IP over Avian Carriers with Quality of Service (1999)

[mig4ng]

g(old)

[jonathanlydall]

In 2009 when South African IT communication was essentially only permitted through a single entity, as a publicity stunt a small ISP did an implementation of this:

https://pigeonrace2009.co.za/

As I recall at the time, the best consumer speeds available were 512kbps with a 3GB per month cap at today’s cost of about 45USD.

The worst part (especially as a WoW player) is that QoS was applied giving priority to ports 80, 443, 110 and 25. This resulted in all other ports having terrible latency, probably added 150ms on top of the unavoidable (due to speed of light) 190ms to get to European servers.

Fortunately today the situation is much better, there are numerous FNO companies and even more numerous ISPs for each.

I pay about 45 USD for an uncapped 100Mbps connection.

[Doohickey-d]

It's an interesting form of spam how theres a link for an online gambling site just inline in the text.

[iso1631]

> Carriers in the queue too long may leave log entries

> Avian Carriers MAY eat the NATs.

There's always something I've not spotted / forgotten before with these

[breppp]

Reminds me of that AWS hard drive truck thing where your data is sent with quite the latency

[esafak]

Echoing Andrew Tanenbaum's famous quip, Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurtling down the highway.

[dredmorbius]

Alas, Snowmobile has been retired:

<https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/17/amazon_snowmobile_del...> (2024).

[ale42]

See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sneakernet

[nurettin]

Horse heads have also been used historically to send messages of a certain nature.

[dredmorbius]

With guaranteed receipt. Or at least, they cannot be refused.

[SilentM68]

That's funny, but let's make it more plausible and less-sci-fish-ly satirical :)

Proposal: Using Trained Carrier Pigeons as Emergency Data Relays

Objective Create a simple, low-tech way to move digital messages across a large area when internet, radio, and phone networks are completely blocked.

Core Idea Pigeons carry small memory cards with the messages from one station to the next, like a chain of human couriers but using birds.

Steps to Set Up

1. Build small pigeon lofts (homes) at key locations across the area (e.g., every 50–100 km). 2. Train homing pigeons to fly reliably between each pair of nearby lofts (standard pigeon training methods). 3. At each loft, install a simple automatic device that: - Reads data from a memory card the arriving pigeon carries - Copies the data to a new memory card - Attaches the new card to an outgoing pigeon 4. Attach a tiny, lightweight memory card (e.g., microSD in a small protective tube) to each pigeon’s leg. 5. People at the starting point load their digital messages (text, small files) onto the card and send the pigeon. 6. Pigeons fly to the next loft → data is copied → next pigeon flies onward → repeat until the final destination.

Basic Protocol Rules - Each message gets a clear label (e.g., “To: City B, From: City A, Priority: High”). - Stations check cards daily and send pigeons in both directions when possible. - Use only trained, healthy pigeons; rest them between flights. - Protect cards from water and impact with a small, sealed case.

Realistic Performance - Speed: Hours to several days per hop, depending on distance and weather. - Capacity: One 256 GB card can carry thousands of text messages or a few large files. - Reliability: Works in no-power situations; depends on pigeon health and weather.

Damage Control -Add cyanide to the chip in case the pigeon gets captured.

This is a proven concept (used in wars before radio) updated with modern tiny storage.

AI Agents can be fun, at times :)

[NoPicklez]

It would've been more fun to do this via a conversation with a real human

[aleken]

Bergen Linux User Group doing it: https://blug.linux.no/project/rfc1149/

[71bw]

> One major benefit to using Avian Carriers is that this is the only networking technology that earns frequent flyer miles, plus the Concorde and First classes of service earn 50% bonus miles per packet.

:D

[block_dagger]

Bird Internet?

[dredmorbius]

Bird Internets aren't real.

[paulddraper]

Could be useful, if only birds were real.

[theginger]

Disappointed there still isn't a protocol for sending messages in a bottle.

[noumenon1111]

The original IP over avian carriers RFC is literally ideal for sending IP packets in a bottle.

[tosti]

There ain't an RFC for morse code, either.

[tmountain]

Fun read from simpler times.

[mapt]

Send a raven to Pyongyang.

[noumenon1111]

Objective unclear; we sent a writing desk instead thinking, surely Poe could still write on this...

[mghackerlady]

or you can just like, email them. Their overseas news agencies have email addresses