President Asks, How Do I GPS Track My Dog?
MOSCOW (Reuters) - President Vladimir Putin said on Monday he was keen to use Russia’s planned global positioning system GLONASS to look after his black Labrador Koni.
"When can I buy hardware to equip my dog with so that she won’t run away too far?" Putin was quoted as asking First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov during a briefing on progress towards developing a competitor to the U.S. GPS system.
Russia is working to expand GLONASS, a system which locates objects on the ground using orbital satellites, and make it available for civilian use. The project is part of the Kremlin’s attempts to boost hi-tech sectors of the Russian economy.
"Producers will be able to offer collars for dogs and cats of commercial users in mid-2008," Itar-Tass news agency quoted Ivanov as replying.
(Writing by Oleg Shchedrov; Editing by Ibon Villelabeitia) … Reuters source article
I’ve had a lot of searches here at the GPS Tracking ROI blog looking for dog tracking information. I’ve done a few articles on systems in the past … but I have to say that in my professional opinion this segment of the market is sadly lacking. here’s a few articles of interest … RoamEO, ProDog, Stealth Pet Tracker. (if you sell or know of a system that really works well, drop me a line and I’ll be glad to highlight it).
I thought this item was unique in three major ways:
First, President Putin asked where he could buy a system for his personal use, rather than ordering his staff to just GPS track his dog. Quite a difference from our US "Imperial Presidency’" that we’ve created, where presidents … of either party … just wish for things and they appear by magic.
Second, I thought it pretty interesting that Putin would be taking a briefing on the specifics of GLONASS. During my years with the GPS program it was a rare event indeed when actual GPS information even when as high as the staff offices of Cabinet members … for the US president to be briefed on something as "mundane" on GPS status would be a pretty rare event.
And lastly, yet again, I’m a bit sad by the level of technical expertise displayed by media folk who are supposed to be covering the technology beat. The referenced article gives the idea that GLONASS is new … it actually "went live" back in the mid-1990’s and was opened to civil use in September 1995 … you have been able to buy joint GPS/GLONASS receivers for at least 10 years now, and many surveyors and researchers who have used GLONASS to augment the accuracy of GPS positioning would be pretty surprised to learn that it’s new.
Must have been a slow news day at Reuters.