First Cell Phone for Dogs

revelCyllufyalP writes "A company called PetsMobility has come out with PetCell, the first cell phone for dogs. The phone will allow users to call their dogs in case the dog gets away and also includes a GPS tracking device if the dog doesn't respond to the call. In addition, the PetCell will feature GeoFence, which will alert owners whenever their dogs wander outside a prescribed area. Will the PetCell actually prove useful to dog owners or is it just another cheap gimmick?"

Comments

Re:I don't think it'll be cheap

[JanneM]

Kitty goes out, Kitty comes back in.

Except when Kitty gets run over, or sneaks onto a truck bound for Vladivostok, or urinates on the wrong car, or gets caught by animal control, or... Quite apart from the lack of consideration towards your neighbours (people can be allergic, phobic or just plain don't want kittycrap in their yards), it's not good petkeeping to let it run free either.

If you want to have a cat in a city, keep it indoors or walk it leashed. Seriously. Just like with dogs, if they are trained to wear a leash as kittens they have no problem with it.

Re:I'd debunk this.. at least for 1 dog

[tmortn]

No the real issue is whether the dog is responding in particular to the command or to the person. It has been well established that dogs can understand vocabulary. IE a word as an abstract meaning. Thus they do not need a person to understand that fetch *object* only means fetch it if a certain person asks it in a certain way. If you doubt this go look into it. There was a story about a border collie not to long ago that recognised dozens of objects... that is in a room full of these objects if you asked the dog to fetch a specific one it would find it and bring it back, and bring back nothing if it was not to be found.

As for recognising a voice on the phone. Hell some people can't do that and just like you wouldn't necesarrily do something some unrecogniseable person asks you to do niether will a dog. On the otherhand a dog may be more willing if they are trained to do more. Also they may recognise (perhaps even mistakenly identify) the voice and then be willing to do anything they would normally. Also the dog may be unwilling to seperate the voice from the presence of the person. Same thing happend to people with the invention of the phone in the first place. But we deal with abstraction better than dogs.

I always find it funny when people insist that a dog does not understand a command given by someone they don't know. They seem to be unable to understand that the dog is quite capable of deciding they are not someone they have to obey. Some will respond to any attention just like some people. And some are loyal to one person.

Re:Cell sounds like least useful of its features

[richie2000]

"Bear hunters" seems like too limited a market for something like this.

Possibly, but there are over 100 000 elk hunters in Sweden alone, most of them with one or more dogs. I know of several with this kind of product already and many more with the old style . A good hunting dog can easily cost a few thousand USD, not to mention the emotional ties to it that you get after a while, so a few hundred is a very reasonable price for something like this.

a barking dog could likewise scare away the quarry

Elk hunting dogs specifically are trained to bark at the elk to make it stand still and look at the dog to distract it from noticing the hunter. After a while, the hunter learns to recognize the type of bark, if the dog has found an elk or is in distress, for example.