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The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

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Re: The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

#51

Post by Koshkin »

keiferski wrote: post #20
vidarh wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of my pet theories is that economic growth is surprisingly poorly correlated to economic or social systems except for one thing: Stability. Bring stability, and people learn the mechanisms that works for their society, and overcome surprisingly large differences in type of obstacles. Be it dealing with the vagaries of the free market, or how to maneuver a Soviet-style bureaucracy. It's in fact almost depressing h…

“In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder and bloodshed but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love; they had five hundred years of democracy and peace and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.” - Orson Welles, The Third Man, 1949 Ancient Greece was also exceptionally politically unstable and yet produced the fou…

> The cuckoo clock.

At least that's something I could hang on my wall.

Re: The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

#52

Post by wcarss »

mantas wrote: post #28
Koshkin wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Soviet bureaucracy wanted to transform Quite the opposite: soviet bureaucracy didn't want to transform anything, they were more concerned with maintaining the status quo for as long as they could. This is why the system turned out to be too rigid to withstand the pressures of the modern world. On the other hand, think about how much the planned economy would benefit from the wide-spread automation and access to mod…

What would planned economy do with hands not needed anymore? :) Even with totally unproductive economy, USSR had lots and lots of bullshit jobs just to keep people employed. What would USSR do with tons of unemployed people? Create fake jobs? Or what... let people find out what they'd like to do and let them start private initiatives?!?

Self-directed initiatives need not be private -- that isn't some kind of big gotcha there, see for example: all open source work.

Re: The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

#53

Post by ben509 »

ZinniaZirconium wrote: post #45
nradov wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We had other protocols. TCP/IP won exactly because it was technically superior. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protocol_Wars

Is IPv6 winning yet??

It's hit 35%, and has broken 40% in many countries: https://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/statistics.html

IPv4 will probably never go away because it's a better choice for private networks.

Re: The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

#54

Post by xxpor »

gen220 wrote: post #14
ZinniaZirconium wrote: post #4

It would have been so cool if the USSR had its own internet and shared it with China and China were still running it now because wouldn't it be great to stop hearing about how people think firewalling the entire Chinese IP space will keep hackers out. Also a parallel internet built on something other than TCP/IP would promote competition to see which internet design is technically superior. But realistically nobody w…

Poetically, this universe you've created reminds me of the story of the Berlin metro during the Cold War. Prior to the division of the city, the metro system spanned the whole city, and was rebuilt to functioning capacity in the aftermath of WW II. Once it became necessary to construct a controlled border between the NATO and Soviet sectors, they eventually erected barriers on the tracks; creating two disconnected tr…

Were the armed guards there to keep the western trains from stopping or for keeping easterners from escaping via the tunnels?

Re: The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

#55

Post by influx »

cambalache wrote: post #19
wwwwewwww wrote: post #13

"Red Plenty" is a "historical fiction" novel that is an easy read and deals with this subject. Glushkov is the main character.

It's extremely anti-soviet, almost propagandistically so. It wouldnt be out of place as a work made at the request of Voice of America, although the author is an Englishman.

Shocking that a regime in which, "the communist leaders of the Soviet Union were responsible for no fewer than 15 million deaths." could be painted in a bad light. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_killings_under_communist_...

Re: The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

#56

Post by [deleted] »

xxpor wrote: post #54
gen220 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Poetically, this universe you've created reminds me of the story of the Berlin metro during the Cold War. Prior to the division of the city, the metro system spanned the whole city, and was rebuilt to functioning capacity in the aftermath of WW II. Once it became necessary to construct a controlled border between the NATO and Soviet sectors, they eventually erected barriers on the tracks; creating two disconnected tr…

Were the armed guards there to keep the western trains from stopping or for keeping easterners from escaping via the tunnels?

[deleted]

Re: The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

#57

Post by xxpor »

ZinniaZirconium wrote: post #45
nradov wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We had other protocols. TCP/IP won exactly because it was technically superior. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protocol_Wars

Is IPv6 winning yet??

Depends what you're looking at, on mobile it absolutely is. Not sure what the situation around the world is but in the US pretty much all LTE connectivity is via v6. T-Mobile at least doesn't even dual stack, if you need to go somewhere that's v4 only they do NAT64

Re: The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

#58

Post by tropdrop »

cambalache wrote: post #50
WC3w6pXxgGd wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Should the novel be pro-soviet?

So are those the only 2 options? Why the fondness for a dichotomy? Sign of the times I guess. To expand my comment, the problem is not that it criticizes the soviet regime, that is OK and even needed.The big problem is the total lack of nuance which robs the work of any artistic value. When you read non-fiction and fiction soviet authors (Chekhov, Dostoevski, Grossmann, Zhukov, Bulgakov) there is always criticism of…

It sounds like Spufford fails to see the Soviet citizens as real humans.

For an example how to not do that, all one must do is read any of the authors you mention (or Tolstoy, Chukovskaya, Gogol...) Tolstoy in particular has a knack for painting the interior psychological worlds of his characters fluidly and from a place of deep empathy.

Re: The Soviet web: the tale of how the USSR almost invented the internet (2017)

#59

Post by ulzeraj »

Koshkin wrote: post #38
mantas wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would planned economy do with hands not needed anymore? :) Even with totally unproductive economy, USSR had lots and lots of bullshit jobs just to keep people employed. What would USSR do with tons of unemployed people? Create fake jobs? Or what... let people find out what they'd like to do and let them start private initiatives?!?

No problem there: an efficient planned economy would have no trouble whatsoever also planning for bullshit jobs, efficiently. Incidentally, does not look like bullshit jobs were specific to the USSR, they are indeed everywhere .

I fail to see how magic advanced computer power would solve the problem of economic calculation in the socialist commonwealth. Without prices there is no efficient distribution of resources.
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