Pigeon Protocol Finds a Practical Purpose

Selanit writes "Since David Waitzman wrote his tongue-in-cheek Standard for the Transmission of IP Datagrams on Avian Carriers, there have been occasional attempts to actually transmit information via pigeon. One group back in 2001 successfully sent a PING command. But now there's a practical use for pigeon-based communications: photographers working for the white-water rafting company Rocky Mountain Adventures send memory sticks full of digital photos via homing pigeon so the photos will be ready when the rafters finish up. The company has details on how the pigeons are trained and equipped. It may not be a full implementation of the Pigeon Protocol, but it works in narrow canyons far off the beaten path — and just as David Waitzman presciently predicted, they occasionally suffer packet loss due to hawks and ospreys."

Comments

Cache La Poudre

[stoolpigeon]

I rafted the Poudre this summer. It was a great time. The company we went with did a great job, not sure why the need to race photos back. Our photographer rode back with us, while we turned in our gear, changed clothes, etc. he set up in the office, and started showing the pictures to folks on an iMac. While we watched he burned a dvd. We had a big group so he set a price and sold us a dvd that we could all copy. It was pretty sweet. Mountain Whitewater Descents was the company we used and I'd recommend them to anyone headed that way.
 
Apparently a while back some French trappers got snowed in and hid their gun powder by the river - that's how it got its name.

Not really TCPIPoP

[gblues]

This is less "TCP/IP over Pidgeon" and more "Sneakernet Over Pidgeon." Although if all the memory cards were the same size you could get away with calling it ATM over Pidgeon, I guess.

Re:Not really TCPIPoP

[antifoidulus]

Unless the pigeon comes back it's certainly not TCP, more like Pigeon UDP.

Another misleading headline...*sigh*

[DNS-and-BIND]

This isn't an implementation of RFC1149. *sigh* It even says so in the summary, not even the freaking article. They're just using carrier pigeons as couriers, like they've been used for centuries.

"Since David Waitzman wrote his tongue-in-cheek Standard for the Transmission of IP Datagrams on Avian Carriers, there have been occasional attempts to actually transmit information via pigeon.
Yeah, attempts like the victory at Marathon in 490BC...