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#elpaquetesemanal#sneakernet#cuba

This is Cuba's Netflix, Hulu, and Spotify – all without the internet

Vox

12M subscribers • 4 videos on Hallway

YouTube
  • Recommended by 1 person: 1 on Hacker News.

Beginner. No background in the topic needed.

5.5M views11 years ago1 recommendation

Distributed systemsNetworking and protocols

How Cuba's underground sneakernet, El Paquete Semanal, distributes terabytes of media and information weekly across the country without internet access.

Media smugglers get Taylor Swift, Game of Thrones, and the New York Times to Cubans every week through an illegal network of runners. Subscribe to our channel! goo.gl/0bsAjO In Cuba there is barely any internet. Anything but the state-run TV channels is prohibited. Publications are limited to the state-approved newspapers and magazines. This is the law. But, in typical Cuban fashion, the law doesn't stop a vast underground system of entertainment and news media distributors and consumers. "El Paquete Semanal" (The Weekly Package) is a weekly trove of digital content—everything from American movies to PDFs of Spanish newspapers—that is gathered, organized and transferred by a human web of runners and dealers to the entire country. It is a prodigious and profitable operation. I went behind the scenes in Havana to film how the Paquete works. Check out the video above to see how Cubans bypass censorship to access the media we take for granted. Read full post at vox.com/2015/9/21/9352095/netflix-cuba-paquete-internet Vox.com is a news website that helps you cut through the noise and understand what's really driving the events in the headlines. Check out vox.com to get up to speed on everything from Kurdistan to the Kim Kardashian app. Check out our full video catalog: goo.gl/IZONyE Follow Vox on Twitter: goo.gl/XFrZ5H Or on Facebook: goo.gl/U2g06o

Why it's here

1 person recommends this

What people say. Engineers point to this as a real-world example of a highly successful, human-powered sneakernet and offline content distribution network.

placeybordeauxon Hacker News • Recommends

On “The Cuban CDN”

I'd recommend watching the video that is linked: link to this video It talks about the mechanics, largely it looks like someone in Miami is consistently collecting stuff until they get close to 1TB or a week has passed, then that 1TB is flown out to Havana and it's copied and passed around after that.

29athrowawayon Hacker News • Mentions

On “Internet in a Box”

This is how people consume content in Cuba link to this video If you like this story, I recommend this documentary: link (Chuck Norris vs Communism)

movedxon Hacker News • Mentions

On “'VPNs are lawful technical tools,' says EU Court in landmark copyright ruling”

This is hard to read, but I think you're saying the Internet will see a shift to "Sneaker Net" like tactics where people torrent stuff, store it on HDDs, and just move those HDDs around? Like they do in Cuba: link to this video For the most part, I agree.