<story><title>Teenager invented a low-cost tool to spot elephant poachers</title><url>https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/this-teenager-invented-a-low-cost-tool-to-spot-elephant-poachers-in-real-time-180980522/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ajsnigrutin</author><text>But it was a teenage girl who &amp;quot;solved&amp;quot; something you engineers couldn&amp;#x27;t, so take that!&lt;p&gt;I always found it funny, how journalists manage to take something a kid did, without knowing the specifics, and inflate the story, just because a kid did it.&lt;p&gt;Even if it&amp;#x27;s useless in real world, and the people working on that professionally, could already tell you that...&lt;p&gt;Sometimes it&amp;#x27;s even a direct scam: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=otjvUz7qKXc&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=otjvUz7qKXc&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>Avalaxy</author><text>So it doesn&amp;#x27;t detect poachers, it detects humans. And it requires drones flying non-stop over gigantic masses of land.&lt;p&gt;Edit: having dabbled in this field myself during my studies, I know from research that one of the biggest problems is simply corruption among rangers. It doesn&amp;#x27;t really matter if you can spot a poacher if a whole group of rangers will decide to not do anything about it (because for them the financial incentive of doing nothing can be HUGE). Of course the corruption problem stems from very low incomes and poor living conditions in those countries. If your monthly income is $100, it&amp;#x27;s quite tempting to accept a $10.000 bribe.&lt;p&gt;Edit 2: I worked on this: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.hackthepoacher.com&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.hackthepoacher.com&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;. We tried it with cell phone detection.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>raman325</author><text>Wow, have a little heart why don&amp;#x27;t you. Sure, this isn&amp;#x27;t going to revolutionize anti-poaching, but it shows two things:&lt;p&gt;1. Teenagers can build cool things too! We need more kids interested in STEM and females are underrepresented, so these &amp;quot;puff&amp;quot; pieces are great inspiration for the next kid who happens to come across it.&lt;p&gt;2. All that was needed for her solution was a cheap FLIR camera connected to an iPhone 6, meaning you don&amp;#x27;t have to be rich&amp;#x2F;VC funded to experiment with hardware solutions.&lt;p&gt;This is Smithsonian Magazine, not the Wall Street Journal. I say bring on more stories like this!</text></comment>
<story><title>Teenager invented a low-cost tool to spot elephant poachers</title><url>https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/this-teenager-invented-a-low-cost-tool-to-spot-elephant-poachers-in-real-time-180980522/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ajsnigrutin</author><text>But it was a teenage girl who &amp;quot;solved&amp;quot; something you engineers couldn&amp;#x27;t, so take that!&lt;p&gt;I always found it funny, how journalists manage to take something a kid did, without knowing the specifics, and inflate the story, just because a kid did it.&lt;p&gt;Even if it&amp;#x27;s useless in real world, and the people working on that professionally, could already tell you that...&lt;p&gt;Sometimes it&amp;#x27;s even a direct scam: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=otjvUz7qKXc&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=otjvUz7qKXc&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>Avalaxy</author><text>So it doesn&amp;#x27;t detect poachers, it detects humans. And it requires drones flying non-stop over gigantic masses of land.&lt;p&gt;Edit: having dabbled in this field myself during my studies, I know from research that one of the biggest problems is simply corruption among rangers. It doesn&amp;#x27;t really matter if you can spot a poacher if a whole group of rangers will decide to not do anything about it (because for them the financial incentive of doing nothing can be HUGE). Of course the corruption problem stems from very low incomes and poor living conditions in those countries. If your monthly income is $100, it&amp;#x27;s quite tempting to accept a $10.000 bribe.&lt;p&gt;Edit 2: I worked on this: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.hackthepoacher.com&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.hackthepoacher.com&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;. We tried it with cell phone detection.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>kzrdude</author><text>At the same time, I think it&amp;#x27;s ok if news stories are not about only world-changing stuff. It can be about “mundane” stories of “this young person did something” too. We can read the story and give it space on the page, even if someone else is already doing the same thing better (?)</text></comment>