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.
> Avian Carriers MAY eat the NATs.
There's always something I've not spotted / forgotten before with these
(The car was a Geo Metro and my co-workers described it as not much bigger than one of the backup tapes-- one of them likening it to some kind of interchangeable backup module itself.)
<https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/17/amazon_snowmobile_del...> (2024).
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 :)
Unpolished Comment: In other words, my comment was not levity. Learn to read the room, listen, close your mouth (e.g. flies may get in) and try to understand the deeper meaning in what others say or post before making an assumption.
More AI Polishing: (oh, I know you know) In case you missed the point, "pigeon relay" is a historical messaging system where homing pigeons carried notes in stages across long distances. Pigeons were raised at stations along a route. A message was attached to one bird and released; it flew home to the next station. There, the note was transferred to a fresh pigeon headed to the following station, and so on—like a relay race. Genghis Khan used this to span Asia and Europe. It was fast, hard to intercept, and worked when other methods failed.
Another Unpolished Comment: In other words, this could be a viable option to transfer information in places where regimes have instituted information blackouts that block all forms of modern electronic and digital communications, such as "Iran, Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea" and other places where crime is a daily occurrence, civil and human rights violations contine and remain unchecked or acknowledged by "Biased People" covertly embedded inside media outlets, especially the Western Media.
Extremely Unpolished Point of View: Inexperienced and younger people--hint, hint--are usually the first to criticize points of view like mine because they have been taught to think or feel a certain way by listening to a single source of news or point of view. Since I have lived thousands, hundreds, er tens of decades, I have learned the game, thus I prefer to bypass all that crap, ignore TV, ignore most if not all media outlets, and use word of mouth (e.g. people, shortwave radio) to verify what's going on in the world.
Hopefully this should convince you that I am a cyborg and not an AI :)
Sigh, my brain hurts :(
:D
