I'd like to ... share that Open Traits Network was discussed in Beckett Sterner, Steve Elliott, Edward E Gilbert, Nico M Franz, Unified and pluralistic ideals for data sharing and reuse in biodiversity, Database, Volume 2023, 2023, baad048, https://doi.org/10.1093/database/baad048

[jhpoelen]

In

Beckett Sterner, Steve Elliott, Edward E Gilbert, Nico M Franz, Unified and pluralistic ideals for data sharing and reuse in biodiversity, Database, Volume 2023, 2023, baad048, https://doi.org/10.1093/database/baad048

the authors reference the Open Trait Network in the following fragment

[...] More recently, Gallagher et al. (51) advocate for a unified ideal while rejecting the goal of constructing a single, comprehensive repository. They introduce the Open Traits Network (OTN) as an international collaboration focused on data synthesis for organismal trait information. They contrast their approach against that of a global aggregator:

A centralized and connected network structure will not facilitate trait data synthesis. Trait observations are highly nuanced and hierarchical. Describing multiple aspects of a phenotype for any organism with traits is not amenable to a simplified set of exchange fields that apply across the Tree of Life (51).
In short, and in contrast to species observations as organized in GBIF, trait observations from different taxonomic groups are too heterogeneous to pool into one database under a single standardized classification system. [...]

Also, note that, in the conclusion the authors mention

[...] While the unified data pool has operated widely throughout biodiversity data science, approximating a global and comprehensive scale of pooled biodiversity data does not eliminate the demand for datasets scaled and attuned to local problem and solution frameworks that scientists and decision makers have to address. Nonetheless, as the coordinated network of data portals exemplifies, data can be usefully integrated without satisfying a requirement for theoretical unification. There is therefore substantial opportunity for biodiversity data scientists to overcome key limitations of existing heuristics for unified data pooling by pursuing a coordinated approach to pluralistic data pooling.[...]

Curious to hear thoughts, if any.