27 ms·

Better yet: why aren't they treated as pirates?

by bhickey 3y ago

marcosdumay 3y ago
There's nobody patrolling the oceans.
- blitz_skull 3y ago
  The US Navy would like a word.
  - marcosdumay 3y ago
    You seem to have a serious misconception about either the US Navy or the oceans. There are actually satellites that do it. Over the course of many days. And it's not easy or quick to act on their feedback. Something like a military or police patrol simply can not happen.
    - pc86 3y ago
      I mean it could, but it would be pretty expensive. We know generally where ships go to fish. You watch those areas and get an idea of the various ships, you stage your ships nearby and wait. If you're really keen on being targeted you could follow ships back to port and over time have assets there wait to ID the individuals on the ship. The problem is this would cost millions of dollars and take weeks or months unless you got very lucky. The Navy could do it in their sleep but why would they? Nobody who cares enough about this problem has the means to execute it, and nobody with the means cares.
    - nonameiguess 3y ago
      This isn't true at all. I worked for a long time on the first implementation of the Navy's Maritime Domain Awareness System and my wife currently works for the NRO's Enterprise Collection Orchestration system that auto-tasks orbital surveillance platforms in response to automatically detected global events. Many of the capabilities are classified, but I can assure the US Navy both knows about and has some means to respond quickly (not necessarily by dispatching a manned vessel) to anything bigger than a driftwood log that appears on an Earth ocean. The reason they don't is the Navy is not a law enforcement agency and this is not their mission.
- aziaziazi 3y ago
  Sea shepherd does!
  - kridsdale1 3y ago
    I’m Commander Sea Shepherd, and this is my favorite post on YCombinator.
redblacktree 3y ago
The term would be poachers.
_3u10 3y ago
Because people like eating fish.
- fredoliveira 3y ago
  This might surprise you, but: not at all costs, actually.
  - moffkalast 3y ago
    True, only for a reasonable cost. The kind of prices that responsible and renewable fishing probably can't match.
  - danparsonson 3y ago
    While that may be true in principle, it seems likely to me that price is a very important factor for many or even most people, so much so that they don't look too closely at provenance. Were that not the case then I would expect the market for battery chickens to have dried up by now, for example.
  - aragonite 3y ago
    Unless you live in the Maldives or Iceland: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_seafood_consumption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_seafood_c...
- mistrial9 3y ago
  commercial fishing is subject to an extreme form of "size" competition that is hard to fathom! many documented cases, in many language groups
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

Better yet: why aren't they treated as pirates?

marcosdumay 3y ago

There's nobody patrolling the oceans.

blitz_skull 3y ago
The US Navy would like a word.
- marcosdumay 3y ago
  You seem to have a serious misconception about either the US Navy or the oceans. There are actually satellites that do it. Over the course of many days. And it's not easy or quick to act on their feedback. Something like a military or police patrol simply can not happen.
  - pc86 3y ago
    I mean it could, but it would be pretty expensive. We know generally where ships go to fish. You watch those areas and get an idea of the various ships, you stage your ships nearby and wait. If you're really keen on being targeted you could follow ships back to port and over time have assets there wait to ID the individuals on the ship. The problem is this would cost millions of dollars and take weeks or months unless you got very lucky. The Navy could do it in their sleep but why would they? Nobody who cares enough about this problem has the means to execute it, and nobody with the means cares.
  - nonameiguess 3y ago
    This isn't true at all. I worked for a long time on the first implementation of the Navy's Maritime Domain Awareness System and my wife currently works for the NRO's Enterprise Collection Orchestration system that auto-tasks orbital surveillance platforms in response to automatically detected global events. Many of the capabilities are classified, but I can assure the US Navy both knows about and has some means to respond quickly (not necessarily by dispatching a manned vessel) to anything bigger than a driftwood log that appears on an Earth ocean. The reason they don't is the Navy is not a law enforcement agency and this is not their mission.
aziaziazi 3y ago
Sea shepherd does!
- kridsdale1 3y ago
  I’m Commander Sea Shepherd, and this is my favorite post on YCombinator.

redblacktree 3y ago

The term would be poachers.

_3u10 3y ago

Because people like eating fish.

fredoliveira 3y ago
This might surprise you, but: not at all costs, actually.
- moffkalast 3y ago
  True, only for a reasonable cost. The kind of prices that responsible and renewable fishing probably can't match.
- danparsonson 3y ago
  While that may be true in principle, it seems likely to me that price is a very important factor for many or even most people, so much so that they don't look too closely at provenance. Were that not the case then I would expect the market for battery chickens to have dried up by now, for example.
- aragonite 3y ago
  Unless you live in the Maldives or Iceland: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_seafood_consumption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_seafood_c...
mistrial9 3y ago
commercial fishing is subject to an extreme form of "size" competition that is hard to fathom! many documented cases, in many language groups

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]