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Pigeons' Bandwidth Advantage Quantified
An anonymous reader submits "A well documented test took
place in the north of Israel, in presence of several dozen Internet geeks and
experts. During the test, 3 homing pigeons carried 4 GB (gigabytes) for 100 km
distance, achieving, what apparently looks as pigeons' world record in data
transfer to a given distance. Bandwidth achieved by the pigeons was 2.27
Mbps...Transferring a similar volume of information through a common uplink of
ADSL line would have taken no less than 96 hours..."
So essentially, we should unplug all the cables and just get a bunch of shithawks?
the DSL doesn't shit on my car.
2.27 Mbps = 0.28375 MBps
4 GB / 0.28375 MBps = 14097 secs
14097 secs = 3h 54Mins
100km / 3h 54Mins = 25.53 km/h
25.53 km/h = 15.86 mph
Not bad for laden little pigeons
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
the response time for packet loss is prohibitive... may as well get satellite
12 gauge shotgun i'm applying for the patent right now
vodka, straight up, thank you!
There will be at least ten comments that say (even though it's a pigeon and not a swallow): "Was it African, or European?"
barzelay.net
the relevant rfc
Fill up a cargo jet with full up hard drives and I'd bet you get really good bandwidth.
It's a truism within the London-based Post-production industry (pretty much all located within a square mile of Soho, central London) that the bandwidth of a bunch of RAID arrays in a transit van is pretty much unbeatable, even with the fast networks that post-houses have between themselves... transferring physical media used to be called 'sneakernet' when walking across the room, it's just been scaled up slightly
I'm quite impressed that a pigeon can do 100km in 2.5 hours though, I had no idea they were *that* fast...
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
Finally, I can start implementing my MORSE OVER IP OVER PIGEON CARRIER protocol stack!!
DrkBr
That's it, I'm switching to PSL. (Pigeon Subscriber Line)
"What is the average velocity of a data-laden pigeon . . ."
You'd lose both a huge amount of your data and your only connection should something happen to those pigeons. Still, it's more reliable than AOL.
"You should never doubt what nobody is sure about." -- Willy Wonka
Insert obligatory joke here about "dropping packets"....
Who is General Failure? And why is he reading my disk????
I feel sorry for the pigeon who needs to be hashed on the other end to check if it's the same one... that's gotta hurt.
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
GeneralEmergency
Try wiretapping that you FBI bitches
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
3h 54Mins
Ping time is twice that. Doh!
If I had something intelligent to say, I would have said it.
Now if I can train my pets to fetch me playboys from local 7-11s, I am as good as without broadband.
Is it already April 1st somewhere?
That's all fine and good if you know where you're sending your packets. But what if you have to do a DNS look up? Then you have to send several scout pigeons to the nearest aviary which will in turn send a pigeon back with a map of where to send your data pigeons.
And there's a whole other issue with those bastard Verisign Pigeons, but I'm not going to get into that now.
There's also a risk of packet sniffers who use various means to down your pigeons and read your data (no router protection).
And if they do happen to down your pigeon, they can give it new data and send it on its way as if it came from your IP (iniating pigeon). WATCH OUT CREDIT CARDS!
The solution of course is to use Pretty Good Pigeons to protect your data.
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
..but can they stream?
-- kortex "Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts"
The Worlds Record for Data Transfer in a Station Wagon"
Basically, a station wagon of 35 gig tapes from SETI is driven to it's destination. Takes 16 hrs to fill 1 tape.
Although it is very humorous to see pigeons used, they are still prone to packet failure (automatic weapons fire).
Yep, and I believe it was one of the guys from MS Research that said he could buy new servers with RAID arrays and send them cross country for less than the cost of a network link that could support the same kind of data transfer =)
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Actually, the distance involved matters not. Bandwidth is purely the time to put data on the line. Latency is the time it takes to get from A to B. So the bandwidth would be the same no matter how far they travelled or how fast they flew. A good simile is bandwidth is how many tapes you can load in your trunk per hour. Latency is how fast you can drive those tapes to your destination.
Scott, Keeper of the Crystal Flame
Lets see how far those flying rats get with 4 GB of floppies attached to their frickin' heads.
We can't attach them there.
That's where the frickin' lasers go.
I can throw 10,000 DVDs in my trunk, and drive 100km in an hour
How long does it take you to load 10,000 DVDs in your trunk? Not to suggest that you still wouldn't beat the pigeons, but I don't think your time would be as good as you are hoping.
Would that be considered "great bandwidth"?
Yes, but that latency would not be considered so great.
Besides, if they can use 3 pigeons, why not compare it to 3 DSL lines?
You could, or you could compare one pigeon with dial-up. Or you could compare with an 18-wheeler instead of the trunk of your car.
Lighten up - this is a great hack! And better than another SCO story.
Schrodinger's cat is either dead or really pissed off...
Pigeons carrying data? Web page has photos of baby birds as a way to replicate the system, photos of turtles for no good reason.
I think the posts for April Fools Day have started to arrive. Damn, it's early this year.
Better get mine in, then: LZip for DOS - Yes, lzip 2.0 has been ported to DOS! Lzip is an advanced file compression utility that generates smaller file sizes than either gzip or bzip2, and does so much faster. Lzip can achieve these goals because it it based on a so-called "lossy" compression scheme.
is all the 'packets' they drop
What this goes to show is that a cheap and somewhat reliable technology can sometimes put our high-tech stuff to shame when response time is not a factor.
NetFlix is the most commonly cited example, how they can send a DVD over USPS faster than that information more often than not faster and cheaper than it could have been delivered over the Internet.
Sometimes moving the data physically is better than moving the data by wire, and this should always be taken into account when designing an information system. The Internet's great, but it's not the solution to all data transfer needs.
You can eat the pigeons (squab, actually) when they arrive.
And yes, just like chiken, but better.
...is trying to turn all of our isp's into Stool Pigeons anyways.
I trrew my DVD collection across the room yesterday. That's 1 terabyte per second, right?
The ancient sport of "The pigeon war, better known as kash al-hamam, involves having opponents keep their flocks up circling in the sky as they try to lure each other's pigeons into their flocks."
So the pigeon carrier signal can be hijacked, and data can be stolen in a new kind of man-in-the-middle type attack specific to the pigeon protocol.
Additionally, this type of attack is freighted with geopolitical intrigue: this pigeon war sport is practiced in Lebanon, which, being a place of conflict with Israel, renders yet another dimension of threat to the robustness and security of the pigeon carrier signal.
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Not a fair comparison against DSL...they multiplexed the pigeons. This is just more anti-DSL FUD
;P
-Turkey
"The technology eliminated the need for cat 5..."
In fact, I would recommend not using ANY kind of cat technologies with this protocol.
eleven plus two / twelve plus one
When a Clear Channel radio station changes formats and therefore needs a large volume of music on site quickly, they usually send a server that is pre-loaded with the new format worth of music on HDs, and the studio just plugs that into their network. This also gives them the capability to change the format overnight without anybody at the studio complex needing advanced notice, so that soon-to-be-unemployed DJs don't see it coming and therefore leave the station a few days early to ruin the transition... the UPS delivery of the new music comes in a non-descript cardboard box which can be scheduled to be on the site just hours before the changeover happens.
Actually, that's a working pace for a pigeon. They were working hard, but not really what you could call "trying." Birds are fast.
Mind you a duck will overhaul a pigeon. That fat body is all wing flapping muscle. A duck is built to fly fast, high and for days at a time if needed. A duck in fear of its life can break 100 kph in level flight. An Eider just trying to get somewhere in a hurry for no particular reason has been clocked at 76 kph. That's the current officially confirmed record.
Nevermind the falcon that eats the pigeon creating packet loss.
I have no idea what the achievable bandwidth of a duck is though. They could deliver data intercontinetally. Having to wait through migratory periods would probably kill it pretty good.
KFG
For large datafiles. You load them onto harddrives and overnight them to the destination. For large amounts of data it is -by far- the fastest.
We didn't receive any messages, and Captain BlackAdder did not shoot this delicious, plump-breasted pigeon.
I was wondering if homing pigeons were extint.
This FAQ answered that question and many others for me.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
this actually works. here in nz, a caving tour company uses pigeons to ferry memory sticks back to base so the digital photos can be waiting when the tourists get back. http://www.waitomo.co.nz/pigeonpix.html
Duck homing is pretty precise. I have ducks and geese in my "backyard" (the Mohawk River) who manage to find the exact same favorite pool every year from whatever far flung warmer clime they spend it in (the bastards).
The problem as I see it is that pigeons are dogs and ducks are cats. Tell a pigeon to carry something through antipigeon fire to save the regiment and the otherwise intelligent animal will say, "Oooooooo, Oooooooo, can I? Pleeeeeeeeeese!"
Whereas you to try to tell a duck that and he'll say, "Yeah, right Sparky. Blow me. Why don't you just run along and carry it yourself? Or maybe ask that stupid pigeon. I'll bet he'll do it. A pigeon will do anything. Just ask that Skinner dude."
Which is why no duck has ever won a Crouix de Guerre. On the other hand no duck is standing on his remaining leg stuffed in a museum either.
The ducks like it that way.
That isn't to say that a duck won't oblige by carrying a message, but it'll go when he wants, where he wants.
If that happens to coincide with your needs, fine and dandy, if not, well, tough noogies.
KFG
Sometimes they come with notes attached.. it's like fortune cookies with wings!
But I think there is work on extending the TCP/IP protocols for interplanetary missions, so timeouts etc might be OK?
I'm pretty sure you'd get 100% packet loss trying to use avian carriers for interplanetary communication.
I guess when the bird died, it would send an ICMP message back about the timeout by falling on your head.
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
"That fat body is all wing flapping muscle"
I read this and instantly got a mental picture of some poor geek in a bar modifying it for use as a pick-up line.
[matt]
"I paid my money, I refuse to be inconvenienced." -Karl Cocknozzle