Love all the write ups on that site. I like how he starts with a problem, walks through all the issues, and goes into detail on what the problem actually is (in an approachable manner too!) I...
Love all the write ups on that site. I like how he starts with a problem, walks through all the issues, and goes into detail on what the problem actually is (in an approachable manner too!)
I learned a lot about scraping, NK, and good writing in general reading that.
I'm shocked: North Korea has an internal software industry – and mobile device sales points – and a hacking part? So many things from the intro alone. I'd always assumed that North Korea is too...
I'm shocked: North Korea has an internal software industry – and mobile device sales points – and a hacking part? So many things from the intro alone. I'd always assumed that North Korea is too poor to have any sort of digital profile of its own. I know there are foreign-facing espionage teams which must have access to the tools, but regular people? I thought everybody aside from the ruling elite was living in poverty.
Trying to determine what is propoganda and what is not is incredibly hard to do. I am both amazed and surprised, while at the same time not at all that they have these industry points these days....
Trying to determine what is propoganda and what is not is incredibly hard to do. I am both amazed and surprised, while at the same time not at all that they have these industry points these days.
The aspect of 'physical app stores' is a pretty cool and ingeniuous concept for areas without reliable internet infrastructure.
This reminds of how video games used to be sold in Russia when I was 7 or 8. It's a surprisingly-vivid image, considering I don't remember much of those days. There's a large store – an univermag...
The aspect of 'physical app stores' is a pretty cool and ingeniuous concept for areas without reliable internet infrastructure.
This reminds of how video games used to be sold in Russia when I was 7 or 8.
It's a surprisingly-vivid image, considering I don't remember much of those days. There's a large store – an univermag – not far from where I used to live with my parents. On a winter day, as it was snowing softly, I remember a man in a warm synthetic coat standing before the univermag, his hood on as to protect him from the snow; his hands are in the pockets, and he's not moving much, and mostly to see if anyone's willing to buy what he's selling.
In front of him was a table – the kind with crossed legs that fold underneath the tabletop, a portable kind – with its contents covered by a plastic cover (again, snow), with a stretchy string holding the cover onto the table. Underneath the covers are rows and rows of CD boxes, each with a different game. I was nothing like savvy about them at the time – I've only had a PC for a year or so, and with no Internet or the gaming magazines, it was impossible to tell which was what or whether it was good – so what my father did was pay for a game, take the CD home, let me try it, and if I didn't like it, he'd take it back to the man, say it didn't work (which was a lie), take a different CD, try that... Repeat until either the game was good, or it was getting too long so my father'd go back, give back the CD, and get back his money. (He didn't purchase anything, so he needn't pay for anything – fair is fair, right?) I think it happened once, and I can't remember which one it ended up being; I think it was the latter, but can't be sure.
To this day, I feel so embarrassed about this whole transaction 'cause I feel like I took part in my father ripping off the man somehow – even though he didn't. I guess I felt embarrassed about lying to the man about the game "not working" (I didn't lie – my father did – but I felt complicit to it, seeing how I went along with it; I was a kid, whaddaya do?), even though no harm was done. Maybe it's because the man gave us his trust, exchanging the CDs freely, and we went behind his back anyway? I dunno, but it's a vivid image, nevertheless.
With time, the man and his table went away. In the univermag building, in a partition aside from the main store, opened a CD booth full of games. My friends and I would often go there – wasn't far from the school, either – and just marvel at them. They were rare and, therefore, valuable to us; just having one of those for free, or as a gift, would've been a blessing.
There was also the fact that one could ask the local PC gaming club's owners to rip a CD with a new and cool game for a price. (Wasn't cheap, but market-bought games, even pirate ones, costed more. You could provide the CD-R or add its price to get one form the club owner.) That's how I got GTA: Vice City first. Downloading games over 56.6kbps connection would've been extremely expensive back in the day (I know because I once ran up quite a bill by secretly using the modem Internet connection when my parents were away or asleep; they ripped into me for that one). How they got their hands on those new games – even pirated – is still a bit of a mystery for me. (@ainar-g, any idea?)
There's also the Cuban HDD Internet, where a 1TB drive gets passed around the people for a small price weekly, allowing them to access the latest TV show episodes, digitalized magazine issues, films etc. The price for regular Internet access on Cuba is something ridiculous, so this is how people get by.
So – yeah, there would be local spots. I guess people adapt the needs to the situation at hand, especially when the rest of the world is on it. (Still, though: Android devices in North Korea...)
The spice data must flow. A friend of a friend of a sister's husband's brother is an MNS in a NII, so he has 256 kbit/s unlimited internet and way too much free time. You know the way from there.
How they got their hands on those new games – even pirated – is still a bit of a mystery for me.
The spice data must flow. A friend of a friend of a sister's husband's brother is an MNS in a NII, so he has 256 kbit/s unlimited internet and way too much free time. You know the way from there.
My mother was always worried that my downloading .MP3s on a government line (medical statistics facility) would raise questions. My concerns stem entirely from the early memories of my using an...
My mother was always worried that my downloading .MP3s on a government line (medical statistics facility) would raise questions. My concerns stem entirely from the early memories of my using an unlimited Internet access.
By that logic, everybody else is but a projection of your consciousness. Just because you don't know much for certain about that country doesn't mean you can swipe it all off the table. Other way...
I have no baseline to conduct a smell test on anything. For all I know North Korea doesn't even exist.
Just because you don't know much for certain about that country doesn't mean you can swipe it all off the table. Other way lies flat-earth movement and the rest of the government conspiracy nonsense.
There is no way to prove that you yourself aren't the product of a simulation either. As a thought experiment, simulation theory and solipsism can be fun to explore, but if you genuinely believe...
There is no way to prove that you yourself aren't the product of a simulation either. As a thought experiment, simulation theory and solipsism can be fun to explore, but if you genuinely believe and/or act as if they are true (even if they ultimately are), that's where you get into very, very dangerous and dehumanizing territory, IMO.
And completely discounting all information from other people about something or some place just because you have never and might never encounter it in person yourself, and outright dismissing everything as "distorted" or just "memes" when you fully admit you have no first hand experience regarding those things, is similarly dangerous, IMO.
Love all the write ups on that site. I like how he starts with a problem, walks through all the issues, and goes into detail on what the problem actually is (in an approachable manner too!)
I learned a lot about scraping, NK, and good writing in general reading that.
I'm shocked: North Korea has an internal software industry – and mobile device sales points – and a hacking part? So many things from the intro alone. I'd always assumed that North Korea is too poor to have any sort of digital profile of its own. I know there are foreign-facing espionage teams which must have access to the tools, but regular people? I thought everybody aside from the ruling elite was living in poverty.
Trying to determine what is propoganda and what is not is incredibly hard to do. I am both amazed and surprised, while at the same time not at all that they have these industry points these days.
The aspect of 'physical app stores' is a pretty cool and ingeniuous concept for areas without reliable internet infrastructure.
This reminds of how video games used to be sold in Russia when I was 7 or 8.
It's a surprisingly-vivid image, considering I don't remember much of those days. There's a large store – an univermag – not far from where I used to live with my parents. On a winter day, as it was snowing softly, I remember a man in a warm synthetic coat standing before the univermag, his hood on as to protect him from the snow; his hands are in the pockets, and he's not moving much, and mostly to see if anyone's willing to buy what he's selling.
In front of him was a table – the kind with crossed legs that fold underneath the tabletop, a portable kind – with its contents covered by a plastic cover (again, snow), with a stretchy string holding the cover onto the table. Underneath the covers are rows and rows of CD boxes, each with a different game. I was nothing like savvy about them at the time – I've only had a PC for a year or so, and with no Internet or the gaming magazines, it was impossible to tell which was what or whether it was good – so what my father did was pay for a game, take the CD home, let me try it, and if I didn't like it, he'd take it back to the man, say it didn't work (which was a lie), take a different CD, try that... Repeat until either the game was good, or it was getting too long so my father'd go back, give back the CD, and get back his money. (He didn't purchase anything, so he needn't pay for anything – fair is fair, right?) I think it happened once, and I can't remember which one it ended up being; I think it was the latter, but can't be sure.
To this day, I feel so embarrassed about this whole transaction 'cause I feel like I took part in my father ripping off the man somehow – even though he didn't. I guess I felt embarrassed about lying to the man about the game "not working" (I didn't lie – my father did – but I felt complicit to it, seeing how I went along with it; I was a kid, whaddaya do?), even though no harm was done. Maybe it's because the man gave us his trust, exchanging the CDs freely, and we went behind his back anyway? I dunno, but it's a vivid image, nevertheless.
With time, the man and his table went away. In the univermag building, in a partition aside from the main store, opened a CD booth full of games. My friends and I would often go there – wasn't far from the school, either – and just marvel at them. They were rare and, therefore, valuable to us; just having one of those for free, or as a gift, would've been a blessing.
There was also the fact that one could ask the local PC gaming club's owners to rip a CD with a new and cool game for a price. (Wasn't cheap, but market-bought games, even pirate ones, costed more. You could provide the CD-R or add its price to get one form the club owner.) That's how I got GTA: Vice City first. Downloading games over 56.6kbps connection would've been extremely expensive back in the day (I know because I once ran up quite a bill by secretly using the modem Internet connection when my parents were away or asleep; they ripped into me for that one). How they got their hands on those new games – even pirated – is still a bit of a mystery for me. (@ainar-g, any idea?)
There's also the Cuban HDD Internet, where a 1TB drive gets passed around the people for a small price weekly, allowing them to access the latest TV show episodes, digitalized magazine issues, films etc. The price for regular Internet access on Cuba is something ridiculous, so this is how people get by.
So – yeah, there would be local spots. I guess people adapt the needs to the situation at hand, especially when the rest of the world is on it. (Still, though: Android devices in North Korea...)
The
spicedata must flow. A friend of a friend of a sister's husband's brother is an MNS in a NII, so he has 256 kbit/s unlimited internet and way too much free time. You know the way from there.Sure. I'd just assume there would be questions about how he uses the traffic.
Choose two.
My mother was always worried that my downloading .MP3s on a government line (medical statistics facility) would raise questions. My concerns stem entirely from the early memories of my using an unlimited Internet access.
By that logic, everybody else is but a projection of your consciousness.
Just because you don't know much for certain about that country doesn't mean you can swipe it all off the table. Other way lies flat-earth movement and the rest of the government conspiracy nonsense.
There is no way to prove that you yourself aren't the product of a simulation either. As a thought experiment, simulation theory and solipsism can be fun to explore, but if you genuinely believe and/or act as if they are true (even if they ultimately are), that's where you get into very, very dangerous and dehumanizing territory, IMO.
And completely discounting all information from other people about something or some place just because you have never and might never encounter it in person yourself, and outright dismissing everything as "distorted" or just "memes" when you fully admit you have no first hand experience regarding those things, is similarly dangerous, IMO.
That way madness lies, literally and figuratively.