Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/05/03/inside-cubas-massive-weekly.html
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When I look at Cuba on the map, the geography looks a lot like Japan’s relationship to Asia, or Britain’s relationship to Europe. Once Uncle Sam stops messing with their trade, I think that island is going places!
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I suppose that going WiFi mesh would attract too much official attention? (Bah, “mesh” seems to be this year’s bulshytt buzzword.)
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I ponder whether the “Paqueteros” have yet to have accusations of censorship, inhibiting the free exchange of ideas, and being a tool of the oligarchs, or something.
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My apologies, I’m hung over like a bear.
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I heard about this today through this interview the lead author did on This Is Hell.
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Anyone got a magnet link?
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oddly fitting, given that Columbus initially mistook Cuba for Japan.
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It’s Johnny Mmemonic but envisioned by housewives.
How about WiFi hotspots, with an HTML front end for FidoNet and modems?
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I have the feeling that this may save a lot of people a lot of time. How many links do you click that aren’t useful? Once you learn the quirks of your curator (yeah, Cory, you have quirks) you no longer are tempted to try to check everything out.
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The Wired piece was great and the recent documentary about Major Lazer performing in Cuba went into depth about how the Paquete culture that helped them to develop a following there.
(And it’s free to view for Apple Music subscribers.)
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They have something a bit like that, but not connected to the Internet. From the Wired article mentioned in the post
:IF THE LOGISTICAL effort of transporting a physical piece of hardware to millions of people so they can keep up with Silicon Valley sounds ambitious, it pales in comparison to the makeshift technical marvel that makes up Cuba’s other internet workaround. Named SNET, short for street network, it is a homebrewed intranet stretching across the capital and parts of the provinces that reproduces much of the consumer internet we know in the free world. With no fast, affordable access to Facebook, Instagram, or online audio streaming, the Cubans have simply created their own versions of these sites and services internally in a wholly separate network, and they are quickly rushing into the same minefield of acceptable-use policies, cyberbullying, pornography filtering, memes, and general online mayhem that Americans have been suffering for years.
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Once again, people proving that we do actually live in the 1980’s cyber punk future. Cool 
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