How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the Soviet Internet

Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by hodwik2 on Monday May 02, 2016 @10:30AM (#11611643)

A number of African nations are currently struggling with this -- attempting to bootstrap nationwide networking from zero, while having economies which are very much command economies (although in Africa, that's due to corruption, rather than being baked into the law).

In one small African nation the government was intensely interested in building a national system for finding lost cows. (This was a much-touted presidential initiative.) Basically, farmers would be able to text their cow's ID and the system would tell them if another farmer had found it.

In spite of the simplicity of such a system, it took them years of 'research and development', and enormous budgets spent, for a system which they discovered in the end, didn't work. It turned out, they couldn't figure out how to procure and install a server for it to run on.

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by drzaiusapelord on Monday May 02, 2016 @10:41AM (#11611726)

>It turned out, they couldn't figure out how to procure and install a server for it to run on.

Sure they could. There's talent abound in Africa. Unfortunately, the case here is usually corruption. That project money was siphoned to the politicians themselves or a connected pal, or both. Just old fashioned fraud here. I think "Africans don't know what they are doing" is a convenient scapegoat that empowers fraudsters. And if that narrative leads to more foreign aid, then wonderful, because the politically connected class abuse that too.

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by hodwik2 on Tuesday May 03, 2016 @10:35PM (#11625776)

Oh, I'm glad you know more than I do about this thing I lived through, so you could correct me on it.

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by pjc50 on Monday May 02, 2016 @11:16AM (#11612034)

Western developed economies are quite capable of doing this, such as the Canadian gun registry which somehow managed to spend billions of dollars without achieving anything.

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by presidentender on Monday May 02, 2016 @11:19AM (#11612081)

CGI, which built the registry, is the parent company of CGI Federal, known lately for the Obamacare site.

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by Aelinsaar on Monday May 02, 2016 @12:02PM (#11612574)

Let me guess... they're absurdly well connected though?

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by Bluestrike2 on Monday May 02, 2016 @07:07PM (#11616492)

You don't get large federal contracts without being well-connected.

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by pasbesoin on Tuesday May 03, 2016 @11:40AM (#11621595)

And this sub-thread is one, if tiny and partial, solution. Sunlight (public knowledge and understanding), bleaching out such stains. I appreciate the pointers.

And... we shouldn't let these people simply re-organize under new names.

Just as I'm likely to look askance at anyone with Goldman Sachs in their resume. Only, I prefer to know and respond more specifically.

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by leggomylibro on Monday May 02, 2016 @07:34PM (#11616671)

And before that they were known for bungling a healthcare exchange for Canada's CMS (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services).

I guess the US took them because they had experience in the field?

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by ape4 on Monday May 02, 2016 @12:27PM (#11612856)

Off topic of course. The gun registry was very political and had many people who wanted it to fail. Then it did fail. I always wondered if the two were related.

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by PeCaN on Monday May 02, 2016 @07:36PM (#11616691)

Then again, it could've failed simply because it was brought to you by the makers of healthcare.gov

(well, I guess the firearms registry was first, but you get the idea about the creators)

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by Frozenlock on Monday May 02, 2016 @06:56PM (#11616413)

And despite this immense failure, in Québec we are looking to do it all over again.

sigh

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by tomjen3 on Monday May 02, 2016 @11:59AM (#11612545)

Shouldn't Twillio, digital ocean and one small bespoke node app be able to do it?

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by pjc50 on Monday May 02, 2016 @03:07PM (#11614491)

It's not about what needs to be done, it's about finding reliable people to do it, especially when there's all sorts of opportunities for people to funnel it to a "preferred bidder".

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by kuschku on Monday May 02, 2016 @02:44PM (#11614244)

If half of them would work outside of the US, people would already be happy. DO’s usability goes down a lot if you don’t have a credit card (you literally pay to be able to pay), and Twilio is quite similar.

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Re:How Not to Network a Nation: The Uneasy History of the So... by hodwik2 on Tuesday May 03, 2016 @10:23PM (#11625724)

The government was immensely paranoid about it, insisting it had to run on site, and be completely configurable by their tech staff, who were not themselves engineers.

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