Mastodawn

AI6YR Ben Jul 31, 2025

Someone has figured out how to encode data into bird calls

The Register: Flock storage: Audio boffin encodes data in a starling

"...little bird successfully learned and emulated the sound in the exact same frequency range that he heard it, effectively transferring about 176 kilobytes of uncompressed information."

It's a neat demonstration of what a starling is capable of. "While there are a lot of caveats and limitations there," Jordan went on, "the fact that you could set up a speaker in your yard and conceivably store any amount of data in song birds is crazy."

We asked Jordan if there might be more attempts in the future. "I suppose if I were to try again, I'd use FT8 signals, which are used in amateur radio and designed to transmit data with the imperfections of analog signals.

https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/30/encoded_audio_starling_song/

#hamradio #ft8

Flock storage: Audio boffin encodes data in a starling

: Birdsong stores 176 KB, but can it run Doom?

The Register

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Mitch Effendi (ميتش أفندي)Jul 31, 2025

@ai6yr i am so fascinated by the idea of using SSTV transmit images over mediums that aren't explicitly RF — namely, sound. this is crazy cool and an inspiration.

made me realize that i could embed an explicit SSTV signal (an image) into an OGG that could be played through speakers without making people's ears bleed.

instruct people to download and open an SSTV decoder app, use the phone's built-in noise-cancelling, and decode a hidden image!

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Mitch Effendi (ميتش أفندي)

well, it works, but i think it would take an audio engineer to figure out how to blend the audio in a way that isn't jarring. i tried a bunch with live filters and didn't have much luck on a naive attempt.

here's a copy of an SSTV signal (it's my avatar) in case anyone is up to the task. it is encoded in `Robot 36C VIS 8`. there is a free decoder on f-droid.