Author: pavel
Date: 05:48:37 01/26/03
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On January 25, 2003 at 19:01:20, Robert Hyatt wrote: > > >I think that can be traced back to Ken Thompson. In the early 1980's he >was on his way to Moscow to give a "Belle" demo there at the Institute for >Control Science, after an invitation by Donskoy. Belle, as you may know, had >a built-in PDP-11-70, plus a bunch of chess boards based on simple PLA chips >that were available anywhere. However, there was a definite export limit on >high-technology, and for reasons unknown to anybody, U.S. customs siezed the >machine as it was ready to be loaded on the plane to Moscow. After a lot of >haggling, they said "you can't take this out of the US, it is valuable >technology that could be used in war-time against us." Ken responded, "sure >it could be used in a war, you could drop it out of a plane and you _might_ >get lucky and hit someone..." > >:) It goes on to show that programmers have more than just few things in common. Sense of Humor, for one. ;) I never heard of this little incident before; but thanks to you, and others, for the little story. Cheers, pavs
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