More Than 300 Sharks In Australia Are Now On Twitter(npr.org)
npr.org
More Than 300 Sharks In Australia Are Now On Twitter
http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2014/01/01/258670211/more-than-300-sharks-in-australia-are-now-on-twitter
13 comments
Maybe this isn't a bad idea after all.
I guess I can't tell what is a good idea or not. I mean my team & I just created a web app that plays, pauses & stops audio in sync across multiple devices (flash mob anyone), but hmm we might be working on the wrong idea.
http://SpeakerBlast.com - Blast audio in sync across multiple devices. NO?
I guess I can't tell what is a good idea or not. I mean my team & I just created a web app that plays, pauses & stops audio in sync across multiple devices (flash mob anyone), but hmm we might be working on the wrong idea.
http://SpeakerBlast.com - Blast audio in sync across multiple devices. NO?
I'm seeing more and more wildlife crossings out west.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Trans-Canada-wildlife_over...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cerviduct.jpg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgOMcpUN5RY
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Trans-Canada-wildlife_over...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cerviduct.jpg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgOMcpUN5RY
They actually have car whistlers that you can attach to your hood that are supposed to deter wildlife.
Like this? http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003XNGLJU
These are very common in Michigan, where I live
These are very common in Michigan, where I live
I've put them on plenty of cars, they only seem to catch bugs which plug the holes up.
The electronic ones at least keep making noise, but there's still no telling if they actually help.
I guess it's worth a shot, but I never expect much from them.
I guess it's worth a shot, but I never expect much from them.
We have them in Australia...
Shoo Roo! http://www.shuroo.com
Shoo Roo! http://www.shuroo.com
These should be in rental cars. I think I've never seen as many dead animals next to the road as in West Australia. Glad I didn't hit one in 4 weeks.
The Internet of Things that bite you.
Would rather see a rss feed that could be used in an app, with details of the shark locations. But I guess you would have the problem of some yahoo tracking down the shark and killing it, although it is a protected species.
I'm a little surprised it's not GPS-based, with prices on GPS modules these days easily below $20. Make it powered by water movement and you can have receivers nearby to pick up the signals, so that you can see exactly which sharks are where, how fast they're moving, their depth, etc. The signals just have to be strong enough to be receivable when the shark is reasonably near, any since any that are farther away are of less concern. Even better if they show them on a big screen at the beach.
I wonder about the predictability of this. There are 100s of millions of sharks out there. (Maybe more?) How much can the location of 300 predict? Is it that sharks travel in packs, so where there is one, there is many?
To the extent that this moves us away from viewing sharks as monsters, it will be useful.
We kill 100s of thousands of them (maybe even millions?) for every one of us that they get, despite their natural advantage in water. Killing them is a shame.
To the extent that this moves us away from viewing sharks as monsters, it will be useful.
We kill 100s of thousands of them (maybe even millions?) for every one of us that they get, despite their natural advantage in water. Killing them is a shame.
I read the article looking for one thing. Them mentioning the potential for false sense of security. I was very pleased and Happy they mentioned it. As it was my first thought. After reading what they were doing. I may have overlooked it but did they mention any estimates about how many sharks there are in that area? Even if a wild guess? To reflect are there only 300 of 10,000 sharks tagged or 100,000?
A sense of security from shark attacks is probably not false, given the unlikelihood of it.
This is cute, but it kind of falls under the "Let's do this thing we've done, but with new social media technology!" category rather than something genuinely useful.
Not being attacked by a shark is a real-time scenario... A shark that is 0.75 miles away could easily be 0.5 miles away by the time you've checked your phone, got off your towel, and tip-toed into the water.
I'm not dismissing the program by making it keep promises that it hasn't made...it just highlights how technology needs to be a strategy...to have these signals out in a public API is very cool, but for it to serve its ostensible safety purpose, the beaches need to be equipped with a public-announcement system that keys off of that data (whether it be a Twitter feed or whatever the scientists were using before).
Not being attacked by a shark is a real-time scenario... A shark that is 0.75 miles away could easily be 0.5 miles away by the time you've checked your phone, got off your towel, and tip-toed into the water.
I'm not dismissing the program by making it keep promises that it hasn't made...it just highlights how technology needs to be a strategy...to have these signals out in a public API is very cool, but for it to serve its ostensible safety purpose, the beaches need to be equipped with a public-announcement system that keys off of that data (whether it be a Twitter feed or whatever the scientists were using before).
100% agree, a solar powered siren connected to the GSM phone network in the middle of the beach you'd think would be more useful.
I was also thinking along these lines, but I wonder if they chose the distance to match the behaviour patterns of sharks. How quickly would a shark approach a beach when feeling hungry?
Nice step forward. This really needs to be all around Australia not just Western Australia. With the majority of the population on the East coast, something like it or even an app like California has "Shark Net" would be super.
I swam at the pictured beach - Gracetown beach in WA - only two days ago. Fortunately there were no sharks that day, although it does have the highest shark death rate of any beach in the country.
Just think of the opportunities for marketing promos with the next "Sharknado" movie!
If they had lasers or Fonz jumping over them, that would be impressive.
That's about 300 Shark Fin Soups with a really easy hunt.
I wish something slightly similar could be done to eliminate road kill.
One idea I've thought of to eliminate roadkill/keep them in the woods is to have some type of high pitched sonar attached to the outside of your car. You turn it on and or it activates itself based on location. Animals would hear it coming from a quarter mile away and run in it's opposite direction.
HA that's probably not the greatest solution, but road kill is costly and unpleasant. It would be neat to see someone come up with a good solution!