5 ms·

If I am to guess: - large academic population and high general education - a tradition of collecting banned and bootlegged content, particularly Western (sami

If I am to guess: - large academic population and high general education - a tradition of collecting banned and bootlegged content, particularly Western (samizdat, magnitizdat) - lack of resources to get things legally (e.g. university subscriptions) - a culture of hacking and tinkering (the best known book scanning middleware, like ScanTailor and ScanKromsator and various djvu tools, comes from Russian hobbyist programmers). Also applies to adjacent countries like Ukraine.

matrix87 2y ago
> According to a 2016 OECD estimate, 54% of Russia's adults (25- to 64-year-olds) have attained tertiary education, giving Russia the second-highest attainment of tertiary education among 35 OECD member countries. [0] Wonder why, was it a thing before the Soviets? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Russia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Russia
- krasin 2y ago
  > Wonder why, was it a thing before the Soviets? Before Soviets, Russian population was largely uneducated; could not read or write. Soviets immediately started a country-wide educational campaign, Likbez: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Likbez https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Likbez Soviets did many things, some good and some very bad. But their push for free & universal education has been good.
  - generationP 2y ago
    I consider the wide-scale and fairly high-quality scientific education system to be the only genuine upside of Soviet communism. Admittedly, part of its success was the fact that it offered many people the only way to the middle or upper class (the Soviet Union was an extreme class society, with peasants forced to stay on their collective farms and non-Muscovites banned from settling in Moscow unless they took up professions that were currently desired by the system). Another caveat is that it was STEM-only, and excluded computer science (which the Soviet system was unconducive to for various reasons) until the 80s. The SU was particularly unwilling to teach anyone foreign languages, unless one chose (and was cleared) to work for intel.
    - braincat31415 2y ago
      The last statement is completely wrong; there were many avenues to study foreign languages, either for adults or children. Children could attend schools that specialized in foreign language instruction, and extracurricular classes were also available. Same went for adults that could study languages as full-time students, or attend after-work classes, or participate in a directed self-study. Private tutoring was easy to find in major metro centers. I have to mention though that the quality of foreign language education in regular schools was dismal. While in school, I participated in an after-school study group that studied Spanish under a guidance of a university professor (for free), and a part-time job that I took over the summer allowed me to pay for French tutoring. My school had an exchange program with schools in Manchester, with plenty of opportunities to become fluent in English. Speaking of a middle class, it was not unusual that a factory worker's salary exceeded that of a high-school teacher with a university diploma.
      - generationP 2y ago
        Good point -- I was implicitly talking about serious instruction on advanced levels. There was no shortage of classes where you got to listen to French music and read some easy books; but nothing that would bring you to fluency. An exchange program with Manchester, though? That must have been late in the 80s?
        braincat31415 2y ago
        Understood, that's true, to do any serious study people had to apply to and enter a formal program, day, evening, or remote. The other option was private tutoring. The exchange program ran in early 80s.
        krasin 2y ago
        That would be in Moscow, correct? Because it would be unheard in a small industrial town I am from.
- _ugfj 2y ago
  No, this is definitely a Soviet thing. The 1897 census found 79 million peasants out of 93 million, these people basically had no chance of getting a tertiary education. Only the remaining 15% and not that many of those either had even a chance. Indeed, while the Stalinist rule was not a particularly popular one, the elderly certainly appreciated how their children became engineers, doctors and such. I mean, I heard my own grandmother saying this about my father often, she was a devout communist all her long life (96 years...) even after the Soviet Union fell apart.
- skjoldr 2y ago
  Russia and most other post-Soviet countries maintained mandatory military draft, with education being one of the only non-health-related exemptions available. Because of the sad state of those armies in the 90's, 00's, and even 10's, very few young men in particular were willing to basically waste a year or so of their life, so instead nearly every male school graduate went into a university, which contributed to the statistics.

matrix87 2y ago

> According to a 2016 OECD estimate, 54% of Russia's adults (25- to 64-year-olds) have attained tertiary education, giving Russia the second-highest attainment of tertiary education among 35 OECD member countries. [0] Wonder why, was it a thing before the Soviets? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Russia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Russia

krasin 2y ago
> Wonder why, was it a thing before the Soviets? Before Soviets, Russian population was largely uneducated; could not read or write. Soviets immediately started a country-wide educational campaign, Likbez: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Likbez https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Likbez Soviets did many things, some good and some very bad. But their push for free & universal education has been good.
- generationP 2y ago
  I consider the wide-scale and fairly high-quality scientific education system to be the only genuine upside of Soviet communism. Admittedly, part of its success was the fact that it offered many people the only way to the middle or upper class (the Soviet Union was an extreme class society, with peasants forced to stay on their collective farms and non-Muscovites banned from settling in Moscow unless they took up professions that were currently desired by the system). Another caveat is that it was STEM-only, and excluded computer science (which the Soviet system was unconducive to for various reasons) until the 80s. The SU was particularly unwilling to teach anyone foreign languages, unless one chose (and was cleared) to work for intel.
  - braincat31415 2y ago
    The last statement is completely wrong; there were many avenues to study foreign languages, either for adults or children. Children could attend schools that specialized in foreign language instruction, and extracurricular classes were also available. Same went for adults that could study languages as full-time students, or attend after-work classes, or participate in a directed self-study. Private tutoring was easy to find in major metro centers. I have to mention though that the quality of foreign language education in regular schools was dismal. While in school, I participated in an after-school study group that studied Spanish under a guidance of a university professor (for free), and a part-time job that I took over the summer allowed me to pay for French tutoring. My school had an exchange program with schools in Manchester, with plenty of opportunities to become fluent in English. Speaking of a middle class, it was not unusual that a factory worker's salary exceeded that of a high-school teacher with a university diploma.
    - generationP 2y ago
      Good point -- I was implicitly talking about serious instruction on advanced levels. There was no shortage of classes where you got to listen to French music and read some easy books; but nothing that would bring you to fluency. An exchange program with Manchester, though? That must have been late in the 80s?
      - braincat31415 2y ago
        Understood, that's true, to do any serious study people had to apply to and enter a formal program, day, evening, or remote. The other option was private tutoring. The exchange program ran in early 80s.
        krasin 2y ago
        That would be in Moscow, correct? Because it would be unheard in a small industrial town I am from.
_ugfj 2y ago
No, this is definitely a Soviet thing. The 1897 census found 79 million peasants out of 93 million, these people basically had no chance of getting a tertiary education. Only the remaining 15% and not that many of those either had even a chance. Indeed, while the Stalinist rule was not a particularly popular one, the elderly certainly appreciated how their children became engineers, doctors and such. I mean, I heard my own grandmother saying this about my father often, she was a devout communist all her long life (96 years...) even after the Soviet Union fell apart.
skjoldr 2y ago
Russia and most other post-Soviet countries maintained mandatory military draft, with education being one of the only non-health-related exemptions available. Because of the sad state of those armies in the 90's, 00's, and even 10's, very few young men in particular were willing to basically waste a year or so of their life, so instead nearly every male school graduate went into a university, which contributed to the statistics.