> Too bad mindstorms are ridicously expensive here in Brazil, I am yet to put my hands in one.

This is a lot worse than it seems. Protectionism in Brazil goes further than Mindstorms and protectionism in the world goes further than Brazil.

What stupid (and heavy lobbied and bribed) politicians will never get is that protectionism is also cultural isolationism. By keeping good and inspiring technology off the gates they are actually limiting engineering creativity and imagination. They're actually stifling innovation and progress, not stimulating it.

Brazilian culture grew so much when it imported other people's culture and modified it to their own. Jazz was imported and became bossa-nova. Soccer was brought in by British workers in the railways and became "jogo bonito". Corbousier's modernist architecture was assimilated by Oscar Niemeyer and changed into Brazilian architecture. If culture was walled by protectionism, these developments would never happen. Similarly, technological development will be repressed by protectionism.

Protectionism was integral to the rise of the East Asian Tigers, as well as the recovery of post-WWII Europe. There is a time and place for such policies.

Aren't legit copies of video games especially difficult to find in Brazil? And when you do find them they are > $120 USD? That is just what I've heard, I wonder if it is due to this protectionism that you mention?

Protectionism might be a factor but in this case is not the only one. Heavy taxation and costs of distribution and marketing are more relevant here. Pirates evade all of them.

For games it is mostly taxes ( including protectionist taxes )

A congressman here calculated that a videogame may get taxed 273% on its original import price without shipping costs.

That number is staggering! Thank you for your input. =)

We had Dacta in the UK. It was paired with a BBC Micro and we wrote our own software in BASIC. Was awesome.