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Mobile Phones for Geese and Seals
prostoalex writes: "BBC News has two related articles about mobile phones and messaging being introduced to the animal world. The stories, aptly named Geese 'phone' home and Seals 'phone' home (kudos from this-title-is-so-original dept.) talk about 'tagged' animals that report about their location via the cellular systems. And if seal tracking is available only to the scientists in the field, following the geese online is open to anyone who contributes .75 British pounds to the research project."
Quack
Quack Carrot Top Quack?
QUAAAAACK
I have been pwned because my
The GNU/Stallman diaries. Issue 1.
Hello my good friends and welcome to the GNU/Stallman diaries! I'm your host, GNU/Stallman and I will be keeping you up to date with the wonderful world of Cheap Software.
I managed to do some more work on the GNU/Hurd this week and will give you a run down on my progress in this issue.
After booting my trusty PC I fired up the nice GUI (that's a GNU/User Interface) by typing 'win'. My good friend Eric told me I could add that to the AUTOEXIT DOT BAT file but I told him I didn't like bats, only butterflies. Silly Eric! He can be a real goose sometimes!
Anyway, I decided to focus on security as that seems to be a hot topic these days. What with that Internet thing and all. To secure GNU/Hurd I thought it best to require the user to login with a name and password. This should keep out all the naughty people, like the ones that ruined my other machine at the Cheap Software Foundation!
After about 5 hours of programming and debugging (I hate bugs! Unless their butterflies of course! ROFL!) I had a working login system. In the spirit of Cheap Software I present the source code below. Enjoy!
10 REM GNU/Hurd (c) 1982,1983,1984,1985,1986,1987,
20 REM 1988,1989,1990,1991,1992,1993,1994,1995,1996,
30 REM 1997,1998,1999,2000,2001,2002 Cheap Software Foundation
40 REM
50 PRINT "Login:"
60 INPUT A$
70 IF A$ <> "dick" THEN GOTO 50
80 PRINT "Password:"
90 INPUT A$
70 IF A$ <> "boneflute" THEN GOTO 50
80 END
Well my comrades, that's all the time I have this week! Look out for Issue 2, coming soon!
clicky
Just imagine the work required to teach geese to dial the right number.
Donate background CPU time to fight cancer.
i mean clicky
Interesting. I wonder what else they can track? Put one in your pet to know where it goes. Put one in yer teenagers car to see where it goes. Put one under your skin to see where you go....or have it done...
The geese are shitting on my lawn. They will be airborne and moving elsewhere in a minute.
I have been pwned because my
Well, now I finally realize at whom all those "Collect Calling" ads are targeted. Surely any life-form high than a goose would not be swayed to use a service promoted by Carrot Top.
Aparently since everyone on the planet already has a call phone or two, the wireless companies have finally realised to move on to other species.
Brillant! However, I am concerned that they chose whales and geese.....maybe they're easy to sucker into long contracts!
Chicago2600.net more than a lifestyle, its a survival trait.
I'll contribute 50 pounds if they include penguins in the program. Think of the publicity we'd get with a wired mascot! Oh, how about another 100 if they include a gnu.
I bet those roaming charges are going to suck!
Chicago2600.net more than a lifestyle, its a survival trait.
Not much in English though, but here is the web page with a little in English.
The transmitters on the other two seals have broken, but you can see the old tracks for them.
11:04am : Begin monitoring. Gnu in Region 3 of wildlife preserve.
11:35am : Gnu position remains unchanged
1:22 pm : Gnu position remains unchanged
4:25 pm : Gnu is defecating
4:26 pm : A non-identified human has entered wildlife preserve
4:26 pm : Human seems to be calling gnu
4:27 pm : Gnu approaching human in Region 4 of wildlife preserve
4:27 pm : Gnu acting oddly
5:12 pm : Police entering wildlife preserve
5:14 pm : Man being arrested. Man protesting loudly
5:27 pm : Police identify man as Richard M. Stallman
5:30 pm : Police charge man with illegal entry and 3 counts of animal cruelty
5:30 pm : Gnu returns to Region 3 of wildlife preserve
8:29 pm : Gnu is sleeping. Position unchanged
I have been pwned because my
...whatever happened to the prime directive?
Can you hear me now? QUACK! Can you hear me now? dan QUACK!
All the birds take the same route from Iceland to Greenland, even though they took the journey at different times. On the 4th of June Arnthor was well ahead of the pack (okay okay so it's not a race but), but by the 10th of June, it was clear he/she had decided to have a few days break on the edge of Greenland while Hugh and Kerry had a few days break. Also intresting is that these two birds both arrived on the same island, and it looks like they arrived at the same time, but at opposite ends of the island.
This could be a new sport, taking bets on which bird gets to Canada first - with daily web updates. More exciting than the football.
You will forget this sig before you next see it
following the geese online is open to anyone who contributes .75 pounds to the research project.
Pounds of what?
I have been pwned because my
DateLine: circa 1942, the northern most tip of Vancouver Island, British Columbia. At a top secret location a specially trained cadre of experts carefully sweep the NorthWest Pacific skies for signs of the awaited Japanese invasion. Their cutting edge technology: RADAR. Early one morning the first wave of Zeros shows on the RADAR screen and the word is sent out: the invasion has begun... well almost... that was until the first wave of Zeros showed itself to be a flock of Canadian Geese. Now we can just call their service and check their flight plans.
A log cabin remains, with a plaque commemorating the brave souls who spent the war, huddled over bleeding edge technology muttering... airplane?...goose?"Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
Cohen
Why do the geese need mobile phones when they could more easily have adapted the well known RFC 1149 protocol?
I copied this sig from someone else (but where did they get it from?)
You cant track them online, but it would make for one trippy-as-hell video to project on a wall at a party.Some guy at National Geographic has been attaching camcorders he calls CritterCams to the backs of sea turtles, sharks, and other shit that swims around in hard to reach places (no comment).
peace***
For .75 pounds, no more sitting around, waiting and getting liquored up while bird hunting
Has any thought been given to how difficult it would be for poachers to "hack" this system and use it to track the seals for their own goals, which are usually exactly opposite those of the researchers?
Imagine if the poachers could simply trigger the SMS system and then triangulate on the position of the largest closest herd of seals.
I browse Slashdot at +3, Funny
The sponsorship, which costs £75 a year, is the latest conservation scheme tied to mobile phones.
Thats 75 pounds not .75 (as in 75 pence) as the /. story states. Not sure if i'm willing to put up quite that much. maybe a fiver....
[Please type your sig here.]
The government is installing involuntary tracking devices in order to monitor their location and movement remotely? Has anyone addressed the privacy concerns of this plan?
--
"First they came for the geese and seals, but I was not a goose or seal, so I said nothing."
$5 toward a pot for hackers who can break encoding on location stuff for cell-phones, and/or codes that the seals are using.
:)
I foresee fun uses with using in on the always-on cellphones headed (here?) our way. Then I can find the cell-phone number of that cutie, and then track her to her haunts
-- Ender, Duke_of_URL
I guess we really need to keep track of those geese and seals, though!
I didn't see the cost listed anywhere, but the size and the fact that it sends messages to a mobile phone makes me wonder if this oculd be used as a Spider/Bat Tracer (as in the tracking devices that the superheroes use, not as in animals that could be tracked).
This could have some wonderfully evil applications if it doesn't cost $10k a pop.
(And we find 56kB/sec slow....)
However, the Geese are actually using a satellite tracking system (as described in not much detail here). The text message bit is just an advertising thing that the WWT will send you an SMS when they get data - which is nothing new technically.
I'd be interested in the battery requirements for both of them though - I've got this image in my head of a seal trying to wind up a charger
Some stuff Seattle did a couple years ago.
I have been pwned because my
"Can you still hear me?"
"Quack."
"Goooood."
Repeat until desired effect achieved.
"PC Load Letter? What the $@#% does that mean?!"
It's actually pounds Sterling
I live in Finland, and it is possible to get spammed with about any content you can imagine. During year 2001, 1.2 billion sms messages were sent in Finland. With Finland's 5.2 million citizens, that means 230 messages per person during last year. And that includes infants, and those who are over 65 years old (there is 760 000 of them, 15.6%). :)
So for us, the mobile messaging is not a buzzword anymore. It is the default. And in addition to this wireless notification aspect, this was an article, that I would have thought to see on WWF's site and not Slashdot
fnord
I have to ask if the slashdot community finds this application of technology tasteful or moral. I will be the first to admit that cellular telephones have worked wonders for business people, emergency rescues, and friends meeting to see a movie.
But with this power came great responsibility. Once one carries a cell phone, one has "leashed" themself to whomever holds the number for that phone, whether it be colleagues, relatives, or a significant other. At the very least, wireless communication has been a mixed bag for humanity.
Is it right to foist such a double-edged sword on animals?
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
..and these animals can call while flying and swimming? I guess my ATT&T service needs the help of that Verizon guy that walks around asking... "Can you hear me now? Good!"
Can you hear me now?
Goooood!
but can't find bin Laden?
*gruntle* dear metamoderator, please indicate how my reply was offtopic and how you are not just embarrassed about US CDMA voyages and resulting mobile periphery. Anyway, the only good reason to track geese, is to know where to go and shoot them.
Now if we could train them to use the little handcranks, viola !! (Come on, this one was obvious)
Just a reminder I guess that new technology often impacts on the environment in unexpected ways, especially when novel components are used. What's more worrying is that your mobile phone may have helped fund warlords in Africa to continue a bitter civil war. The technology doesn't seem quite so cool now, does it?
Never email donotemail@WeAreSpammers.com
Apparently it had met a hungry badger.
What was the point of this story? Did it bring any of you a deeper sense of fulfillment? Slashdot used to stand for something: Rabid devotion to the downfall of Microsoft and the sacrifice of all our souls on the altar of Open Source. Now you post this filler?
My wife Starflower and I once actually succeeded in reading the tag numbers off a pair of live, conscious Canadian Geese. Believe me, it wasn't easy. We discovered that Canadian Geese are a lot like programmers: they can be bribed with food. The father goose was easy... he wanted the food and was willing to get close. Mother goose was harder: she was more wary of us, and to make matters worse, her tag was upside down. Her tactic worked: she got a lot more food.
Miko O'Sullivan
wouldn't need to be on any cellular network to send the data. (tho, if you weren't in a populated area with any APRS internet gateways, you'd need to do some more complicated math to figure out if a sat was overhead to send through).
Geese go "HOONK!"
It has never been easier for goose hunters! Yes for only .75 british pounds you can now track down geese with you cellphone!
I always wondered how the tagged animals look at and are looked upon by the other animals?
Is it a "Ha ha...you got your ass tagged" or a "wow...that's so cool that you were selected" kinda mentality.
Verizon will use this for their marketing campaign
These guys are gonna loose more cellphones to buckshot....
and how sick are these guys gonna feel when their little cell-seal gets clubbed?
Animals only "phone home" if they are fitted with spyware/malware products (a la RealDownload Demon).
Now I can use ducks and chimpanzees to beta-test
my software!
Non-stop, twenty-four hours a day, baby seals calling in yelling and screaming:
Help! Help! There's a man coming toward me, he's got a club in his hand. Help! My co-ordinates are--humpph.
I get cutoff from bandwdith problems already, now I've gotta compete seals and geese?
What's next, the seals and geese working tech support?
ring, ring, ring... uh yes hi, I have a problem with my cellphone bill...
quack?
No, I don't wanna hold!!!
*music plays*
Those damn geese always putting me on hold!!!
--Keeping the flame wars alive, one post at a time
Loading the gun...