Thylacine: Specimen Or It Didn't Happen

This week a group of Tasmanians (press conference here) claimed to have seen and to have footage of a living thylacine, a species which has not been confirmed to exist since the last known specimen died in captivity on September 7, 1936.    No zoologist has yet accepted this extremely blurry footage as being of a thylacine, and many wildlife observers consider it is very likely to be a spotted-tailed quoll.

You can see a longer video here.  It contains unconvincing (compare actual accounts) "barking", the video above, something unidentifable nosing the camera, and a bunch of Where's Wally pics in which you can just make out what might be the eyes of something if you try very hard.  When I slow down the main video frame by frame I can see blurry paler patches on the animal consistent with the spotting on a spotted-tailed quoll.  The most interesting thing about the videos is actually the large number of lyrebirds (introduced to Tasmania) that they show.

I thought it might be of some interest to someone out there to outline my position regarding this poor animal the thylacine, and the intermittent circus of alleged "sightings", "photos" and "videos" surrounding it.  As usual, I am expressing my own view and not necessarily the view of any organisation I belong to or any employer I from time to time work for.