
Installed on all three computers in the country
A Russian blogger studying in North Korea has posted some
information about Red Star, North Korea's first indigenous operating
system. We wonder why anybody would want to study in North Korea, but
that it beside the point.
Boffins from the sane part of the Korean peninsula, South Korea,
examined the OS and concluded that it was aimed at monitoring using
activity, which is about the same as concluding that the Pope is
Catholic. Their report noted that the OS is designed to control
information security and that it will not be easily distributed due to
the sheer lack of applications. Is it just me, or are South Korean
experts just experts in stating the obvious?
Red Star is based on Linux, so no imperialist swine is making any money
on intellectual property rights. It's being sold on the streets of
Pyongyang for $5 a pop and it has some features that international
users might find a bit awkward. For example, it uses the North Korean
calendar which starts from the birth of Great Leader Kim Il-Sung, so
2010 is actually 99.
Sadly, the average North Korean citizen rarely has access to proper sustenance, let alone PCs with internet connectivity, which are reserved for party officials in the Hermit Kingdom. Oddly enough, on one occasion North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il told former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright that he was an internet expert.
More
here.