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Forget Netflix, North Korea has own video streaming service
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The Mansudae Grand Monument, featuring bronze statues depicting Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il, is seen in North Korea. (Uri Tours/-)
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video streaming service has arrived in North Korea, according to Korea Central Television, allowing viewers to replay documentaries about their leaders and learn Russian and English.
In theory, Manbang, which is the name of the set-top box, will allow North Koreans to watch five different TV channels in real time, all featuring state-sanctioned news and educational programs, and find information about the activities of leader Kim Jong-un and Juche ideology. Users can also read articles from official newspaper Rodong Sinmun and the Korean Central News Agency. The programming will be entirely state-run and not in any way related to streaming services available in the rest of the world like Netflix.
Korean media claims that Manbang works by plugging a set-top box into an internet modem, then connecting an HDMI cable from the cable box to the television, similar to an Apple TV or a Roku. “The information and communications technology is based upon two-way communications,” said Kim Jong Min, an engineer behind the project, according to NK News. “If a viewer wants to watch, for instance, an animal movie and sends a request to the equipment, it will show the relevant video to the viewer [...] this is two-way communications.”
However, it is unclear how most North Koreans will be able to use Manbang, as only a very small percentage of the country has access to the internet, and what is available is tightly controlled.
(Read also: By letting camera roll, film gives rare view of North Korea)
North Korea is home to 25.2 million people, according to the World Bank, but only 3 million people, 12 percent of the population, have domestic cell phone plans. None of those plans can be used to call internationally. According to Amnesty International, North Koreans who smuggle in unauthorized cell phones to access the global internet risk being sent to prison camps.
Steven Weber, a professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley, and an expert on North Korea remained skeptical that the North Korean streaming service would come to fruition.
“If you have a set-top box on your TV, it still has to connect to a network via cable or wireless,” he said as quoted by Forbes. “Perhaps in some imaginary world, the North Koreans could create their own content, they could store it on air-gapped servers apart from the internet and distribute it, but even the Chinese can’t afford that.” (tif/kes)
