6 ms·

I was in Estonia two days ago. I just passed through on a whim as part of a European bicycle tour. I am embarrassed to admit, I knew very little about the count

by ikawe 12y ago

I was in Estonia two days ago. I just passed through on a whim as part of a European bicycle tour. I am embarrassed to admit, I knew very little about the country before being there. I was only there a week, so my impressions are addmittedly naive, but very positive. There was a lot of technology forward thinking - online voting, constitutional right to internet access, co-working spaces catering to young entrepreneurs. So quite hight tech on the one hand, and on the other hand, there is a deep respect for and serious comprehension of nature. The country is 50% forest! And my experience with Estonian camp sites was that they were free, ancient, and beautiful. I felt like I was camping in a sacred grove (I probably was). Man, wish I had stayed longer. Anyone doing any cool projects there?

jkaljundi 12y ago
Re projects, here's a list of some of the Estonian startups: http://hub.garage48.org/estonian-startups http://hub.garage48.org/estonian-startups
sudowhodoido 12y ago
I see a lot of that across Europe. I've been dying to do a road trip out that way (from the UK) but it's difficult with three children. Everyone I've met and spoken to out there has been through some serious shit right up until the late 1990s from wars to genocides. They really are forward thinking because looking back hurts badly. It might sound cheesy but I have a lot of hope for Europe and most of it comes from the East. At the same time I'm disgusted at how the media and general population treats our fellow Europeans.
- vidarh 12y ago
  > Everyone I've met and spoken to out there has been through some serious shit right up until the late 1990s from wars to genocides. "Out there"? I'm going to presume that the wars and genocide you're talking about was the former Yugoslavia, as not many places fit the bill unless you go looking much further away, in which case Estonia is almost as far from there as it is from the UK (driving distance can go either way depending on route). And still 1700km from Estonia to Donetsk, Ukraine if you want to include that conflict...
  - sudowhodoido 12y ago
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singing_Revolution http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singing_Revolution ?
  - jacquesm 12y ago
    Estonia suffered mass deportations under the Soviet regime, this has never been appropriately dealt with in terms of compensation or criminal trials and the Estonian people are still extremely conscious of this even though the actual crimes committed against Estonians are now long ago. So I highly doubt Yugoslavia was the intended subject there.
- jacquesm 12y ago
  > It might sound cheesy but I have a lot of hope for Europe and most of it comes from the East. I very much agree with you. The East of Europe has very recent memory of how not to run countries, the West is already forgetting those lessons and repeating past mistakes. For now the West is still ahead economically, but I suspect that this will not last indefinitely. You can pretty much draw a line through 'Helmstedt' (the site of the old autobahn border crossing between 'East' and 'West' Germany) and use that as the pivot point. On the left of that pivot the swing is steadily downwards whereas on the east of that up to the Russian border there is slow but fairly steady progress. Of course the map is not the territory and you'd have to account for the situations further North and South with different pivot points but on the whole this seems to be how it is today.
  - tripzilch 12y ago
    I agree with this in general, especially about forgetting lessons and repeating past mistakes. Privacy-awareness in East-European countries is impressive, it's on the top of their minds because they know what can happen if you let it run loose. On the other hand, I read a few years ago (and I don't have much reason to suspect much has changed though I'd love to hear I'm wrong) about a village in East-Germany that was entirely in control by neo-nazis. That was scary to find out such things are actually going on today (this was before I heard about Greece's Golden Dawn and how they run refugee camps). When travelling, I was warned about the are that people that looked too "foreign" might have a bad time (I suppose when coloured or Arab, me and my travel companion were both very white, Dutch and half-German). Maybe it's just an anecdote or some small isolated issues blown out of proportion, but this is what also plays in the back of my mind whenever I consider they're learning from past mistakes. Either way, no throwing babies out with the bathwater, we can both support and learn from their historical awareness, as well as be vigilant about rising intolerances.
  - sudowhodoido 12y ago
    Thanks for the reply. Interesting theory and one I agree with entirely based on who I know. I'd love to move out of the UK and will do this if we ever drop out of the EU. Perhaps East of that line.
  - 12y ago
- netcan 12y ago
  I am happy to hear you say this. I live in Ireland and I'm very pro-EU. Not in the sense that I like or dislike policies or structures, but in the sense of the EU's real and original goals: Solidarity. Open Borders. Peace. It makes me sick to see that countries have sent the EU Parliament their nationalists, populists and outright fascists. Solidarity. Open Borders. Peace. It's worth making it a generational goal. A thousand years of solidarity, open borders & peace. I have hope for, with and from our brother east of here (which for me is pretty much all Europe :) .
- saraid216 12y ago
  > At the same time I'm disgusted at how the media and general population treats our fellow Europeans. I'm having trouble interpreting this sentence since I have no context. Does "the media and general population" refer to Western Europeans or does it refer to Estonians?
  - kbart 12y ago
    In Western Europe, Eastern Europeans (Estonia included) are usually low-paid immigrants and portrayed as a cheap workforce, criminals, social burden etc. generally, a lower human beings.
yurylifshits 12y ago
Most of Skype early development was made in Estonia.
namenotrequired 12y ago
Excuse the OT, I'm considering a visit. As a foreigner with no connections, how do you recommend I could get a feel for the startup scene there (as you seem to have done)? > Anyone doing any cool projects there? One Estonian startup whose product I use a lot is TransferWise, here's an invite link (for one free currency transfer): https://transferwise.com/u/5d78 https://transferwise.com/u/5d78
- tauntz 12y ago
  Ping me when you're around - Estonia is so small that everybody in the tech scene knows almost everybody. There are lots of people who'd like to show you around and talk about startups and technology in general!
mcv 12y ago
I've never been there, but from what I understand, they love folk music, and kids learn to program in primary school. Sounds like a wonderful country. Also the home of Skype. Not to be underestimated.
- jmspring 12y ago
  There are a few startups that have been started by Skype alumni in Estonia. Transferwise as mentioned above is one. Another is https://lingvist.io https://lingvist.io. Another which is dual homed in Estonia and Palo Alto is http://teleport.org http://teleport.org. I went to Tallinn for the first time in 2002 before it was part of the EU. I took the ferry from Helsinki and spent the day walking around the old town. Quite enjoyable. Two things that really stood out were - internet cafes were readily available and extremely cheap (under $2/hour from what I recall) and the beer was cheap :) I have since been there a handful of times while I was at Skype - unfortunately I never did make it outside of Tallinn. Edit - I forgot, I caught a rather fun Folk-metal band on Eurovision when I was visiting once. Metsatoll - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dC3Q9q4cRZA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dC3Q9q4cRZA
- mrkickling 12y ago
  I'm quite sure skype is originaly a swedish company EDIT: seems like it was made in Estonia, but that the founders were swedish and danish.
  - jkaljundi 12y ago
    The 2 majority founders were swedish and danish, but the 4 Estonian founding engineers had a significant stake from day one. The same team of swede, dane and estonians had developed Kazaa and Joltid together before.
tauntz 12y ago
A shameless plug but since you asked for it.. :) We're doing something cool - at least it's really cool to me - a super simple CI server for mobile apps for freelancers and small teams (greenhouseci.com). By the way, Estonia has a cool tech scene also outside of Tallinn! We're in Tartu and there are a lot of cool startups here too!
- jkaljundi 12y ago
  +1 for Tartu! :)
rudolfosman 12y ago
Check this out - www.zazler.com Webserver designed to work with relational databases and bring more value on client-side. Zazler's unique architecture speeds up building mobile apps, JavaScript heavy interfaces and integrations by reducing amount of code and todo list. Basically, it creates a RESTful API of a relational database. Written in Haskell, in Estonia :-)

by ikawe 12y ago

jkaljundi 12y ago

Re projects, here's a list of some of the Estonian startups: http://hub.garage48.org/estonian-startups http://hub.garage48.org/estonian-startups

sudowhodoido 12y ago

I see a lot of that across Europe. I've been dying to do a road trip out that way (from the UK) but it's difficult with three children. Everyone I've met and spoken to out there has been through some serious shit right up until the late 1990s from wars to genocides. They really are forward thinking because looking back hurts badly. It might sound cheesy but I have a lot of hope for Europe and most of it comes from the East. At the same time I'm disgusted at how the media and general population treats our fellow Europeans.

vidarh 12y ago
> Everyone I've met and spoken to out there has been through some serious shit right up until the late 1990s from wars to genocides. "Out there"? I'm going to presume that the wars and genocide you're talking about was the former Yugoslavia, as not many places fit the bill unless you go looking much further away, in which case Estonia is almost as far from there as it is from the UK (driving distance can go either way depending on route). And still 1700km from Estonia to Donetsk, Ukraine if you want to include that conflict...
- sudowhodoido 12y ago
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singing_Revolution http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singing_Revolution ?
- jacquesm 12y ago
  Estonia suffered mass deportations under the Soviet regime, this has never been appropriately dealt with in terms of compensation or criminal trials and the Estonian people are still extremely conscious of this even though the actual crimes committed against Estonians are now long ago. So I highly doubt Yugoslavia was the intended subject there.
jacquesm 12y ago
> It might sound cheesy but I have a lot of hope for Europe and most of it comes from the East. I very much agree with you. The East of Europe has very recent memory of how not to run countries, the West is already forgetting those lessons and repeating past mistakes. For now the West is still ahead economically, but I suspect that this will not last indefinitely. You can pretty much draw a line through 'Helmstedt' (the site of the old autobahn border crossing between 'East' and 'West' Germany) and use that as the pivot point. On the left of that pivot the swing is steadily downwards whereas on the east of that up to the Russian border there is slow but fairly steady progress. Of course the map is not the territory and you'd have to account for the situations further North and South with different pivot points but on the whole this seems to be how it is today.
- tripzilch 12y ago
  I agree with this in general, especially about forgetting lessons and repeating past mistakes. Privacy-awareness in East-European countries is impressive, it's on the top of their minds because they know what can happen if you let it run loose. On the other hand, I read a few years ago (and I don't have much reason to suspect much has changed though I'd love to hear I'm wrong) about a village in East-Germany that was entirely in control by neo-nazis. That was scary to find out such things are actually going on today (this was before I heard about Greece's Golden Dawn and how they run refugee camps). When travelling, I was warned about the are that people that looked too "foreign" might have a bad time (I suppose when coloured or Arab, me and my travel companion were both very white, Dutch and half-German). Maybe it's just an anecdote or some small isolated issues blown out of proportion, but this is what also plays in the back of my mind whenever I consider they're learning from past mistakes. Either way, no throwing babies out with the bathwater, we can both support and learn from their historical awareness, as well as be vigilant about rising intolerances.
- sudowhodoido 12y ago
  Thanks for the reply. Interesting theory and one I agree with entirely based on who I know. I'd love to move out of the UK and will do this if we ever drop out of the EU. Perhaps East of that line.
- 12y ago
netcan 12y ago
I am happy to hear you say this. I live in Ireland and I'm very pro-EU. Not in the sense that I like or dislike policies or structures, but in the sense of the EU's real and original goals: Solidarity. Open Borders. Peace. It makes me sick to see that countries have sent the EU Parliament their nationalists, populists and outright fascists. Solidarity. Open Borders. Peace. It's worth making it a generational goal. A thousand years of solidarity, open borders & peace. I have hope for, with and from our brother east of here (which for me is pretty much all Europe :) .
saraid216 12y ago
> At the same time I'm disgusted at how the media and general population treats our fellow Europeans. I'm having trouble interpreting this sentence since I have no context. Does "the media and general population" refer to Western Europeans or does it refer to Estonians?
- kbart 12y ago
  In Western Europe, Eastern Europeans (Estonia included) are usually low-paid immigrants and portrayed as a cheap workforce, criminals, social burden etc. generally, a lower human beings.

yurylifshits 12y ago

Most of Skype early development was made in Estonia.

namenotrequired 12y ago

Excuse the OT, I'm considering a visit. As a foreigner with no connections, how do you recommend I could get a feel for the startup scene there (as you seem to have done)? > Anyone doing any cool projects there? One Estonian startup whose product I use a lot is TransferWise, here's an invite link (for one free currency transfer): https://transferwise.com/u/5d78 https://transferwise.com/u/5d78

tauntz 12y ago
Ping me when you're around - Estonia is so small that everybody in the tech scene knows almost everybody. There are lots of people who'd like to show you around and talk about startups and technology in general!

mcv 12y ago

I've never been there, but from what I understand, they love folk music, and kids learn to program in primary school. Sounds like a wonderful country. Also the home of Skype. Not to be underestimated.

jmspring 12y ago
There are a few startups that have been started by Skype alumni in Estonia. Transferwise as mentioned above is one. Another is https://lingvist.io https://lingvist.io. Another which is dual homed in Estonia and Palo Alto is http://teleport.org http://teleport.org. I went to Tallinn for the first time in 2002 before it was part of the EU. I took the ferry from Helsinki and spent the day walking around the old town. Quite enjoyable. Two things that really stood out were - internet cafes were readily available and extremely cheap (under $2/hour from what I recall) and the beer was cheap :) I have since been there a handful of times while I was at Skype - unfortunately I never did make it outside of Tallinn. Edit - I forgot, I caught a rather fun Folk-metal band on Eurovision when I was visiting once. Metsatoll - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dC3Q9q4cRZA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dC3Q9q4cRZA
mrkickling 12y ago
I'm quite sure skype is originaly a swedish company EDIT: seems like it was made in Estonia, but that the founders were swedish and danish.
- jkaljundi 12y ago
  The 2 majority founders were swedish and danish, but the 4 Estonian founding engineers had a significant stake from day one. The same team of swede, dane and estonians had developed Kazaa and Joltid together before.

tauntz 12y ago

A shameless plug but since you asked for it.. :) We're doing something cool - at least it's really cool to me - a super simple CI server for mobile apps for freelancers and small teams (greenhouseci.com). By the way, Estonia has a cool tech scene also outside of Tallinn! We're in Tartu and there are a lot of cool startups here too!

jkaljundi 12y ago
+1 for Tartu! :)

rudolfosman 12y ago

Check this out - www.zazler.com Webserver designed to work with relational databases and bring more value on client-side. Zazler's unique architecture speeds up building mobile apps, JavaScript heavy interfaces and integrations by reducing amount of code and todo list. Basically, it creates a RESTful API of a relational database. Written in Haskell, in Estonia :-)