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Pigeon beats Telkom

2009-09-09 12:23

kalahari.net

Birgit Ottermann

Cape Town - Winston, a homing pigeon, has made history by beating a Telkom ADSL line in delivering 4GB of data from Howick to Hillcrest, outside Durban in just 2 hours 6 minutes and 57 seconds, whereas the ADSL download was "still just under four percent complete" at 11:45.

South Africa's most famous pigeon, left Howick just after 10:00 on Wednesday morning and flew a distance of around 70km to deliver a data card (strapped to his leg) to financial services company The Unlimited at its head office in Hillcrest.

Winston easily beat the ADSL line, despite giving it a 26 minute head start, while stretching his wings and waiting for the company data to be downloaded onto the memory card.

A confident Winston flew straight to his home in Gillits, outside Hillcrest, from where he caught a short car ride to reach the Hillcrest head office.  Homing pigeons have a natural ability to find their way home from any point of departure.

Winston enjoyed huge support with messages from fans on his Facebook profile and constant tweets on his Twitter feed.

He himself also twittered several times with comments like "flying weather cloudy and cool, feeling good, no major problems to report... Hillcrest traffic is a worry".

Right from the start, the general consensus was that Winston would beat Telkom.

Cyber Stone Age

South Africans have long lamented the country's slow internet connections and limited bandwidth.

Despite the launch of the new Seacom cable about two months ago and promises of superfast internet at affordable prices, South Africans are still stuck in the Cyber Stone Age.

The Unlimited Group initiated the pigeon race after intensive research in alternative methods of delivering electronic data fast and efficiently.

"We came across the lesser spotted internet protocol: IPoAC or CPIP, commonly known as Internet protocol over Avian Carrier or Carrier Pigeon Internet Protocol respectively," the company said in a statement on their website.

Hundreds of fans followed Winston's historic flight online, however, many of them had to settle for Twitter updates, as, ironically, their internet connections were too slow to watch the live stream.

"Crap! Internet connection useless! Unable to watch live stream, plse post running commentary so we know how Winston's doing!,"  Jackyah333 tweeted on Twitter.

"Yeah thats why this #pigeonrace2009 is a great spectacle of telecoms inadequacy ;)" another Winston fan Kahlil_Incubus added.

According to a Sapa report, Telkom spokesperson Pynee Chetty declined to comment on Winston's win, requesting the news agency to send questions via e-mail.

For more information about the pigeon race visit the official website.

- News24


Long live Winston 9/9/2009 12:41:00 PM
Woohooo!!! Way to go Winston. Winston for president!!

Johan 9/9/2009 12:41:03 PM
Just shows you Telkom is still as crap as ever...

Kobus 9/9/2009 12:42:11 PM
This is classic, really! I would like to know how long it actually took to do this download or did it "time out" before it was completed.

RedTara 9/9/2009 12:42:40 PM
Hmmm...This gives me the idea, that there actually are cheaper alternatives out there. Yay for SA!

Vrye Denker 9/9/2009 12:48:53 PM
Gee, I was at least hoping for a neck-and-neck sprint for the finish line.

A test ws performed some three years back and the conclusion was that it was faster to fly to Hong Kong, download a full-length DVD-quality movie and fly back to SA than to just download said movie right here.

Mkhwenyane 9/9/2009 12:53:08 PM
Yeah right, and how long will the mails take to reach Telkom???

Baas Koos 9/9/2009 12:54:53 PM
Bwwhaha ha ha ha ha ha @ TELKOM!!!! i am not surprized!!! and you were given a head start!!! Shocking!! but good news for your competitors! Weldone Winston!

Morpheus 9/9/2009 12:57:49 PM
Kobus, dude, its still downloading!

Chatsubo 9/9/2009 12:58:41 PM
Strangely, they never state what speed the ADSL connection was? Hopefully they didn't throw the contest by using the lowest speed line available.

SO 9/9/2009 12:59:21 PM
I can just see the racing pigeon trainers taking of - Did they tell you how long it takes to train one? And now they cannot move buildings as the pigeon only knows one route. Morse code beats cell phone texting – so are we going Morse code again? If you try this in UK or US you will get the same result unless the company forked out the money to pay for a 10 Gig dedicated link between their offices. To do things like this is good for amusement but it will not change the world in 10 sec

James 9/9/2009 12:59:29 PM
Way to go Winston ! No comment from Telkom - how typical. So is seacom just a pink elephant or are we going to see its usage by the likes of Telkon(artists) anytime in the future ?????????

Stanman 9/9/2009 1:02:20 PM
Well done, but what now happens if Winston needs to retrun the memory card - would he be able to find his way back, or would he have to be driven there - how does Telkom then fit into that scenario...I think Telkom would win the return leg...(home and away)???

ADW 9/9/2009 1:04:58 PM
Just wait... it's coming... Telkom hates competition... Soon will come the Telkom-squadron of Pigeon-eating hawks.

Birdman 9/9/2009 1:06:34 PM
So how long was the actual flight??

Denise 9/9/2009 1:08:14 PM
Way to go! Winston for Minister of Telecommunications!

Strike 9/9/2009 1:08:16 PM
another benefit would that the Pigeon never demands an increase or goes on strike!

Alan2 9/9/2009 1:08:25 PM
And anyone is surprised at this? What is reall interesting is how this is being reported internationally... you know, in countries who might be interested in investing here.... Well we are now very firmly in the technological 3rd world. A friend from the UK mailed me a link to this story and could barely stop laughing long enough to type.

tnt 9/9/2009 1:09:45 PM
e-mail to telkom probably also delayed...

G-Man 9/9/2009 1:10:27 PM
I am now officialy changing from Iburst to FlyBurts, LMFAO

Ghwappie 9/9/2009 1:12:24 PM
Next race: a human runner with a data card in a cleft stick. Will still beat Telkom ADSL hands down - if the runner is not mugged or knocked down by a taxi before reaching Hillcrest.

WinstonFan 9/9/2009 1:13:29 PM
Another classic example highlighting what we all already knew...
Grin an bear the current state of affairs while Virgin provide 50Mbps lines in the UK, and places like Singapore, Japan and Portugal it boasts 1000Mbps lines. SA has a long way to go.

Burtfred 9/9/2009 1:15:10 PM
The only thing fast about Telkom is how they disconnect you if you don't pay their rip-off bill.
Go Winston you beauty!

Paul 9/9/2009 1:15:51 PM
Fell off my chair laughing.. can I sue Telkom for work related injury?

Craig 9/9/2009 1:17:34 PM
"made history" - hardly. This concept/race is not new and has been done in similar ways
(and results) with older technology many times before.

The 'race' was a waste of effort as it was a forgone conclusion (barring an unfortunate end for the pigeon). Even if the Telkom line were able to do the impossible and sustain a 4Mbps transfer rate for the entire process, it would still have taken 10 hours! As it stands, the figures in the article suggest a transfer rate closer to 170Kbps.

In all likelihood, even with first-world high quality telecom infrastructure at 20Mbps, the pigeon would still have won.

JJR 9/9/2009 1:20:29 PM
Just make sure you do not put an attachment on the email, otherwise telkom will never get it.

Paul 9/9/2009 1:22:39 PM
Fell off my chair laughing.. can I sue Telkom for work related injury?
Trying to submit a comment on News24 is also a pain lately.. Can we send it via pigeon and then someone just type it in directly into the Db??

Reminds me of another story.. if you want to download a couple of DVD's, quicker to fly to Singapore, go to an internet cafe (100Mb/s) download it and write to DVD, and fly back.

pigeon pie 9/9/2009 1:23:01 PM
WELL DONE WINSTON!!!!!!!! I think because of the speed and precision with which he performed his task, he should be allowed an extra 10 minutes during his flight to fly over Telkom offices on his way and crap on their offices

Michael G 9/9/2009 1:23:18 PM
I can see tomorrow's headline:
Telkom buys a fleet of Homing Pigeons to supplement their network. Roflmao!

Peter 9/9/2009 1:24:11 PM
How can upgrade my Telkom ADSl line to a pigeon.

Mike3 9/9/2009 1:24:17 PM
Now, lets try that to Cape Town.

Peter 9/9/2009 1:24:18 PM
So what movie did he transfer :D

Ahmed 9/9/2009 1:26:22 PM
Every 3 month there should be the Winston Challenge. Challenge Telkom, Vodacom, iBurst, Neotel, ... to face the pigeon.

Internet User 9/9/2009 1:26:46 PM
This was done before ages ago.
http://www.blug.linux.no/rfc1149/

Ian 9/9/2009 1:28:20 PM
We demand that the Pigeon is subjected to gender testing, maybe it was a male hawk!

Aryan 9/9/2009 1:29:32 PM
Just shows how crap these BEE companies are. Ha-ha. What a joke

JC 9/9/2009 1:32:11 PM
Brilliant! Do you know that it is cheaper to buy a return ticket to Hong Kong, pay for 100Gig of download data, and fly back, than to pay Hellkom to do it locally?

Internet User 9/9/2009 1:33:13 PM
I think the more telling sign is that it was almost impossible to watch the live stream. I think that is more telling about how bad our internet is than whether or not a bird can carry some random amount of data faster than it can be downloaded.

GW 9/9/2009 1:33:27 PM
Is this not part of Nyanda's portfolio as Min of Communication? Perhaps now that he has two new BMW750's it will be much faster!

Bob2000 9/9/2009 1:33:29 PM
...And using Vodacom or MTN out of bundle rates, there would have been a bill for at least R8000. I wonder if Winston has some cousins they would like to sell.

@ SO 9/9/2009 1:34:08 PM
Well, how long has it taken telkom to lay the lines? How long does it take telkom to come and connect you up? Complete your comparison if you want to use it as a basis for critique of the test. Furthermore, I would bet good money on the fact that you would not get the same result in the States. I have experienced the internet speeds there...and they are also uncapped! Telkom is incompetent! and will always be until the telecoms industry is deregulated. Go Winston!

Bokhoring 9/9/2009 1:36:54 PM
It would have had more impact if they tried it with an old 512 MB memory card.

CTheB 9/9/2009 1:37:34 PM
So the expected outcome, then. Difference made to telecoms in SA? Most likely zero, unfortunately.

Vims 9/9/2009 1:39:34 PM
Obviously this was an unfair test. I'm no Telkom fan, but can Winston deliver data to any corner of the globe. NO! Can you use Skype or IM programs over Winston's 1-way, non live connection? NO! Does Winston have error checking? NO! Don't you idiots see, this was not a competition, it was a marketing ploy by some desperate company to get "free" publicity at the expense of a big organisation. You're all idiots for going along with it. BTW we live in a 3rd world country so why do we always compare ourselves to 1st world countries????? Get over yourselves!

IandI 9/9/2009 1:41:48 PM
A pigeon is too fast for Telkom. Let's send a donkey cart and driver next time and see who wins then!

Johan 9/9/2009 1:45:11 PM
Telkom has nothing to worry about, soon pigeons will form a union and then not a single one will be of any benefit to us South Africans ever again. And let me tell you, wage negotiations with pigeons can be a most frustrating afair.

scott 9/9/2009 1:47:08 PM
Do you honestly think Telkom would pay any attention to this... they probably think we are lucky to have we have got.... more competition is needed in South Africa.. this includes all other public services... if one does not preform.. switch to a different user..

len 9/9/2009 1:47:17 PM
If I was Telkom, I would be embarrassed too

Anon1 9/9/2009 1:50:46 PM
Yet another government run parastatle. They should start using a donkey to generate power with a dynamo, there will probably be less power outages than with Eskom. Pigeons also do not strike, maybe a better alternative?

@Vims 9/9/2009 1:51:49 PM
Can you use Skype or IM over Telkom network, does Telkom have any checking on non-working ADSL lines NO! Can you get an ADSL line in the same year you ordered it, NO! You get over yourself, they had some fun based on an April fools joke about the Avian protocol. Eskom and Telkom compare themselves permanently to 1st world countries when it comes to increasing their rates.....

Dylan 9/9/2009 1:51:53 PM
Vims, you are what scientists refer to as "a moron idiot".

Fred 9/9/2009 1:53:29 PM
Calling Telkom Chiefs birdbrains, will now be taken as a compliment.

chris 9/9/2009 1:55:08 PM
An electronic signal travels at the speed of light. So the pigeon travels faster than the seed of light.

Craig @ ... the other Craig @1:17:34 9/9/2009 1:56:50 PM
china,first world transfer rates are closer to 2Gb hardly 20mbps... Telkom could have done it in less than an hour with "first world" internet....

JJ 9/9/2009 1:57:47 PM
Have you tried reading news24 and making comments via a pigeon.

Just Another bird 9/9/2009 1:57:57 PM
Vims, do you perhaps work for Telkom? No? you should then. Oh and we all had a wonderful time following Winston's story. Why are you getting so aggro? How about you get over yourself?

Bokhoring@Vims 9/9/2009 1:58:53 PM
The point is our telecoms do not compare well to many developing countries - both price and speed wise. I think it is a great way of citizen protest

Bokhoring@Vims 9/9/2009 2:00:12 PM
The point is our telecoms do not compare well to many developing countries - both price and speed wise. I think it is a great way of citizen protest

Viva 9/9/2009 2:00:52 PM
Oh my lord, the pigeon is out of the bag. For the next race I predict Telkom will hire a couple of snipers to save face. Don’t be surprised if Kentucky fried pigeon is served at the next Telkom board meeting. Viva the Winston. How much does Winston charge? I might be interested in his services.

Bokhoring@Vims 9/9/2009 2:01:46 PM
The point is our telecoms do not compare well to many developing countries - both price and speed wise. I think it is a great way of citizen protest

Letstasti 9/9/2009 2:03:01 PM
The cheapest way to send data.
Telkom is ripping us off.No wonder they able
to sponsor events WITH our money and pay
such high salaries that are first world rates
not based on a developing country rate.

Kuiper 9/9/2009 2:03:26 PM
Why always comparing to Telkom. How would Vodacom and MTN perform. If I must guess, not better.

JB 9/9/2009 2:05:19 PM
and the WHOLE of SOUTH AFRICA is LAUGHING at Telkom. Fiber Optic Boo Whoo. World Cup 2010? We will need more Pigeons people!

My-Little-Pony-tail 9/9/2009 2:06:24 PM
Hey WINSTON. When Malema hails you as a hero, do us all a favor…

Stephen 9/9/2009 2:11:41 PM
In order for Telkom or any other provider to have stood a chance, they would need to provide connectivity in excess of 4.3 Mb/s over the entire link.

Mike3 9/9/2009 2:15:00 PM
Craig at 2Gb it would take 2 hours, not that you can get 2Gb over coper wires. We should be more worries about the education system that the telcoms.

GW 9/9/2009 2:16:52 PM
Maybe Nyanda is planning to use his 2 BMW 750s to improve the speed.

lawless 9/9/2009 2:24:32 PM
Makes one wonder what is going to happen during the 2010 Soccer World Cup. 100 Pigeons should should be enough.......

G-Man 9/9/2009 2:28:38 PM
You Go Winston, TELKOM YOU WAKE UP. Stop pocketing so much and give the speed and price to the people!!

Al 9/9/2009 2:37:35 PM
Vims, we keep comparing ourselves to 2st world countries because our leaders often claim that we are at the forefront of any field - until it becomes clear we are lacking. Then they naturally fall back to the "third world" excuse.

Norm 9/9/2009 2:55:12 PM
Face it Telkom produces crap....at least we can recycle Winston's!!

BeenThere 9/9/2009 2:55:48 PM
Well after struggling with Telkom and my ADSL connection for four month now and just getting excuses and work around's I can well believe that Winston may be a better option

Realist 9/9/2009 3:03:17 PM
Whilst Telkom bashing is a fun pastime , WAKEUP !!!
Who sends 4gb files !! plonkers , break it down to cd sizes and you can get them in parallel from US mirror servers in under an hour with the rights tools on a telkom line.

Get a proper ftp/ download manager USD$29.
If you want to you get the job done.

Try winston on that one.

Should fire their IT department

Aag Nee 9/9/2009 3:11:54 PM
I can not believe people are so dum to fall for this. It is a race no telecoms provider in SA can win with a internet connection type product. Do the sums. The Unlimited is take you for a ride and hope to get free ads.

Sturm 9/9/2009 3:15:51 PM
The biggest problem currently is Hellkom monopolizing a public service, over charging, lack of service and ridiculous salaries. We deserve better, especially when we have to pay for it.

Goldfish 9/9/2009 3:17:53 PM
I have found a way of transferring 4 000 000 Gig's of data from Cape Town to Jhb in 20hours. Load 4Gig flash sticks into my station wagon and drive..... mmmm a business opportunity? LOL

Phillip @Kuiper 9/9/2009 3:22:58 PM
MTN 3G up to 3 x faster than Telkom ADSL.

I thinks it is time for Telkom to stop ripping us off.

Mandy 9/9/2009 3:31:33 PM
To the author and most commentators - thanks for the laugh. Nice to see we haven't lost our sense of humour completely.

lol 9/9/2009 3:38:18 PM
lol @ all you telkom bashers, the whole point is actually moot, as the company only wanted exposure, thus would have only done what is neccesary to obtain the results, by decreasing the line speed 386kb vs 4mbps, 2mb vs 4gb. I would have loved to see Telkoms response on this, a 10kb email via pigeon vs 4mbs... think before you post.

Vrye Denker 9/9/2009 3:40:13 PM
Maybe Telkom would win if the transfer were to a remote location like the UAE. But wait! if after 2h30min, they were only at 5%, that means that it would take them 50 hours to complete the transfer, barring any disconnects. in 50 hours, one could put the 4 Gigs on a DVD and send it by airmail. It would still be faster AND cost considerably less. I think it's about US$20(R150) to send a DVD from SA to the UAE, whereas a 4Gig ADSL rental would be three times as much if you're lucky AND ignore the line rental.

Another plus is that carrier pigeon also results in less downtime if you imagine that he was delivering data meant for a public facing website.

rav21 9/9/2009 3:46:13 PM
well done Winston!
boooooooooo Telkom!

Craig 9/9/2009 3:51:08 PM
@Craig
I don't know where you get the figure that 1st world transfer rates are "closer to 2Gb". Hard drive to hard drive copies on most computers are slower than that. Most LANs probably still run at 1Gbps/100Mbps.
See: http://www.chooseisp.co.uk/broadband-guide/comparison/fastest-broadband.html
"Only one broadband provider uses underground fibre optic cables to deliver the fastest broadband in the UK (up to 50Mb)".
Also: http://www.dslreports.com/archive
This link provides ACTUAL speeds... As you'll see, the 5 fastest retail ADSL offers in that report measure around 8Mbps download, and but for 2 exceptions, the fastest upload is around 2Mbps.

Sure faster speeds may be available outside the realm of standard ADSL; but that's a different story.

@Mike3
Other Craig's figure of 2Gb is way off, but so is your maths.
4GBytes = 32Gbits.
32Gbits transferred at 2Gbits per second would take 16 seconds.

My maths was also off, in that 10 hours is actually for 1Mbps. So, using 1st world infrastructure it would be possible to download 4GB at 8Mbps in little more than an hour - provided the source (assuming it's also ADSL) can upload at the same rate.

Andrew 9/9/2009 3:56:16 PM
My friend stays in Scotland and pays 5pounds for a 4mbs line and is cap at 10Gig. Here we pay our arses of and stil get the biggest crap because the p o e p h o l in charge of Telkom and also the P ** p h o l that is so called the minister of Coms just knows buggerhol and knows only how to coms with there loud mouths and buggerhol do aditute

Patrice 9/9/2009 4:04:45 PM
Winstons fan club of cyber geeks are obviously not bright enough to distinguish between apples and pears. Their logic would suggest that an elephant would deliver 4 Gigs faster than a pigeon would. How scary is that ?

Viper 9/9/2009 4:26:07 PM
In all fareness to Telkom, nowhere is the speed of the line stated nor does it say what other traffic is using the line. If you have a 384KB line being used for the download and you have other traffic like surfing and email using this line, what else do you expect.

Anton 9/9/2009 4:26:15 PM
Well done to those behind this brilliant initiative. To me it really highlight Telkom and the Dept of Comm's pathetic attempt to provide SA with bandwidth! Ministers and DGs are getting wealthy on with their side ventures while SA businesses are suffering from their utter incompetence in their appointed roles - Go Winston!

Stockman 9/9/2009 4:29:06 PM
Iburst just as useless, busy changing back to Telkom.

Telkom Wanker 9/9/2009 4:31:13 PM
Telkom rules!!!! I get paid to sit on my fat @ss and eat my cake all day long. Screw the pigeon and a big thank you to all of the suckers in SA we can rip off.

bekkie 9/9/2009 4:31:42 PM
Some thing is fishy here, "26 minute head start, while stretching his wings and waiting for the company data to be downloaded onto the memory card." what PC did the download a ZX16 Spectrum, the servers might have also been slow, I am sure if they had done a peer to peer connection the data download would have won. Some one somewhere is not telling the truth. Telkom is not bad, I have excellent service and great speed. My PC does not take more the 12 minutes to down load 4gig of infor to a flash disk.

1M dl 9/9/2009 4:34:43 PM
Last week I downloaded 4g file and it took 30 mins... of course I'm not in south africa... I'm in EU

Yvonne 9/9/2009 4:35:27 PM
Telkom is useless. End of story. they are sooo outdated. Lived in Japan and Singapore and Thailand for many years. On top of it they are RIPPING US OFF MONEYWISE IN EVERY MANNER FOR THEIR RIDICULOUSLY LOUSY SERVICE. wE ARE PAYING MUCH MORE THAN THE REST OF THE WORLD. THEY NEED HEALTHY HONEST COMPETITION
AS SOON AS POSSIBLE AND IF THEY CANNOT MATCH IT THEY MUST GO !!!

Graeme Selvan 9/9/2009 4:37:46 PM
@ Chatsubo it was a 1 meg line , they stated it on the website. Well it was expected I guess. Even with my 4 meg line to download 4 gigs of data on a cached local server would take around 5 to 6 hours and that is telkoms top speed available pretty scary. Winston you beauty....

Antony Carthy 9/9/2009 4:41:50 PM
This is retarded:
1) This does not follow the correct IPoAC RFC specification which has been around since 1990 http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1149 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers
2) we do not know how far the ADSL data was traveling to get to its destination, it's pointless if its via an overseas link for instance. I can transfer and have transferred more than 4GB in less than that time over ADSL.

I could give 10000 pigeons 100GB of data each to carry and claim that I am now transferring more data than the entire Internet?

This article doesn't prove anything about anything.

AB 9/9/2009 4:54:52 PM
I have a 3Mbps line. However that is the downlink speed. My uplink is only 256K. So while I can download (via a torrent for example) 4GB in about 3-6 hours depending on the conditions at the time (I'm not in South Africa!), the upload would take at least 36 hours.

Ant 9/9/2009 5:00:29 PM
Great publicity stunt - they could always count on Telkom to lose hands-down

khura 9/9/2009 5:09:32 PM
@Ian (1:28:29)

Well mate, you certainly know how to make someone laugh out heartily. i second you on that, let that pigeon undergo gender and species testing, word has it its not one but tests will prove like they did with our golden girl, Caster. anyone seen how stunning she looks when she dresses totally lady-like?

BMW Agent 9/9/2009 5:23:36 PM
Now, if anybody deserves a R1.3M BMW, Winston does...with all the extras the taxpayers can buy!

Relax 9/9/2009 5:28:01 PM
Relax - do not jump to conclusions - the ASDL is only the pipe that transport the data. The result may be that they attached a slow PC to the line. What is the PC used processor speed? How many RAM this PC have? How big is this PC hard drive? Link a slowpoke to any ADSL, line at even 20mbps, the result will be the same.

ayasie 9/9/2009 5:52:18 PM
BY THE WAY. the ISP is NOT Telkom but Internet Solutions ( own capping , own sizing of pipes, own bandwidth). Very easy to just see the worst of Telkom.

Dave 9/9/2009 6:56:48 PM
W came before T.
Wireless Telegraphy
Then,
Wireless Telephony...
Telkom? Dark ages!

Overload 9/9/2009 7:14:33 PM
Next trial: 8GB, one on each leg. A bit of carboloading should do the trick! Fly high, Winston!

USA 9/9/2009 7:36:42 PM
Hey "SO" I live in the USA and I can download a 2gb movie from Amazon in just 5 minutes and start watching it. I have a standard cable internet connection at home

assassin 9/9/2009 8:26:27 PM
You guys are quick to complain but never compliment where it is due!
I'm sure someone must have received good service from Telkom at some stage but did you ever make it public???

..Soon to be ex-Telkom employee

Kevin Williams 9/9/2009 8:36:55 PM
Where are we going. It seems SA's plea for cheaper rates is being ignored by CO's that makes profits to laugh about. Where is the consumer rights movements, where is the mobile telecoms ministers...etc to help us out here or are they getting something under the table to keep quet? Oh now I know it is government that actually benefits A LOT..Telkom still government ????Shame on the ANC...

warra-warra 9/9/2009 8:48:49 PM
I love Winston! I love Winston! I love Winston!...I... love....Winston! The way to go best friend!

bekkie 9/9/2009 9:06:22 PM
Come on give Telkom a break, they are not that bad. We are not in Japan with superfast lines, nor do we have that type of poulation density, would mweb, Neotel or any other service provider have done any better? I do not think so. On an E1 service it would still take 4 hours and 40 minutes to down load that file, does not matter where you are in the world.

EM 9/9/2009 10:31:50 PM
@ADW
did the government not replace the scorpions with the hawks? lol

Joe 9/9/2009 10:46:26 PM
what a slap in the face of turd world Telkom services! They are not just one of the most expensive, but they also SUCK ASS!

Chris in Oz 9/10/2009 12:14:21 AM
And you are surprised? If Winston flew to Cape Town, with an overnight stop in Beaufort West, he would have still beaten Telkom.

Tony 9/10/2009 1:13:03 AM
WE BEEN HAVING IT!!!!

willie 9/10/2009 3:12:19 AM
Well they cant help their best drummers were not available thet day! have a heart.

Neil 9/10/2009 4:52:44 AM
lol... just clicked on the link for the website...

"Bandwidth Limit Exceeded
The server is temporarily unable to service your request due to the site owner reaching his/her bandwidth limit. Please try again later.
Apache/2.0.63 Server at pigeonrace2009.co.za Port 80"

Typical... :)

astreae111 9/10/2009 6:20:08 AM
If this happened in Natal why does the article start with Cape Town? Confusing i'm sure to many I'm sure

@Dylan 9/10/2009 6:48:40 AM
Not the wisest comment I person could ever make.

Frazer 9/10/2009 6:50:14 AM
I never thought I'd ever defend Telkom, but I must say I get pretty good service on my ADSL. I download full HD movies on my AppleTV in about 40 minutes all the time, so maybe it's more a case of the Western Cape being in the Cyber stone age.

Fibre optic cables 9/10/2009 6:50:56 AM
We could never have the same speed as countries such as Japan or South Korea. Their countries are small with high population density. It is cost effective to lay fibre optic cables everywhere, looks ugly but works well. Here in South Korea, I can download 700megs in 1 to 2 minutes, I kid you not.

South Korea 9/10/2009 6:54:39 AM
Here, I am in Busan. I can download 700megs in 1 to 2 minutes. I think they would have made pigeon pie out of useless Winston.

Mike3 9/10/2009 7:36:36 AM
The Unlimited (read Polis Smous) it making a file transfer meaning that the upstream and downstream speed is important. The "A" in ADSL stand for Asynchronous meaning the up and down speed is not the same. ADSL is totally the wrong service to connect between branch offices. There is point to point synchronise services available from various network providers that is more suited to this application. They do not need to use Telkom. Maybe they should replace their IT person with a pigeon. It was a set-up anyway.

Leenesh 9/10/2009 7:50:04 AM
The Unlimited Group need a new IT department. The best alternative those guys came up with was a PIGEON!!!

Mike 9/10/2009 8:42:54 AM
Stupid. I could download 64 gigs onto a high end memory stick and give it to a pigeon to fly for 10 minutes, and no consumer internet connection in the world would beat it.

Mikie 9/10/2009 8:45:57 AM
Stupid. I could download 64 gigs onto a high end memory stick and give it to a pigeon to fly for 10 minutes to a nearby neighbour, and no consumer internet connection in the world would beat it. Its all relative people.

Stu 9/10/2009 8:57:50 AM
I had a PE number steal 4.9 GB of bandwidth from my account (I pay 20c per MB after my cap !!!!) and it took from 12h45 to 22h30 on a Saturday for the thief to download. Obviously Winston could probably fly to another province in that time!

adam 9/10/2009 9:05:54 AM
perhaps it is time government imposes fines for telkom, just as it is planning to do with cellular service networks for shoddy service

Paone 9/10/2009 9:11:31 AM
@ Mike:

There's no excuse for a 4GB download taking over 2 hours just to get to four percent complete. Matter of fact, I don't understand the Winston haters... are there a lot of Telekom workers posting with bruised pride?

glen 9/10/2009 9:18:57 AM
And telkom staff strike for MORE money

glen 9/10/2009 9:22:33 AM
Rather increase the pigeon's pay !!!!!!!

wab 9/10/2009 9:25:02 AM
Not a good piece of reporting..
There are no details of what the ADSL was meant to achieve, even in first world standards. For a data centric business to have 1 gig ADSL package is pretty pathetic.

The distance is totally biased as well; try JHB or Cape Town to Durban next time.

Barry 9/10/2009 9:25:14 AM
This is cheap publicity stunt and as an IT company, they should be ashamed of themselves. Who in his right mind develops a system where it is necessary to transmit 4GB data over an ADSL line (in one go)? Why did they choose 4GB? IF they had chosen 2GB, it would have been a close race and with 1GB (which is an enormous amount of data), the ADSL line would have won. This thing is getting far more publicity than what it is worth (and the IT Co knows this)

Barry
Cape Town

Realist 9/10/2009 9:30:53 AM
Wikipedia say Asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) , this tells about the same Asymmetric issues over the world.

Certainly the wrong tools for the job. You get what you pay for. Exept the free publicity here , One must wonder what the ulterior motives are, seeking freebie from telkom ?

Sue 9/10/2009 9:31:01 AM
Did you see the latest. Telkom claims they can't be blamed for slow broadband! Haha! What a joke. We have the slowest internet in the world because there are incompetent idiots working there. We have applied for and ADSL line 6 months ago. When they finally arrived 3 weeks ago the not so bright technician installed the wrong line! We are still waiting for them to come back and install the right one!!

Richard 9/10/2009 9:31:09 AM
Sadly for SA, Telkom have a monopoly on telecomms infrastructure, so no matter who the service provider is, the speed can never be faster than the capacity of the pipe Telkom have installed between source and destination. And whilst the clowns at the top are only interested in lining their own pockets and maintaining the chips on their shoulders, there is no hope of emerging from the dark ages. Give it a few years, and, knowing that fixed infrastructure in Africa only goes downhill over time, a snail will be able to do the same as Winston.

Nobby 9/10/2009 9:34:21 AM
In the UK we pay £18 (R250)a month for an uncapped 8MB line. It is an essential resource...Telkom & Eskom...kom nie.

Indjun 9/10/2009 9:39:42 AM
Please let the world (CNN) know just how useless our parastatle is, let FIFA know so that the genuises at telkom can wake up

Sue 9/10/2009 9:45:41 AM
P,S. Those of you who say A Bird will beat any line in any country has never lived in another country! Get real! South Korea's lines were faster 8 years ago than it is today in SA!

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