In February 2010, Ilya Ponomarev, then a member of the Russian parliament, brought a group of American diplomats and Silicon Valley moguls to Novosibirsk.
I met Howard Solomon and Esther Dyson and even had a beer with Jack Dorsey and Ashton Kutcher. I was hopeful back then. Visits like this showed the advantages of cooperation over isolation. Unfortunately, things did not go as planned.
Looking back, that period was quite captivating. Yet, in the present day, it all seems like a distant dream or a bout of delirium.
