Soviets on USENET: summary (long)
Peter Sellmer
things get hairy!
OK. Here it is! Everything all the netters have given me about
getting in touch with the USSR. I've tried to eliminate as many
of the redundant responses, to generate maximal info content over
minimal lines. I personally have no idea what to make of a lot
of this stuff, but that's OK. We have contact!
Peter
Date: Wed, 31 Oct 90 13:45 EET
From: "Seppo P|ntinen, HY, Sosiologia, p. 90-1917029" <maytag!cc.Helsinki.FI!PONTINEN>
You may try the following:
1) There is a newsgroup talk.politics.soviet
It has had some discussion about e-mail connections to Soviet
Union (although not at the moment in our NEWS).
2) There is a listserver list USS...@INDYCMS.BITNET
I have not ordered it but I understand that now it is linked with
talk.politics.soviet. Thus let`s hope that one of the above
possibilities is open to you.
3) There is also a listserver list BALT-L (where you might find
Latvian connections). Unfortunately I don't have its site.
Date: Fri, 2 Nov 90 10:18:23 -0500
From: Lyle Seaman <maytag!sununix.comm.wang.com.comm.wang.com!lws>
The USSR has been on the net for quite some time. Not the Internet,
per se, but they have had email access. I have seen a number of
postings by Soviets, but can't recall any addresses off the top of
my head.
The Teleport connects Moscow via San Franscisco. You can call
(415) 931 8500 for information, or try these email addresses:
sfmtmoscow%c...@arisa.xerox.com
nbotkin%c...@arisa.xerox.com
DASnet connects the Teleport to the Internet. For information,
call (408) 559-7434. The contact name I have is Anna Lange,
but that may be out of date.
Interlink connects Soviet users through Germany. Contact
inte...@immoscow.su or unido!gtc!gtc8!kirill
Date: Tue, 30 Oct 90 15:11:02 -0600
From: Dr Dr <maytag!uxa.cso.uiuc.edu!mtpg7040>
There's a person in Moscow we've had some contact with (& there appears to
be more than one person posting from the site). He(?) said in one of his
posts ~1-1/2 months ago they'd been on the net for a month. His(?) name's
Vadim. You can find some of their postings in alt.folklore.computers and
alt.sex.
Addr: a...@hq.demos.su
Date: Wed, 31 Oct 90 14:28:33 EST
From: maytag!ultima.csd.uts.EDU.AU!axolotl (Iain D. Sinclair)
There is a "net.personality" called Vadim G. Antonov. As far as it can
be ascertained, he is 'for real'. He mostly posts to alt.folklore.computers.
And from that net.personality himself.....
From: maytag!hq.demos.su!avg (Vadim G. Antonov)
Date: Sun, 4 Nov 90 20:25:53 +0300 (MSK)
Hi, Peter,
excuse me for the delay, I was out of the office. I'm surely not the
only Russian /hm, I don't like to count myself as Soviet/ on Internet.
I like an idea to be a pen-pal but unfortunately I have no enough time
(just imagine the lots of mail I receive!). Anyway you could ask
postmasters of different our sites (like kiae.su, spb.su, jvd.msk.su,
fian.msk.su, serp.ihep.su, iias.spb.su, isi.itfs.nsk.su). You
may call Dmitry Volodin <d...@hq.demos.su> in order to get a more
detailed list of sites. Unfortunately we have no sites in Latvia,
our net is really young :-).
Best Wishes,
Vadim
Date: Sun, 4 Nov 90 23:50:12 est
From: "Lawrence K. Kolodney" <maytag!altdorf.ai.mit.edu!lkk>
>From ar...@venera.isi.edu Sun Nov 4 23:42:32 1990
Posted-Date: Fri, 21 Sep 90 14:35:41 PDT
Subject: USSR on USENET
From: Yigal Arens <ar...@venera.isi.edu>
Subject: Re: Seeking Soviet Readers
On September 10, 1990, I saw a posting in alt.folklore.computers
purporting to be from one Vadim G. Antonov from an organization known
as DEMOS in Moscow. On Sept. 16, I sent out an inquiry over USENET
directed to 39 newsgroups, chosen as those I thought might be
interesting to a new site in the Soviet Union. Here is what I
learned from the replies I got to this inquiry:
First, the USSR is receiving the USENET news feed. Welcome!
Initially, because of limited bandwidth, USENET news reaches only
three network nodes in Moscow, and they only get a small fraction of
the newsgroups. Here are the newsgroups they are known to receive:
alt.folklore.computers
comp.unix.sysv386
comp.mail.uucp
comp.dcom.modems
comp.unix.questions
comp.protocols.iso
comp.mail.sendmail
comp.unix.xenix
xomp.unix.xenix.sco
eunet.test
eunet.jokes
Electronic mail to the Soviet Union can reach a far larger number of
sites; these sites are connected to the growing RELCOM network, and
as communications problems are solved, it appears to be a safe
assumption that USENET will spread through much of RELCOM.
RELCOM currently connects about 50 host computers, but it is growing
quickly. By the end of this year, they expect on the order of 200
hosts on the network. Hosts are currently located in the following
organizations:
demos.su - DEMOS (network R&D center & software mfr)
kiae.su - Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy (Moscow)
icsti.su - International Ctr of Sci & Tech Info
velham.su - project VELHAM (psychology & education)
jvd.su - Joint Venture Dialogue (Moscow)
ipmce.su - Inst of Precise Mechanics & Computer Engin
hantarex.su - Joint Venture Hantarex
isi.itfs.nsk.su - Institute of Systems Researches (Novosibirsk)
kaija.spb.su - Center KAIJA (Leningrad)
iias.spb.su - Institute of Informatique (Leningrad)
ioc.ew.su - Institute of Cybernetics (Estonia, Tallinn)
Organizationally, RELCOM is a network connecting commercial and
academic research and development institutions, apparently using UUCP
protocols, with no military connections at this time. The network is
intended to be a self-supporting non-profit operation; central network
support services are provided by the DEMOS Software Cooperative (named
after the moon of Mars, not short for Demonstration, as many US
readers appear to have inferred).
USENET news and electronic mail between the various networks in the
United States and the RELCOM network in the Soviet Union is handled by
fuug.fi, Finland, the mail relay host of the Finnish UNIX User's Group.
The usual path to this machine is through mcsun.eu.net, also known as
relay.eu.net; this machine is located in Amsterdam and serves as the
gateway for much of the electronic mail between the United States and
Europe.
The people at DEMOS software say that they are in the process of
registering .su (Soviet Union) as an official top-level Internet domain
with the Stanford Research Institute Network Information Center. Until
they do so, electronic mail to sites in the .su domain must be
explicitly forwarded through relay.eu.net.
People at DEMOS Software are in contact with people at the Open Systems
Foundation and at Bell Labs. The Soviet UNIX User's Group will host
the First Soviet UNIX User's Conference in Moscow, Oct 29 to Nov 2.
--------------------
How do we know that the entire thing isn't an elaborate hoax? There
was an elaborate (and funny) April fool's hoax perpetrated in 1984 by
Piet Beertrema in Amsterdam involving USENET postings from a fictional
person named K. Chernenko on a machine named kremvax and involving
machines named moskvax and kgbvax.
It would be quite remarkable if the contacts with DEMOS software were
forgeries. People at Bell Labs have arranged trips to Moscow to
attend the Soviet UNIX User's Group meeting using electronic mail to
people at DEMOS; the contacts between the Open Systems Foundation and
DEMOS have been conducted this way, and many other people have
reported contacts with users at DEMOS and at the Joint Venture Dialog.
All of the network trace information added to the USENET postings and
electronic mail from the machines in the Soviet Union consistently
indicate the use of the same gateway machine in Finland, and if they
were forgeries, the only site where it would be easy to originate
them would be in Finland. Mail to users in Finland, the Netherlands,
Austria, Australia, and the United States all seems to pass through
the same path into the Soviet Union.
Doug Jones
jo...@herky.cs.uiowa.edu
------- End of Forwarded Message
From: maytag!uhura.cc.rochester.edu!gest_ss (Gavin Stark)
Date: Fri, 9 Nov 1990 19:42:36 EST
I found the following in a USENET map listing locally:
The following are all in the USSR, the names are just
demos,ioc,jvdrd,kiae.
This might give you more to go on... (gives mailing addresses of people who
might know...)
#N demos, dvv.hq.demos.su, soviet-union.eu.net, ussr.eu.net
#S IT386SX; SCO XENIX 2.3.2
#O Demos Co-operative
#C Dmitry Volodin
#E d...@hq.demos.su
#T +7 095 231 2129
#P pod.1 d.6 Ovchinnikovskaya nab., SU-113035 Moscow, USSR
#L 38 50 E / 55 05 N city
#W oj...@fuug.fi 900813, d...@dvv.hq.demos.su 900821
#R USSR EUnet backbone site
#
demosLAN = {demos, ache, avg386, jumbo}!(LOCAL)
# Backbone Connections (UUCP)
demos fuug(DAILY/2)
# Polled sites (UUCP)
demos kiae(HOURLY), jvdrd(HOURLY)
# Polling sites
demos koch(DAILY), md1(DAILY)
#N ioc
#S Labtam 32; Unix V.3
#O Institute of Cybernetics, Estonian Academy of Science
#C Alexander Schmundak
#E sa...@ioc.uucp
#T +7 014 2 527316
#P Akadeemia tee 21, SU-20010 Tallinn, Estonia, USSR
#L 24 45 E / 59 25 N
#W oj...@fuug.fi 900527, d...@hq.demos.su 900821
#
ioc fuug(DEAD)
#N jvdrd, jvd.su, .jvd.su
#S 80?86 box; SCO XENIX 2.3.2
#O Joint Venture Dialogue
#C Nick Saukh
#E n...@saukh.rd.jvd.su
#T +7 095 329 4700
#P 13 Spartakovskaya ul., SU-107066 Moscow, USSR
#L 38 50 E / 55 05 N city
#W d...@dvv.hq.demos.su 900820, d...@dvv.hq.demos.su 900822
jvdrd jvd.su, .jvd.su
jvdrd =jvdrd.rd.jvd.su
jvdrd jvdcpd(HOURLY), jvdhq(HOURLY), kiae(HOURLY), saukh(DEDICATED)
#N kiae, kiae.su, .kiae.su, home.demos.su, .home.demos.su
#S 80386SX box; SCO XENIX 2.3.2
#O Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy
#C Vladimir Petrov
#E p...@kiae.su
#T +7 095 196 7212
#P
#L 38 50 E / 55 05 N city
#W d...@dvv.hq.demos.su 900819, d...@dvv.hq.demos.su 900821
kiae kiae.su, .kiae.su
kiae home.demos.su, .home.demos.su
kieaLAN = {kiae, berta}!(DEDICATED)
kiae ccsix(DAILY/6), icsti(DAILY/6), itm514(HOURLY), jvdrd(HOURLY),
r11740(HOURLY), demos(HOURLY)
Date: Mon, 5 Nov 1990 10:52:02 -0500
From: John Obrien x4089 <maytag!kcdev!obrien>
Peter, as promised last week here is the info about MOSTNET.
>From daver!llustig!sgi!cdp!mostnet Thu Oct 25 12:23:43 CDT 1990
Article 2742 of alt.bbs:
Path: kcdev!daver!llustig!sgi!cdp!mostnet
>From: mostnet\@cdp.UUCP
Newsgroups: alt.bbs
Subject: INFORMATION from USSR, Moscow.
Message-ID: <224600028\@cdp>
Date: 23 Oct 90 16:32:00 GMT
Lines: 76
Nf-ID:N:cdp:224600028:000:2178
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!mostnet Oct 23 09:32:00 1990
|~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~|
> M O S T N E T => E D U C A T I O N A L N E T W O R K <
|------------------- Moscow, USSR --------------------------|
Moscow School Telecommunication Net - is the first Soviet
computer communication system providing services to
educational organizations. We began our work in the autumn of
1989 and initially supported twelve Moscow schools taking part
in the New York State - Moscow School Telecommunication
Project.
Now the users of the net are: schools in Moscow, Leningrad,
Kiev, Moscow City Committee on Public Education and Moscow
University.
At the present time the possibilities for network expansion
are limited by the lack of equipment in the schools.
The MoSTNet host computer runs on "WildCat", a communication
package. MoSTNet uses IAS node in Moscow to enter the
international computer networks.
The main aim of MoSTNet is development and selection of
most effective means of telecommunication in education. The
Laboratory " Telecommunications in Education" of the Council
of Cybernetics of the Academy of Sciences is conducting
research based on the MoSTNet activities. We develop new
educational materials, conduct international educational
research projects.
--------------------------------------------------------------
||~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| E - Mail addresses: |
|| MoSTNet, USSR | ------------------- |
|| M O S C O W | SFMT: mostnet |
|| S C H O O L | EIES: 1593 |
|| TELECOMMUNICATION | IASNet: /02502040300/ |
|| NETWORK | ID: MOSTNET |
|| | PSW: MOSTNET |
| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ |
|~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~|
| ACCESS THROUGHT:=> | INTERNET: MOSTNET\@LABREA.STANFORD.EDU |
| | USENET: MOSTNET\@cdp.UUCP |
--------------------------------------------------------------
From the postmaster at DEMOS, himself, Dmitri Volodin....
Organization: DEMOS, Moscow, USSR
From: maytag!hq.demos.su!dvv (Dmitry V. Volodin)
Date: Tue, 6 Nov 90 15:13:49 +0300 (MSD)
Hi.
We've got only 3 nodes receiving the USENET News in this country.
The problem is that the appropriate hardware (high speed modems etc.)
is still very expensive and rare here.
I'm (as a postmaster) currently trying to make connections to
various colleges and universities. Once I succeed in making it
and university and college authorities enable access for students
there'll be a huge lot of potential pen-pals. But for the time
being I estimate the number of e-mail users as something like
100 people and most of them cannot communicate more or less easily
in English.
Anyway, I can try to find a communicative person if you inform me
what are you interests etc.
--
Dmitry V. Volodin <d...@hq.demos.su> |
fax: +7 095 233 5016 | Call me Dima (D-'ee-...)
phone: +7 095 231 2129 |
From maytag!uhura.cc.rochester.edu!gest_ss Tue Nov 6 15:49:31 1990
Date: Tue, 6 Nov 90 18:30:10 EST
From: Michael A. Patton <maytag!lcs.mit.edu!MAP>
Sorry this doesn't have a reference, the reply function seems broken.
There was a session (and a BOF, and a press-conference) about this
topic at Interop. There is no Internet connection, Government
restrictions in the West on export TO East Block are the main problem.
I think they have nascent UUCPish connections in most of these places.
Several of the presenters from the eastern european countries had
working E-Mail addresses (various gateways, lots of "%"s and "!"s and
stuff), but I don't think the Russian did. I have not received my
proceedings yet.
There has also been some discussion on the Telecom Digest (one of the
readers/contributors is from Russia). The first correspondence I ever
saw from Russia was via a FIDO node and it was submitted to Telecom
Digest, you should be able to find it in the archives (Anonymous FTP
to LCS.MIT.Edu, cd telecom-archives), but there's a lot to look
through.
Date: Fri, 09 Nov 90 09:04:37 EST
From: Daniel Klein - 412/268-7791 <maytag!SEI.CMU.EDU!dvk>
Yeah, Dmitri is a nice guy. I met him last week (and the rest of the DEMOS
crew) when I was there last week.
-Dan
I've asked Dmitri about the appropriateness of going to him for pen-pals,
as I thought it a little rude to dump a lot of chatty traffic on him
without warning! He hasn't replied to date, but I have no doubt that
he will. I don't really know what else to say, as so much depends on
the state of their hardware, and who the other people are at the Soviet
end of things. But hey, they know we're out here, and vice-versa, so it's
a start. Good luck, one and all!
A special thanks to all the intrepid net.people who did some digging and
put in the effort to reply!
Peter
--
Peter Sellmer
(pe...@watcsc.uwaterloo.ca or psel...@watserv1.uwaterloo.ca)
"Dip in...to the sea... of possibilities!" Patti Smith