kremvax

kremvax
 /krem.vaks/, n.

   [from the then-large number of {Usenet} {VAXen} with names of the form
   foovax] Originally, a fictitious Usenet site at the Kremlin, announced
   on April 1, 1984 in a posting ostensibly originated there by Soviet
   leader Konstantin Chernenko. The posting was actually forged by Piet
   Beertema as an April Fool's joke. Other fictitious sites mentioned in
   the hoax were moskvax and {kgbvax}. This was probably the funniest of
   the many April Fool's forgeries perpetrated on Usenet (which has
   negligible security against them), because the notion that Usenet
   might ever penetrate the Iron Curtain seemed so totally absurd at the
   time.

   In fact, it was only six years later that the first genuine site in
   Moscow, demos.su, joined Usenet. Some readers needed convincing that
   the postings from it weren't just another prank. Vadim Antonov, senior
   programmer at Demos and the major poster from there up to mid-1991,
   was quite aware of all this, referred to it frequently in his own
   postings, and at one point twitted some credulous readers by blandly
   asserting that he was a hoax!

   Eventually he even arranged to have the domain's gateway site named
   kremvax, thus neatly turning fiction into fact and demonstrating that
   the hackish sense of humor transcends cultural barriers. [Mr. Antonov
   also contributed the Russian-language material for this lexicon.
   --ESR]

   In an even more ironic historical footnote, kremvax became an
   electronic center of the anti-communist resistance during the bungled
   hard-line coup of August 1991. During those three days the Soviet UUCP
   network centered on kremvax became the only trustworthy news source
   for many places within the USSR. Though the sysops were concentrating
   on internal communications, cross-border postings included immediate
   transliterations of Boris Yeltsin's decrees condemning the coup and
   eyewitness reports of the demonstrations in Moscow's streets. In those
   hours, years of speculation that totalitarianism would prove unable to
   maintain its grip on politically-loaded information in the age of
   computer networking were proved devastatingly accurate -- and the
   original kremvax joke became a reality as Yeltsin and the new Russian
   revolutionaries of glasnost and perestroika made kremvax one of the
   timeliest means of their outreach to the West.
    

kremvax
kgbvax

   /krem-vaks/ (Or kgbvax) Originally, a fictitious {Usenet} site
   at the Kremlin, named like the then large number of {Usenet}
   {VAXen} with names of the form foovax.  Kremvax was announced
   on April 1, 1984 in a posting ostensibly originated there by
   Soviet leader Konstantin Chernenko.  The posting was actually
   forged by Piet Beertema as an April Fool's joke.  Other
   fictitious sites mentioned in the hoax were moskvax and
   {kgbvax}.  This was probably the funniest of the many April
   Fool's forgeries perpetrated on {Usenet} (which has negligible
   security against them), because the notion that {Usenet} might
   ever penetrate the Iron Curtain seemed so totally absurd at
   the time.

   In fact, it was only six years later that the first genuine
   site in Moscow, demos.su, joined {Usenet}.  Some readers
   needed convincing that the postings from it weren't just
   another prank.  Vadim Antonov, senior programmer at Demos and
   the major poster from there up to mid-1991, was quite aware of
   all this, referred to it frequently in his own postings, and
   at one point twitted some credulous readers by blandly
   asserting that he *was* a hoax!

   Eventually he even arranged to have the domain's gateway site
   *named* kremvax, thus neatly turning fiction into truth and
   demonstrating that the hackish sense of humour transcends
   cultural barriers.  Mr. Antonov also contributed some
   Russian-language material for the {Jargon File}.

   In an even more ironic historical footnote, kremvax became an
   electronic centre of the anti-communist resistance during the
   bungled hard-line coup of August 1991.  During those three
   days the Soviet UUCP network centreed on kremvax became the
   only trustworthy news source for many places within the USSR.
   Though the sysops were concentrating on internal
   communications, cross-border postings included immediate
   transliterations of Boris Yeltsin's decrees condemning the
   coup and eyewitness reports of the demonstrations in Moscow's
   streets.  In those hours, years of speculation that
   totalitarianism would prove unable to maintain its grip on
   politically-loaded information in the age of computer
   networking were proved devastatingly accurate - and the
   original kremvax joke became a reality as Yeltsin and the new
   Russian revolutionaries of "glasnost" and "perestroika" made
   kremvax one of the timeliest means of their outreach to the
   West.

   [{Jargon File}]