History of computer markets and piracy in Poland

I found this very interesting article (in Polish) about the history of computer markets and software piracy in Poland. It's very interesting stuff - it reminds me of the 1990's in the UK when car boot sales and dodgy markets were full of dodgy geezers that would copy you anything for a small amount of cash.

ppe.pl/publicystyka/1374/gieldy-komputerowe-piekny-relikt-przeszlosci.html


Does anyone here have any stories about using computers in the 1990's or earlier in Poland? I'd love to hear some stories :)

I brought a mac powerbook to Poland in the early 1990s and wanted to buy a printer... there was actually a mac store downtown and they had mastercard/visa stickers on the window so I tried to use my card and they were kind of flabbergasted. Apparently they'd put up the stickers cause.... I dunno, maybe they thought they looked nice... Eventually they ran the purchase through a travel agency next door that could deal with plastic... (another weird note - how Poland went from cash only to plastic in a very short period of time virtually completely bypassing checks... one friend had a checking account and a checkbook but it wasn't easy to use...)

The few other people I knew with computers back then were foreigners or had weird scraped together collections. One acquaintance had begun a language/computing skills school (not the weirdest combination back then by any means) and I carefully never found out where he got the computers... (you learned to not ask about a lot of things back then).

I remember hearing about this thing called the internet on a trip back to the US in the mid 90s and my workplace not too long after that had a single modem in one professor's office that you had to go through a classroom to reach. Fun days...

I saw check book once in my life and that was only because of my mum's work.
Generally that is one of the very few good things about having a 'catching up' economy- you can skip few steps.

I grew up around computers. I remember ZX spectrum's and IBM PC's installed in our living room. My father had a small private computer lab in our flat with the equipment, printers and plotters which were not easy to get by back then in Poland.

In the mid 90's he has set up an internet network in our local technical university.
Not long after that an ex-commie uni rector has introduced his son for that position to get all the credit for my father's work.

Lazy and talentless opportunists always want to consume the work of the others. That's the essence of socialism.

My father has quit his academic job to start a small IT company. He has made a good choice.

My first computer was a zx spectrum, remember the noises and psychedelic lines loadng games. also trying to program geometric shapes with basic. . good times. :)

and yes delph the piracy software markets in warsaw were divine, remember some polak kunt spotting me as a auspol, and of course meet in the basement and try to rob.. punch punch kids well let's just say he didn't get any of my ill gotten western gains..