the mineral is unique to another deposit.

Without firm evidence to support item 1, I would have to agree the greatest probability is that either the locality listed is wrong or the identification of Orlymanite is wrong.

As such, it should not be listed on either the Orlymanite page or the N'Chwaning II page, and setting it to user-only gallery is the best option.

Jolyon