Debugging Behind the Iron Curtain (2010)

I mean, the post itself kinda answers it.

This was news to me too. I did some surface level research and couldn't find any mention of that.

That said, my parents are from the former USSR and just because there isn't a law on the books doesn't mean it wasn't de facto banned.

It wasn't restricted per se. Just it didn't exist or produced as a civil appliance, so you won't be able to buy it. But civil defense kits usually had the counter, so if you really wanted one you probably could get it. My dad got one right after Chernobyl disaster.

there is no problem if nobody knows about it. explain many government decisions both inside and outside the USSR.

pretty sure this explains it:

> the government plan was to mix the meat from Chernobyl-area cattle with the uncontaminated meat from the rest of the country

I wonder if this was posted now as a result of a report of radioactive shrimp being sold at Wal-Mart:

https://www.fda.gov/food/alerts-advisories-safety-informatio...

It was not. Moreover, decommissioned Geiger counters from bomb shelters were available. It's more fair to say that Geiger counters were not sold on the open market because they were considered to be specialized equipment.

The USSR was strictly controlling radio transmitters and survey equipment but not regular measurement devices.

I do not know if this was the rationale, but presumably the powers that be could not see any upside to civilians possessing such equipment - after all, it could be used for purposes like calling the bluff on the official narrative

('During the recent fire at the Chornobyl nuclear power plant, only trace amounts of radioactivity has been detected outside the immediate vicinity...')

or espionage ('Hmmm... I wonder why many of the freight cars coming down the track from the alleged paint factory in East Podunkskij are 100x more radioactive than those from other areas?')

We are, after all, talking about a system which restricted access to photocopiers.

but don't you see, Communism is so bad that it changes the laws of fundamental physics! But of course you are right, this is a total nonsense story but it is interesting to reflect on why somebody would feel compelled to tell such a lie and spread such propaganda. Also interesting to reflect on what the capitalist analog of this story might be - do we trust that American food corporations would never knowingly ship unhealthy meat?

Chernobyl food contamination was mostly Cs-137 which emits Gamma rays. But Gamma rays aren't the type of radiation well suited to flip bits. To reliably flip bits, the cows would have to contain so much Cs-137 that they'd die within a day or so.

Story is likely made up.

BASHIR: Out of all the stories you told me, which ones were true and which ones weren't?

GARAK: My dear Doctor, they're all true.

BASHIR: Even the lies?

GARAK: Especially the lies.

Those poor cows would have to glow in a dark to emit such level of radiation.

If I'm reading [1] correctly then the SM-1800 was a clone of Intel-8080A, not PDP-11.

[1]: page 2, line starting with K580 of https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP86R00995R0005011...

You're right. This and the "banned Geiger counters" are both implausible.

Shame, I already sent this to my coworkers. Time to retract this cool story.

Yes, the story is definitely false. I looked into some details the first time I saw it on HN, seemed strange then, and it cannot be true. Radiation from the disaster could, and did, mess with electronics, but close to the disaster area. Most contamination is with alpha-decay elements, and alpha rays aren't going to make it from inside a train to a computer inside a building by the tracks. And yes, any living creature radioactive enough to affect electronics would be rapidly and painfully dying.

It's a funny story, but the physics is impossible, and there's several historically implausible details as well, so I'm comfortable saying it's made up.

Ah thanks! We've changed to that from https://beza1e1.tuxen.de/lore/crash_cows.html now.

Submitters: "Please submit the original source. If a post reports on something found on another site, submit the latter." - https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

We've since changed the URL (see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44964232)

time wasting activity detected, deducting estimated cost from salary BEEP

Also I remember reading the exact same "story" on the daily WTF website .. ~20 years ago. It surfaces regularly. :)

All fair.

This is likely also related to the (likely stretched) story about a train full of radioactive meat that floated around for a while [0] that seems to get interpreted a little differently each time [1].

[0] https://time.com/4305507/chernobyl-30-agriculture-disaster/#...

[1] https://origins.osu.edu/milestones/april-2016-eating-you-foo...