Abstrakt
This chapter addresses the specifics of computing practices (both amateur and professional) in peripheral contexts. Its aim is to lift "clones", "ports" and other "bastard" hardware and software artifacts from relative obscurity and derision up to the focus of the history of computing.
The chapter approaches the topic revisiting the classic concept of bricoleur, introduced by Lévi-Strauss as a counterpoint to engineer. Bricoleur makes do with the resources that are at hand, and that is one of the reasons why hobby computing and homebrew programming have played such important roles in peripheral contexts with limited access to resources and components, such as in the 1980s Soviet bloc.
The chapter uses examples from 1980s Czechoslovakia, specifically the local efforts to design and build microcomputers without using any unavailable Western-manufactured components, or the clones and conversions of Western games for domestic or domestically available hardware. It argues that clones required considerable ingenuity and effort to make, and that they have made important contributions to the proliferation of computer technology and literacy in regions like Eastern Europe.