Charles,
I am unsure as to the exact year but around 2004/05 there was a meeting of the major Recorder users in Peterborough hosted by JNCC - (Stuart Ball, Sally Rankin and Mike Weideli were there along with many others).
At this meeting there was a BIG push for a complete Master List of species complete with full synonymy to replace the extant Recorder-3 list which was felt to be very outdated. It was agreed that this would go ahead BUT in the development of Recorder-6 it was (as I remember) felt that this was likely to be very difficult to manage with there needing to be an aggregation/combination of so may different lists from different providers. This led, at least in part, to the specification and development of the Name Server rather than a single Master List of species.
I find it interesting, though possibly inevitable, that this subject has recurred and that the call is still for a single Master List of ALL species names (inc. those which are useful to recorders if not strictly specific in their classification (e.g. aggregates (e.g. Taraxacum officinale agg.), and some of the aggregates of moths (e.g. Daggers)).
I am intrigued that you seem to be saying that a 'master list' in some form would now be a possibility - am I correct in my assumption here ? If so, then I will be interested to know how, if at all, the problems which prevented it from happening before have changed in the interim.
Just thought I would let you know a bit of the history as it may suggest who to talk to before too many wheels are re-invented or hoops gone through.
Cheers
Steve :)
Steve J. McWilliam
www.rECOrd-LRC.co.uk
www.stevemcwilliam.co.uk/guitar/