Keeping connected
Tech Life
BBC
4.4 • 221 Ratings
🗓️ 16 September 2025
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week we're talking about connectivity. How to keep the internet running when international data cables are damaged by earthquakes or war. And are light beams a solution ?
Also this week: Satellites and AI are being used to count migrating wildebeest in Africa. We hear how tech is challenging long-standing estimates of animal numbers.
Presenter: Shiona McCallum Producer: Tom Quinn
(Image: A photo of many fibre optic cables emitting bright light against a dark background. Credit: Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. |
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| 0:07.2 | You're about to listen to a BBC podcast. |
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| 0:11.5 | So, you might like to know that the BBC makes loads of other podcasts. |
| 0:15.6 | Really? |
| 0:16.4 | Wow. |
| 0:17.2 | Many of them are very funny. |
| 0:19.1 | Which I think means... |
| 0:20.1 | A hatful of ha ha haas. |
| 0:21.7 | And energy! |
| 0:42.4 | Even if we do say so ourselves. I agree 100% to that. Find them all on BBC Sounds. Just tell us a joke. Come on, tell us a joke. Tell us a joke. Come on, tell us a joke. Just search comedy on BBC Sounds. I'm really looking forward to getting stuck in. Hello and welcome to TechLife, the programme about technology and how it shapes the world we live in. |
| 0:47.0 | I'm Shona McCallum. This week, keeping the internet up and running. |
| 0:53.2 | Have you ever thought about what happens to internet cables in the event of a natural disaster or wars? |
| 0:55.4 | We look at the issues of connectivity. |
| 0:59.8 | We also ask, are light beams a solution for carrying data? |
| 1:05.8 | Plus satellites and AI are being used to count migrating wildebeest in the Serengeti. |
| 1:13.6 | The bigger finding here is that we can use this technique to monitor wildlife populations at scale. So I think it's quite exciting that we can now do this for other wildlife populations as well. We hear how tech is |
| 1:19.0 | challenging long-standing estimates of animal numbers. Have you ever wondered how if you send an email from your phone in Nairobi, |
| 1:46.0 | it can arrive in Auckland in a matter of seconds, |
| 1:49.0 | or how you can video chat with someone on the other side of the world almost instantly? |
| 1:54.0 | Well, behind these communications that we take for granted a lot of the time |
... |
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