The experiment came about because of staff at an IT company complaining that the ADSL connection they had through Telkom was too slow. So, they put a 4GB data file on a USB memory stick, attached it to a carrier pigeon (as you do) and sent it on it’s way to fly the 60 miles between their two offices in Howick and Durban. It did the journey in just over an hour, and the data upload took another hour (must have been on USB1.0 or something, because that is just painful!).

At the same time, they attempted to upload the file over their internet connection to the same destination. By the time the pigeon’s payload had been successfully uploaded, the internet file transfer had only reached 4% complete, a truly almighty level.

So, there you go. Winston the pigeon has shown that in certain circumstances, you really would be better off sending that file by carrier pigeon. Just might cost a bit more… Pigeons have expensive tastes, you know!