History Main / InstantMessengerPigeon

* Several messenger pigeons were carried across the English Channel during the D-Day invasion. After one officer landed on the beach and let his birds go (they all carried duplicate messages), most of them flew in the wrong direction -- inland. He cursed them for traitors, but they ignored him.

** There is no excuse in ''Dark Dawn'' for Isaac to be sending Kraden's own pigeon back to him, after Kraden sent it to Goma Plateau with a message for Isaac, especially since Kraden was traveling at the time. Presumably [[AWizardDidIt an Adept did it]].

* In ''TheGreatRace'' reporter Maggie DuBois uses homing pigeons to deliver her stories to the newspaper sponsoring the race. The pigeons return directly to the newspaper building, not their dovecots.
* ''TopSecret''. The traitor [[spoiler:Nigel]] uses homing pigeons to send messages to the East German government.

As useful as pigeon post proved during the siege of Paris in the Franco-Prussian War, this method of communication possessed some considerable drawbacks: the homing pigeons' capacity to reliably deliver messages was entirely dependent upon their ability to locate their nest and mate. Thus, the pigeons had to first be transported from their nesting location to the senders' location, and once released, the bird would fly straight to its home and not budge thereafter; for mutual conversation, both parties needed either several pigeons nested in the other's location or some means of retrieving them after sending a message. (Though sometimes a pigeon could be trained to go back and forth between two locations, one counting as "home" and the other being a major food source) Homing pigeons were also prone to getting lost or eaten by predators during particularly difficult journeys, which necessitated sending the same message with several pigeons, some or all of which could fall into the hands of a third party. Indeed, the Germans even trained falcons to do specifically this during the aforementioned siege.

* ''[[RealmOfTheElderlings The Rain Wilds Chronicles]]'' has a framing story told via letters between two pigeon handlers. No, the one way trip thing does not come up somehow.
** Actually, this one was handled pretty well. The pigeons are used by a pair of interdependent cities to communicate, and are sent to various coops by boat. The pigeon handlers get reprimanded at one point for using such an expensive system for personal letters, and important letters are sent with several pigeons.

* The {{Tintin}} adventure ''The Blue Lotus'' showed the villain Mitsuhirato receiving and sending messages by carrier pigeon.

* Well averted in Stephen Donaldson's novel,"The Mirror of her Dreams", wherein Terisa Morgan, the protagonist from Earth, desperately lectures her Fantasy World interrogator on the limitations of Earth carrier pigeons (one-way communication, not two-way); he's never heard of them and suspects her of using pigeons to pass messages, even though SHE alerted HIM to the method. Unfortunately, the only person around who could corroborate this is the Big Bad (who did, indeed, get the idea and the pigeons from Earth, but is unlikely to speak up for her).

* Parodied in ''TheMonkees'' episode "Monkee See, Monkee Die". The boys are fogged in a haunted mansion and talk about using a carrier pigeon to get a message out, and one conveniently lands on the windowsill. The note on it's leg says "please don't attach notes to my leg, I am not a carrier pigeon."

* One caller to [[GrandTheftAuto Chatterbox]] who is the head of an organization trying to get people to stop using phones, says that the group has had to resort to carrier pigeons, who keep disappearing. Later on a redneck calls in saying that pigeons make a good meal, and sometimes they "come with notes attached, just like a fortune cookie with wings."

* Truth in Television, at least in South Africa. [[http://www.news24.com/Content/SciTech/News/1132/1bc8b09e39b043928317dc769d4196e4/09-09-2009-12-23/Pigeon_beats_Telkom According to this article,]] a carrier pigeon beat the main internet provider in delivering 4 GB of data.

* The new BBC ''Series/RobinHood'', not normally noted for realism, got carrier pigeons pretty much right in the episode "Lardner's Ring". The fact that a given pigeon always flies to one destination is clearly explained (as is the fact that the destination is the pigeon's nest and mate, leading one of the characters to produce a soppy metaphor about True Love in a later episode), and the villains try to bring the pigeon down with arrows and a hunting hawk. (The natural hazards are somewhat underplayed, however: it's more or less implied that once the pigeon is out of range of the villains, it's home free.)

* The Internet Engineering Task Force often publishes [[TheParody spoof]] standards documents on April Fool's Day. One of these was "[[http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1149 A Standard for the Transmission of IP Datagrams on Avian Carriers]]", ie, a document proposing a standardized way to send Internet traffic via carrier pigeon. In 2001, a group in Norway [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers#Real-life_implementation tried it out]] and determined that it had severe problems with latency and packet loss.

* Parodied in ''TheMonkees'' episode "Monkee See, Monkee Die". The boys are fogged in on an island and talk about using a carrier pigeon, and one conveniently lands on the windowsill. The note on it's leg says "lease don't attach notes to my leg, I am not a carrier pigeon."

This trope gets is name from the concept of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant_messaging_&_messengers Instant Messaging]] in computing. Considering that you don't even need a computer to work an InstantMessengerPigeon, it's no wonder the MedievalStasis is still in effect. For another example of animals not quite working that way, see AutomatonHorses.

* Played straight in ''LastExile'', when a messenger pigeon finds Sophia ''aboard a friggin' airship''. Fair enough, pigeon post was occasionally used to deliver messages to ships in nearby waters and other mobile destinations, but [[LORd this troper]] would have appreciated it if the pigeon had been looking for the dovecote instead of, you know, ''Sophia''.

** If the mole had the pigeons, could Conan have stolen the pigeon ''he'' used from the mole? In that case, Conan's pigeon would be homed in on the same place as the original one.

[[folder:Films -- Live Action]]

** I always thought it was sped-up fox noises to fit the sped-up running fox scene.

* Well averted in Stephen Donaldson's novel,"The Mirror of her Dreams," wherein Terisa Morgan, the protagonist from Earth, desperately lectures her Fantasy World interrogator on the limitations of Earth carrier pigeons (one-way communication, not two-way); he's never heard of them and suspects her of using pigeons to pass messages, even though SHE alerted HIM to the method. Unfortunately, the only person around who could corroborate this is the Big Bad (who did, indeed, get the idea and the pigeons from Earth, but is unlikely to speak up for her.)
* [[RealmOfTheElderlings The Rain Wilds Chronicles]] has a framing story told via letters between two pigeon handlers. No, the one way trip thing does not come up somehow.

[[folder:Live Action TV]]

[[folder:Live Action TV]]

* ''TalesOfTheQuestor'' averts it twice. The first time, the bird gets eaten by a hawk, the second time, a bird refuses to go out into cold weather.

As useful as pigeon post proved during the siege of Paris in the Franco-Prussian War, this method of communication possessed some considerable drawbacks: the homing pigeons' capacity to reliably deliver messages was entirely dependent upon their ability to locate their nest and mate. Thus, the pigeons had to first be transported from their nesting location to the senders' location, and once released, the bird would fly straight to its home and not budge thereafter; for mutual conversation, both parties needed either several pigeons nested in the other's location or some means of retrieving them after sending a message. Homing pigeons were also prone to getting lost or eaten by predators during particularly difficult journeys, which necessitated sending the same message with several pigeons, some or all of which could fall into the hands of a third party. Indeed, the Germans even trained falcons to do specifically this during the aforementioned siege.

* Spoofed in [[http://www.explosm.net/db/files/Comics/Rob/messengerpigeonnew.png this]] ''Cyanide and Happiness'' comic.

* ''{{Cyanide and Happiness}}'' shows [[http://www.explosm.net/comics/1391/ how]] to do the "instant" version.

* Played with in ''{{Blackadder}} the Fourth''. Blackadder kills a messanger pigeon and eats it to remove any evidence of recieving suicidal orders, in order to have a plausable explanation for not following them. Unfortunately for him, General Melchett is personally familiar with the pigeon, and is able to recognise its remaining feather. It's also noted that shooting messanger pigeons is made a capitol offense due to the number of orders not getting through.

* ''Genesis LPMud'', as a fantasy RPG, could get away with InstantMessengerPigeons. And then Instant Messenger Spiders were implemented for the Drow to send quick communications underground. And then the goblinoids got Instant Messenger Slave Children. Like the pigeons and spiders, the slave children could optionally be killed and eaten by the message recipient.

* The [[RealmOfTheElderlings ''Rain Wilds Chronicles'']] has a framing story told via letters between two pigeon handlers. No, the one way trip thing does not come up somehow.

* Lampshaded in ''{{Blackadder}} the Fourth''. Blackadder is hungry and shoots a passing messenger pigeon under the assumption that if the army can kill a few thousand men a day surely they won't mind a dead pigeon. The pigeon is bearing the news that, because of communications problems, the shooting of messenger pigeons is now a court-martial offense. To make matters worse, this particular pigeon, called "Speckled Jim", is General Melchett's prized pet. Oh, and Melchett presides over the court-martial.
** He didn't shoot it because he was hungry, he shot it because he was pissed off (because they'd found a way to get orders to him) and then ate it to hide the evidence.