Automated Enterprise Control System "Lviv": the local history of the "Soviet Internet"

We are pleased to invite you to the lecture by Taras Nazaruk that continues the series of lectures on modernity experiences in Lviv entitled "Let's Have a City...".

The implementation of the project "Soviet Internet" began in Lviv in the 1960s. At that time, artificial intelligence or the city's IT industry was not yet a matter of discussion. Instead, there was widespread talk about the electronic brain and cybernetics, which were supposed to automate processes and unite all organizations of the Soviet Union into a single computer network.

The Lviv Electron plant made one of the first steps to create this network. At this place, the team led by academician Glushkov launched a pilot Automated Control System (ACS). They tried to use a computer for the production of TV sets. Over time, dozens of similar systems were developed in Lviv and hundreds across the USSR. However, they never became a unified network; moreover, the consequences of their creation have remained scarcely studied. Researchers today call this project the "Soviet Internet" that failed.

Even though the creation of the network was not realized, the computerization of enterprises, organizations, and the city in general began right at that time. This process never stopped after that. This lecture serves as an invitation to talk about the way these Soviet Automated Control Systems were envisioned and the significance they had for Lviv.

Credits

Cover Image: Archive of the Electron Concern // Urban Media Archive of the Center for Urban History