Bit of an upset in the UK recently, when a bomb detecting device being sold by a British company to a variety of countries was revealed to be useless. The director of the company selling the device was arrested for misrepresentation and exports of the device were banned. And guess who had already bought a shitload of these over-priced toys? Yep, Thailand.
The Thai government have now tested the device, known as the GT200, and have confirmed that it does not work. The Thai army, who laid out the cash for the devices and has been using them in the South of Thailand, disagree and insists that the GT200 works well. So they called a press conference to make their case.
Preparations for the conference went something like this:
Well, Private Somchai, we need to persuade the Thai public that these GT200s work and are a good deal.
Yes Sir! Could be a bit difficult though sir.
Nonsense! Our first argument will be that they have saved lives and are very effective. The UK government says they don’t work, the Thai government says they don’t work; but they don’t wave them around every day like we do. We will say they have saved 7,000 lives; that’s an impressive number.
Very good sir. But the value for money aspect may be a little difficult. A UK scientist says the device is basically a box with a car aerial attached to it.
Ah yes, but I bet the box is stuffed full of complex electronics.
It’s an empty plastic box sir.
What about the different cards you insert to detect different substances? I bet they are really advanced.
Mainly cardboard sir, with a circuit of the type that is used to stop people nicking stuff from shops. It is estimated that entire device costs less than 1,000 baht to construct. How much did we pay for them sir?
More than one million baht.
Well, we bought about 800 units, so that is just a little bit more than 1,000 baht a unit. We got a pretty good deal thanks to our transparent and effective procurement procedures designed to obtain technically acceptable goods at the lowest price. Do you like they way I said that sir? I have learned to say “our transparent and effective procurement procedures designed to obtain technically acceptable goods at the lowest price” without laughing.
Yes Somchai, very droll; but the one million baht cost is per unit. We have spent more than 800 million baht on these pieces of crap. There must be a way we can make them seem more high tech and complex.
I think I have a solution sir!
Do tell Somchai, and it better be good; not like that rubbish you came up with about those refugees who paddled themselves out to sea with no food and water, “for a bet”.
Well sir, my cousin plays a lot of computer games, and he has a souped-up graphics card so he can play “Ninja Giraffe Heroes” at full resolution. The graphics card looks really complex. So we use a photo of all the circuitry to illustrate the complexity of the device.
So we show people a photo of a computer graphics card board and pretend it is the non-existent circuitry of the bomb detector?
Yes!
They will never believe that!
Ah, but here is the good bit sir. The graphics card is called the Nvidia GT200! It’s got the same name!! We just stick up a photo of the GT200 graphics card and everyone will accept that it is somehow a component of the GT200 detector.
Somchai, you are a genius; that just might work!
And so a man in a uniform stood in front of the Thai press yesterday and extolled the virtues of the GT200 bomb detector, whilst a photo of the Nvidia GT200 graphics card was displayed in the background.
Read that last sentence again. They really did that…
Watch the video here:
Just as well the device wasn’t called a Tantalizing Torpedo.
Comments 🔗
2010-02-19| Billy saysI had thought of running a piece on this shenanigans a little while ago but was too embarrassed as the CEO of the British Company involved is from ……. wait for it …… Liverpool … clearly having received all his technical training at Paddy’s market where they specialise in empty boxes with aerials sticking out ….
2010-02-19| Lloyd saysTruly unbelievable, if this is the level of intelligence in the upper levels of the Thai army it doesn’t bode well for Thailand.
2010-02-19| Spike saysDon’t worry; once the Navy get their submarine we will all be a lot safer.
2010-02-19| Jock saysThat’ll be a YELLOW SUBMARINE …. no doubt from Liverpool .. Boom Boom …
2010-02-19| jon sutton saysThe Nvidia GT200 card uses 250 watts apparently, operaors will need their Weetabix to operate that with their own static electricity/magnetic field/aura or whatever else is supposed to power this magical box of tricks!!
2010-02-20| Spike saysThe TV report from the UK that exposed the device as a fraud: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQMwXo1SSVo
2010-02-21| Camberley saysI thought this was a joke until I saw the video.
2010-02-24| Presentation Briefing says[…] NVIDIA GT200. For those of you do not know what NVIDIA GT200 is, NVIDIA GT200 is a graphics card used in computer–decent for game-playing, NOT recommended for detecting bombs. In fact, this graphics card is not even inside the GT200 bomb detecting device. NVIDIA GT200 and GT200 bomb detector are two completely different things. Yet, somehow the image of the rather complicated looking renderings of the graphics card found its place in the slides the military used to explain the magic inside the bomb detector. (source) […]
2011-02-14| Dubious D saysSee latest BBC Newsnight investigation here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxArxIgB9oA&feature=player_embedded
Thailand watch out for the HEDD1 (Hasn’t Even Detected DooDoo Once) from Unival…!!
2011-02-14| Spike saysThanks, interesting. No doubt the Thai military are still buying them.