Wed Sep 9, 3:54 PM JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - A South African information technology company on Wednesday proved it was faster for them to transmit data with a carrier pigeon than to send it using Telkom , the country's leading internet service provider.
Internet speed and connectivity in Africa's largest economy are poor because of a bandwidth shortage. It is also expensive.
Local news agency SAPA reported the 11-month-old pigeon, Winston, took one hour and eight minutes to fly the 80 km (50 miles) from Unlimited IT's offices near Pietermaritzburg to the coastal city of Durban with a data card was strapped to his leg.
Including downloading, the transfer took two hours, six minutes and 57 seconds -- the time it took for only four percent of the data to be transferred using a Telkom line.
SAPA said Unlimited IT performed the stunt after becoming frustrated with slow internet transmission times.
The company has 11 call-centers around the country and regularly sends data to its other branches.
Telkom could not immediately be reached for comment.
Internet speed is expected to improve once a new 17,000 km underwater fiber optic cable linking southern and East Africa to other networks becomes operational before South Africa hosts the soccer World Cup next year.
Local service providers are currently negotiating deals for more bandwidth.
(Reporting by Peroshni Govender; Editing by Jon Hemming)
I'm paying 50$ for a 128kb/s shared Broadband connections. Not bad enough? I have a 5G download limit. Like I can ever reach THAT without going absolutely fucking insane. A 512 kb/s ADSL hookup would cost me about 54$ per month, with a download limit of 6G, but it would take them about 45 days to come and hook it up at my place..and I'm too lazy for that at the moment. Still, it's pretty expensive, and it's pretty fucking shitty.
(Maybe the Pigeon was on roids or maybe it evolved into a pidgeoto midflight)
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"I want to say something but I'll keep it to myself I guess and leave this useless post behind to make you aware that there WAS something... "
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/reuters/090909/odds/odd_us_safrica_pigeon
Rise and rise again, until lambs become lions
lol....what? I want to put this quote in my sig.
(Maybe the Pigeon was on roids or maybe it evolved into a pidgeoto midflight)
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
Are you kidding? My download speed reaches a top speed of 18 Kb/s if I'm absolutely lucky.
Rise and rise again, until lambs become lions
Rise and rise again, until lambs become lions