Imagine this: A robber goes into a bank with a gun and threatens to kill anyone who moves. He tries to flee after grabbing the money. While the robber is scurrying out the door, however, a net drops from the ceiling and the robber is wrapped up like a dumpling.
Similar scenarios have already appeared in comic books and movies, but up until now that is where they have stayed.
But Hsieh Kuo-cheng (謝國楨), who owns a security firm in Taichung, was able to turn this seemingly fantastic idea into reality. He is now known as the inventor of the net-trapping device, also known as (tienlotiwang, 天羅地網) in Chinese, which became a US patented product in 2001.
PHOTO: CHANG HSIEH-SHENG, TAIPEI TIMES
The device also came to the attention of the Annals of Improbable Research magazine, the organizer of the annual Ig Nobel Prize. The magazine eventually decided to recognize Hsieh as this year's Ig Nobel Prize winner in economics.
The list of this year's award winners was released at a ceremony held in Boston last month. Hsieh, however, could not attend the event because the committee was unable to find him in time for the awards.
"Somebody suggested to us the possibility that maybe the poor man was trapped inside his own machine," magazine editor Marc Abraham said at the ceremony.
The mysterious Hsieh eventually appeared after the story of his Ig Nobel Prize was published in local Chinese-language daily newspapers.
The 56-year-old Hsieh said in an interview with the Taipei Times that the creation was inspired neither by comic books nor novels. As a former commander of an amphibian frogman unit in Kinmen, Hsieh said they used to set up traps similar to the device to capture Chinese spies swimming to the island to engage in espionage work.
Hsieh established a security firm in Taichung after he was discharged. He was the bodyguard of former premier Hau Pei-tsun (郝柏村) when Hau ran as an independent presidential candidate in 1996.
Eight years ago, Hsieh began to research the possibility of creating an automatic system that would capture robbers and thieves using a big net. Not knowing if it would be feasible, he sought the assistance of scientists in both Taiwan and China and spent more than NT$20 million (US$617,000) on the project.
"The whole world was against it [the project], including my wife," he said.
"Money was not really an issue to me," he said. "All I know is that crime rates are rising everywhere, and the device, once created, can be sold around the globe."
The device was eventually created and has proven to be workable after two years of testing in Shanghai.
Hsieh said that the device will be installed above the entrance to banks.
When a robbery occurs, the bank staff can press a button on a remote control to activate the system. The system will lock onto and trace the robbers, unleashing a net from above when he or she gets close to the entrance.
He said the device is also equipped with a high-speed lifting motor, which will allow a rope to quickly tie up the robber and suspend him above the ground with his body upside down.
Hsieh noted that the device has not been installed anywhere, as it is yet to be mass produced.
Dan Bloom, the Ig Nobel Prize representative in Taiwan, said he thought Hsieh was chosen because his invention was so unfathomable that the committee wanted to know why he was willing to go through the trouble of creating the system.
"The concept [of a net-trapping device] just blew them away," Bloom said.
Bloom said that organizers will invite Hsieh to Boston next year to be officially recognized.
You can view a video demonstration of the system by going to webcf.info/ and clicking play on the video insert.
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not