Leading the Computer Revolution In a Totalitarian State 75
szczys writes: How do you enter the information age when computers, and the components that go into them, are embargoed by other countries and imports of any value are restricted by your own? This and a myriad of other barriers didn't stop Voja Antonic from building his own computers and teaching others how to do so during the 70s, 80s, 90s, and beyond.
He managed to get a TRS-80 into Yugoslavia by having a friend cut the cables between the two boards and send them separately to avoid getting caught in customs. He bootstrapped his own personal computer and published the plans in the country's first computer magazine. It was built by over 8000 people. Check out these stories and his experience of living in the Eastern Bloc and through the war in '90s, all while continuing to build and promote computers in what is now Serbia.
He managed to get a TRS-80 into Yugoslavia by having a friend cut the cables between the two boards and send them separately to avoid getting caught in customs. He bootstrapped his own personal computer and published the plans in the country's first computer magazine. It was built by over 8000 people. Check out these stories and his experience of living in the Eastern Bloc and through the war in '90s, all while continuing to build and promote computers in what is now Serbia.
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A 1-bit rand function...
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"A 1-bit rand function..."
No, by now that would at least rand(6).
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Sure, now, in the west. But then, particularly in the soviet bloc, it's 1 bit
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Statistics are the new superstition.
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I'm intrigued as to what the inputs to this algorithm were. You know, garbage in = garbage out and all that. Especially given that (I assume this predates genetic tests and ultrasound) things like roundness of the bump or which tit itches most have been proven again and again and again to be utter bollocks.
Also, don't they have neutral colours there?
I really wonder about Russians sometimes, and not just when they have elections.
It was built by over 8000 people. (Score:5, Funny)
Didn't they get in each other's way?
Greatly disappointed (Score:4, Funny)
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Thank you for being a friend... You're a pal and a cosmonaut.
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Ah, that feels better! :-D
My post would have been up much sooner, but /. forced me to wait 5 minutes since I previously posted. That doesn't seem to be a very good way to facilitate conversation. :-?
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Crap, replying to undo accidental downmod.
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This story has been up for several minutes already, and no "First Post!" or "In Soviet Russia, computers build YOU!" comments. Slashdot is really going downhil...
You insensitive clod!
Ever since Natalie Portman spilt her hot grits after being told that Netcraft finally confirmed that /. was dying (as indicated by the new overlords - Dice - no longer wanting the site) we have all been in mourning and unable to formulate the correct meme.
Now get off my lawn as I have to have room to tie this onion to my belt.
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His UID Is higher than yours so I'm disappointed you didn't use "You Must be New Here" on him.
Not Totalitarian (Score:2)
Yugoslavia under Tito was not a totalitarian state. Dictatorship, yes. Keeping the ethnic tensions that later exploded in the 1990's repressed, yes. Totalitarian? No, at least, not by the 1970's.
(And, yes, I did go there and did know people there. It was the sort of place where people could travel abroad and dissidents could get their convictions thrown out on appeal [nytimes.com]. Tito was no Mao.)
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"Totalitarian" is a political fighting word (Score:2)
... to denounce socialist ideas by giving the failed state-socialist states the same name as fascist states, thereby trying to blur the crucial differences between both. The "totalitarian theory" that makes such an equation does not seek knowledge about both concepts, it intends a relativization of facist and, significantly, National Socialist crimes.
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The "totalitarian theory" that makes such an equation does not seek knowledge about both concepts, it intends a relativization of facist and, significantly, National Socialist crimes.
Which is reasonable, because ideology is irrelevant to whether a state is totalitarian or not. But sure, being murdered by a Communist is clearly morally better than being murdered by a Nazi.
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Are you saying that it is morally better to be opposing Stalin than to be a Jew?
Are you saying it would be better for the Moon to be made of red cheese than green cheese? See how dumb non sequitur leading questions sound?
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According to historian Bryan Mark Rigg, an Israeli Army and U.S. Marine Corps veteran, up to 160,000 soldiers who were one-quarter, one-half, and even fully Jewish served in the German armed forces during World War II. This included several generals, admirals, and at least one field marshal, Erhard Milch.
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You're confusing "totalitarian" with "authoritarian". Authoritarianism is the lack of limits on state power. Totalitarianism is when the state actually uses that lack of limits to institute a pervasive, total control of the populace in all aspects of their lives. Remember that the word was actually used in its proper meaning in a positive sense by the very people that we recognize as the first conscious totalitarians today: Italian fascists. Mussolini defined it as "everything within the state, nothing outs
Re:Not Totalitarian (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Not Totalitarian (Score:5, Informative)
I came here because I was surprised by the term "totalitarian" used to describe Yugoslavia. I'm glad to see that others who knew the country have already started to debunk the sensationalist (but mainly very ignorant) "journalism".
While I didn't live there, I had it's passport, and travelled there often for holidays and to visit family. While Tito did imprison some opponents, it seems to have been mainly would-be nationalist leaders. We all saw what happened when they and their ideas were left loose. (Which also shows that imprisoning people with dangerous ideas is usually not a good long-term solution).
But Yugoslavia definitely didn't feel like a totalitarian regime. Tito helped to free his country from the Nazis, and then a couple of years later freed it from the Soviet influence. Finally, he was among the founders of the Non-Aligned Countries Movement [wikipedia.org]. Unlike the US, Yugoslavia didn't order or help any killing of elected leaders in other countries, nor did it support fascist military regimes in other continents.
False History (Score:5, Informative)
Yugoslavia was neither, as someone already corrected, totalitarian, the way the Soviet Union or other East Bloc state-socialist nations might have been called, nor even, for that matter, member of the East Bloc at all. Yugoslavia was a non-aligned country, and not just any of them, but one of the five founders of the Non-Aligned Movement of states (NAM).
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Yup.
The best definition, according to the Kirkpatrick Doctrine, is that Yugoslavia was an Authoritarian State. Not everything was under Government control; there was a lot of small-c capitalism. Although when the Government chose to meddle, it could do so with little consequence. This was mentioned in relation to the confiscation of CB Radios, but not Ham Radios. (One aspect not mentioned- CB'ers had developed the reputation of being Assholes by then- Worldwide. And they still are.)
During the mid-Eightie
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Correct, I remember it was also a great proxy country if you wanted to sell cars, computers etc into the actual Soviet bloc. One of my first jobs actually involved transporting cars from France and Belgium to "dealers" in Zagreb during the Yugoslav War. It involved bribes at the Austrian border to get past miles of border traffic and past checkpoints.
High tech USSR (Score:2)
Did you know that a .su top level domain existed? I learned that recently. That's right, Soviet Russia on the Internet! Didn't last any long at all.
I wonder what would have happened if they had the time to develop 486-level chips for microcomputers. Pseudo-communists with a space station, space shuttle and same consumer high tech as the capitalist pigs.
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Unfortunately, sudo.su, superuser.su and root.su are all taken. Any other ideas?
Tales of Customs (Score:2)
Reminds me of the story of Richard Garriott's Sputnik 1. It's an actual spare probe prepared by the Soviets in the 1950's as a backup.
When Russia was having a hard time transitioning away from Soviet rule in the 90's, Soviet space stuff was being auctioned for ridiculously low prices.
Richard snapped up the spare Sputnik for a bargain, and disassembled it to get it past customs. His team unscrewed
I did my first coding in California (Score:2)
I even know people who have done IT in Massachusetts.
Totalitarian? (Score:1)