Current Events > Communist-run Cuba starts rolling out internet on mobile phones

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https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cuba-internet/communist-run-cuba-starts-rolling-out-internet-on-mobile-phones-idUSKBN1K62U7

Communist-run Cuba has started providing internet on the mobile phones of select users as it aims to roll out the service nationwide by year-end, in a further step toward opening one of the Western Hemispheres least connected countries.

Journalists at state-run news outlets were among the first this year to get mobile internet, provided by Cubas telecoms monopoly, as part of a wider campaign for greater internet access that new President Miguel Diaz-Canel has said should boost the economy and help Cubans defend their revolution.

Analysts said broader web access will also ultimately weaken the governments control of what information reaches people in the one-party island state that has a monopoly on the media. Cuba frowns on public dissent and blocks access to dissident websites.

Its been a radical change, said Yuris Norido, 39, who reports for several state-run news websites and the television. I can now update on the news from wherever I am, including where the news is taking place.

Certain customers, including companies and embassies, have also been able to buy mobile data plans since December, according to the website of Cuban telecoms monopoly ETECSA, which has not broadly publicized the move.

ETECSA has said it will expand mobile internet to all its 5 million mobile phone customers, nearly half of Cubas population, by the end of this year. ETECSA did not reply to a request for more details for this story.

Whether because of a lack of cash, a long-running U.S. trade embargo or concerns about the flow of information, Cuba has lagged behind in web access. Until 2013, internet was largely only available to the public at tourist hotels in Cuba.

But the government has since then made increasing connectivity a priority, introducing cybercafes and outdoor Wi-Fi hotspots and slowly starting to hook up homes to the web.

Long before he took office from Raul Castro in April, 58-year-old Diaz-Canel championed the cause.

We need to be able to put the content of the revolution online, he told parliament last July as vice president, adding that Cubans could thus counter the avalanche of pseudo-cultural, banal and vulgar content.

Cuba could use subsidies to encourage the use of government-sponsored applications, analysts said. Last month, ETECSA launched a free Cuba-only messaging application, Todus, while Cubas own intranet with a handful of government-approved sites and email is much cheaper to access than the wider internet.

In a 2015 document about its internet strategy that leaked, the Cuban government said it aimed to connect at least half of homes by 2020 and 60 percent of phones.

But many Cubans are skeptical. ETECSA President Mayra Arevich told state-run media in December it had connected just 11,000 homes last year.

Ive been many times to the ETECSA shop to ask if they can give us home access, said Yuneisy Galindo, 28, at a Wi-Fi hotspot on one of Havanas thoroughfares. But they tell us they still arent ready and will call us.

Most mobile phone owners have smartphones, although Cuba is only now installing 3G technology, even as most of Latin America has moved onto 4G, with 5G in its final testing phase.

This rollout will expand slowly at first and then more quickly, if the government is increasingly confident that it can control any political fallout, said Cuba expert Ted Henken at Baruch College in the United States.

The price could prove the biggest restriction for many, though. Hotspots currently charge $1 an hour, compared with an average state monthly wage of $30.

Cuba is barely entering the year 2006.
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So in other words, we can expect more literal communists to pollute the internet in the coming years. All because the indoctrinated middle schoolers in Cuba will finally have 3G access while the civilized world has moved on to 5G.
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Oh no, more communists on the internet...
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Seriously, allowing Cubans access to the internet is a horrible idea. It's going expose them to harmful anti-communist propaganda.
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What do you mean literal communists? Cuba isn't real communism.

frozenshock posted...

Seriously, allowing Cubans access to the internet is a horrible idea. It's going expose them to harmful anti-communist propaganda.

Harmful propaganda? You mean enlightening truth. Freedom from the mental shackles forcibly imposed by Marxists for generations.
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There's always the slight hope that the new guy is another Juan Carlos.

FLUFFYGERM posted...

frozenshock posted...

Seriously, allowing Cubans access to the internet is a horrible idea. It's going expose them to harmful anti-communist propaganda.

Harmful propaganda? You mean enlightening truth. Freedom from the mental shackles forcibly imposed by Marxists for generations.

You don't understand. This is not a joke. The internet is filled with enemies of communism.
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I'm ready for the communist memes.
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they are allowing private property now.

hopefully they see the light
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i was in cuba earlier this year and the younger generation were all at wifi parks on the internet on their phones

crazy to see they're going to expand mobile data
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bump
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