(/pəˈnɪʃəs/)
Adjective
1. Causing harm in a subtle way.
… The Soviet state failed to network their nation not because it was too rigid or top-down in design but because it was too fickle and pernicious in practice. There is an irony to this. There is an irony to this. The first global computer networks took root in the US thanks to well-regulated state funding and collaborative research environments, while the contemporary (and notably independent) national network efforts in the USSR floundered due to unregulated competition and institutional infighting among Soviet administrators. The first global computer network emerged thanks to capitalists behaving like cooperative socialists, not socialists behaving like competitive capitalists.
From the post OGAS, the Soviet Union’s 1960s-era internet system
Source: How the Soviets invented the internet and why it didn’t work (aeon.co)
