ABC's of Reporting Something Seen

People reporting - in detail - what they have seen is crucial to understanding what is happening in Earth's skies and orbit.  Surveys of social media, however, reveal that people are hesitant about reporting - even to recognized UFO groups.  Two reasons are often expressed.

1) People refrain from reporting because "I reported, and nobody came out to investigate."

a. Not all groups have the volunteer power to send out people for every report. A triage approach is often used to classify the type of report submitted (low priority to a high priority and levels in between).  One person may have to deal with hundreds of reports with no help and thus the problem is clear.  Although every witness believes what they saw was exciting, rare, and highly strange it often can only be categorized in a most general "strange lights in sky" file of other reports lacking details.

b. Not enough information was included in the report to identify location, time, descriptions, etc. Often no names were given and no contact information. This makes it impossible to verify that the report is not a hoax or submitted by someone with an agenda contrary to real investigations.

2) People refrain, and urge others to refrain, claiming groups merely ignored them, swept it under the rug, or were dupes of the government.

a. There are currently about four groups (government and private) where people can file a report of something unusual. Instead of telling people to not use "X" - do urge them to use "Y" or "Z." To NOT do this makes the person appear mean spirited or having some kind of grudge. Neither is beneficial for research. 

So - keep reporting, recognize that volunteer groups are limited by the number of volunteers they do not have, and consider volunteering to learn and do more.

In our present culture there is a tendency to not read, do research, or study.

People seek "crowd source" answers - and you never know how smart or dumb the crowd might be. 

Simply because many believe one thing or another does not mean that is truth. 

Just because someone has a video on some social media platform does not mean they are not as crazy as a bat. So often the alleged "conspiracies" are simply ideas that arose as someone refused to let  the facts speak.  Hidden agendas, politics, troublemaking... Sources must be validated, tested and measured against the wider expanse of proven history or scientific fact.