Roger,
We've been along this discussion thread before as you know.
It is difficult to reconcile the idea of a public forum for earthquake prediction
with earthquake predictions that are not made public until after the fact. Perhaps
we need two lines here - one for public predictions and discussion, a second
for a double-blind test where the forecasts are not made publically to avoid
the me-tooism.
I concur that there are some, and we have seen it on this board, as well, I believe,
who take predictions made by someone else, change them a bit and put them out
as their own. The solution seems to me the one Mary C proposed - first come
first served - all other related predictions (if the first is public) are merely tacked
on as afterthoughts.
Some of the more successful predictors on this board have been imitated -
but it is usually pretty obvious, and the second prediction is not usually made
as a separate one, but part of the thread following the first. So far, there doesn't
seem to be a problem and if it ain't broke don't fix it. Or do you see a problem or
a potential problem that I don't here.