[liberationtech] English Version of How to Tweet from Cuba

[Jesse Young]

Hi Andrew,

And hello to the liberation-tech list -- Joshua Stern and I from
envaya.org have been following this list for about a year now.

It's possible to set up a SMS bridge using an Android phone that
locals could text from mobile phones without internet (at local
rates).

Just last week we released Telerivet -- http://telerivet.com/ -- a
service that makes it easy to deploy SMS services anywhere in the
world, just like this.

As an alternative, you could use EnvayaSMS -- http://sms.envaya.org/
-- an open-source Android app that acts as an SMS gateway, which we
developed as a project of our non-profit, Envaya.

Telerivet is easier to use than EnvayaSMS (even non-programmers can
set up a simple SMS service with Telerivet in a few minutes).
EnvayaSMS requires more technical expertise, but has the benefit of
being free and open-source with no dependence on third-party servers.

To set up a Twitter bridge with either Telerivet or EnvayaSMS, a
developer could implement a service that acts as a client of the
Twitter API (if there's not already a service that does this). Then
somebody in Cuba with an internet connection would just need to get an
Android phone with a Cuban SIM card, install the Telerivet or
EnvayaSMS app, and point it at the appropriate URL.

Telerivet is in beta now and we're improving it rapidly, so feedback is welcome!

-Jesse

> One of the
> ideas that I was kicking around when Telecomix was looking at Cuba was the
> use of some sort of SMS bridge device that locals could text at local rates,
> thus driving the barrier to entry and cost significantly down.



On Tue, Mar 6, 2012 at 7:11 AM, Andrew Lewis <andrew at pdqvpn.com> wrote:
> Hey Diana, long time no see, not sure if it is just me, but I do not have
> anything attached to this email. Either way Id love to follow up with you
> off list. I know that I have seemingly fell off the face of the earth, but I
> am trying to get back to work soon.
>
> To the rest of the people reading Libtech, basically there is no wifi or
> Internet itself inside Cuba available to the average Juan, and Juanita's.
> However as cell phones are becoming more available, people are using SMS to
> communicate more and more. This has led to a rise in people accessing
> twitter to express themselves, but requires the use of either hyper
> expensive foreign cells, or even more expensive illicit wifi. One of the
> ideas that I was kicking around when Telecomix was looking at Cuba was the
> use of some sort of SMS bridge device that locals could text at local rates,
> thus driving the barrier to entry and cost significantly down. I have my
> ideas in how it would work, and I'll send them to the list in a bit, but I
> would be intrigued to see if anyone else had ideas, or if they had any input
> before I put my ideas out there.
>
> Thanks,
> Andrew Lewis
> Telecomix IRC: Punkbob
> Twitter: ThePunkbob
>
>
>
> On Mar 6, 2012, at 2:18 PM, diani barreto <diani_de at yahoo.de> wrote:
>
>
>
> Hello dear friends at Liberationtech,
>
> As you expressed  interest via Twitter,  on Yoani Sánchez' post on how to
> tweet from Cuba, I completed this translation.
> It was originally intended as a guide for Cubans on the Island to connect to
> Twitter, but in the meantime it has served as a guide to inform the world on
> how Cubans use Twitter without Internet access.
>
> I hope it is of interest to you.
>
> Thank you for your support.
>
> Finest regards,
>
> Diani Barreto
> @deCespedes on Twitter
>
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