Hi, just came to point out a tagging error.

"Possum" automatically changes to species tag "Opossum".

You're right!

That alias should probably be reversed, since they belong to 2 different marsupial families (more accurately, orders) i.e.

An unalias of possum to opossum

An implication of possum to marsupial

Most notably, it looks like possums have furry tails (post #100386, while opossums have bald ones (post #182014)

I don't see the need for a distinction. The tail thing isn't exactly common knowledge.

Well, that's probably because opossums are much more common on e621 than possums are

Also, it looks like gliders and cuscuses are possums, but not opossums

Not to mention that people who do know the difference would find it pretty inconvenient to have a search for opossum show both possums and opposums, with no way of sorting them

But the ratio of people who do know the difference to people who don't is probably 1:1000 at best. Accuracy versus utility, really.

Even if there is some sort of minor distinction, I think the majority of people have been taught that the terms are interchangeable. Or at least I was and I've never heard otherwise until just now.

Oh, well if everyone thinks they should remain aliased for convenience, that's fine too

Looks like it's not an error, Molestia

The Australian possums were named from the American opossums. The majority of opossums/possums on e621 are the familiar Virginia opossum, the only marsupial native to North America.

Of course, "possum" is also a dialectical variant of "opossum" in the Americas, so it's hardly surprising an alias had to be made. With some users using "opossum" and others using "possum", all those Virginia opossums ended up with an identity crisis that required an alias to sort out.

If we're ever confronted by an Australian possum that can't be called a cuscus, glider, or some other no-possumed name, I'd recommend using more of the species name (like Leadbeater's possum or striped possum).

At the same time, why not make the distinction if we can? Like the difference between a mouse and a rat. Given, yes this is a more technical and lesser known difference but it's a difference all the same. Any more opinions?

More peopple know that mouse =/= rat than know that possom =/= opossom. I was brought up that they are exactly the same thing, except "possom" is just a common misspelling. I bet if you take a poll, you're going to find a very large number of people think the same.

Making the distinction would make it more difficult for the vast majority to find what they want, not less difficult. You have to decide whether to make it more difficult for a small number of people, or for a great number of people.

Rainbow_Dash said:
At the same time, why not make the distinction if we can? Like the difference between a mouse and a rat. Given, yes this is a more technical and lesser known difference but it's a difference all the same. Any more opinions?

Back when I joined e621 and for some time after, it was "opossum" that was aliased to "possum", something I never contested even though I prefer it the current way. "Possum" is a common, legitimate variant of "opossum", both usually referring to the Virginia opossum. Thus, it only made sense that some people would tag "possum" instead of "opossum". Furthermore, the need for an alias trumped the need for a distinction between the opossums of the Americas and the possums of Australia and New Guinea.

Yet, the distinction is a legitimate one, however rare it might come up. When taking a quick look through three pages of female opossums, I noticed one possum amongst all the Virginia opossums. Throw in males, intersex, and ambiguous genders as well, and I'm sure there's about a handful of possums on e621 hiding amongst all those North American marsupials.

The majority of Virginia opossums shows we still need the possum --> opossum alias. For the possums, I'd recommend tagging them also as, for example, possum_(leadbeater's) or possum_(striped), as applicable. That way, you can still find them via a search with "possum" until you realize you can use "possum*" to cut out all those you-know-whats.

Sorry to necro this but I didn't want to create a new thread for it.

All those who said possum and opossum are interchangeable, that is true... in America. Outside the US, they refer to two different groups of marsupials, just like titanmelon said, and having the two under the same tag forces people to go through over 1000 opossum images when looking for the much smaller number of possums.