As Twitter began to gain popularity around 15 years ago, millions of people in Cuba were looking for a similar website they could use to send short messages to the world. It was difficult to access Twitter itself because Cuba’s communist government restricted internet access, so there was a big untapped market there. Fortunately for …
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As Twitter began to gain popularity around 15 years ago, millions of people in Cuba were looking for a similar website they could use to send short messages to the world. It was difficult to access Twitter itself because Cuba’s communist government restricted internet access, so there was a big untapped market there.
FortunatelyforCubans,analternativequicklyemerged.Itwascalled“ZunZuneo,”whichisaCubanexpressionthat’ssupposedtosoundlikethenoiseahummingbirdmakes.SowehadTwitterandtheyhadaknockoffcalledZunZuneo.Eventhoughitwasaprettycheapknock-off,however,theapplicationquicklybecamepopular,gainingtensofthousandsofusersinamatterofmonths.Thecreatorsoftheapphadobtainedalistof500,000Cubancellphonenumbersfromsomewhere—presumablytheblackmarket—so
