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As a former Soviet satellite it was in an excellent position to do so. the USSR was first in space, first to the moon, and first to invent the universally prog

As a former Soviet satellite it was in an excellent position to do so. the USSR was first in space, first to the moon, and first to invent the universally programmable computer, the MESM. in 1958 they even invented the first mobile phones.

naveen99 7y ago
I wonder why the Russians or even the Chinese or Indians haven’t publicly attempted to clone Microsoft Windows (a desktop os). There is a Russian Linux distro. But I would think it would be more productive to have an international software arms race than a military / space arms race.
- macspoofing 7y ago
  Because it's hard and especially hard for monolithic systems (i.e. governments) to go up against private enterprises in certain spaces. Governments are really good at funding cutting edge research that does not have an immediate or obvious market (e.g. early internet, space exploration, fundamental physics research, etc.). Governments are not good at actually competing in a space where there is a market and private competition. >But I would think it would be more productive to have an international software arms race than a military / space arms race. There is. It's called 'the market'. We are in the midst of an 'international software arms race', and this arms race spans every category of software. You want project management software? There are a thousand options. In a top-down communist-style system, you would maybe get one option.
  - naveen99 7y ago
    Yeah, I guess it’s more profitable for them to just collect taxes from Microsoft instead. But I am not sure it can’t be done. What if the government deployed desktops to all citizens that were centrally administered, and requires them to be used for all government business / taxes, public services. Clearly I am talking about a dystopian society... but I don’t see why some dictator or communist wouldn’t want to implement it. Aren’t large Chinese companies essentially branches of the government? Why doesn’t China want a fully controlled clone of Microsoft ? They clearly wanted their own google: baidu, their own amazon: Ali baba, their own Facebook: wechat... It’s no more inefficient in principal to have government controlled personal computers as it is to have corporate controlled work computers. Work desktops are famously useless with all the required bloatware, encryption, antivirus, restrictive group policies and internet policies... but corporations think it’s worth the loss of efficiency, electricity, employee time to have a stranglehold on their computing. Why wouldn’t the super power hungry governments want the same ?
    - goatinaboat 7y ago
      What if the government deployed desktops to all citizens that were centrally administered, and requires them to be used for all government business / taxes, public services. France tried this, le Minitel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minitel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minitel
  - andrekandre 7y ago
    just to add to your overall point: > Governments are not good at actually competing in a space where there is a market and private competition. they are also good at serving markets that are too unprofitable for private companies to serve (such as public transportation or housing for extremely poor people, cheap postal services, fuel subsidies etc)
- nradov 7y ago
  Wine is kind of a clone of Windows, and available to everyone. But in general Microsoft and Apple change their desktop OSs so fast that it's impractical for cloners to keep up. The clones will always have compatibility problems and fail to support some applications software. Just implementing the published APIs is insufficient because there's so much undocumented behavior.
  - throwaway023421 7y ago
    Not so simple. If the clone gains significant market share it can enforce compatibility.
    - HideousKojima 7y ago
      I.E. basically what happened with IBM Compatibles in the 80's
- anticodon 7y ago
  There's ReactOS. I'm not sure but I believe that many of ReactOS developers are Russian. Although I don't understand the point of Windows clone.
  - UncleSlacky 7y ago
    At any rate, I'm pretty sure the Russian government donated to ReactOS development a few years back.
  - hakfoo 7y ago
    One of the big features is being able to provide a steady controlled state. If you have an embedded device running WinXP, there's going to be a day where no amount of premium support will get Microsoft to continue fixing the platform. This seems like it's going to get worse, or at least more confusing, with the almost rolling-release Win10 model. I think there are literally some Atom-class CPUs that would run the Win10 that existed a few years ago, but not a freshly downloaded image. If that device runs ReactOS, you can clone the repo of the last compatible version and hire your own team to keep it running. An interchangeable product also helps keep Microsoft honest. Buyers can easily say "you wronged us (with self-serving or stupid decisions or inferior products), so we'll swap to your competitor". Think of Dell vs. Lenovo, Ford versus GM, or Electro-Motive versus General Electric. They are aware of the market pressure and that they can't afford to ship a lemon.
- Koshkin 7y ago
  I guess, the answer might be that by the time Windows became popular USSR had been no more.

naveen99 7y ago

I wonder why the Russians or even the Chinese or Indians haven’t publicly attempted to clone Microsoft Windows (a desktop os). There is a Russian Linux distro. But I would think it would be more productive to have an international software arms race than a military / space arms race.

macspoofing 7y ago
Because it's hard and especially hard for monolithic systems (i.e. governments) to go up against private enterprises in certain spaces. Governments are really good at funding cutting edge research that does not have an immediate or obvious market (e.g. early internet, space exploration, fundamental physics research, etc.). Governments are not good at actually competing in a space where there is a market and private competition. >But I would think it would be more productive to have an international software arms race than a military / space arms race. There is. It's called 'the market'. We are in the midst of an 'international software arms race', and this arms race spans every category of software. You want project management software? There are a thousand options. In a top-down communist-style system, you would maybe get one option.
- naveen99 7y ago
  Yeah, I guess it’s more profitable for them to just collect taxes from Microsoft instead. But I am not sure it can’t be done. What if the government deployed desktops to all citizens that were centrally administered, and requires them to be used for all government business / taxes, public services. Clearly I am talking about a dystopian society... but I don’t see why some dictator or communist wouldn’t want to implement it. Aren’t large Chinese companies essentially branches of the government? Why doesn’t China want a fully controlled clone of Microsoft ? They clearly wanted their own google: baidu, their own amazon: Ali baba, their own Facebook: wechat... It’s no more inefficient in principal to have government controlled personal computers as it is to have corporate controlled work computers. Work desktops are famously useless with all the required bloatware, encryption, antivirus, restrictive group policies and internet policies... but corporations think it’s worth the loss of efficiency, electricity, employee time to have a stranglehold on their computing. Why wouldn’t the super power hungry governments want the same ?
  - goatinaboat 7y ago
    What if the government deployed desktops to all citizens that were centrally administered, and requires them to be used for all government business / taxes, public services. France tried this, le Minitel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minitel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minitel
- andrekandre 7y ago
  just to add to your overall point: > Governments are not good at actually competing in a space where there is a market and private competition. they are also good at serving markets that are too unprofitable for private companies to serve (such as public transportation or housing for extremely poor people, cheap postal services, fuel subsidies etc)
nradov 7y ago
Wine is kind of a clone of Windows, and available to everyone. But in general Microsoft and Apple change their desktop OSs so fast that it's impractical for cloners to keep up. The clones will always have compatibility problems and fail to support some applications software. Just implementing the published APIs is insufficient because there's so much undocumented behavior.
- throwaway023421 7y ago
  Not so simple. If the clone gains significant market share it can enforce compatibility.
  - HideousKojima 7y ago
    I.E. basically what happened with IBM Compatibles in the 80's
anticodon 7y ago
There's ReactOS. I'm not sure but I believe that many of ReactOS developers are Russian. Although I don't understand the point of Windows clone.
- UncleSlacky 7y ago
  At any rate, I'm pretty sure the Russian government donated to ReactOS development a few years back.
- hakfoo 7y ago
  One of the big features is being able to provide a steady controlled state. If you have an embedded device running WinXP, there's going to be a day where no amount of premium support will get Microsoft to continue fixing the platform. This seems like it's going to get worse, or at least more confusing, with the almost rolling-release Win10 model. I think there are literally some Atom-class CPUs that would run the Win10 that existed a few years ago, but not a freshly downloaded image. If that device runs ReactOS, you can clone the repo of the last compatible version and hire your own team to keep it running. An interchangeable product also helps keep Microsoft honest. Buyers can easily say "you wronged us (with self-serving or stupid decisions or inferior products), so we'll swap to your competitor". Think of Dell vs. Lenovo, Ford versus GM, or Electro-Motive versus General Electric. They are aware of the market pressure and that they can't afford to ship a lemon.
Koshkin 7y ago
I guess, the answer might be that by the time Windows became popular USSR had been no more.