The checkers are hung!

On November 30, 1999, at the end of the 20th century, on Tuesday, Alexei Tolkachev wrote in his diary: "And even in Russian you can? Well, Vaische."
The next Russian entry made a month later said : "For a long time I did not pick up a checker."

As far as I know, these are the first notes in Russian in Livejournal diaries.

It would be strange not to talk with Alexei.

Alexey, what is the father of such a strange but talented son, like LJ?

What is the "father"? Father is the one who drifted, nourished, and not the one who, excuse me, "he remembers the hour of conceiving, no accurately." I am a prodigal dad who accidentally found out that he, it turns out, is growing an adult son. And now he is touched, proud, is presenting some rights.

But still - how was it there for an hour to conceive?

5 years ago, from a familiar American student he heard the following task: “You are standing at the railway arrow. Three people are going on the bridge, you are personally unfamiliar. They are rushing at all pairs. According to the conditions of the task, you cannot shout to them, and they will probably die under the wheels of the train. The only thing you can do is to translate the arrow. Announced person who will die if you save those three. From students it was necessary to choose an answer and argue it in writing. My acquaintance received the three - I don’t know what the answers were evaluated by the criteria. I was interested in the dilemma, and I decided to take it out for discussion in my then Russian -speaking club - the Forum of the regulars of the site of anecdot.ru. Not even the site itself, but its guest book. Do you know, probably, how such mugs folded and add up? There were already three of them at the joke.ru (intended by the owner of the site for completely different things): “live broadcast” (where I went), “your opinion” (where the snobs went) and the “discussion club” (which I did not go to, so I don’t know who went). When our "live broadcast" began to clog undesirable characters, we, the regulars, without a scandal removed from the place and opened our forum based on UBB: Ultimate Bulletin Board with the beautiful name "Almira". It was there that everyone carried their problems, joys, riddles and discoveries. I think that at least half of us lived in the USA and Canada, the rest - in Israel, Moscow, Siberia, in general, a geography standard for a 1999 web. I placed my task in the philosophical section of the forum and decided to provide - for clarity - an automated voting. Then, if you remember, all these forums and boards were more victorious, votes were made manually or through external sites. I found such a site. He was called www.freevote.com designed his task there, gave alternative answers, inserted Link where necessary.
I don’t remember the results of the vote, but I well remember the agony that the dilemma caused the most conscientious dilemmas, including the story of how one of the participants (answering the third) chose “yes” and, seeing the statistics of “66.6%“ for ”, took it for a sign from above. Calm down, he soberly reasoned that he would vote, the numbers would still be the same as only in the same. The opposite side, I went to Freeevote several times, trying to come up with interesting votes, but no one answered the author of the site, Brad Fitzpatrik, I briefly addressed my new Livejournal. I registered, left a couple of records and abandoned for a couple of years.
It turned out that I, like Early Adopter, rely on many benefits available only to paid users. In particular, in my piggy bank there were immediately 15 invitation codes, of which I spent only half in three years. And freevote.com, I checked, rested in Bose (see also http://www.livejournal.com/users/at/867.html ).

And how did you guess to poke in Russian beanes?

It would be strange if he had not poked. In those years, the Internet was the only outlet for me, my Russian circle of communication. Since then, he has become a habitat from an outlet and even threatens to give me a second profession. And then it was necessary to immediately experience a new toy for compatibility with the Russian language. Computers, operating environments, browsers and sites then were different, we did not accept the keyboard and drivers of the keyboard.

Why did the Russian environment in LJ then not work out? In the end, in 99 there were many Russians who quite own the pen (or what is there now?). And the progressiveness of LJ was quite obvious.

The project was absolutely not advertised - even more so in Runet. LJ, in my opinion, is a unique phenomenon - a snowball that turned into an avalanche. Like any good avalanche, it began gradually. I do not remember other such sites in the history of the network. Somehow it looked like Lycos.com, but where is he now? The environment developed, not in the month when I came across LJ, and when exactly - they did not notify me, and then I did not check. When two years later, the environment lived and flourished, I joined it. In 1999, I had about two dozen standing network interlocutors, I share a find with them, who knows, the birth of LJ could happen a year or a month earlier. I don’t know how much I delayed the parish of LJ, but just in case I am ashamed. However, even my inertia did not stop the wheel of history.

But you still did not continue to write in Russian then. Why?

Because it implicitly understood what millions are appreciated for today: this is not just a diary, but a way to interest the world. Therefore, all early, naive, semi-literate notes were made, although quite sincere, but on the calculation of someone who will read and say: "Hello, who are you? Let's be friends." I do not think that among 720 users LJ at that time there were many Russians. At the same time, I did not advertise my notes among my friends from Real Madrid. I wanted a mysterious stranger or stranger from a neighboring neighborhood to come to me.

It turned out, by the way? Or did the strangers never come out?

Not a single comment.
This mood lasted about a month. When I returned to LiveJournal two years later, I did it at the invitation of a distant Moscow friend, and therefore the records have been in Russian since then. In addition to a few concerning American politics.

Do you often read other people's diaries? How much does it attract you at all?

I read from the crust to the crust once or two - our man went, say, by half -deck to America to earn money, and every day I found 15-30 minutes to write down sensations and experiences. This is interesting. It is unrealistic to read the magazine of one of the thinkers entirely - at least in a week. Too much and too smart. I appreciate such records when they fall into my frand tone. I read the tape, sometimes I read comments, sometimes I read the Frenda Frendes, do you know about such a service? I have not come in for so long that I no longer remember how to do it.

Yes, www.livejournal.com/users/ user/friendsfriends/ - but it works only for paid users.

A great way to kill a couple of hours and replenish the clushydruseum clip. Now I have no problems with an extra time, and real work and new hobbies have replaced virtual friends. Although, when it is necessary to quickly choose the option of translation, I go there, in ru_translate. The quality is not the highest, but the reaction rate and goodwill is out of competition. There are (there) are the times when I, with foam at my mouth, proved to someone that they, all of humanity, need LJ, that their life will change irreversibly. It is possible that these people are already in LiveJournal, but I do not read them.

Are you distinguishing LJ and LJ? That is, despite the perfect identity of technology, are these different cultural phenomena? Why? And what is this difference manifested?

It's hard to say. I do not perceive the non -Russian part of LJ/LJ at all, for me this is a purely Russian phenomenon, so as it is not called it, the essence will not change. Our people say about the "pseudoscience", "pseudo", "false -yuzers", therefore, the Latin abbreviation is heard. Last year, I left in my LiveJournal a great entry: “And here, it turns out, and in English they write” and asked my freeds to share links to interesting English-speaking diaries. Nothing good came out of this. By the way, here you have the difference: we have "Frems" and "Cols", and "them" - "friends" and "love". We understand and appreciate the difference between virtual and real and use English terms to emphasize it. I have never seen LJ with 500-1000 friends, frands, as you want. Perhaps because they perceive this term literally. And I have never seen them publish mathematical and language riddles, make digestes of news or records in other people's magazines, etc. Perhaps because I did not look. In the LiveJournal, bison, monsters, giants of thought and fathers of Russian democracy fell out, spears in the press break around him. I did not notice any of this in connection with LJ. Here are the tests "What are you Pokemon?" - They know how. As we can, by the way, are we. It is good that we have not yet lost a sense of humor and do not perceive ourselves and LJ too seriously.

Brief autobiography

Alexey Tolkachev was born in 1970 in Moscow. In 1977, he was given to special school number 26 and the next ten years resisted attempts to teach his English. In 1985, he discovered computers and decided that he would be a programmer. In 1987 he entered the Moscow Ordzhonikidze Aviation Institute at the Faculty of Applied Mathematics. In 1988, I read James Micheneer The Drifters and decided to see the world. In 1991 he entered the business school of Russian-American independent university. He worked as a translator and guide with visiting American businessmen. In 1992, he was sent for summer internships to the University of California in Irvain, where he continued to study the laws of demand and proposals. When they asked what he was most missing, he replied that he was money and offered his services. In 1993, he graduated from MAI and the wound and went to California to study. In 1994, being registered with an American student, he went to exchange in Belgium. On September 24, 1994, Stella Artoet's beer discovered for himself. He traveled around Europe for four months, locking himself in train toilets from controllers. November 24, 1994, while in Paris, experienced a special feeling. In 1995, he received a master's degree in the business administration and met a good girl with whom he still lives. He worked (and for some reason still works) a programmer in various offices. In 1997, he discovered Runet, where he disappears since then. In 1998, he sent the best joke of the year on anekdot.ru. He translated Joe Dassen and Jacques Bel , was going to sue Cortnev about the song “If there weren’t you”, until I realized that only the first line coincides. On November 30, 1999, he founded a live journal - the Russian branch of Livejournal. In the same 1999, he acquired the DVD-player and became a movieman. He wrote for the Film.ru film portal , fought for the correctness of the transfer to the cinema. It compiled a database of complex, witty and viciously understood names of films within the framework of the project "Interpreter". In November 2000, he came up with the quiz “ Game of Quotes ”, which to this day is drawn with the help of a group of enthusiasts. He collected 13,717 quotes from domestic and foreign films. In November 2003, he decided to become a sports journalist and offered his services to a respected newspaper with a ridiculous name " Soviet Sport ". Since then, it has been illuminating the game and life of Russian hockey players at Anahaim Maita Dax and other NHL clubs. On February 3, 2004 , I talked on the phone with Phil Esposito and now does not know what to strive for further.