A pigeon network at the scanner
A sheet is unrolled from a pigeon’s leg and fed into a scanner. A person corrects OCR errors, including trouble recognizing F, before the computer accepts a valid packet. On April 28, 2001, Norway’s BLUG carried printed Internet data by pigeon and read it back in.
From April Fools to a catalogue
The blueprint was RFC 1149, an April Fools’ document from 1990. It dressed bird-borne IP delivery in technical language and explicitly called itself experimental, not a recommended standard. A Christie’s catalogue entry describes a printout as a packet carried during that experiment.
What nine and four count
The published ping log records nine packets transmitted and four received. Those figures do not count surviving pigeons.
V’s view
V’s view. The delight is seeing the Internet briefly become something you can hold. Characters pass through a printer, a bird’s leg and a scanner. Unfold one packet and wings and human hands come into view.
Scope: We compared the RFC with the organizers’ report and log. The lot description is Christie’s account; we have not independently authenticated the object.