When she finally returned to Cuba, Sánchez helped to establish Contodos, a magazine that continues to act as a forum for Cuban free expression, and a vehicle for reporting news.

Time magazine listed her as one of the world's 100 most influential people in 2008, stating that "under the nose of a regime that has never tolerated dissent, Sánchez has practiced what paper-bound journalists in her country cannot; freedom of speech".

[2] In November 2009, U.S. President Barack Obama, wrote that her blog "provides the world a unique window into the realities of daily life in Cuba" and applauded her efforts to "empower fellow Cubans to express themselves through the use of technology".

As the nation's railroad system fell apart after the collapse of communism in Europe, William Sánchez, out of work along with many of his colleagues, became a bicycle repairman.

Sánchez says that by the end of her university studies she "understood two things: the first, that the world of intellectualism and high culture disgusted me and the saddest, that I no longer wanted to be a philologist.

[8] After a short period of employment with Gente Nueva, Sánchez asked to be released from her position, then focused on a higher paying job as a freelance Spanish instructor for German tourists visiting Havana.

According to Sánchez, this was during a time "when engineers preferred to drive taxis, teachers worked as hotel desk clerks, and store counters were tended by neurosurgeons or nuclear physicists.

Sánchez states that she then flew home to Cuba "for a two-week family visit" on a round-trip ticket, and by destroying her passport was able to avoid being forced on a plane back to Switzerland.

"[16] Sánchez flew to Prague in the Czech Republic, where she was received by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and former presidential candidate Karel Schwarzenberg who was particularly interested in discussing the reforms that took place in Cuba during 2012 and the state of civil society there.

The magazine continues to be published today as a "forum for free expression" from the island, and as a vehicle for the reporting of news such as Father Jose Conrado's February 2009 letter to Raúl Castro Ruz.

The magazine's editorial board consists of Dimas Castellanos, Miriam Celaya, Marta Cortízas, Reinaldo Escobar, Eugenio Leal, and Yoani Sánchez.

A select list of guests began entering the "Che Guevara Room", while our "group of impertinents" watched, from outside, as midnight arrived.

Sánchez believed that the "debate was hijacked by the institutions, jailed by an academic world full of concepts and fancy words, and condemned to take the course of the imminent conference of the UNEAC [Cuban Writers and Artists Union].

For this, without detailing all the complications, the elevator does not work, the gatekeeper asks me to show my passport to sit at the computer, or there are frustrations to sign on, plus the slow-speeds imposed by proxies, filters and keylogger.

[30] In an interview with journalist Ted Henken published in Poder360, she explained this view, saying: I refuse to use incendiary language, defamation, or harangues, because that only exacerbates the cycle of intolerance that is an obstacle to reasoned debate.

The official press spends all its time trying to make us believe that this is a very monolithic country, that we all think the same, and it does so with a dose of revolutionary violence and ideological aggressiveness that is paralyzing.

[33] Sánchez has also appeared in interviews by Spain's El País newspaper;[34] in an article in Germany's Die Zeit;[35] and in The New York Times.

In a prologue to this new edition of a book commemorating his visit to Bolivia in 1993, Fidel Castro took the opportunity to quote a long excerpt from Sánchez's blog and, although he did not mention her name, expressed his disappointment that there are young persons in Cuba today who think as she does.

I recognize the right of this gentleman to make this comment, but I allow myself to observe that the responsibility implied in receiving a prize is never comparable to that of bestowing one, and Yoani, at least, has never awarded a medal to a corrupt person, a traitor, a dictator or a murderer.

[41] Since her blog was blocked from public Internet sites in Cuba, Sánchez has relied on Cuban friends abroad to post her texts for her, which she sends to them by email, along with the accompanying photographs.

Although this method of disseminating the blogs was slow and delayed, and readers could not comment directly on the website, it was quite effective and continues to this day [March 2009].

[56] Sanchéz said to a known Venezuelan blogger that visited her in Havana: "In any case we are trying to educate others so blogging would become in Cuba a permanent feature, a means of democratizing citizen expression, as in the free world.

[58] This citizen journalism project seeks to provide a multimedia platform to independent bloggers in Cuba to express the realities and hardships of everyday life there.

"[59] An article in El Nuevo Herald by Ivette Leyva Martinez,[60] speaks to the role played by Sánchez and other young people, outside the Cuban opposition and dissidence movements, in working towards a free and democratic Cuba today.

[61][62] On February 5, 2009, Father José Conrado, Pastor of Santa Teresita del Niño Jesús in Santiago de Cuba, wrote an open letter[63][64] to Cuban president Raúl Castro Ruz which was published in the digital magazine, Contodos.

[65] Sánchez and Escobar traveled to Santiago de Cuba the weekend before the letter was released and spent several days there, meeting with Father Conrado.

During the same visit they held a blogger meeting with young people there, and Sánchez put her Ortega y Gasset award in the sanctuary of the Virgin of Charity of Cobre, where "the long arm of the censor does not enter."

[73] On November 18, 2009, Obama supposedly responded to these questions with a detailed expression of his support for the bloggers' work:[74][75] Your blog provides the world a unique window into the realities of daily life in Cuba.

The government and people of the United States join all of you in looking forward to the day all Cubans can freely express themselves in public without fear and without reprisals.

[78] Sánchez and her husband were arrested on October 4, 2012, apparently in an attempt to prevent her from writing about the trial of conservative politician Ángel Carromero, who crashed a rental car, killing Oswaldo Payá.