"This is gonna be the Aussie version of finding big foot," a user commented on a YouTube video from 2016 named Thylacine Sighting SA.
It has more than 700,000 views.
The video was posted by the president of the Thylacine Awareness Group of Australia (TAGOA) Neil Waters, whose work centres around reporting sightings of the thylacine – also known as the Tasmanian tiger.
The channel's videos have racked up a total of 4.5 million views.
They follow a tradition of claims about photographic or video evidence of the lost Australian species.
While Mr Waters's footage has been deemed fiction rather than fact, partners in a new science venture say a living baby thylacine might be as little as 10 years away.
But before we start seeing them in fenced-off areas of the wilderness, let's take a look back at what led to the extinction of the Tasmanian tiger.
When did the Tasmanian tiger go extinct?
The last of the large marsupial predator species died in 1936, but the thylacine was not officially declared extinct until 1982.
According to the National Museum of Australia, which holds one of the most significant thylacine-related collections in the world, the last known shooting of a wild thylacine took place in 1930, and by the mid-part of that decade sightings in the wild were extremely rare.
The museum said a shift in public opinion and the start of conservation action came too late.
The species was granted protected status just 59 days before the death of ‘Benjamin’, the last known thylacine, which died in Hobart zoo from suspected neglect on September 7, 1936.
The story of the last thylacine is a well-worn one, but the animal being named 'Benjamin' has been disputed by local experts.
The City of Hobart's senior cultural heritage officer Brendan Lennard said the name came about much later, in the 1960s.
"No-one who worked at the zoo ... ever knew it by that name," he said.
Why did it go extinct?
Excessive hunting, combined with habitat destruction and introduced disease led to the rapid extinction of the species.
The museum said the thylacine became "an easy scapegoat" in the early 1800s and was feared by the Tasmanian public.
As early as 1830, bounty systems for the thylacine had been established.
In 1888, the Tasmanian Government introduced a bounty of £1 per full-grown animal and 10 shillings per juvenile animal destroyed.
The program extended until 1909 and resulted in the awarding of more than 2,180 bounties.
The museum estimates that at least 3,500 thylacines were killed through human hunting between 1830 and the 1920s.
Where does the name thylacine come from?
The name thylacine roughly translates from Greek via Latin as ‘dog-headed pouched one’.
The thylacine was commonly known as the Tasmanian tiger, due to the distinctive stripes on its back.
Despite its fierce reputation, the tiger was semi-nocturnal and was described as shy, usually avoiding contact with humans.
The National Museum of Australia states the fossilised remains of thylacines have been found in Papua New Guinea, throughout the Australian mainland and in Tasmania.
Wait, was it actually a dog?
Based on photos, many have pointed out the similarities between the Tasmanian tiger and large dogs such as the grey wolf.
A study by the University of Melbourne's Andrew Pask and Axel Newton confirms that the two are very distant relatives and have not shared a common ancestor since the Jurassic period, over 160 million years ago.
"Their striking similarities are the result of convergent evolution, a process where different animals evolve to look the same because they occupy similar places in the ecosystem," their report states.
Have there been any sightings of the Tasmanian tiger?
In the age of smartphones and cameras, you never know what you might capture.
Throughout the years, Mr Waters hasn't been the only one to have footage of a purported Tasmanian tiger sighting.
There have continued to be reported sightings by people who believe the animal is still about.
Expeditions have also been organised to search for the thylacine in the Tasmanian wilderness.
So, were the sightings real?
We don't mean to burst your bubble, but the experts say they weren't.
A majority of Tasmanian tiger sighting footage has been reviewed by Nick Mooney, the honorary curator of vertebrate zoology at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery (TMAG).
In a 2021 statement from TMAG, Mr Mooney rejected Mr Waters's identification of the animals as thylacines.
"The animals are very unlikely to be thylacines and are most likely Tasmanian pademelons," the statement said.
"TMAG regularly receives requests for verification from members of the public who hope that the thylacine is still with us.
"Sadly there have been no confirmed sightings of the thylacine since 1936."
A major factor as to why there couldn't be any thylacines left in the wild is its short life span.
The animals were short-lived and had a life span typically less than a decade, meaning there would need to be many individuals roaming the bush for the species to have survived this long.
Can they be brought back?
Scientists say they have never been in a better position to bring thylacines back.
A University of Melbourne research lab that has been working on the de-extinction of the Tasmanian tiger for the past 15 years announced it has partnered with a US-based genetic engineering company to boost efforts to bring the marsupial back.
"The ultimate goal of this project is not to just bring back the thylacine, but to get to a point where it can be put back into its natural environment in Tasmania," Professor Pask said.
His unit has already assembled the first complete genome of the Tasmanian tiger after using DNA from thylacines that had been preserved in alcohol.
Now that they have access to DNA editing technology, the next step is to turn the genome of the thylacine into a living animal.
Have any other animals been brought back from extinction using this process?
Professor Pask says the technology ist yet to be used successfully, but that could change.
"We're partnering with the huge team from the US who have been proposing to bring back the woolly mammoth," he told ABC News Mornings.
"They have been working on that project now for probably about 15 years."
Professor Pask says he and his team are working to try and develop techniques to bring back multiple extinct animals.
