Fidel Castro
15th February 2004, 02:09
This article was in today's Scottish Daily Record, telling the story about Soviet deals over the well known computer game, tetris. I thought it might be of interest to some:
COMPUTER KREMLINS Feb 14 2004
But the story behind Tetris is one of murky deals and Cold War politics
By Brian Mciver
WHILE the Kremlin's top scientists grappled with nuclear missile technology, one computer expert tried to stop coloured bricks filling his screen.
In 1985, Alexey Pajitnov spent a fortnight writing a deceptively simple software program on an archaic Electronica 60 computer.
The game named Tetris after the Greek word for four, the number of different shapes which fell from the top of the screen was an instant hit with his colleagues.
It was soon copied onto floppy discs among the Moscow computer community and then throughout the rest of the eastern bloc.
But nobody realised it would spark secret negotiations between western business tycoons and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
Pajitnov said: 'We didn't have the idea that software was something which could be considered as a product or be sold or protected or whatever.
'It made no sense for us at all. 'We were far too busy with the serious kind of equations of outer space or nuclear war, you know. It was something absolutely alien.'
The game was spotted in Hungary by British computer programmer Robert Stein, who soon became addicted to it.
He immediately acquired home PC rights for the game from the Soviet Union, which held the rights to inventions dreamed up by its citizens.
But Stein didn't hold on to the rights for long he sold them to newspaper tycoon Robert Maxwell's computer firm Mirrorsoft.
Around the same time, Gorbachev took control of the Politburo and ushered in the era of glasnost and perestroika.
His outward-looking views on business links with the West soon saw the battle for the game's profits heat up.
In 1989, Maxwell teamed up with US home console giants Atari, prompting Japanese rivals Nintendo who were set to launch a revolutionary portable games machine to get involved as well.
Using American deal maker Henk Rogers, Nintendo tried to cut in on the sale and, on an incredible day, sent their man into the Kremlin to negotiate a deal.
He arrived just minutes before Maxwell's son Kevin held a similar kind of secret meeting with technology official Nikolai Belikov.
A few hours earlier, Robert Stein acting as Maxwell senior's agent met Belikov as well.
By the end of the series of furtive meetings, Nintendo had finally secured the rights to Tetris for games consoles, despite Robert Maxwell personally lobbying Gorbachev to have the deals reversed.
Atari pressed on with their plans to release the game, thinking they would benefit from Mirrorsoft's rights and had already started production and advertising their version of the game when Nintendo announced their deal prompting an incredible series of lawsuits.
Nintendo eventually won after Belikov testified on their behalf Maxwell's pressure had been so great he admitted he had feared for his life if Nintendo lost and he returned to the USSR a hero of free trade.
Since then, the game has appeared on virtually every platform ever released, from watches to the Sony Play Station, and similar games are supplied with just about every home PC, meaning its official sales figures reflect only a fraction of its popularity.
As for inventor Pajitnov, he played only an advisory role in negotiations and never received apenny. But by the time those rights deals expired in 1996, the Soviet Union was long gone and he managed to re-assert his authorship of the title, and started making money from it.
He now works for software giants Microsoft as a games developer, and doesn't regret his lost millions too much.
Pajitnov said: 'It was two very, very powerful sides fighting for my small game, and we got in a very sharp and hot place.
'You always could make a little bit more than you made.
'But you know I never, I never seriously think about this stuff. I live as I live.'
COMPUTER KREMLINS Feb 14 2004
But the story behind Tetris is one of murky deals and Cold War politics
By Brian Mciver
WHILE the Kremlin's top scientists grappled with nuclear missile technology, one computer expert tried to stop coloured bricks filling his screen.
In 1985, Alexey Pajitnov spent a fortnight writing a deceptively simple software program on an archaic Electronica 60 computer.
The game named Tetris after the Greek word for four, the number of different shapes which fell from the top of the screen was an instant hit with his colleagues.
It was soon copied onto floppy discs among the Moscow computer community and then throughout the rest of the eastern bloc.
But nobody realised it would spark secret negotiations between western business tycoons and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
Pajitnov said: 'We didn't have the idea that software was something which could be considered as a product or be sold or protected or whatever.
'It made no sense for us at all. 'We were far too busy with the serious kind of equations of outer space or nuclear war, you know. It was something absolutely alien.'
The game was spotted in Hungary by British computer programmer Robert Stein, who soon became addicted to it.
He immediately acquired home PC rights for the game from the Soviet Union, which held the rights to inventions dreamed up by its citizens.
But Stein didn't hold on to the rights for long he sold them to newspaper tycoon Robert Maxwell's computer firm Mirrorsoft.
Around the same time, Gorbachev took control of the Politburo and ushered in the era of glasnost and perestroika.
His outward-looking views on business links with the West soon saw the battle for the game's profits heat up.
In 1989, Maxwell teamed up with US home console giants Atari, prompting Japanese rivals Nintendo who were set to launch a revolutionary portable games machine to get involved as well.
Using American deal maker Henk Rogers, Nintendo tried to cut in on the sale and, on an incredible day, sent their man into the Kremlin to negotiate a deal.
He arrived just minutes before Maxwell's son Kevin held a similar kind of secret meeting with technology official Nikolai Belikov.
A few hours earlier, Robert Stein acting as Maxwell senior's agent met Belikov as well.
By the end of the series of furtive meetings, Nintendo had finally secured the rights to Tetris for games consoles, despite Robert Maxwell personally lobbying Gorbachev to have the deals reversed.
Atari pressed on with their plans to release the game, thinking they would benefit from Mirrorsoft's rights and had already started production and advertising their version of the game when Nintendo announced their deal prompting an incredible series of lawsuits.
Nintendo eventually won after Belikov testified on their behalf Maxwell's pressure had been so great he admitted he had feared for his life if Nintendo lost and he returned to the USSR a hero of free trade.
Since then, the game has appeared on virtually every platform ever released, from watches to the Sony Play Station, and similar games are supplied with just about every home PC, meaning its official sales figures reflect only a fraction of its popularity.
As for inventor Pajitnov, he played only an advisory role in negotiations and never received apenny. But by the time those rights deals expired in 1996, the Soviet Union was long gone and he managed to re-assert his authorship of the title, and started making money from it.
He now works for software giants Microsoft as a games developer, and doesn't regret his lost millions too much.
Pajitnov said: 'It was two very, very powerful sides fighting for my small game, and we got in a very sharp and hot place.
'You always could make a little bit more than you made.
'But you know I never, I never seriously think about this stuff. I live as I live.'