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Notel Media Player Helps North Koreans Skirt Censorship
An anonymous reader writes A small portable media device, costing roughly $50, is allowing North Koreans to access and view foreign media despite tight government censorship, according to a Reuters report. The 'Notel', a mashup of notebook and television, is being described as a symbol of change in the repressed society. Used to watch DVDs and shared content from USB sticks and SD cards, the media player can be easily concealed and transported among families and friends. According to correspondents in the region, as many as half of all urban North Korean households have a notel and are swapping a broad range of banned media such as soaps and TV dramas from South Korea and China, Hollywood blockbusters, and news clips — all of which is strictly forbidden by Pyongyang law.
Just wait until the MPAA and RIAA get ahold of them for piracy. They'll wish they were in north Korean prison.
It's funny because Notel is like No Tell, which means don't tell, so the fat dictator can't put you in a forced labor camp with your entire family/kill you.
Notel was a motel chain.
the fruits of civilization bringing freedom of information into the dark corners of totalitarianism.
North Korean dominance over its people can't last forever. Sooner or later, they'll wake up to the fact that they're being subjugated, manipulated, and forced to live in poverty.
I hope more Notels get circulated. The more, the better.
What else can happen when an unstoppable force collides with an immovable object?
Saves the day again.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
What do North Koreans have against skirts?
This is what I loaded on my notel, anyway.
youtube.com/watch?v=i33mKIcwfx8
The last place on Earth not yet polluted with Western style pop culture and consumerism. You would think that after 70 years of wholesome, commercial free living these N. Koreans would have lost their taste for soaps and TV dramas. It's almost like they're not satisfied with the indigenous culture of their great nation.
I think perhaps this isn't really a case of these good people debasing themselves with our media dreck. They are collecting this material for use in their world class education system. Course material for their uncorrupted pupils; "See little Jin? These Americans are in the last stages of starvation... their bellies have bloated so much they can no longer peddle their bikes and must use giant SUVs to do the bidding of their capitalist masters."
They're also collecting it as evidence. So you better watch out; when N. Korea finally conquers us all we'll have a lot to answer for, because they'll have the proof.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
And was like "Man, everyone is getting into the media streaming game, even defunct Canadian companies."
How is it that millions of N. Koreans have discovered the Notel before slashdot?
...omphaloskepsis often...
The article talked about how people would put a North Korean DVD in the DVD player part, watch stuff using the SD card slot, and then conceal the SD card if they got searched.
I wonder if the North Korean authorities will start using catchphrases from Western media in their interrogations and gauge the suspect's reaction, kinda like how in "The Great Escape" the guards would say something spontaneously in English to trip up the escapees.
It's fine and brilliant to break the law of a government like North Korea because western governments don't like what they ban.
Yet it's fine and dandy for those governments to ban filesharing sites because it's against the law to use them.
How does that work? Janus complex?
It's only "several magnitudes worse" because you don't like their politics. When it comes to death, Texas is worse and Saudi Arabia. When it comes to incarceration, the USA is worse. When it comes to quashing opposing politics, again Saudi is worse, Pinochet was worse, and the USA and UK supported him, the UK even hid him. When it comes to interference in foreign interests, the USA is worse.
But the NK aren't a democracy and aren't a right wing non-democratic dictatorship, and the media keep painting them as evil. So they're "magnitudes worse".
They're not.
You're magnitudes worse indoctrinated than most, and likely just as indoctrinated as the North Koreans. And for the same reason: if someone else is the epitome of evil, you can put up with evil done in the name of toppling them.
Of course, ACTUALLY toppling them means you can't get away with the evil yourself any more, so either you don't topple them or you find another "ultimate evil" to blame. USSR to Iraq and NK to ISIS.
Get yourself executed and you entire family sent off to starve in a reeducation camp all for watching SpongeBob.
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes