The world’s moving onto the web, all right:
Ottowa: Scientists will soon start attaching microchips to fish and other marine animals to track their movements around the world’s oceans and learn how they are being affected by phenomena such as climate change and overfishing, experts said on Monday.
Canada’s Ocean Tracking Network, has gotten a hefty grant to build an ocean-based network of life-based mobile data gatherers. It’s an ambitious project — tag a whole slew of marine beasties, drop sensors in the ocean, see where they go, watch this change over time, and use this data to make arguments for policy and as a basis for further scientific research.
The Tagging of Pacific Pelegiacs project has had something like this going for a while now; their Near Real-Time Animal Tracks covers several animal species over a wide range of Pacific Ocean locations. What seems noteworthy about the OCT is their desire (and now mandate) to extend this technology worldwide, with an expressly political aim. Exciting.