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Only tangentially related to the article, but where/how do researchers get global coverage SIM cards that you can just put on a stork and expect to get data/cal
by reubenmorais 8y ago
Only tangentially related to the article, but where/how do researchers get global coverage SIM cards that you can just put on a stork and expect to get data/calling wherever it flies? I've looked for this before but only found what seemed like tourist scams with very high prices per MB/minute.
- gwbas1c 8y agoThat's probably what they were paying. They probably used a very efficient protocol to keep bandwidth consumption low.
- akerro 8y agoMaybe worth looking into how Amazon Kindle solved it years ago? They offered free GSM/3G? access to the internet, something like 150MB/monthly, unlimited access to Wikipedia, in so many countries, basically everywhere.
- PMan74 8y agoAnd car companies presumably have global agreements e.g. I can drive my car across Europe and have all the navigation related stuff continue to work. But easier for Amazon or big car company to broker such an agreement. I think the question is how would Joe Public get something like this.
- codetrotter 8y agoHow many of those navigation systems use the internet though? Most consumer grade car navigation systems use offline maps.
- filleokus 8y agoMany of them (at least in cars < 5 years old) that I've used have had some kind of real-time traffic/congestion/construction info built into the system. I guess these use some kind of internet based communication?
- burning_hamster 8y agoRadio, actually: https://www.techwalla.com/articles/how-does-live-traffic-on-gps-work https://www.techwalla.com/articles/how-does-live-traffic-on-...
- PMan74 8y agoI was thinking the same as I typed the comment but my assumption is that there has to be some kind of mobile data because of #1 live traffic updates & #2 map updates. On #1 comment below says this is done by radio RDS On #2 however there has to be a way to update the maps in the car as roads (new roads, closures, lane changes, speed limits, etc.) change. My assumption was that car makers hardly expect people to manually update these maps. And likewise could probably not live with the liability of years old data in the maps. But looks like I may be incorrect here http://updateportal.skoda-auto.com http://updateportal.skoda-auto.com BMW at least have actual SIM cards in the cars so original point stands.
- cr1895 8y ago>I can drive my car across Europe and have all the navigation related stuff continue to work. Well, since a year or two EU-wide free roaming is a thing.
- hardwaresofton 8y agoHere in Japan, an attendant at the local meetup works for a company that does just that: https://soracom.io/en/ https://soracom.io/en/
- timewarrior 8y agoGet GoogleFI - $10/GB worldwide
- xori 8y agoOnly if you live in the US
- krn 8y agoAt least in the EU, AldiTalk offers 4G LTE with plans of up to 5.5 GB for 12.99€ / month[1]. I am not sure, though, what is the price per MB when a stork leaves the EU. [1] https://www.alditalk.de/internet-flat-xl https://www.alditalk.de/internet-flat-xl
- fyfy18 8y agoMost, if not all, EU carriers (I assume including this one, but don’t speak German) have a limit of how long you can actually be outside your home country. After that period they either terminate your contract or withdraw the free EU roaming (which is perfectly legal per the regulations).
- krn 8y ago"Complying countries: in major EU countries like the UK, Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Croatia, Cyprus, Malta and Greece there is a general adoption of the principle without any limitations or FUPs on almost all prepaid plans offered."[1] [1] http://prepaid-data-sim-card.wikia.com/wiki/European_Union#Assessment_and_recommendations http://prepaid-data-sim-card.wikia.com/wiki/European_Union#A...
- jsilence 8y agoYeah, basically you'll have to make the stork sign the form that makes him accept the international roaming charges when leaving EU territory.
- ge0rg 8y agoDon't forget that in some countries, the stork's ID card is required to activate the SIM card before use.
- watt 8y agoThe actual data plan price listed there is 14.99, sorry to say. (2.99€ is for the sim card.)
- lozenge 8y agoYou can get emergency beacon devices for hiking and sailing that also work globally.
- tgb 8y agoDo these use a SIM card? Thought they were satellite. That's what the first thing I googled seemed to agree with too ( https://www.yachtingworld.com/features/epirbs-plbs-and-man-overboard-aids-62213 https://www.yachtingworld.com/features/epirbs-plbs-and-man-o... ).
- isostatic 8y agoYes, wouldn't be good in an emergency when out trekking if it needed a nearby base station!
- gaius 8y agoThey work via satellites e.g. SPOT Gen3 or Garmin InReach.
- wjdp 8y agoThey use a mix of satellite and ground radio (satellite to get the SOS out and a rough location, then radio to actually locate you) See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_locator_beacon https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_locator_beacon There are lots of types that work in different ways however. E.g. For marine use we use VHF radios with digital functionality. There's a big red 'distress' button that will transmit your vessel information and position to the coastguard. That's all done via radio, no satellites. (You then back it up with a very analogue mayday call)
- estsauver 8y agoI believe twilio has a SIM product now. https://www.twilio.com/wireless https://www.twilio.com/wireless
- owenversteeg 8y agoHuh, that seems pretty decent. $2/mo/sim is a bit expensive though. Almost competitive with Worldsim for small amounts of data.
- pjc50 8y agoIdeally you'd get a dedicated M2M MVNO operator who'll sell you a whole stack of them. If you just want one, you'll have to do a lot of price comparison; Three UK have some nice deals where you can use inclusive minutes/data in some non-EU countries as well as the standard EU free roaming.
- reubenmorais 8y agoThanks for the MVNO keyword, it led me to a few interesting offerings I didn't know existed in my local market. I did some price comparisons and found that unless I'm in different countries every month or I have a hard requirement on using the same number globally, it's much, much cheaper to just get a disposable local SIM card every time I travel.
- wpietri 8y agoDoes anybody know of one that doesn't charge a monthly fee? I have a product idea where I'd like to use mobile data as a backup in case of wifi network failure. So I'm willing to pay a higher per-MB fee if I can avoid a monthly per-SIM fee.
- isostatic 8y agoWith global roaming? Maybe something like knowroaming, $8 for a day's unlimited data in 100+ countries. Not much good if you want to use 100kbytes a day, but for your use case it might work https://www.knowroaming.com/order/data-packages/160-global-unlimited-data-package-1-day.html https://www.knowroaming.com/order/data-packages/160-global-u...
- dankohn1 8y agoI use https://www.bnesim.com/ https://www.bnesim.com/ for a SIM card for my 4G hotspot. They charge €19 a GB in 64 countries, including China, Japan, and most of Europe.
- lathiat 8y agoI use FlexiRoam which gives me ~$30/GB that works in almost any country - everyone I’ve travelled to so far. On the same recharge and SIM card. It also sticks onto your existing sim and lets you software switch between your existing sim and the flexiroam. They also have country specific plans which are cheaper for some specific destinations. I’ve not tried those but I’ve gone through about 25GB of data over 2 years of the global plans in probably 10+ countries. Obligatory referral link which gives you 100MB free data. Though worth searching sometimes travel sites have a promo code that’s good for 500MB or more free: http://roam.my/LATHIAT http://roam.my/LATHIAT
- lathiat 8y ago*While some countries have vastly cheaper data. Some do not and also if you go to lots of destinations the “starter park” / SIM card cost can outweigh the cost difference easily. Which is why it easily made sense to me. Also saves you trying to find one at the airport (strangely not always possible) and also gives you coverage when at transit airports (flying from Australia to varios destinations I almost always have a few hours transit somewhere in the middle) If you’re in a country with easily accessible cheaper data for long enough (eg the UK has really cheap travel sims) you could always switch for that trip.
- sandworm101 8y ago>> ~$30/GB Does that include Canada? That is about HALF the advertised rates where I am. The real rates, after all the fees, are inevitably higher. Please send a few storks my way. https://www.telus.com/en/bc/mobility/plans/ https://www.telus.com/en/bc/mobility/plans/
- ReverseCold 8y agoCanada looks like 5GB/25USD.
- sandworm101 8y agobyob in bc. 80$/month for 1gb/month, advertised price.
- tooop 8y agoInteresting, i have never thought that this is a problem as my telco covers calls/sms in 207 countries and data in 174 countries, you just have to have the correct phone plan (there are 3 groups of countries with different price for data starting from 100MB to 1GB for 15 days at 13EUR)
- dzek69 8y agoI thought this is just normal thing, that you can bring your SIM card anywhere and it will just work. Prices are different thing. The device could be optimized to send the data only when connected to a low-cost network, or send just general data at very low frequency when on high-cost network, just to know the device is alive. Also getting a cheap plan on data but expensive on calls should be also possible.
- AnssiH 8y agoAll providers/plans here (Finland) provide near-global non-free roaming. Is it different where you live? My provider lists ~190 roaming countries, not counting satellite/planes/ships, on their roaming rates page: https://elisa.fi/puheliittymat/kaytto-ulkomailla/ https://elisa.fi/puheliittymat/kaytto-ulkomailla/
- reubenmorais 8y ago> Is it different where you live? Yes, generally you have to activate intl roaming ~a week before you travel, by talking to a customer support agent on the phone, and it's limited to specific regions at a time. It's also ridiculously expensive.
- xorcist 8y agoThe previous owner's migratory patterns likely made international roaming non-optional in this case.
- MaxBarraclough 8y agoYour question is a contradiction, no? As you imply, most SIMs will work just about anywhere, they'll just charge you an obscene amount for the privilege. If you want cheap international telephony, there's a whole industry for travel SIMs, but they're often still pretty expensive to use in some countries. The researchers' real mistake was using a contract SIM. Should have used a prepaid one.