The "one laptop per child" program put some thought into the connectivity problem. They actually designed their machines around the idea of distributing content via meshing and intermittent "sneakernet" deliveries.
Sadly, the price/performance wasn't quite there in the mid-2000s, but it seemed like they had some good ideas:
Sadly, the price/performance wasn't quite there in the mid-2000s, but it seemed like they had some good ideas:
https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/16/17233946/olpcs-100-laptop...
Maybe the mesh networking could have worked better if it were used exclusively for distributing small files, like a P2P Whispernet.