talking to andromeda

A couple of people have criticized on this programme, commenting you can’t have two-way communication with the andromeda galaxy due to the distance.
The film was clear enough that the communication was only one way. The team picked up the signal from andromeda ( completely by chance: Kaufman, the American spy said at one point “we’ve spent billions on this particular lottery ticket; you get lucky with your first dollar”) The signal told them how to build the computer,and the computers programme did the rest.
A similar scenario to ‘Contact’, but then, this story is from the 60’s, so who’s stealing from whom?