[ih] How the Soviet Union Sent Its First Man to the Internet in 1982

[Brian E Carpenter]

What does this statement in the full story mean?

> This is why a top level “.su” domain (for Soviet Union) still remains on the domain market today, despite ICANN’s requests to delete it.

As every fule know, su is "Exceptionally reserved" in IS3166, the same status as uk.
Its ownership is presumably a national matter for Russia, as the main successor state of
the USSR.

That said, the story is interesting. It wasn't actually the Internet, but never mind.

I recall a visit in 1981 to the high-energy physics lab normally known as 'Serpukhov'
(Серпухов) but actually located at Protvino (Протвино́). They had a bunch of knock-off
PDP-11s (made in Czechoslovakia, I think) and were very interested in the idea
of networking them together somehow. They would have had to build all the equipment
themselves. Their 'mainframe' was a BESM-6, which looked like something from the late
1950s but was actually a knock-off Ferranti Atlas. There was certainly no modem in the
place, and no photocopier either. Also no knives in the cafeteria; you had to bring
your own.

Regards
   Brian Carpenter

On 30/12/2015 11:24, Joly MacFie wrote:
> https://globalvoices.org/2015/12/29/how-the-soviet-union-sent-its-first-man-to-the-internet-in-1982/
> 
> (excerpt)
> 
> The terminal used by Klyosov to join the conference was a Soviet ES-EVM
> computer <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ES_EVM>(designed from blueprints
> stolen from IBM). It was connected to the only modem supposed to officially
> exist in all of the USSR: an antediluvian 360 baud/s device. In comparison,
> this device had a capacity 22 times less than the old 56k modems that were
> widely used in the early 2000s: the text display rate on the 360 baud/s
> modem was of one letter per second.
> This precious modem was protected by a security presence so impressive that
> Klyosov later wrote he had not seen such since his childhood, when he lived
> with his parents on the Kapustin Yar missile test polygon
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kapustin_Yar> under Stalin.
> [image: An EVM ES-1033 computer with control panel. These were developed in
> the USSR in the 1970s-1980s. Image courtesy of computer-museum.ru.]
> 
> An EVM ES-1033 computer with control panel. These were developed in the
> USSR in the 1970s-1980s. Image courtesy of computer-museum.ru.
> 
> Surrounded by many soldiers, the computer room itself was empty. So when
> Klyosov logged in for the first time, he was alone when these words
> appeared on the screen: “You are connected to the University of Stockholm
> server. Welcome.”
> 
> Once logged in, Klyosov was free to talk and exchange any information he
> wanted, without any state control. Neither the fact that the computer room
> was surrounded by military guards, nor the fact that Klyosov was forbidden
> from going abroad had any influence. We can imagine how the situation
> created by this single connected Soviet computer and its only user might
> seem paradoxical. Just remember that the Soviet Union in the early 1980s
> remained a heavily cloistered state, with the authorities attempting at all
> costs to stop the transfer to the West of any kind of “dissident” cultural
> products (samizdat publications among them). In such a context, Klyosov’s
> case was truly exceptional.
> 
> 
> 
> _______
> internet-history mailing list
> internet-history at postel.org
> http://mailman.postel.org/mailman/listinfo/internet-history
> Contact list-owner at postel.org for assistance.
>