Internet in Russia: A Study of the Runet and Its Impact on Social Life (Societies and Political Orders in Transition) 303033015X, 9783030330156

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Societies and Political Orders in Transition

Sergey Davydov Editor

Internet in Russia

A Study of the Runet and Its Impact on Social Life

Societies and Political Orders in Transition Series Editors Alexander Chepurenko Higher School of Economics, National Research University, Moscow, Russia Stein Ugelvik Larsen University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway William Reisinger Department of Political Science, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA Managing Editors Ekim Arbatli Higher School of Economics, National Research University, Moscow, Russia Dina Rosenberg Higher School of Economics, National Research University, Moscow, Russia Aigul Mavletova Higher School of Economics, National Research University, Moscow, Russia

This book series presents scientific and scholarly studies focusing on societies and political orders in transition, for example in Central and Eastern Europe but also elsewhere in the world. By comparing established societies, characterized by wellestablished market economies and well-functioning democracies, with post-socialist societies, often characterized by emerging markets and fragile political systems, the series identifies and analyzes factors influencing change and continuity in societies and political orders. These factors include state capacity to establish formal and informal rules, democratic institutions, forms of social structuration, political regimes, levels of corruption, specificity of political cultures, as well as types and orientation of political and economic elites. This series welcomes monographs and edited volumes from a variety of disciplines and approaches, such as political and social sciences and economics, which are accessible to both academics and interested general readers. Topics may include, but are not limited to, democratization, regime change, changing social norms, migration, etc. More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/15626 International Advisory Board: Bluhm, Katharina; Freie Universitðt Berlin, Germany Buckley, Cynthia; University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Sociological Research, USA Cox, Terry; Central and East European Studies, University of Glasgow, UK Fish, Steve; Berkeley University, USA Ilyin, Michail; National Research University Higher School of Economics, Russia Melville, Andrei; National Research University Higher School of Economics, Russia Radaev, Vadim; National Research University Higher School of Economics, Russia

Sergey Davydov Editor

Internet in Russia A Study of the Runet and Its Impact on Social Life

Editor Sergey Davydov Higher School of Economics National Research University Moscow, Russia

ISSN 2511-2201 ISSN 2511-221X (electronic) Societies and Political Orders in Transition ISBN 978-3-030-33015-6 ISBN 978-3-030-33016-3 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 Chapter “Runet in Crisis Situations” is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). For further details see licence information in the chapter. This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Preface

What is Runet? There are at least three possible answers to this question. First, it is a segment of the Internet with content in Russian language. Second, it is a segment of the Internet associated with the domain zone .RU. Third, it is the national—Russian—segment of the Internet. The latter definition is the closest one to the idea of this book. However, the use of this elusive term will be presented with different layers of meaning in the following pages. Herein also lies the general concept of the book. Our contributors do not always agree with each other and sometimes express non-coinciding opinions. What they all certainly agree on, however, is that the Runet deserves to be written about. In recent years, we hear more and more often that the so-called new media are in fact not so new. Communication technologies, which were breathtaking a quarter of a century ago, have become routines, even sometimes banal, and are nevertheless still able to bring surprises. Today, for many people in the world the Internet is part of everyday life. And Russia is no exception. We should not forget that we are discussing a country with the biggest territory and diverse and complex climatic conditions. That is why communication infrastructure and technologies are of particular importance here. A side effect is the uneven development of the infrastructure and, accordingly, the information inequality—in particular, between residents of large and small settlements. According to Mediascope, a research company, Internet resources from various devices are used by 76.3% of the population. 82.8 million people go online every day. The Internet’s monthly reach is 93.6 million people.1 According to RAEC/HSE estimates, the contribution of the Internet economy to the Russian economy as of 2018 amounted to RUR 3.9 trillion, or about $62.2 billion.2

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Average data for October 2018–March 2019, audience 12+. See: Economica Runeta 2018 [Runet Economy 2018] (2019). https://raec.ru/upload/files/ru-ec_ booklet.pdf. Accessed 28.06.2019.

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Size matters, but it’s not everything. Media culture is also important. In the mid-1950s, the authors of the Four Theories of the Press, Fred Siebert, Theodore Peterson, and Wilbur Schramm, introduced a special theory—the Soviet Communist—that did not fit into their evolutionary scheme of development of media systems. Contemporary Russian media system is markedly different from the Soviet one 70 years ago. However, it is obviously specific enough to attract the attention of social scientists worldwide. As one of our contributors Natalia Konradova notes: “Runet is in the Age of Man.” This book is proof that the Russian Internet studies are also in the Age of Man. Our international and interdisciplinary project would have not been possible had a number of research institutes and individual researchers not made the Runet the center of their scientific interests during the last quarter century. We wanted not only to present different scientific schools and approaches but make an integral social study of Runet in all its respects. Our 25 authors of this book represent 10 countries: 13 of them work in Russia and the other 12 in China, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Portugal, Sweden, the UAE, the UK, and the USA. They are Russian scholars working abroad as well as foreign scholars researching Russia. I am sincerely grateful for the support of my colleagues from the National Research University “Higher school of Economics,”namely, Rector Yaroslav Kuzminov, Head of the Department of Sociology; Alexander Chepurenko, Chair of the book series “Societies and Political Orders in Transition”; and my supervisor and Dean of the Faculty of Communications, Media and Design, Andrey Bystritsky. My former student and now colleague at the Department of Media Julia Chernenko took on great organizational and coordination work. The comments and proposals of Tania Moilanen, our proofreader, were always accurate and extremely useful for our authors’ team, since for many—including the editor—English is not their native language. Last but not least, I would like to note the great pleasure of our online and—alas, much less—offline interaction with our awesome authors’ team. I sincerely hope for continued cooperation with all of you on new projects. Moscow, Russia

Sergey Davydov

Contents

Part I

Theory and History

Digital Inequalities in European Post-Soviet States . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Hanna Kreitem, Massimo Ragnedda, and Glenn W. Muschert

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The Internet in the Structure of the Russian Media System . . . . . . . . . . Elena Vartanova

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The Rise of Runet and the Main Stages of Its History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Natalia Konradova

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Part II

Economy and Regulation

Investments in Runet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Aleksandr Rozhkov and Margarita Zobnina Regulation of Online Freedom of Expression in Russia in the Context of the Council of Europe Standards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Elena Sherstoboeva Part III

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Digital Culture

Digital Literacy Concepts and Measurement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 Sergey Davydov, Olga Logunova, Daria Maltseva, Alexander Sharikov, and Igor Zadorin Journalistic Cultures: New Times, New Gaps? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121 Svetlana Bodrunova and Kamilla Nigmatullina Diversity of the Internet in Russia’s Regions: Towards an Alternative Research Agenda . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149 Polina Kolozaridi and Olga Dovbysh

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Data Turn and Datascape in Russia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171 Marina Shilina Elite Russian Students’ Internet Strategies: Trust, Persuasion, and Rejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197 Ellen Mickiewicz Part IV

Participation, Representations and Discussions

Russia in International Social Media Discussions: Pro and Contra . . . . . 215 Greg Simons Runet in Crisis Situations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231 Gregory Asmolov Gender Activism in the Russian Segment of the Internet . . . . . . . . . . . . 251 Elena Pronkina The Internet: Its Influences on Environmental Communication and Environmental Movements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263 Karl Bruckmeier Making Ruins Great Again: Documentation and Participation on Instagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281 Ekaterina Kalinina Afterwords . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295 Marlene Laruelle

Part I

Theory and History

Digital Inequalities in European Post-Soviet States Hanna Kreitem, Massimo Ragnedda, and Glenn W. Muschert

1 Introduction In this chapter, we examine what has happened in the field of digital inequalities (with particular focus on Russia and the European post-Soviet states) in the nearly 30 years since two significant events transpired: the dismantling of the Soviet Union and the advent of the World Wide Web. The goal is to establish a framework of comparison for a deeper analysis covering European post-Soviet states. The pathway is to compare and contrast Internet penetration and adoption among different postSoviet states and to discuss the development of the digital divide in these countries. Between 1922 and 1991, the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics (USSR), or the Soviet Union, spanned vast regions in Eurasia, covering a sixth of the land surface of Earth, which made it the world’s largest country at the time. There were, of course, regional differences within the Soviet Union, with regions sometimes exhibiting similarities but other times differences. By the end of 1991, the Soviet Union had dissolved, with the 15 union republics that formed the USSR forming 15 independent states; many maintained close relations, developing multiple union bodies, such as the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the Eurasian Economic Community, and the Union State, among others. In contrast, the countries that considered themselves occupied by the Soviet Union took this opportunity to create distance from Moscow and other centres of power within the former USSR. These included the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, which preferred to align themselves more closely with the European Union.

H. Kreitem (*) · M. Ragnedda Northumbria University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] G. W. Muschert Khalifa University of Science and Technology, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_1

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A similar transition occurred among a number of other countries in Eastern Europe, which had also adopted Soviet-style political and economic regimes and who had been under the direct or indirect influence of the Soviet Union, notably the Czech Republic and Slovakia (as Czechoslovakia), East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Romania. These countries experienced high instability and rapid changes (sometimes termed as “shock doctrines”) that resulted in drastic changes to their societies. These drastic changes came at a time when the Internet was in the early stages of taking a global position among early adopters. As will become clear throughout the chapter, different post-Soviet states not only adopted the Internet differently but also demonstrated different trends of digital skills development and digital engagement. Nowadays, these aforementioned countries are part of the European Union, which provides common economic strategies, as well as initiatives related to digitisation and the Internet. In order to clarify this topic, after an initial definition of the three levels of the digital divide, we initially explain differences in terms of Internet penetration and gaps in accessing ICTs. These gaps refer to the so-called first level of the digital divide and are useful in understanding the spread of the Internet in these countries. Next, we will clarify differences in digital technology adoption among post-Soviet countries. Finally, via an examination of the 2018 Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI), we examine differences and similarities among countries in terms of the digital skills, uses of the digital services, integration of the digital technology, and digital public services. DESI, a composite index provided by the EU, summarises relevant indicators of Europe’s digital performance and digital competitiveness. Although other statistics are available that cover local position, of which many are available in local languages only, we have opted to use a unified measurement to provide better confidence in the results and comparison. The data used are particularly useful because they dig deeper into digital inequalities by looking at the second level of the digital divide based on inequalities using ICTs and not simply first-level concerns of simple access. As a conclusion, this chapter will show the differences and similarities among post-Soviet countries, in terms of tangible outcomes deriving from the use of the Internet. This part will be challenging since we only had data provided by the DESI 2018 available to use, hence excluding “CIS countries”, which we will represent here with the Russian Federation. Despite this challenge, these data provide insight because they shed light on the differences between countries in terms of the third level of the digital divide.

2 A Look at Digital Divides The development of the information society has highlighted the existence of obstacles preventing certain social groups from accessing and properly using technologies, leading to new forms of exclusion from employment, governmental/public institutions, leisure activities, and academic opportunities, among other aspects. This gap in accessing and using ICTs has been termed the “digital divide”. However, this term, often used in binary term, is confusing because it suggests a one-dimensional gap,

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mainly based on the economic and technical factors (possession of technologies), and therefore occludes multiple dimensions that go beyond the simple access to or possession of resources. Framing the digital divide as a technological problem and as a matter of adoption implies that digital divides can be solved via reducing the simple discrepancy between those who have a personal computer and a connection to the Internet and those who do not (Hoffman & Novak, 1998; Katz & Aspden, 1997). Thus, what is defined as the first-level digital divide mainly concerns itself with the gap between those with access to and those who are excluded from ICTs and network use. At an early stage of the development of the Internet, when it became clear that there was unequal access to digital opportunities, policymakers worldwide strived to reduce the gap between Internet “have’s” and “have not’s” by offering more diffuse, cheaper, and faster physical access. However, closing the first level of the digital divide does not automatically translate into closing the gaps of unequal access to the digital sphere. Indeed, a solution to the global first-level digital divide is still far away, as in 2018 around 50% of the world population is not connected to the Internet. Thus, researchers (followed by policymakers) also started focusing on other discrepancies and introducing the concept of “digital inequalities” (Dewan and Riggins 2005; Hargittai & Hinnant, 2008; Kvasny & Keil, 2006). Such inequalities, indeed, exist not only in terms of access and adoption (Agarwal, Animesh, & Prasad, 2009; Niehaves & Plattfaut, 2014; Racherla & Mandviwalla, 2013) but also in terms of ICT uses, motivations, skills, and support (Sipior, Ward, & Connolly, 2011; van Deursen & van Dijk, 2014; Venkatesh, Morris, Davis, & Davis, 2003), factors that contribute to what is now termed the second-level digital divide. Such online inequalities, if not addressed, tend to produce and reinforce pre-existing social inequalities. In fact, accessing the Internet alone is not enough in a digitally enabled society: What is also needed is to have the capabilities to use, create, navigate, and understand content online. Inclusion in, or an exclusion from, the network society is based on the capabilities of technological devices (hardware and software), length and amount of Internet use, resources (mostly intangible) conveyed by the networks, digital skills, and online activities (DiMaggio, Hargittai, Celeste, & Shafer, 2004; Hargittai & Hinnant, 2008; Howard, Busch, & Sheets, 2010; van Dijk & van Deursen, 2014). Digital inclusion is essential for full participation in the network society, for education, economic participation, political expression, public safety, and public health (Dewan & Riggins, 2005; Lindsay, 2005; Wei et al., 2011). This is in line with a vision of the concept of inequality related to the digital environment and social inclusion/exclusion. Various sociologists (e.g. DiMaggio & Hargittai, 2001; Ragnedda & Muschert, 2013, 2018; Witte & Mannon, 2010) have analysed the intertwined relationship between social and digital inequalities by focusing on the underlying social structures. Exclusion from, or even limited access to, the digital realm has become a significant source of social inequality. From this, the position held in a network society, where economic and socially relevant information circulates, can be interpreted as a factor in terms of producing inequalities. The advent of ICTs had, therefore, the rise of new domains of exclusion for those whose social exclusion extended into the digital realm, just as digital inclusion/participation has granted new

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privileges to those who can access and effectively use digital technologies. The different access and the different uses, skills and motivations in using ICTs produce different tangible outcomes. These inequalities in the different social benefits deriving from different access and uses of ICTs are defined as the third level of the digital divide (Ragnedda, 2017). The digital divide, therefore, is a much more complicated issue than the simple access to ICTs. It is not only a technical or economic problem, but it is intertwined with social inequalities and social structures (Ragnedda, 2018). It is, therefore, a phenomenon that must be analysed both in relation to various social structures and within different geopolitical contexts. With this in mind, the following sections attempt to shed light on the evolution of the digital inequalities in post-Soviet states, to understand how the development of Internet applications may permeate multiple domains of life in areas crucial to citizens’ life chances.

3 Digital Inequalities in the Post-Soviet States 3.1

Policy and Practice

Computing devices had been used in communications applications in USSR since the 1950s, with missile defence systems (M-40) communicating to remote terminals sending radar data over hundreds of kilometres away, and later the launch in 1972 of a data telecommunication network to serve the needs of the Russian Railways. By the early 1980s, the USSR began to use computer networks to connect with the world outside, testing connections with Australia and the United States. Further commercial networks appeared through the early 1990s. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Russian Federation and other states inherited a vast network of telephone and data connections. Albeit not state of the art in a global sense, this network served as an initial backbone for the development of the Internet in postSoviet countries, playing a major role in future network development in former Soviet countries and Eastern Europe. The Soviet attitude towards communication technologies was described to be driven by telephony policy that was targeted along with other media policies, at the surveillance and maintenance of control through keeping the sector underdeveloped. The resulting concentration of access to media among the ruling elite, the nomenklatura (Vartanova, 2002), necessarily created an informational divide between the ruling caste and other castes. Still, digitisation and technological development was seen as scientific development rather than as a threat to the political status quo; although it allowed some development in the sector, it still limited connectivity with other countries. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Russian Federation maintained the attitude of surveillance and maintenance of control as a guiding principle of communication technology, while countries such as Estonia took a different stance, viewing technology as a springboard to the future and a tool to reduce citizens’

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alienation from the state (Runnel, Pruulmann-Vengerfeldt, & Reinsalu, 2009). This difference in attitude certainly found its place in policies and strategies set in relation to information and communication technologies in general and the Internet in particular. Nevertheless, we can still notice some influence of Moscow in the information policies of neighbouring countries, as will be clear later. In Russia shortly after the demise of the USSR, the political elite’s perception of the Internet is that it can be described as a powerful catalyst for political change or stabilisation. For example, in 1991, Relcom/Demos, a private computer network, played a role in maintaining a flow of information used in an unsuccessful attempt to oust then-president Gorbachev from power (Rohozinski, 1999). Similarly, the state has worked since the mid-1990s to gain control over the Internet through legal frameworks, such as the Concept of the State Information Policy approved by the Douma in 1998, which for the first time introduced the construction of an information society as a strategic goal of Russian national development (Vartanova, 2004). A series of policies and strategies followed, aiming at spreading access to the Internet while maintaining central control over information. For example, the 1999 Concept of Building the Information Society in Russia promoted such national values when planning for the expansion of the Internet. This was obvious as other federal programmes emerged for the development of the Unified Information and Educational Space (2001–2005) and for the Electronic Russia (2002–2010). The year 2010 saw the emergence of the programme titled Information Society (2011–2020). Other post-Soviet countries followed similar trajectories; for instance, Ukraine developed its information policies with inspiration from the Russian policies and their focus on control. Other countries like Estonia, however, embraced technology to guide them through the market and social transitions, creating guiding initiatives to connect citizens and to develop democratic institutions. One of the prominent strategies was the Principles of Estonian Information Policy (1998), which set a regulatory goal to develop its information policy action plan that aimed at modernising legislation, developing the private sector, shaping the interaction between the state and citizens, and raising awareness of problems concerning the information society.1 In terms of the initiatives to address digital inclusion, one of the main programmes was Tiger Leap, launched in 1997 to provide ICT infrastructure to schools, support content creation, and support ICT-related skills development in Estonia (Runnel et al., 2009). That same year, with the support of the UNDP and later the Open Estonia Foundation, Estonia rapidly established Public Internet Access Points (PIAPs), which are public locations with free access to computers connected to the Internet. This process started within the main cities and later expanded to reach smaller towns and rural areas. Such initiatives quickly placed Estonia in its position as a highly wired nation, with high reliance on digital capacities, particularly regarding

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Details on the information policy can be found at https://www.ega.ee/publication/principles-ofestonian-information-policy/.

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government services. Since then, Estonia has accomplished many e-government milestones, such as becoming the first nation worldwide to equate digital signatures and conventional signatures in 2000, with current use of 50 million digital signatures annually, and to offer Internet voting in nationwide elections in 2005 (EAS, 2018). A similar transition affected other countries experiencing market transitions in their economies, including Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Romania. These countries have also had a perception of monitoring and control as a needed component when it comes to information and communication technologies but had less dependence on the Russian Federation when it comes to strategies and international relations. In contrast, these countries, which are now members of the European Union, have adopted EU strategies and policies aiming at digital inclusion and diffusion. East Germany did go through the transition as well; however, its case is idiosyncratic as it was absorbed by the highly developed West Germany, and data on the East German case often is aggregated within the German development.

3.2

Divides and Inequalities

In practice, one of the few metrics that can be collected in a compatible manner among most countries, and still show an indication of digital equalities, is individuals using the Internet as a percentage of the population. This metric is mainly related to the first level of the digital divide at the access level, which relates to differences in ICT penetration and adoption (Agarwal et al., 2009; Hsieh et al., 2008; Racherla & Mandviwalla, 2013). When looking at this indicator among post-Soviet states in Europe, as graphed in Fig. 1, we can conclude a general pattern of convergence towards very high Internet penetration rate, with all countries having more than half, and all but Ukraine and Georgia have more than two-thirds of the population already connected to the Internet. Nonetheless, a closer look shows that growth did not go in a conforming manner. Estonia, for example, crossed the 10% point around 1998, while Armenia, Georgia, and Ukraine needed 10 more years to cross that point; a similar difference stands for the 50% point as well. A closer look at growth patterns, we can notice two clear patterns of growth: the first pattern applies to the Baltic states, while the second applies to CIS that are in Europe, as isolated in Fig. 2. In this graph, we have also added average growth in Internet users for the other transitional states group we are discussing, such as Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Romania. The trend line is conveniently positioned in the middle of the other two groups, showing with no doubt that even when a country adopts monitoring and control attitude to ICTs, compliance with regional and possibly global strategies and regulations related to digital services, skills, and diffusion results in higher use of the Internet, thus narrowing the gap in first-level digital divide.

Digital Inequalities in European Post-Soviet States

100.0%

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Internet Users in Post-soviet States in Europe

90.0% Percentage of Population

80.0% 70.0% 60.0% 50.0% 40.0% 30.0% 20.0% 10.0% 0.0%

Year Armenia Georgia Russian Federation

Azerbaijan Lithuania Ukraine

Belarus Latvia

Estonia Moldova

Fig. 1 Internet users in the post-Soviet states in Europe as a percentage of the population

Percentage of Internet Users of Baltic States and CIS 90.0%

Percentage of Population

80.0% 70.0% 60.0% 50.0% 40.0% 30.0% 20.0% 10.0% 0.0%

Year Baltic

CIS

Post-Socialist

Fig. 2 Comparison in the percentage of Internet users in the Baltic states and the CIS in Europe. Georgia is included in CIS numbers until 2008 and Ukraine until end of current data

This data sounds particularly interesting since it shows the attempt made by policymakers and governmental institutions to bridge the digital divide, in line with policies to enhance ICTs’ adoption (Hsieh et al., 2011). To be more precise, as we have seen above, this shows the attempt to close the first level of the digital divide. This data, while useful to give an overview of the spread of the technologies, does not indicate the skills of the users nor the tangible outcomes of Internet use.

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Indeed, as noted, access to ICTs does not mean closing the digital inequalities. These inequalities relate to the degree the user is capable of using ICTs, different digital skills, support, and usage (Hargittai & Hinnant, 2008; Sipior et al., 2011; Venkatesh et al., 2003). Studying the second and third levels of the digital divide is more complex, because of the lack of standard metrics collected in a compatible manner at common time points, particularly when comparing countries from different parts of the world. Several scholars have attempted to develop ways to measure digital inequality (Corrocher and Ordanini, 2002; Hilbert, 2014) proposing a different methodological analysis of measures (Vehovar et al., 2006). To cope with this challenge, this chapter is using the 2018 DESI provided by the European Union. These data offer indices that measure the composition of 30 indicators covering connectivity, human capital, use of Internet services, integration of digital technology, and digital public services. However, these indices do not cover countries outside of the EU. To be able to compare countries of this study, we will use the DESI data below to look at digital inequalities in post-Soviet and post-Communist countries in Europe but rely on other statistics to get a sense on inequalities in CIS countries, which we will represent here with Russian Federation. In a research conducted in 2011 and 2013, Volchenko (2016) showed how the digital divide in Russia, as expected, exists among typical factors of inequality of age, income, education, and type of residence; however, although men are more likely to use the Internet than women, gender is not a considerable factor affecting opportunities of Internet use, especially when taking into consideration the age structure and life expectancies among genders (Volchenko, 2016). Nonetheless, it was proved that although a digital divide in terms of access is decreasing, information-oriented Internet digital divide is increasing. Furthermore, reading reports and statistics from Yuri Levada Analytical Center, particularly Russian Public Opinion Herald, asserts a significant change in information-seeking behaviour among Russians, with an increase in the number of people finding news in the country and the world from Internet publications such as newspapers, journals, and information portals, from 9% in 2009 to 33% in 2016. A similar increase occurred with finding news from other online sources from 6% to 23% in the same years. A slightly smaller increase, but still a significant one, occurred with trusted Internet sources, from 7% to 20%. Nonetheless, it is interesting to point out that there was a zero-sum change in the percentage of people believing that the Internet will be able to replace papers, radio, and television in the future, with percentage sitting at 34% in 2001 and 2016, with a decrease to 23% in 2003. Deviatko has also studied digital inequalities in Russia, trying to determine the validity of the theoretical visions of inequality inspired by Marx or by Weber, to conclude that there is a gap in Internet use factored by income and type of employment in a pattern seemingly following Marx’s interpretation of inequalities as a basic conclusion. Nonetheless, this gap is narrowing, which, as Deviatko analysed, can be attributed to the recent trend of diminishing income inequalities in Russia (Deviatko, 2013, p. 130). This narrowing in inequalities does not, however, affect the gap in digital opportunity among different geographical areas in Russia nor the type of employment and occupational structures.

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For Estonia and other Baltic states, despite the high Internet penetration rate, and in relation to the level of education as a determining factor for digital opportunities in terms of usage, studies found the existence of a gap between citizens of Estonia with high and medium levels of education on one hand and those who have a low level of education on the other hand (Cruz-Jesus, Vicente, Bacao, & Oliveira, 2016). This result is in line with many other European countries, but the divide remains lower than the education-related digital divide in Latvia and Lithuania, where only citizens with a high level of education sit on the advantaged side. Earlier studies also suggested a lack of motivation towards using the Internet and a lack of skills as main factors behind people not using the Internet. This was particularly significant among people over the age of 50 and people in blue-collar jobs (Kalkun & Kalvet, 2002). The lack of motivation and a preference to do things the “old way” are apparently factors in the adoption of e-government services, as can be seen with the adoption rate of Internet voting, where less than one-third of the population chose to vote online, despite all the effort put into promoting that form of voting. It was also found that as the class structure in these countries is largely unsettled and the society is rapidly changing, social status is a better predictor of digital opportunities than social class (Klamus, Talvis, & Pruulmann-Vengerfeldt, 2013, p. 204), giving more importance to factors such as economic and cultural capital, digital literacy, and sufficient leisure time. The topic of digital literacy initiatives in Russia is further discussed in another chapter in this book. According to the DESI 2018 index covering digital skills and types of Internet uses, the Baltic states’ ranking varied, with Estonia as 9th in the ranking, Latvia in 13th position, slightly above the EU average, and Lithuania in 20th position. Other states that are transitioning from a communist economy to a market economy in Europe ranked lower than the EU average: the Czech Republic sat at the 18th rank, while Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria, and Romania reserved four of six lowest positions in the rank. In looking at the human capital component of the DESI, particularly at the digital skills, which corresponds to the second level of the digital divide, we can observe an interesting gap between the total percentage of Estonian Internet users and individuals with at least basic digital skills. As such, over 85% of Estonia’s inhabitants have a level of Internet access, while only 60% have digital skills, at least a basic level of it (DESI Human Capital, 2018). This means that around one-quarter of the population has access to the Internet but lacks the skills that would enable them to make use of that tool. This difference is in line with Latvia and Lithuania and other Baltic states as well as the European Union average, but still poses a serious question about the effectiveness of skills development initiatives (Fig. 3). Having access to the Internet and possessing good digital skills does not necessarily guarantee helpful use of the Internet, according to which users would advance themselves and increase their opportunities in society. Indeed, access to (bridging the first level of the digital divide) and confident use of ICTs (bridging the second level of the digital divide) do not necessarily improve citizens’ life chances (Ragnedda, 2017). This third level of the digital divide is, as mentioned above, related to the inequalities in the externally observable and tangible Internet

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Basic Digital Skills and Usage 40

Weighted Score

35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 2014

2015

2016

2017

2018

Year Bulgaria

Czech Republic

Estonia

EU28

Lithuania

Latvia

Poland

Romania

Hungary

Fig. 3 Weighted score of basic digital skills and usage across countries

Use of Internet Services - Communication 25.0%

Weighted Score

20.0%

15.0%

10.0%

5.0% 2014

2015

2016

2017

2018

Year Bulgaria

Czech Republic

Estonia

EU28

Latvia

Lithuania

Poland

Romania

Hungary

Fig. 4 Weighted score of use of Internet services for communication

outcomes. Although DESI does not cover tangible outcomes of the Internet, it does nonetheless include components about the use of Internet services, in terms of content, communication, and transactions. This component shows that transitional states have better potential when it comes to specific uses of the Internet. Bulgaria, for instance, although it is ranked towards the bottom of the DESI index, has the highest use of the Internet for communication among all transitional states, including the Baltic countries. Moreover, while Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania maintain their advantage in transaction and content uses, Hungary secured a place amidst them, as being above the EU average in terms of content use (Fig. 4). Measuring digital inequality vectors and factors within these countries, or among them, is not an easy task, particularly given the scarcity of comparable data and with

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a historical dimension, not to mention the instability factor stemming from the fact that these countries have been in transitional states that affect the cores of their economies and societies. Nonetheless, we can infer from the data above general trends that show that classical factors of age, income, and type of employment affect digital opportunities, in a similar manner to those in countries that are not considered to be in a transitional state. However, the countries that are considered to be beyond transition have less of a gap when it comes to gender-related opportunities and a higher gap when it comes to motivation to use the Internet and its digital services.

4 Conclusions The advent of ICTs has drastically changed the society in which we live. The emergence of the Internet was seen, in the early stages, with enthusiasm, as a tool, which could positively change citizens’ life chances and reduce societal disparities. However, forms of inequalities regarding access and use became evident. Researchers started to look at these disparities to understand the effects of these unequal accesses to digital opportunities both at the local and global levels. In this chapter, we looked at the development of the Internet in a specific and complicated area: the post-Soviet countries. One of the first criteria we looked at was Internet penetration as a basic indicator of any differences in terms of the first level of the digital divide between these countries. When looking at this indicator among postSoviet states in Europe, we observe a trend towards a high Internet penetration rate in all countries studied, with over half of their populations having access to the Internet. Countries such as Ukraine and Georgia have more than two-thirds of their populations connected to the Internet, while, in some areas, such as the Baltic areas, there is much higher Internet penetration denoting a difference between the countries in terms of access to the Internet. Another difference noticed among countries was the speed with which the Internet has spread throughout post-Soviet countries as an indicator to reflect the maturity of the Internet market and use. Some countries, such as Estonia, started sooner and were faster in spreading Internet availability among its citizens, in comparison to countries such as Armenia, Georgia, and Ukraine. Studying the second and the third level of the digital divide is a much more complicated procedure than identifying basic Internet penetration rates. These inequalities are intertwined with the social structure and, therefore, involve several variables not always possible to be isolated and studied. However, some insights, following the data issued from the DESI 2018, have been possible. These data, as shown in the charts presented, seem to show little or no change between 2014 and 2018. This can be interpreted as either a slowing in the efforts being made towards mending digital inequalities or that the potential for the development within the current environment has reached an impasse that requires a more fundamental societal change.

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Evidently, this research was not free from limitations. One of the difficulties of this has been the fact that while it was possible to collect and analyse data related to post-Soviet states in Europe, it has been much more complicated to find data on CIS countries. Even when these data were retrieved, it has been complicated to compare and contrast data coming from different datasets. However, despite these difficulties, we have developed some understanding to shed light on an articulated issue, and we encourage other teams of researchers to dig deeper into these data and offer new insights.

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The Internet in the Structure of the Russian Media System Elena Vartanova

1 Introduction Socio-economic transformations of the Russian society started in 1991 have influenced all its spheres. Compared to other social institutions, the media system underwent the most radical changes started by the adaptation of the USSR Law “on the Press and Other Mass Media” (1990) and the Russian Federation Law “on Mass Media” (1991). Both documents laid a legal foundation for new relationships between mass media and society. Though over the past 20 years the relationships between them have taken different forms, the Russian media and journalism socially, economically and technologically evolved into a new “status quo” ensuring the emergence of a modern media system and a rise of contemporary structural interrelations between legacy and digital media, ICTs’ environments and emerging media ecosystem and mass society and fragmenting digital audiences (Dunas, Cherevko, & Tolokonnikova, 2017; Mediasystema Rossii, 2017, pp. 24–27).

2 Historical Dynamics and Conceptual Framework The structure of the Russian media system started to change radically in 1992–1993 following the process of political and economic liberalisation. Planned government funding was abolished, and Russian print and broadcast media companies, left to themselves to engage in economic activity, started to master the art of funding and managing privatised media enterprises. These processes transformed the media market, which had been hierarchical and heavily centralised at the national level, into horizontal interrelated regional/local geographical markets by the end of the E. Vartanova (*) Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow, The Russian Federation e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_2

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1990s (Ershov, 2012; Nordenstreng, Vartanova, & Zassoursky, 2002; Vyrkovskiy & Makeenko, 2014). High costs of distribution and a lack of national advertising further complicated the position of nationally distributed newspapers, and this process resulted into the localisation of print media markets. At the end of the 1990s, growing readers’ interests in local news made regional and local city newspapers more popular and more independent from the central media system (Fomicheva & Resnyanskaya, 1999). The financial crisis of August 1998 stimulated the economic development of the Russian media system with many industries crossed over to domestic consumption, which resulted in the rise of the national advertising market. The process made it possible for Russian media companies to implement advertising-based business models that for many years enabled media companies worldwide to operate successfully. Still, in the 1990s, it is crucial to recall the influence of extra-market processes in the Russian media system governed by financial and industrial groups, commonly known as “oligarchs” (Ivanitsky, 2010; McNair, 2000; Noam, 2016). The stabilisation of the Russian economy in the early to mid-2000s became an important driving force for the development of the internal consumption, the advertising market and, as a consequence, the further diversification of the media system. The rise of the advertising and public relations segments of the media system and the dynamics of the production sector for television and radio together with the media metric companies became other important signs of the media system change (Mediasystema Rossii, 2017, pp. 108–113, 335–338). Since the mid-1990s, the growing penetration of ICTs, cable and satellite channels, the Internet and mobile telephony paralleled by the expansion of telecommunication networks and services brought about a completely new dimension to the Russian media system. The rise of the Internet expanded the boundaries of the media system by strengthening possibilities for free information and opinion exchange, as well as involving Russian journalism and mass media in the global media landscape (Nordenstreng et al., 2002). Bearing in mind the scope and scale of the technological development of the Russian society at large, some scholars defined the post-Soviet media change as a dual one, combining the two processes—social and technological—of media transformation (Zassoursky, 1998). The restructuring of the national media system and growth of its quantitative indicators up until the mid-2010s resulted in the rise of a domestic media industry, characterised by a high level of private and state media ownership concentration and rapid technological dynamics of digitalisation (Noam, 2016; Vartanova, 2019, pp. 29–30). Although the Russian media system has the legacy of the Soviet mass media and even the Imperial pre-revolutionary press which were both characterised by a strong influence of the state and state agencies—in terms of financing, production, functioning of the news rooms and influence on journalists and media professionals as well as media companies—the new modern industrial and technological structure of the Russian media system contrasts with the past and provides an illustrative case of its socio-technological dynamics. Contemporary Russian media system started to transform from the hierarchical structure, ideologically controlled and economically supported by the communist

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party and the Soviet state agencies about three decades ago, and in its present form it evidently differs from the previous one. The change is a multifaceted and multilayered result of national and global media transformations which integrated influences of geopolitical, neoliberal economic, present social and multicultural processes (Curran & Park, 2000; Hallin & Mancini, 2011; Rantanen, 2002) as well as the technologically driven digital media revolution (Athique, 2013; Castells, 1999; Flew, 2005). These all had a complex and powerful impact on the Russian media and made it a unique object for multidisciplinary research (Nordenstreng & Thussu, 2015). Theoretical approaches to understanding the modern Russian media system after 1991 were diverse. Splichal (2001) and Jakubowicz’s (2004, 2007) academic concepts of the Western, mostly American and Western European, media studies turned to become a normative model for media change in post-socialism, thus focusing on a “double teleology” proposed by Sparks and Reading (1998) and understood as a combination of the freedom of press and market-driven media business. Thus, in the 1990s, the conceptual vision of a post-Socialist media system based on this approach became a new value frame for evaluating media transition. In recent decades, analysis of the Russian media system has been mostly done through the lenses of the media–power relationship both by foreign (Becker, 2004; De Smaele, 1999; Dunn, 2014; Hutchings, Rulyova, & Beumers, 2009; McNair, 2000; Mickiewicz, 1999; Toepfl, 2013) and Russian scholars (Kachkaeva & Kiriya, 2007; Koltsova, 2001, 2006; Rickhter, 2007; Zassoursky, 2000). Beyond this approach, the research by foreign scholars focused on the interaction between the global and the national in the Russian media system, the role of technologies (Rantanen, 2002) and changes in media consumption (Mickiewicz, 2008). Yet, Russian media scholars have explored the major trends and driving forces of transformation (Nordenstreng et al., 2002); the key specific features of the Russian media model (Vartanova, 2012); the present structure of the media system (Mediasystema Rossii, 2015); the role of economic, regional, technological, ethnic, cultural and even media usage factors in its present functioning (Gladkova et al., 2019; Smirnov, 2014; Vyrkovskiy & Makeenko, 2014; Vyugina, 2017); and differences in journalism cultures in various regions of Russia (Anikina, 2015). In parallel, the development of the media business and attempts to create a realistic technological and media policy driven by the importance of the ICT penetration in Russia posed a need for industrial data and analysis of the market trends. Official state agencies including the most important for the field the Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications and the Roskomnadzor (Federal Service for Supervision in the Sphere of Telecom, Information Technologies and Mass Communications) together with recently established industrial associations such as Natsionalinaya Associatsija Veshchatelei (National Association of TV and Radio Broadcasters), Gildiya izdatelei periodicheskoi pechati (Guild of the Press Publishers, GIPP), Assotsiatsiya kabelnogo televideniya Rossii (Cable Television Association of Russia, AKTR) and Assotsiatsiya rommunikatsionnykh agentstv Rossii (Association of Communication Agencies, AKAR) became important sources for statistical analysis and industrial research.

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To analyse today’s Russian media system, several basic facts need to be mentioned. Russia is the largest country in the world in terms of the territory which is at the same time rather unevenly populated. The country has 11 time zones and is characterised by a multi-ethnic population speaking more than 150 languages besides the official Russian. In a way, the geographical and demographic features affect the size and structure of the media system in terms of production and distribution. This also results in the dominance of federal television channels broadcast from Moscow via terrestrial and satellite networks. The ethnic variety of the population also affects media functioning since it forces the state to secure a needed number of minority languages media. Russia is also characterised by substantial differences in regional economic and social development, including such divides as between more and less wealthy regions such as Moscow, leading industrial centres and rural areas, between more and less developed agricultural Southern and Northern parts of the country, between more and less populated European and Asian areas, etc. All these factors strongly influence the economic and distribution structures of regional media systems, the quality of telecommunication infrastructure, news demand from audiences and political and business elites, etc. Therefore, bearing in mind the new theoretical framework and available industrial data, several key features of the Russian media system might be identified. Firstly, the modern Russian media system has been in a process of constant and continuously restructuring since the early 1990s until now, as a consequence to the impact of social and technological transformations of the Russian society. At the start of the transition, the vertical and hierarchical structure of the newspaper and magazine market—which was dominant in the Soviet Union—was replaced by a horizontal, almost networked set configurations in the regional and local print media markets (Mediasystema Rossii, 2015, pp. 26–27). Among the main reasons for the early restructure of the media system, there was an economic crisis of the newspaper business in the 1990s, which dramatically increased production costs and destroyed the national distribution of print media. The audiences’ and advertisers’ demand for more localised content also played a role (Fomicheva & Resnyanskaya, 1999). While capital newspapers published in Moscow lost their federal status and circulation, federal television channels became the only mass medium capable of organising and maintaining a national information space. In the mid-1990s, the need to support political processes (primarily in the 1996 presidential elections) and the interests of global and national advertisers turned television into a centripetal mass medium. In the 2000s, the role of TV became of vital importance, not so much in setting federal news agenda as in supporting and strengthening national identity and preserving national culture (Nordenstreng et al., 2002). The next wave of restructuring the Russian media system began with the media shift to digitalisation. As early as in the mid-1990s, media typology started to change in response to the interests of audiences going online and advertisers seeking access to digital consumer communities. As a result of the growing Internet penetration— with an annual growth up to about 75.4% of population online (by the end of 2018)—the Russian online digital media environment has become a new distribution system for the digital content of traditional media, an independent medium for online

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content and services and an ecosystem for convergent products distributed via different online platforms with a connected user at the core (Dunas et al., 2017; Lukina, 2010). Secondly, the shift to market and new advertising-based business models became another crucial factor of change in the Russian media system. Advertising plays several roles in the Russian media, but first and foremost it is a source of funding which, under present industrial conditions, appears to be a reflection of universally accepted economic practice. It became also an important source of consumer information and a means of shaping everyday consumer culture significantly influencing the formation of consumers’ values (Mediasystema Rossii, 2015, pp. 232–236). The total amount of advertising in the Russian media—360 billion RR in 2016 (+11% to 2015)—guaranteed a kind of stability for the largest companies of the domestic media industry, though the changing structure of the system recently reshaped the distribution of advertising. With the rising penetration of digital media, the Internet became the second most attractive channel for advertisers with 136 billion RR (compared to 150 billion RR channelled to the television) and over-performed all other traditional advertising means (AKAR, 2018). Advertising and public relations brought to life a new sector in the Russian media industry with numerous advertising and PR agencies, sociological services, media measurement companies and new departments and sub-departments within traditional media companies, which created a great number of well-paid jobs. Media advertising also stimulated a thematic restructuring of the media market, and the emergence of niche publications or broadcast programmes is accounted for by advertisers’ pursuit for desired target groups. Thirdly, the new Russian media system to a great degree has been shaped by new driving forces, such as audiences’ demand for content and the process of digitalisation. Certainly, traditional driving forces such as politics, economy and culture play a significant role in the post-Soviet media change, especially before and during elections, particularly in regions (Becker, 2004; Dunn, 2014; Koltsova, 2006; Roudakova, 2017; Souch, 2017; Toepfl, 2013). However, the new drivers of the Russian media market such as ICTs, liberalised telecommunications and active audiences have had a serious impact on news agendas, topics, formats and genres of media content (Vartanova, 2019). In the early 1990s, as a result of the rapid price liberalisation, the audience reduced its spending on mass media, while the audience’s refusal to subscribe to newspapers and magazines did result in a serious reduction in circulation and retail, and a subsequent increase in TV watching thus reallocated audience resources, particularly its leisure time, between various media. This led to a re-grouping of the national and regional audiences, from the print to broadcast following move of advertisers to the television segment (Kolomiets & Poluekhtova, 2010). The second reconfiguration of audiences happened in the mid- and late 2000s when the TV viewers’ community started to fragment as a result of the rise in new technologies for television distribution—cable, satellite, the Internet and a broader use of alternative sources such as online media, social networks, digital platforms, search engines, etc. The demand for individualised content, alternative news agendas

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and diversified entertainment as well as a reduction in tariffs for digital services became a driver for a less consolidated and technologically advanced media system (Lukina, 2010; Nordenstreng & Thussu, 2015). In this system, the restructuring has been marked also by the change in advertising flows, which to a growing degree have been re-channelled to digital media since the mid-2010s. By the early 2010s, the advertising revenue of the Russian search engine Yandex became equal and even overcame the ad revenues of the previous leader of the Perviy kanal (Televidenie v Rossii. Sostoyanie, tendentsii i perspektivy razvitiya, 2016). Fourthly, the Russian media system is characterised by numerous mutual influences of centripetal and centrifugal trends currently important for the country. The “centripetence” has been ensured by the federal television channels which have shaped the only generally accessible and now almost digitalised technological infrastructure of Russian information space. This feature is complemented with cinema and series production for federal television. On the other hand, the role of the daily newspapers and online media might be characterised as a centrifugal one. These segments are influenced by an increased interest of the audience in local news, the development of regional political systems and the transformation of print media into online media as an element of urban lifestyle. As a consequence, the major role in setting the national agenda passed to federal universal channels, which, in addition, took on the function of entertaining the audience. Moreover, online media have dramatically broadened the scope of public debates providing parallel and alternative agendas for various parts of the audience (Vartanova, 2014, pp. 146–154). Fifthly, strong relations between the state and its agencies, on the one hand, and journalism and mass media, on the other hand, traditionally defined the nature and conditions of the Russian media system. Since Peter the Great established the first Russian newspaper Vedomosti in 1703, top-down relations between the Russian state and journalism existed almost for two centuries. The legal practice of censorship in the Imperial Russia and the USSR until 1991, the multidimensional economic basis of these relations, the leading role of the state in setting up a framework for the media policy and the whole context of the paternalistic traditions in “state–media” interaction made an impact on the state–media relations in regulatory and economic fields. In parallel with the critics of this feature (Becker, 2004; Koltsova, 2006), some scholars have underlined that historically this reflects a particular form of a social contract regarding journalism which was based on a consolidated vision of social goals and responsible policy of the state in the field of journalism (Ivanitsky, 2010, pp. 27–28). The current policy-making regulatory and economic activities of state agencies in the Russian media system prove that the state still remains an important actor in various aspects. Through subsidising or directly financing socially important projects including content for minor audiences—children, ethnic and linguistic groups—it supports media companies to fulfil their social mission. However, in many cases, this activity, especially at the regional level, might be linked to support the local authorities or to assist them in their information strategies. The law that limits on foreign ownership in Russian mass media (2014/2016), which defined the

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Table 1 Russian media system: basic indicators Indicators Population (in million) Languages in which media are produced Total number of registered media (2016) Number of registered print media (2016) Number of registered electronic media (2016) Number of registered news agencies (2016) Federal TV channels penetration (as % of the population) FM and AM radio stations penetration (as % of the population) Internet users (as % of the population) Personal computers per 1000 households Mobile phones per 1000 people .RU domains .RF domains (since 2010) Advertising market (in billions USD) Average number of terrestrial TV channels per household Average number of radio channels per household Time of average daily media consumption

2018 146.8 161 80,606 55,378 23,676 1552 98.4 91% 71% 1270 1578 5,326,642 857,089 3.3 64 46 8 h 40 min

Sources: AKAR (2018), Mediascope (2018), Roskomnadzor (2018), Rosstat (2018), and Vartanova (2019)

maximum foreign stake in Russian mass media companies at 20%, was one of the most debated economic regulatory documents because of its controversial economic and political rationality. Another angle to this problem is represented by a high number of concerns about information security of digitally illiterate audiences and young people who are not able to critically analyse digital media. In response to these concerns, some new laws were adopted in the 2010s. Among them are the Law on Protection of Children from Information Harmful to Their Health and Development (2010/2012) and amendments to it (2013), the set of amendments to the Administrative Code, the Law on Information and the Law on Communications (the “Bill on Bloggers” of 2014), amendments to the law on mass media and law on advertising (2016/2017), the new antiterror laws (Yarovaya law) and some others. In conclusion, it might be argued that recent developments of the Russian media system, regardless of their rather controversial character, have been defined by processes of the economic deregulation in the 1990s, the rapid growth of the advertising market, quantitative expansion of media industry in the late 1990s– early 2000s and the digitalisation of the media activities and the rise of digital media platforms in the 2010s (see Table 1). Nowadays, the Russian media system is characterised by a complexity of processes and indicators, which integrate the old and the new, the national and the global and the analogue and the digital.

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Table 2 Dynamics of TV watching time in Russia

Minutes per day

2009 228

2011 220

2016 353

Source: Televidenie v Rossii. Sostoyanie, tendentsii i perspektivy razvitiya. Otchet (2011) [Television in Russia. Condition, Trends and Development Prospects. Report (2011)]. Moscow, FAPMC; Televidenie v Rossii v (2016). Sostoyanie, tendentsii i perspektivy razvitiya. Otchet (2011) [Television in Russia in 2016. Condition, Trends and Development Prospects. Report (2016)]. Moscow, FAPMC Table 3 Major sources of news and level of trust to them in 2016 TV Internet Radio Newspaper

Source of news for Russians, % 86 33 22 19

Trust to the source, % 56 20 9 9

Source: Public Opinion–2016 (2017). Yearbook. Moscow: Levada Center

3 Legacy Media: The Role of Traditions The present structure of the Russian media still reflects the important role of the legacy media, especially broadcasting.

3.1

Television as a Core Medium

The role of television in the Russian social transformation has been widely analysed by Russian media scholars underlying its key role in the media landscape (Ershov, 2012; Kachkaeva & Kiriya, 2007; Kolomiets & Poluekhtova, 2010; Vyrkovskiy & Makeenko, 2014). Terrestrial free-on-air television federal channels are obviously of major importance due to their technical availability and increased popularity in the post-Soviet period: until 2019, the year of digital switch-over, 99% of Russians received at least one TV channel, and the average TV viewing time in Russia was about 5 h and 53 min (see Table 2). As Table 3 shows, television remains the most important source of international, national and regional information, and 86% of Russians consider TV to be their main source of news. Importantly, 56% say that they trust it. In the 2000s, television was the fastest growing mass medium, and the number of channels in Russian households increased many times. For many Russians, the fact that audiences watch TV for free was an important factor in choosing television as a main medium. The dominance of the advertising business model on television has led to the further integration of mass media into the audience’s leisure time, and Russian mass media with television at its core turned to become the key segment of

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the entertainment and leisure time industry. This was partly due to the 1990s as the “Golden Age” of Russian television, when after the decades of a tough control over foreign movie production and film diversity and a great number of the first performances became a routine at the top federal channels. Importing popular entertainment formats and an increased share of infotainment in news round-ups became the next stage of a programming development in the 2000s (Mediasystema Rossii, 2017, pp. 344–347). Several types of terrestrial broadcasters have formed the television segment. These include: ● Federal channels mostly broadcast from Moscow, Pervyi kanal (The First Channel), with mixed state and private ownership, state-owned channels Rossija 1, Rossija 2, Rossija K (Culture) and Rossija 24, operated by the VGTRK state broadcaster; children’s channel Karousel operated by the Pervyi kanal and VGTRK; Pyatyi kanal (Channel 5)—the only regional channel from St. Petersburg with national distribution; and commercial broadcaster NTV, owned by state-operated Gazprom-Media, a part of the state Gazprom company ● All-national entertainment networks (REN TV, CTC, TNT) with a strong presence in the regional markets and smaller broadcasters with entertainment and niche focus such as 2x2, TV 3, Peretz, MTV, Yu, Disney, etc. ● Regional TV companies (about 700 local stations), both public and private, mostly without independent full-scale programming ● Non-terrestrial pay cable and satellite channels Thus, since the early 2000s, Russian television has been increasingly influenced by digital technologies, while the development of non-terrestrial pay TV has marked a trend important for the world television industry. By 2016, more than 40% of Russian households subscribed to pay for television services, and the total share of the audience for non-terrestrial channels has grown by 20% from 11.8 in 2014 to 14.3% in 2016 (Televidenie v Rossii. Sostoyanie, tendentsii i perspektivy razvitiya, 2016, p. 36). New forms of television signal delivery provide Russian cable and satellite subscribers with an access to a vast majority of channels including 26 terrestrial channels (among them, 20 generally accessible digital multiplex channels), numerous regional TV broadcasters, more than 20 Russian-language non-terrestrial thematic channels and a variety of foreign channels both translated and non-translated into Russian. The individualised non-linear television consumption at the national level is realised by leading cable platform providers: Moscow-based NKS (about 5 million clients), Comstar (2.4 million), Acado (1.3 million) and many regional ones. As for the direct satellite broadcasting, the Russian operator Tricolor TV (est. in 2005) has currently more that 3 million subscribers and is the largest satellite TV platform provider in Eastern Europe. Many cable and satellite platforms growingly provide IPTV services. Russia, as the European Union and the USA, adopted a Federal Program for the “Development of Television and Radio Broadcasting in the Russian Federation in 2009–2015” in December 2009. With the Russian digital switch-over in 2019, these

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channels are planned to become free and universally available as part of the first digital multiplex. The state maintains a firm position in the television industry by supporting the technical infrastructure, controlling the financial operations of the state channels and formally and informally influencing news flows. As a result, inside the Russian television segment, there remain various divides reflecting not only different levels of technical equipment of households but also different types of media cultures shaped by the use of different media technologies and generational values. Some scholars identified several types of existing audience communities: ● The most numerous one includes middle-aged and older people, who have enough free time and are accustomed to traditional forms of TV consumption; they represent the core of the traditional mass audience and are limited in the use of digital media. ● The one that is most attractive to advertisers; it is comprised by well-educated and well-paid professionals who have distinct news and entertainment demand for television programmes and who extensively use pay channels. ● The latest one, represented by young city dwellers (“digital natives”, generations “Y” and “Z”), whose media behaviour is highly individualised and characterised by digital media use with only sporadic television viewing, mostly via interactive media platforms (Dunas et al., 2017; Mediasystema Rossii, 2017, p. 342). Thus, the ongoing fragmentation of audiences and individualisation of TV viewing as key processes in current media consumption have become visible signs of the impact of digital technologies on the Russian media system.

3.2

Radio in Daily Routine

The dynamics of Russian radio broadcasting has also been of interest. Today, the radio market comprises national networks and local radio stations. Radio in its present structure started to emerge in its modern form in the mid-1990s when cable radio broadcasting (which flourished in the USSR) lost its position because of tough competition with private FM stations in big cities and a deterioration of the networking and transmission equipment in remote territories. The key players in the radio market are 35–40 radio networks of Moscow-based radio stations operating in the country. The key players networks provide news-and-music content (Radio Rossii, Mayak), and many networks (Russkoje Radio, Dorozhnoe Radio, Avtoradio, Europa+, Retro FM, etc.) are their main competitors offering music for different audience tastes. A few radio broadcasters work in a talk-radio format including the traditionally popular Echo Moskvy and its recent rivals RSN or Komsomolskaya Pravda or Business-FM. The development of regional radio broadcasting occurs mostly because local broadcasters join the existing networks.

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Print Media: Falling Circulations, Decreasing Influence

Legacy print media in Russia still have a role to play, due to historical tradition, on the one hand, and their importance for local and regional communities, on the other hand. According to the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media, in Russia in 2016, there were as many as 29,372 magazines, 22,009 newspapers, 1720 collections, 1358 bulletins, 867 almanacs, 39 reference books and 13 catalogues (Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media, 2016). The major trend in the newspaper market since the mid-2010s was a consistent reduction in circulation. This is primarily accounted for by demographic factors since the number of newspaper readers has dropped and a decreased interest of readers, especially young people, in newspapers as a source for news and current affairs’ content, as a result of the development of online digital media. Publishers spent additional sums in order to counteract this threat. One of the ways to solve this problem in big cities was to publish free newspapers, either copying foreign formats (Metro) or as original ones (Bolshoi Gorod in Moscow) (Shchepilova, 2010). Russian newspapers can be divided into several groups: ● According to the geographical locations, there exist national dailies (Moscowbased publications), regional newspapers, located in big cities, and local publications in small settlements; frequency of publication decreases—from dailies to weeklies. ● According to thematic profile, there are several major groups: quality sociopolitical, business, entertainment (tabloids) and general interest publications. National quality newspapers include Rossiyskaya Gazeta (136,927), Izvestia (431,200), Kommersant (93,874), Vedomosti (59,000) and Nezavisimaya Gazeta (40,000). They set the news agenda, but their influence is limited to the largest industrial cities though their brands are rather influential online. Mass market newspapers are the free daily Metro published in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Rostov-na-Donu, Togliatti, Novosibirsk, Nizhny Novgorod and Ufa. The general interest dailies, which combine features of quality and mass tabloid press, are mixed-type publications with an interest in the socio-political agenda having no particular thematic specialisation. Among them, the leaders are the Komsomolskaya Pravda (1.1 m) published daily in 44 Russian cities with regional inserts and the Moskovsky Komsomolets (700,000) characterised by a combination of features of the analytical quality press (an analytical focus on political issues) and of the mass press (scandalous topics, provocative headlines and so on). Other capital newspapers with regional or local inserts are Rossiyskaya Gazeta daily and Argumenty i Fakty weekly (1.2 m). In terms of ownership, the newspaper publishers are complicated because a longterm economic decrease in the market has made it not attractive for private investments; thus, the publishing business, especially in Moscow, is dominated by state companies and private industrial or financial holdings.

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Magazine publishing has developed quite dynamically over the past two decades. The Russian magazine industry is sufficiently fragmented according to the audience’s consumer interests and advertisers’ demands and is comprised of a number of Russian versions of global magazine brands: men’s and women’s, fashion and lifestyle, automobile, interior decor brands and many others. After the economic crisis of 2009–2010, much of the circulation (more than 60%) was published in Finland, Latvia, Poland and even Germany, and when the situation improved, printing came back thanks to the construction of new and renovation of existing printing shops. Even more so than with newspapers, magazine production and distribution are anchored not just in big cities, in general, but in Moscow, in particular. The leading publishing house is the Central Federal District, which comprises 59% of magazine titles. The statistics for other Federal Districts is as follows: the Volga FD, 11% of magazine titles; the North Western FD, 9%; the Siberian FD, 7%; the Southern and Urals FDs, 5%; and the Far Eastern and North Caucasian FDs, 2% (Rossiyskiy rynok periodicheskoy pechati, 2017). The Moscow magazine periodicals significantly outperform regional periodicals: central publications account for 60% of the total magazine circulation. However, as in the case of newspapers, magazines are faced with the imperfections of the distribution and subscription systems. As a result, in the 2010s, residents of the largest cities with the population of over 1 million remained the major magazine consumers because it was easiest to buy magazines in kiosks anchored within the transport networks of these cities or in trade centres, supermarkets and bookshops.

4 Russian Digital Media: Innovative Dynamics The Russian media system has benefited greatly from the progress of information and communication technologies and the rise of the Internet and mobile telephony in Russia. The unique nature of the Internet as a communication space, business ecosystem and media landscape transformed it into an integral part of the modern Russian media system.

4.1

The Internet as Mass Media: A Brief History

Runet, the Russian-language segment of the Internet, was referred to as “Russian wonder” as early as in the 1990s (Doktorov, 1999). The Russian Internet began to actively develop in 1993 and grew rapidly up until 1997 with the number of users doubled each year. In 2019, the maximum number of Russian Internet users stood close to 90 million (about 75.4% of the adult population). The rise of the Internet took place first in industrial centres, especially in Moscow, thus reflecting the emerging digital divide—in terms of connectivity, skills and use—in the Russian context (Ragnedda & Muschert, 2013, pp. 118–133). For years, the geographical

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leaders in terms of Internet penetration in Russia have been Moscow, St. Petersburg and a few regional industrial centres. Though the penetration of digital media grew further, Russia still remains a country of digital divide: in the late 2000s, about 6% of Russians had no idea about the Internet, and more than 70% did not have an opportunity to use it regularly. But in recent decades the inequality of geographical regions has obviously decreased, and now residents of Moscow and St. Petersburg represent less than one third of Russian Internet population. For instance, in 2016, in Moscow, there were 8,496,000 residents going online at least once a month, which made 79% of its total population; in St. Petersburg, the figure amounted to 3,560,000 (78%); in Novosibirsk, it amounted to 1,027,000 (76%); and in Ekaterinburg, it amounted to 928,000 (75%).1 The Russian Internet audience grew steadily: while in summer 2011 it was estimated at 60 million people, and 22 million Russians used mobile Internet, in October 2016–March 2017, the audience for the Russian Internet amounted to 87 million people (71% of the total population). It is estimated that 66 million people (54% of the country’s population) at least once a month access the Internet through mobile devices and 20 million people (16% of the population) do so exclusively through mobile devices.2,3 A particular trend is the growth of the young users’ community. During the period from 2011 to 2015, the number of Internet users in Russia doubled annually, and consequently the size of the Internet advertising market increased almost threefold. The number of female users has also been rapidly increasing in the 2000s. In the early stages of the 1990s, in many cities, a typical user was a well-educated male town or city dweller with a high income, in the age bracket of 25–35, a bureaucrat, a politician, a businessman, a journalist or a student. However, in the mid-2000s, the prevalence of young women among urban Internet users became evident, especially among users of social networks.4 Third, in the early 2000s, the rapid growth in the number of individual users in comparison with corporate users became apparent. According to TNS, at the beginning of the 2010s, 92% of users living in cities and towns with the populations over 100 thousand people had an opportunity to go online from home. Notably, 70% of them use broadband (high speed) access to the Internet.5 In the 2010s, the Internet took on a new role in terms of public communication, which was seen during several election campaigns at the federal and regional levels.

1 https://yandex.ru/company/researches/2016/ya_internet_regions_ 2016#polzovanieinternetomvraznyxgorodax 2 The Internet in Russia in 2016. Condition, Trends and Development Prospects. Report. (2016). Moscow, FAPMC. p. 41. 3 The Internet in Russia. Condition, Trends and Development Prospects. Report. (2012). Moscow, FAPMC. p. 36. 4 http://rumetrika.rambler.ru/review/2/4325 5 http://company.yandex.ru/researches/reports/internet_regions_2012.xml

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While the provision of news from oppositional parties or protest communities via federal broadcast channels was limited, it was the online media, especially social networks with mobile access, which reported alternative news agendas and provided alternative political analysis. Digital media, especially the Internet, have shown their capacity to mobilise and thus as an instrument for the organisation and coordination of protest activities in Moscow and some large industrial centres (Oates, 2013). Since the 2010s, a new stage of the Russian Internet maturation can be identified, characterised by the increased influence of social media that is widely used by the younger generations. The Russian digital media grew owing to the popular national services VKontakte and Odnoklassniki, as well as the Facebook global network. According to the Public Opinion Foundation, in the early 2010s, the average time Russian users spent on social networks was up to 13 hours a month. Russians actively use global Google as well as the national search engine Yandex and the Mail.Ru postal service. The new media easily allow the Russian audience to combine the national and the global. Recent research has shown that social networking platforms have become a new “entry point” into digital media landscape and communication environment (Dunas et al., 2017). In the last decade, the number of Internet users has grown—albeit at a decreasing pace—and yet a generational divide in social media use has remained rather visible. The communication behaviour and media consumption of young Russians has become so distinct in comparison to that of older people’s, that researchers began to study “generations” X, Y and especially Z as particular communities united not only by common media habits but also by lifestyles and values (Vyugina, 2017). The progress of mobile telephony was undoubtedly another hallmark of the modern stage of Russian digital media development. By the beginning of 2010, mobile telephony also proved itself as a channel for accessing the Internet, and in 2019 about 56% of Internet users access the Net via mobile devices. In the context of the network society, thanks to its interactive and decentralised culture, mobile telephony has proven to be a powerful stimulus for development, while mobile telephony—as an alternative technological platform for online access—became a major driver for Internet development in Russia, at the turn of the 2010s (Zassoursky, 2011). During this period, the mobile Internet audience grew twice as fast as the Internet audience in general. In terms of mobile Internet penetration, the leaders are capital cities and cities of over 1 million: in 2016, Moscow was home to 61% of its Internet users with mobile access; Ekaterinburg, 57%; St. Petersburg, 56%; and Novosibirsk, 53%.6 Mobile Internet users today are young and active, while among elder generations it is also used but by well-educated and a well-to-do part of the audience. The most active part of Russian Internet audience is young residents of industrialised urban areas. In Russian cities with populations over 1 million, more than 90% of digital youth under 22 are active Internet users.

6 https://yandex.ru/company/researches/2016/ya_internet_regions_ 2016#polzovanieinternetomvraznyxgorodax

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The Internet as a technological platform has expanded and in some cases even replaced the traditional public sphere, as understood by Habermas in terms of rapid information delivery and political and cultural agenda setting. In the last two decades, the Russian Internet has become a unique communication channel and digital information landscape, which provides users with a maximum choice of content distributed mostly for free. Various viewpoints are presented on the Internet, often in the form of polarised viewpoints, thus making the digital landscape intolerant, ignorant and incompetent (Samattsev, 2017). A diversity of political and cultural views has been created by the Internet presence of many oppositional parties, politicians and digital media activists. Though emerging “echo chambers” have clustered supporters of various ideologies or beliefs, the Internet barriers for different political views in Runet remain low, regardless of the new legislation adopted in the recent years (Mediasystema Rossii, 2017, pp. 364–366). In fact, the Internet in Russia has allowed for a great freedom of content choice ranging from news, information to education and entertainment. Official state agencies, major political parties, NGOs, popular opinion leaders and celebrities also operate numerous sites, social media accounts and messenger services, including Telegram, which has been particularly popular in recent years, thus providing new forms of public and individual communication (Samattsev, 2017). Nevertheless, Runet has become a universal communication environment and an important information channel, while the online environment in Russia has diverse, lively and informal sources of content about politics, the economy, culture and everyday life.

4.2

Runet as a Part of the Media Environment

In the Russian media system, the Internet has become the most open medium, thus closely corresponding to the Habermasian concept of “public sphere”, regardless of some concerns from media scholars about its negative impacts on a society, such as a degradation in media–society relations and public communication, new knowledge inequalities, de-professionalisation of journalism, low trust in online content, etc. (McQuail, 2013, p. 266). However, with its broadening penetration all over Russia and expanding volume of digital content, the Internet has currently become the most serious challenger to the legacy media: television, radio and the print press. This is true in terms of the audience’s preferences of news and entertainment sources, as well as the size of the Internet advertising market which grew up to $1.11 billion in 2017 (AKAR, 2018). Traditional media companies have been rather active on the Internet since its early days. There are more than 6,000,000 sites in the Russian-language sector of the Internet. Several popular newspapers, like the Nezavisimaya Gazeta, started to explore the Internet as early as 1994. The first online media projects were started by literary postmodernist writers who launched Russkii Zhurnal. Currently, the most

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popular online news media are Lenta.ru, KP.ru, Gazeta.ru, RG.ru, NEWSru.com and LifeNews.ru. The birth of active audiences stimulated by the Internet has become a powerful driver for the development of the media system in recent years. As audience demand has been influenced by digital technologies, subsequently, the production of traditional audio-visual media, programming strategies of television channels, formats of radio stations and thematic profiles of newspapers and magazines have been adjusting. On the cusp of the 2000s–2010s, Russia’s leading federal broadcasters and newspaper publishers realised that the former mass audience was starting to fragment and decrease as young, professionally and socially active consumers opted for cable and satellite channels, the Internet and individual viewing possibilities such as video-on-demand, catch-up and other forms of non-linear viewing (Mediasystema Rossii, 2017, pp. 346–347). Active audiences that possess basic skills of content creation have become, as everywhere else in the world, a sign of media change. It is no accident that Russian LiveJournal in the 1990s and Russian social networks VKontakte and Odnoklassniki in the 2000s have become the most active and populated Russian-language Internet communities. This came out as a complex result from the maturing media market, which allowed for the improvement of the technological infrastructure of Russian mass media supported by investments of private telecommunication companies and mobile operators as well as the wide distribution of digital access devices and ICT services among Russians. New digital, interactive and online media have converged existing print and audio-visual media and also created a new digital environment populated by newcomers—digital media products, search engines and social networks. By moving into a rapidly evolving Internet space in the 2000s, the Russian media managed to start a new phase of transformation in which the Internet has become its backbone for technology distribution and as a creative environment accumulating a huge amount of content products and services for the majority of Russians. In the 2010s, the space of the Russian segment of the Internet (Runet) has considerably expanded. At of the end of 2016, in the .RU domain extension, 5,424,919 domains were registered (number six in the global rating scale of national domains), and in the .RF domain extension—897,324 domains.7 The Russianlanguage Internet, Runet, and the .ru zone, which includes almost 80% of them, ranks fourth in the global rating scale of national domains having gained two positions in a year. In terms of this indicator, the Russian regions have already outperformed the capital cities.8 The Russian audience increasingly use the Internet to get the types of news and entertainment, which had been previously satisfied by the legacy media. According to a survey conducted by the Russian Public Opinion Research Centre in 2017, over

7 The Internet in Russia in 2016. Condition, Trends and Development Prospects. Report. (2016). Moscow, FAPMC. p. 51. 8 http://company.yandex.ru/researches/reports/internet_regions_2012.xml

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half of Russian citizens use the Internet for communication with friends and relatives (64%), as a source of news (60%) and entertainment (54%). One in two undergoes training and acquires self-education using the Internet (49%) and makes banking transactions (46%). The least popular is purchasing durable goods and services: 34% of respondents do use the Internet for this purpose, while 46% do not.9 At the same time, the majority of Russians said that they primarily use the Internet to seek information, secondly to communicate on social network platforms and thirdly as a source of news and for research. The core of Internet users’ research and communication practices in Russia is currently focused on social media, which include the blogosphere, social networks, microblogs (Twitter) and messenger services (Telegram). In the early 2010s, Runet had about 12 million blogs, 10% of which were regularly updated. The data for 2013, for example, show that social networks in Russia became the most popular Internet resources (34% of all audience), along with search engines and email services. The audience of social networks is represented mostly by the digital youth, while youngsters access social media more often via mobile devices, in comparison to older users that gain online access from computers. When combining searches for news, entertainment and communication services, Russians have widely used and continue to extensively use the domestic Internet services such as search engine Yandex (about 40 million users in 2017), social networks VKontakte (about 95 million active monthly audience) and Odnoklassniki (about 71 million active monthly audience). The messenger service Telegram created by Pavel Durov gained success in 2018 with a yearly 7.7% growth. However, experts highlighted that nowadays global social media platforms such as YouTube and Facebook have improved their positions in the Russian media market and have become leaders in the digital environment. The new digital media are playing an increasing role in Russian society and transforming the traditional media system.

5 Conclusion In recent decades, the Russian media system has undergone dramatic changes and has been influenced by the trends that determine the development of national media systems across the world. However, their specific manifestations in Russian circumstances have been unique because the global trends integrated into the Russian context have produced particular consequences. These circumstances, in turn, have been shaped by particular media traditions, the political culture, ethnic structure of the society and the ethical values that are rooted in the diversity of the country’s ethnic and linguistic cultures, as well as by many other nationally determined factors.

9

Ibid. p. 45.

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The key characteristics of present-day Russian realities that have an impact on the Russian media system might be summarised as the following: ● Russia has a huge territory and low density of the population, which, on the one hand, complicates the national distribution of national media outlets and requires a highly technological system of distributing TV and radio broadcasting signals and, on the other hand, turns generally accessible and free-on-air federal television channels into the dominant Russian mass medium. This also underlines the importance of ICT/the Internet dimension in the media system and the key role of satellite wireless channels for the provision of digital content to audiences in all parts of the country. ● Russian society might be described as a multilanguage and multicultural society, requiring a diverse media system, in which, under the present market conditions, the content production in minor languages is commercially unprofitable and requires special media policy with particular links to ICT infrastructure support in the regions. ● Uneven economic development in Russia has led to an unequal distribution of financial and technological resources among Russian federal and regional media, to varying opportunities in terms of the audience’s access to digital content and to an uneven distribution of news and entertainment among digitally advanced and less advanced regions. Such unequal access to digital networks and content, coupled with an ongoing existing digital divide, really makes the Russian media landscape quite unequal. Thus, the increasing competition of the legacy media with new digital and interactive media has become a crucial characteristic of the present Russian media system. In the “capitals”—Moscow and St. Petersburg—challenges are coming from the fact that social media is being used extensively by the digital youth which access these mostly through mobile platforms. In the large industrial centres, the competition differs, and the most serious competitors are online broadband media, cable and satellite television. However, the digital divide in less developed regions remains as small cities and agrarian areas without much access to the Internet and is dominated by free-on-air federal channels and local newspapers associated with local governments (Vartanova, 2018). At the same time, digital media have dramatically broadened the scope of news, analytical information and entertainment available to general audiences and created parallel and alternative agendas. The Russian-language content segment of the Internet has become an intrinsic part of the media system, and the future social and industrial developments will likely increase the role of digital media in Russia.

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References AKAR (Association of Communication Agencies of Russia). Retrieved April 22, 2018., from https://www.akarussia.ru Anikina, M. E. (2015). Ideals and values of modern journalists: The search for balance. In Journalism in change: Journalistic culture in Poland, Russia and Sweden, volume 3 of Studies in communication and politics (pp. 153–178). Berlin: Peter Lang. Athique, A. (2013). Digital media and society: An introduction. Cambridge: Polity. Becker, J. (2004). Lessons from Russia: A neo-authoritarian media system. European Journal of Communication, 19(2), 139–163. Castells, M. (1999). The information age, volumes 1–3: Economy, society and culture. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell. Curran, J., & Park, M.-J. (Eds.). (2000). De-Westernizing media studies. New York: Routledge. De Smaele, H. (1999). The applicability of western media models on the Russian media system. European Journal of Communication, 14(2), 173–189. Doktorov, B. (1999). Rossiyskiy Internet: Novoe russkoe chudo. [The Russian Internet: A new Russian wonder]. Petersburg Journal of Sociology, No 2. Dunas, D., Cherevko, T., & Tolokonnikova, A. (2017). Aktualnye kontseptualnye podkhody k rassmotreniyu protsessa mediapotrebleniya [Current conceptual approaches to the process of media consumption]. Vestnik Moskovskogo Universiteta. Seriya 10 Zhurnalistika, No 5. Moscow: Moscow State University. Dunn, J. (2014). Lottizzazione Russian style: Russia’s two-tier media system. Europe-Asia Studies, 66(9), 1425–1451. Ershov, Y. M. (2012). Televidenie regionov v poiske modeley razvitiya [Regional television in search of development models]. Moscow: Moscow State University. Flew, T. (2005). New media: An introduction (2nd ed.). Melbourne: Oxford University Press. Fomicheva, I. D., & Resnyanskaya, L. L. (1999). Gazeta dlya vsei Rossii [A newspaper for the whole Russia]. Moscow: IKAR. Gladkova, A., Aslanov, I., Danilov, A., Danilov, A., Garifullin, V., & Magadeeva, R. (2019). Ethnic media in Russia: Between state model and alternative voices. Russian Journal of Communication, 11(1), 53–70. Hallin, D. C., & Mancini, P. (Eds.). (2011). Comparing media systems beyond the Western world. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hutchings, S., Rulyova, N., & Beumers, B. (Eds.). (2009). Media and power in post-Soviet Russia: Conflicting messages. Abingdon, UK: Routledge. Internet v Rossii v. (2016). Sostoyanie, tendentsii i perspektivy razvitiya. Otchet (2017) [The Internet in Russia in 2016. Condition, trends and development prospects. Report (2017)]. Moscow: FAPMC. Internet v Rossii. (2012). Sostoyanie, tendencii i perspektivy razvitiya. Otchet [The Internet in Russia. Condition, trends and development prospects. Report. (2012)]. FAPMC: Moscow. Ivanitsky, V. L. (2010). Modernizatsiya zhurnalistiki: metodologicheskiy ehtyud [Modernization of journalism: Methodological etude]. Moscow: MediaMir. Jakubowicz, K. (2004). Ideas in our heads: Introduction of PSB as part of media system change in Central and Eastern Europe. European Journal of Communication, 19(1), 53–74. Jakubowicz, K. (2007). Rude awakening: Social and media change in Central and Eastern Europe. New York: Hampton Press. Kachkaeva, A. G., & Kiriya, I. V. (Eds.). (2007). Rossiyskoe televidenie: mezhdu sprosom i predlozheniem [Russian television: Between demand and supply]. Moscow: Elitkomstar. Kolomiets, V. P., & Poluekhtova, I. A. (Eds.). (2010). Rossiyskoe televidenie: industriya i biznes [Russian television: Industry and business]. ACVI. Moscow: Voskhod. Koltsova, O. (2001). News production in contemporary Russia: Practices of power. European Journal of Communication, 3, 315–335. Koltsova, O. (2006). News media and power in Russia. New York: Routledge.

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Lukina, M. (Ed.). (2010). Internet-SMI: teoriya i prakrika [Internet media: Theory and practice]. Moscow: Aspekt Press. McNair, B. (2000). Power, profit, corruption, and lies: The Russian media in the 1990s. In J. Curran & M.-J. Park (Eds.), De-Westernizing media studies. New York: Routledge. McQuail, D. (2013). Zhurnalistika I obshestvo [Journalism and society]. MediaMir: Moscow. Mediasystema Rossii. (2015). Media system of Russia. Moscow: Aspekt Press. Mediasystema Rossii. (2017). Media system of Russia. Moscow: Aspekt Press. Mediascope (Mediascope. Ratings) (2018). Retrieved April 22, 2018, from https://mediascope.net/ data/ Mickiewicz, E. (1999). Changing channels: Television and the struggle for power in Russia. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Mickiewicz, E. (2008). Television, power and the public in Russia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Noam, E. M. (Ed.). (2016). Who owns the world’s media? Media concentration and ownership around the world. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Nordenstreng, K., & Thussu, D. K. (Eds.). (2015). Mapping BRICS media. New York: Routledge. Nordenstreng, K., Vartanova, E., & Zassoursky, Y. (2002). Russian media challenge (2nd ed.). Helsinki: Aleksanteri Institute. Oates, S. (2013). Revolution stalled: The political limits of the Internet on the post-Soviet sphere. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Obshchestvennoe mnenie 2016. Ezhegodnik. (2017). Public opinion – 2016. Yearbook (2017). Moscow: Levada Center. Publichnyj Doklad Federal’noy sluzhby po nadzoru v sfere svyazi, informacionnyh tekhnologiy i massovyh kommunikatsiy. (2016). [Federal service for supervision of communications, information technology and mass media. Public report (2016)]. Retrieved April 22, 2018, from https://rkn.gov.ru/docs/doc_1646.pdf Ragnedda, M., & Muschert, G. W. (Eds.). (2013). The digital divide: The Internet and social inequality in international perspective. New York: Routledge. Rantanen, T. (2002). The global and the national. Media and communications in post-communist Russia. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield. Rickhter, A. G. (2007). Svoboda massovoy informatsii v postsovetskom prostranstve [Freedom of mass information in the post-Soviet space]. Moscow: VK. Roskomnadzor (Roskomnadzor. Registries) (2018). Retrieved April 22, 2018, from https://rkn.gov. ru/mass-communications/reestr/media/ Rossiyskiy rynok periodicheskoy pechati. (2017). Sostoyanie. Tendentsii. Perspektivy razvitiya. Otchet [Russian Periodical Press. Condition, trends, development prospects. Report (2017)] (p. 54). Moscow: FAPMC. Roudakova, N. (2017). Losing Pravda: Ethics and the press in post-truth Russia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rosstat (Rosstat. Statistics) (2018). Retrieved April 22, 2018, from https://www.gks.ru/statistic Samattsev, O. R. (2017). Tsifrovaija real’nost. Zurnalistika informatsionnoji epokhi: factory trnsformatsiji, problem i perspektivy [Digital reality. Journalism of the information age: Factors of transformation, problems and perspectives]. Moscow: Izdetel’skiye resheniya. Shchepilova, G. G. (2010). Reklama v SMI: istoriya, tekhnologii, klassifikatsiya [Advertising in mass media: History, technologies, classification]. Moscow: Moscow State University. Smirnov, S. S. (2014). Mediakholdingi Rossii: natsionalnyy opyt kontsentratsii SMI [Russian media holdings: National media concentration experience]. Moscow: MediaMir. Souch, I. (2017). Popular tropes of identity in contemporary Russian television and film. New York: Bloomsbury. Sparks, C., & Reading, A. (1998). Communism, capitalism and the mass media. London: Sage. Splichal, S. (2001). Imitative revolutions changes in the media and journalism in East-Central Europe. Javnost, 8(4), 31–58.

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Televidenie v Rossii v. (2016). Sostoyanie, tendentsii i perspektivy razvitiya. Otchet (2017) [Television in Russia in 2016. Condition, trends and development prospects. Report (2017)]. FAPMC: Moscow. Televidenie v Rossii. (2011). Sostoyanie, tendentsii i perspektivy razvitiya. Otchet [Television in Russia. Condition, trends and development prospects. Report (2011)]. FAPMC: Moscow. Toepfl, F. (2013). Why do pluralistic media systems emerge? Comparing media change in the Czech Republic and in Russia after the collapse of communism. Global Media and Communication, 9(3), 239–256. Vartanova, E. (2012). The Russian media model in the context of post-Soviet dynamics. In D. Hallin & P. Mancini (Eds.), Comparing media systems beyond the Western world. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Vartanova, E. (2014). Postsovetskie transformatsii rossiyskih SMI i zhurnalistiki [post-Soviet transformations of the Russian media and journalism]. Moscow: MediaMir. Vartanova, E. (2018). Media landscape. Russia. Retrieved May 05, 2019, from https:// medialandscapes.org/about/ejc Vartanova, E. (2019). Russian media: A call for theorising the economic change. Russian Journal of Communication, 11(1), 22–36. Vyrkovskiy, A. V., & Makeenko, M. I. (2014). Regionalnoe televidenie Rossii na poroge tsifrovoy epokhi [Regional television of Russia on the threshold of the digital age]. Moscow: MediaMir. Vyugina, D. M. (2017). Osobennosti mediapotrebleniya tsifrovogo pokoleniya Rossii [Features of media consumption of the digital generation of Russia]. Mediascope, No 4. Retrieved April 22, 2018, from http://www.mediascope.ru/2386 Zassoursky, Y. N. (1998). Changing media and communications. In Y. Zassoursky & E. Vartanova (Eds.), Changing media and communications. Concepts, technologies and ethics in global and national perspectives. Moscow. Zassoursky, I. I. (2000). Politics and media in Russia in the nineties. In Paper presented at the VII world congress for central and east European studies, July 29–August 3. Tampere. Zassoursky, Y. N. (Ed.). (2011). Sredstva massovoy informatsii Rossii [mass media of Russia] (2nd ed.). Moscow: Aspect Press.

The Rise of Runet and the Main Stages of Its History Natalia Konradova

1 The Internet and the Cold War The defining beginning of the Russian Internet’s history depends on how both “the Internet” and “history” are defined. The cultural and political role of the Internet as a new medium and communication environment which met late- and post-Soviet society is its most important aspect. Consideration of the Russian Internet’s evolution includes content ranging from the first contact between private users on either side of the Iron Curtain, to the social and literary experiments of the 1990s, to the prosperity of commercial and political technologies of the 2000s, and, finally, to the new form of social and political activism performed within social networks in the early 2010s. The prehistory of the Russian Internet begins in 1957, with the launch of the first artificial Earth satellite “Sputnik 1”. The link between the two is far more sophisticated than just the advanced telecommunication functions these both performed. The Internet was developed due to the American government’s fear of the USSR in respect to this historical event: President Eisenhower’s founding of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in 1958, in lieu of the Soviets’ evident success. In 1969, the agency launched the ARPANET, a network which connected remote computers scattered across the USA. Four years later, several computer networks were interconnected. This was the Internet, at the time a subject of military management, control, and of secure classification.

This chapter was written as a part of the project “Andersdenken digital. Das russische Internet als individueller Freiraum und/oder öffentlicher Gegenraum”, which is funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft DFG (SCHM 2378/5-1). N. Konradova (*) Berlin, Germany © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_3

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Meanwhile in the USSR, the cybernetics was reinstated after Stalin’ s prohibition of the “imperialistic anti-science”. Computer scientists started to develop a concept of computer networking. The first attempt, made in 1959 by military engineer Anatoly Kitov, was rejected by both the CPSU and the Ministry of Defense. The second one named OGAS (All-State Automated System) was run by cybernetics’ specialist Victor Glushkov and had the form of an ambitious project aimed at organising and supporting the planned socialist economy as a whole. In the early 1970s, OGAS was defunded. Neither American computer scientists nor Soviet cyberneticists ever planned to make their computer networks available to the general public. The projects on both sides of the Iron Curtain were designed for scientific goals rather than communication. Nevertheless, a decade after the ARPANET was launched, other computer networks— that is, BITNET, USENET, and CSNET—appeared in the 1980s. These networks had been made accessible, by universities primarily, and were thus beyond the control of military officials or government: they were public. Since there was no hierarchy in these networks, and as they still required permanent support and improvement, their first users were also their developers. They wrote programme patches (code that would fix or “cure” a programme) and discussed and coded new functions, as well as shared computer jokes, life stories, and their opinions on politics, human rights, music, parenting, etc. These public networks had no centralised management and did not belong to anybody. As Canadian programmer and Internet activist Brad Templeton recalled in 2001, USENET was “the soul of the Internet”, a meeting place where “the important topics were discussed” and “things happened” (Templeton, 2001). USENET users not only published jokes and exchanged software but also criticised the government, elaborated the etiquette of online communication (netiquette), and discussed actual social issues. Later on, these examples of online public sphere would generate a variety of digital utopias—that of direct democracy, peerto-peer economics, virtual communities, etc. (Hauben & Hauben, 1997; Oram, 2001; Rheingold, 1993). On the first of April 1984, USENET users received a letter signed by Konstantin Chernenko, the then General Secretary of the Communist Party of the USSR, which read: Well, today, 840,401, this is at last the Socialist Union of Soviet Republics joining the Usenet network and saying hello to everybody. One reason for us to join this network has been to have a means of having an open discussion forum with the American and European people and making clear to them our strong efforts towards attaining peaceful coexistence between the people of the Soviet Union and those of the United States and Europe. (Beertema, 1984)

Shortly before this Orwellian year, computer networks had become public in the West. It was only one year shy of the first meeting between Gorbachev and Reagan in Geneva, which was a pivotal moment in the conflict between the USA and the USSR. It was because of this that the kremvax1 hoax happened to be incredibly

1 The USENET accounts usually contained two parts: the name of an institution (university, company) and a type of computer. In the case of the kremvax hoax, a letter was sent from a fake

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popular among USENET users. According to the author of the April Fools’ Day joke, a Dutch programmer named Piet Beertema, his letter was even discussed at the Pentagon in the context of information security (Beertema, 2017). Less than 6 years later, the first Soviet programmers joined USENET. But first there was a bitter dispute in several USENET newsgroups over whether the users should or could help “the Soviets” to access the network. It started with a message from an American “hacker”2 who visited Moscow and came back under the impression that Soviet programmers were surprisingly similar to their American counterparts. One of the threads was titled “The Russians are coming!” alluding to a comedy film released in 1966 about a Russian submarine crew that lands in the States. In 1988, with the decline of the Cold War, the first contact was made between American and Soviet programmers as well as civil and ecological activists. The communication was professional rather than public; still, there was an email service in the USSR, which was provided by the SovAm Teleport company in San Francisco and used by a few scientists inside the Soviet Union. At the same time, the Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (CoCom) was still a reality, and the spread of “militarily significant technologies” was strictly limited. Not only computers but also any information about equipment or software could be called significant, and any IT specialist who communicated with the Warsaw Pact states could be punished (British Government, 1989). As such, users were fractured on the issue. The first group argued that the USSR was not a friend of the USA, that it was a totalitarian regime, and that, just as the FBI was able to monitor American programmers to control sensitive information leaks, Soviet programmers may or may not have been under KGB surveillance, and communicating with them would add a new element of unpredictability. Opponents to these arguments outnumbered those who voiced them. Those users who supported communication with the USSR assumed that Western propaganda about the Soviet people was wrong and saw them instead as “real hotshot programmers, folks not unlike ourselves” (Draper, 1988). Supporters of US-USSR contact between programmers rehumanised “the Soviets” by reintroducing human traits to the image of the ex-enemy that had been dehumanised by Cold War propaganda. The opposing forces were outnumbered and the humanist party won the day. The USENET users’ opinion on the USSR was that this was important, not so much in terms of impacting Soviet access to the network (which it did not) but in terms of this being an important historical process to expand beyond the existing USENET community, as illustrated by the New York Times feature published on this subject (Markoff, 1989). The Soviets joined USENET about half a year after the discussion came to pass. The first Soviet man in cyberspace was Andrej Kolesnikov, the Moscow account “kremvax”. The name combined “vax”, a computer model popular among the Internet users, and “krem”, which alluded to the Kremlin. 2 The word “hacker”, in the 1970s and 1980s, signified a person who was interested in technologies, engineering, and computers. John Draper called himself a “hacker” in this old sense of the word, though he was a victim of the changing concept of hacking. Draper was arrested on suspicion of espionage and imprisoned for hacking the telephone system of AT&T company (Lapsley, 2013).

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representative of the SovAm Teleport, Inc. He subscribed to a few groups dedicated to telecommunications and music, where he was welcomed warmly. Users in other newsgroups did not notice the fact that the Soviets were online until August 1990, when programmers from the Demos cooperative connected to the Internet via Finland and subscribed to several newsgroups dedicated to the Unix operating system (OS), humour, and Soviet politics (the latter was discussed in the famous talk.politic.soviet group where the exchange about the USSR, the KGB, and the FBI took place). One of the first messages detected by “the Westerners” was a joke about socialism, communism, and capitalism sent by Vadim Antonov (1990). The post included the signature “Vadim Antonov/DEMOS, Moscow, USSR/(It is NOT a joke!)” and generated a lot of buzz. Demos employees answered all of the questions that had accumulated and that had been posed by Westerners about the USSR, including questions about science, telecommunications, politics, and human rights issues. This disclosure occurred just a few months before what came to be known as the moment of glory of the Soviet users on the USENET: an attempted coup d’état. This would not have been possible if the Soviet software developers had not spent the previous 7 years working on an adaptation of Unix. This machine-independent operating system was perfect for building a computer network. In 1983, Unix was copied in Berkeley University and transferred to Moscow in violation of the CoCom restrictions.3 The system found its way to Soviet programmers working at the Kurchatov Institute of Nuclear Energy and the Institute for Advanced Training of the Ministry of Automobile Industry. The driving force behind this work was Mikhail Davidov, the head of a department at the Institute for Advanced Training. Programmers from the Kurchatov Institute Valerii Bardin, Vadim Antonov, and others developed the OS. In 1984, the same year that Piet Beertema pulled the kremvax prank, a group of Soviet software developers organised a seminar to show their colleagues the first version of the modified Unix. By 1988, the operating system called “Demos” was ready, and the working party received the State Committee on Science and Technology Prize. The same year, a new law “about cooperation in the USSR” was ordained, and private business in the form of a cooperative was allowed. A year later, a part of the Demos team founded a cooperative by the same name and started to sell their operating system and other software as well as computers. They did not leave their institutional posts (including at the Kurchatov Institute) and still worked as scientific state employees.4 In 1990, the Demos team connected to Finland

3 Operating systems and computer networks had being developed in the USSR, but they did not become universal as Unix or the Internet did (Peters, 2016). 4 A cooperative was a form of private business in the socialist system, an offspring of the ambiguity of late socialism. According to Marxist ideology, cooperation was excusable because owners and employees of such enterprises were one and the same and, therefore, there would be no “exploitation of man by man”. At the same time, some cooperators suddenly became very rich, something that was a new reality for the USSR. A notorious case is that of the first legal Soviet millionaire Artem Tarasov who founded the cooperative “Tekhnika” in 1989 and earned 3,000,000 roubles. His deputy with the same income paid 90,000 roubles towards Communist Party dues (Dodolev, 2011).

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with the help of a direct phone line the country had with the USSR. Programmer Alexei Rudnev recalled this moment as a breakthrough5: I came back from vacation and was guided to the Internet. “Look, we drilled a window to Europe: have you heard about this person? Here are his articles in the news.6 And here are news about Unix and here are. . .”. We had the feeling that the Iron Curtain had fallen.

In August 1991, the coup d’état organisers seized Soviet television and newspapers and expelled foreign television channels and correspondents, clamping down on the information leakage out of the USSR. Many scientists and activists had email account by this point in time, so they started to send out Moscow news to their foreign counterparts. Interfax, the first late-Soviet information agency to use SprintNet,7 did the same. Employees of Demos (now renamed the Relcom) informed the USENET users abroad about what had happened in the USSR. These emails were very efficient and reached a great deal of journalists and activists (Konradova, 2016). Usenet’s archive still contains posts from the Demos/Relcom to the Westerners: Don’t worry; we’re OK, though frightened and angry. Moscow is full of tanks and military vehicles, I hate them. They are trying to close all mass media, they shut down CNN an hour ago, and Soviet TV is showing opera and old movies. But, thank Heavens, they don’t think of Relcom as part of the media, or perhaps they have simply forgotten about us. . . . (Soviet Coup Archive)

The international Usenet community mobilised fairly quickly, and in 3 days in August two groups dedicated to the USSR (soc.culture.soviet and talk.politics. soviet) sent thousands of messages to “the West”. For them, reporting on the coup on the Internet was a sign of the new age they were waiting for. The digital utopia of direct grassroots communication, which had become more efficient than traditional media, was turning into a reality in front of their eyes (Szabo, 1991). Though this event was not so important for the Soviet participants, they still considered it as a landmark of the Russian Internet development (Konradova, 2016). That same year the cooperative Demos was transformed into a company. Today, it specialises in information security.

5

By this time, the Kurchatov Institute and Demos cooperative had built, using the foundation of Unix/Demos operating system, a computer network of research institutions over the whole country. Therefore, in entering the Internet and USENET, they not only appeared online themselves but also made a connection between “the world” and the participants of their network in Novosibirsk, Irkutsk, and other Soviet cities. 6 “News” means here user posts in USENET newsgroups. 7 Telenet, later SprintNet, is an American commercial network elaborated in 1974 by the software developers who earlier had participated in work on ARPANET. Ironically, one of the first messages of the agency about the coup was forwarded to USENET by Piet Beertema, the author of the kremvax hoax.

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2 Russian USENET The very first experience of the Soviets being online resulted in a triumph of new media over the old system. Not only the Cold War but the entire Second World came to an end. Russian-speaking users had been integrated into the Internet community and socialised with Americans and Europeans. The first years after 1991 were a time of elaboration on a framework of rules for both virtual communication and discussions about politics, society, and culture. The fact that technical access to the Internet from Moscow and other major cities of the former USSR had existed since 1990, notwithstanding, there were not many users before the emergence of a free market of commercial Internet service providers in 1995 and 1996. Apart from the employees of Relcom, it was Soviet and postSoviet emigrants who subscribed to USENET newsgroups, as well as American Sovietologists and users with a general interest in Soviet topics. The agenda and specificity of topics discussed in the USSR-related newsgroups of USENET talk.politics.soviet (t.p.s.) and soc.culture.soviet (s.c.s.) were determined by the historical moment of the collapse of the Soviet Union and by the social and professional origins of the disputants. The most popular and long-lasting discussions were those dedicated to Soviet colonial, ethnic, and language policy and to the newly achieved independence of the ex-Soviet countries. The newsgroups were founded before the collapse of the USSR, so their names still contained the word “Soviet”. Consequently, users from different former Soviet countries subscribed to t.p.s. and s.c.s. to discuss common post-Soviet issues. The most popular topics were Estonia and Ukraine. While there were also regional USENET newsgroups, such as soc.culture.baltics or soc.culture.ukrainian, subscribers from these countries stayed in Soviet-related newsgroups to discuss, for example, Estonian citizenship law or the Black Sea Fleet—political issues that surfaced after the collapse of the Soviet Union. As experienced emigrants, users were sensitive about the cultural and political aspects of emigration, particularly in reference to their countries of origin, as compared to their host countries. In many threads, the word sovok, a pejorative term for “Soviet” that had emerged in the 1980s,8 was not only used but also discussed. Participants of these conversations used the term to express their attitude towards both the USSR and other people who they did not agree with in general, regardless of their origins. This sovok discourse was related to the high rate of emigration in order to escape poverty and the inability to attain prosperity and democracy (Sovok, 1992). Therefore, in the talk.politics.soviet and soc.culture. soviet newsgroups, concepts such as democracy, the market, commerce, censorship, and theories about the practices of socialism, communism, capitalism, or nationalism—all of which were relevant to post-Soviet reality—were frequently discussed. The word sovok derives from “Soviet” and is homonymic to the word “dust tray”. Both the word and the discussions about Soviet ethos are still present in Russian-speaking Internet discourse, including among a new wave of Russian emigrants. 8

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The noticeable weakness of the Soviet approach to social sciences (which were, in the USSR, replaced with an ideology) resulted in a huge lack of knowledge and resources concerning Russian and Soviet history. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union, ex-Soviet USENET users hurried to fill the gap, rapidly posting their thoughts on Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Nicholas II, the October Revolution, the Cold War, Soviet dissidents, and other SU-related topics. A large majority of the participants were trained in the natural sciences, mathematics, programming, or technology. Many had left the USSR before its collapse, since—due to the high quality of Soviet education in these fields—it was fairly common practice for alumni to be invited to Western universities, either as PhD candidates or as employees. As such, the most disturbing topic for these users was the Soviet educational and scientific policies in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM disciplines). One discussion, dedicated to anti-Semitism at the department of mathematics of Moscow State University (MSU), lasted several years, raised more comments than any other, and survived in the collective memory of participants long after USENET lost its function as the main meeting place of the Internet. MSU was the leading educational facility in mathematics education in the USSR. In the 1970s and 1980s, the university adopted an anti-Jewish policy: applicants who had Jewish origins were not accepted into the university. The Jewish roots of the applicants were detected by MSU examiners on the basis of both the indicated ethnicity in the application form (“the fifth paragraph”9) and latent attributes such as family or patronymic names. Official Soviet ideology declared itself to uphold “internationalism” and “people’s friendship”, so the anti-Jewish policy could not be traced in any laws or documents and was never publicly discussed in the USSR. It was only a small circle of Soviet people who knew about the situation at the MSU and other prestigious higher education institutions. This included Jewish families and Soviet dissidents who wrote reports about anti-Semitism in samizdat (Senderov & Kanevskii, 1980). The reports were republished in newspapers in the West, so politically active subscribers of USENET were well versed in the details surrounding the situation. The discussion started with a question by an American user about the new rector of the MSU, Viktor Sadovnichii, who had been elected shortly before. In his reply, Mikhail Verbitskii (who later became the user tipharet, the “enfant terrible” of Russian blogging) posted a letter from the Moscow-based mathematician Alexander Shen. In the letter, Sadovnichii was described as a low-performing mathematician and, at the same time, a notorious anti-Semite: Sadovnichiy was First Deputy Rector while Logunov was rector. As a Chairman of the Admissions Committee he is directly responsible for the anti-semitism and other corruption

Application forms for student and work positions were typical in the USSR. In the fifth paragraph, an applicant had to indicate his or her ethnicity. The phrase “the fifth paragraph” became an idiom for “Jew”. 9

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N. Konradova in the University. His speciality is mathematics but his qualification is doubtful. He is well known as a slimy pragmatic without any principles. (Verbitskii, 1992)

Stormy reactions ensued. In t.s.p. and s.c.s. newsgroups, both subscribers who had not passed their entrance exams because of their Jewish origins and those who graduated from the MSU knowing nothing about the discrimination policy were caught up in the discussion. The former shared stories about themselves or friends of theirs who had experienced the discrimination firsthand and described the technology of obstruction for Jewish applicants at the MSU. According to them, this included, for example, extended oral exams with special long-standing problems known as groby (from Russian grob which means “coffin”) and special software coded to digitise the selection of Jewish applicants.10 The latter participants, who had not previously known about the “invisible” discrimination, did not believe that such technologies were possible and assumed that there could be no anti-Jewish policy and, furthermore, that certain untrained applicants were merely pretending to be victims. They required documented evidence and discredited human witnesses. The discussion reached beyond the local concern of entrance examinations and ultimately included all of Soviet history, touching on problems to do with nationalism, feminism, science policy, Soviet dissidents, and, again, Estonia. The most popular topic in the dialogue was Igor Shafarevich, a mathematician and Soviet dissident who published his nationalistic and anti-Semitic work Russophobia in samizdat in 1980. In addition to both Jewish and non-Jewish emigrants from the USSR, American Sovietologists participated in the discussion and posted documents and references about “traditionalist opposition” at the MSU and the USSR in general (Hammer, 1990). Users from behind the Iron Curtain were the same as Westerners in terms of their human nature and profession. Still, they belonged to another culture which became distinct upon their arrival on the Net. Some ex-Soviet users not only dismissed as nonsense any witness accounts of anti-Semitism at the MSU but were in fact embarrassed by the social and political agenda and tried to avoid or discount it: Here we go again. Is it a coincidence, that “Antisemitism in (sic.) MGU” is a hot topic in spring? It looks like it’s due to incurable avitaminosis, which was blagopriobretion (anyone cares to translate init (sic.) to English?) by the majority of active readers of this newsgroup back in the SU. (Volodin, 1992)

This was a typical reaction for a person from late socialist society, in fact an individualist society in denial of collective values and solidarity, with a lack of public sphere, and distrustful of the humanitarian agenda associated with the official Soviet narrative (Yurchak, 2006).

10

There are several witnesses and references attesting to the fact that the software did, indeed, exist. The most detailed of such accounts was published by Evgenii Berkovich, the author of a website dedicated to Jewish history. In an interview, Berkovich explained that he knew who the software developers were but could not name them as they were still employed at the MSU (Berkovich, Jevgenij. 2017. Facebook message to author, September 2017).

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Despite the resistance of some users, the discussion had several waves and assimilated the entire assortment of topics that were important for the community, such as emigration, Soviet colonising politics, and sovok issues. Furthermore, the discussion attracted a particular kind of user, that is, a “flamer”.11 Sergey Viznyuk, or Dragon Fly, a user from the University of California, became legendary for writing provocative messages concerning ethnic issues. Jews, Estonians, and Ukrainians fell victim to his flaming as well as “purebred sovoks”, a collocation invented by Viznyuk to refer to ex-Soviet USENET users. Several years later, he wrote How to smash an enemy in newsgroups, a mocking manual for beginners in Internet discussions: Never prove anything. Only state. Never, I mean never, make excuses no matter the nonsense you wrote before. . . And, finally, if you think you carry out any (important) mission on USENET, go sleep it off. “Get a life”, in American parlance.

While the online behaviour of Viznyuk, aka Dragon Fly, was annoying and sometimes offensive, there was a “flamer” of a still higher level: Dimitri Vulis. Vulis worked at the City University of New York. He actively participated in Sovietrelated discussions on USENET, even before the first Soviet users appeared there. Back then he insulted certain users in public messages, but it was in the mid-1990s that he developed his trolling skills. Vulis made fake accounts, posted racist or antiJewish messages under the names of other subscribers, and then accused these same subscribers of anti-Semitism or racism in letters of complaint, which he filed with university administrations. Some of his victims felt the damages of his actions offline, losing their jobs or suffering from marred relations with their university colleagues. In 1996, in a thread dedicated to Vulis, one user formulated the principle of virtual communication, which was a base for online provocations: “On the Internet nobody knows you are Vulis” (Verbitskii, 1997). How did these cases affect Russian-speaking users and their attitude towards online communication? They considered them as native characteristics of virtual life and, furthermore, gave them status of online literature. The manual written by Viznyuk was published on Teneta, a writing contest website founded by Leonid Delitsyn in 1996. The case of Vulis was cited as an example of literary hoaxes by Eugene Gorny in his research of virtual personalities in history of the Russian Internet (Gorny, 2006a).

11

The word troll arose in USENET in the early 1990s and referred to users who manipulated others into emotional reaction through online interactions (Donath, 1999). Russian-speaking users preferred to use the word flamer.

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3 Runet: Sturm und Drang Consideration of long-distance communication as a new form of literature, rather than a form of virtual socialisation, was typical for Russian users. It began when USENET was the one and only place for virtual communication and continued after Web-protocol became widespread and runet12 became a basic feature of Russian Internet identity. From 1995 to 1996, the number of Russian-speaking users continued to grow. Soviet-related newsgroups, s.c.s. and t.p.s., were still actively functioning, though American Sovietologists and random non-Russian users no longer took part. Alongside the old newsgroups, the Relcom company organised its own USENET hierarchy and opened new moderated newsgroups such as relcom.politics, relcom.humor, etc. In spite of some problems having to do with Cyrillic encoding, these newsgroups were entirely Russian—they provided communication in the Russian language—and thus the word “relcom” became equivalent to “Russian-speaking Internet”. Among the subscribers, there were not only users from Russia but also users from other ex-Soviet states who preferred to communicate in Russian or were interested in the Russia-related agenda. The company Relcom therefore exercised the functions of a state representative amidst the disappearance of the state itself (Naumovets, 2000). As before, a large majority of users were emigrants, a fact that continued to define the interests and topics of newsgroups. They were trained in Soviet universities in STEM disciplines and were often students or employees of Western universities and therefore all belonged to the same social and professional circle. Of no less importance was the fact that they had both access to the Internet and the time to spend online. In physical reality, they lived in foreign countries and were surrounded by strange cultures. In their virtual reality, they hunted for the actualisation of their cultural background. USENET users exchanged electronic texts in Russian and posted jokes, lyrics, poetry, and links to the first Russian online libraries. Politics and history were everrelevant topics for the newsgroups subscribers, and literary and humour-related themes gradually became more significant. An important part of these conversations was argumentation about the quality of this or that work of literature or work of art— such as the Strugatskii brothers’ novel, various bard and tourist songs, or Vladimir Vysotsky’s poetry—in other words, informal Soviet popular culture which was in circulation in the form of samizdat, outside of the Soviet cultural establishment. It stands to reason that users would at one point or another start to post their own lyrics and stories. All the USENET messages looked the same, no matter what content they delivered. This digital democracy was particularly important for Russian-speaking users who were raised in the context of Soviet cultural policy and, thus, of a tightly

12 Runet is a portmanteau of ru and net/network. The term was coined by blogger Raffi Aslanbekov in 1997 in his column Great Uncle’s Thoughts and became very popular among early Russian users, as it described not only language but also the special atmosphere of Russian Internet (Aslanbekov, 1997; Likhachev, 2015).

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guarded cultural hierarchy.13 New media allowed them to abolish any form of hierarchy and to post without distinction; as such alongside one another were the poetry of Nobel Laureate Joseph Brodsky, the lyrics of popular bard Vladimir Vysotsky, a haiku written by West Virginia University student Alexei Andreev aka Lexa, and political or sexual jokes. All of these texts were perceived as an organic whole, and the Internet became a space of free expression which turned out to be a new kind of liberated literature: seteratura.14 By 1995, user-generated content from Russian USENET newsgroups became a source for the first literature-related websites. One of the most popular projects was a website called Anekdoty.ru, which contained a collection of jokes published by astrophysicist Dmitry Verner in 1995. Within a year of the launch, the website had more than a thousand visitors daily, and it would continue to top Russian and international ratings for many years (Gorny, 2009). Originally the website contained jokes posted by subscribers of relcom.humor newsgroup. Soon after the launch, Verner published not only urban folklore jokes but also authors’ stories which were sent to him directly by Russian-speaking Internet users. Another literature-related project, Burime (from French bouts-rimes for “rhymed-ends”), was launched by mathematician Dmitry Manin in 1995. Poetry games of bouts-rimes were very popular among the Soviet intelligentsia: a participant received two pairs of rhymed words and had to make a poem. Manin first suggested that USENET subscribers play the game and then developed software and automated user-generated poetry based on formalised rules (Leibov, 2003). Another kind of literature content was presented on a website called De.Li.Zyne. It was organised by geologist Leonid Delitsyn, who published literary works and poetry written by users of the Russian USENET newsgroups s.c.s. and s.c.r. (soc.culture.russian). The website was originally named for its association with e-zines, an emerging type of online media. A year after being launched, the publishing project was transformed into Teneta writing contest, one of the more influential institutions of early Russian Internet literature (De Lit Zyne, 1996; Teneta, 2002).15 By 1996–1997, USENET was losing its unique position as Web technology became widespread. For an average Internet user of the 1990s, the Internet implied an entirely different type of media usage. As a reader, one could, by that point in time, not only receive an uncontrolled influx of information but also visit websites

The content preferences of the first Russian Internet users were directly related to Soviet cultural policy. Since the 1930s, the Soviet government had supported amateur literature and founded creative writing courses, coteries, and contests at almost every factory or institute across the USSR. On the other hand, the Soviet official system fostered cultural hierarchies that resulted in a high status being awarded to authors who published their works and extremely low status to those who were not allowed to be published. Thus, publishing houses functioned as repressive institutions and limited access to the public for both low-level writers and political undesirables. 14 The word seteratura was made up in the mid-1990s and derives from Russian set for “network” and literatura for “literature”. 15 All of these projects were launched on American university websites because its authors studied or worked and later transferred over to independent platforms. 13

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and choose content that matched his or her interest. As an author, one could not only send messages to public newsgroups but also make websites and thus become a writer, an editor-in-chief, and a publisher at the same time. The user position switched from passive to fully active. Web technology pushed the previous limits of the Internet and in turn empowered users to research boundaries—those of cultures, languages, physical and virtual realities, literature, and life. Russian users took full advantage of cyberspace based on the html protocol. They sought out socialisation and organised conventions to meet each other in real life (Berlin, 1993; Gusarskij Klub, 1997–2008). At the same time, they created virtual personalities, gave them lifelike biographies, kept their diaries or correspondence, and experimented with their audience’s reactions. Hoaxes were not a new phenomenon for online communication; the term sock puppet, used to refer to such activity, had been developed several years before by USENET users.16 A peculiarity of Russian Internet practices was that this game of identities became an important part of participants’ new cyberlife. The most famous case involved a pretend death prank, pulled off by Katya Detkina, a virtual young woman created by Web designer Artemy Lebedev. Under the name “Detkina”, Lebedev wrote weekly reviews of Russian websites and criticised his competitors. Soon after he was suspected of dishonesty, there was an obituary notice published on Detkina’s webpage. Many readers were shocked, twice over: first, to hear of the death of Detkina and, second, to find out that she was not a real person (Detkina, 1997). A less cruel but equally dramatic prank was created by a member of the Poruchik Rzhevsky Hussar Club, Eli Ratner. The virtual club was founded in 1995 and united Russian emigrants, mostly from the USA and Israel. Club members participated in online poetry slams, enacting a cycle of Soviet urban folklore jokes about a well-known (notably for being the butt of such jokes) cavalry (hussar) officer, Rzhevsky. In 1996, a new female club member, Shurochka Azarova, made an appearance on the club email list. She participated in discussions about gender and wrote flirtatious messages, sometimes in verse, to male members. Only months later did other members call Ratner’s bluff. A new age of the Russian Internet had begun: virtual personality and literary hoaxes became mainstream17 (Gusarskij Klub, 1996). A large part of Russian Internet writers, journalists, and observers were characters rather than real authors; there was no formula to prove their realness (Gorny, 2009). Initially used in a harmless way, for literary games and playful hoaxes, virtual existence and online anonymity started to play a more essential role in the Russian Internet and, more broadly, in non-virtual reality. In 1995, polittekhnologii (political technology) came online, as a special kind of political consulting that turned out to 16

The term sock puppet in the early online slang referred to the false identity assumed by a user who spoke to himself or herself while pretending to be another person (Word Spy, 2017). 17 Female virtual personalities created by male users were very popular in the early Russian Internet. There were almost no real female users and, according to Sergej Kuznetsov’s character, “there is a hard and fast rule on the Net: the sexier a girl is, the higher the chances are that she is a male” (Kuznetsov, 2004).

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be an overwhelming means to manipulate in post-Soviet Russia.18 While there were many polittekhnologs who served in election campaigns, one of them in particular characterised the new industry as a whole. Gleb Pavlovsky, a former Soviet dissident and the future consultant of the Kremlin, had a great variety of global ideas and projects which were not limited to polittekhnologii. Pavlovsky rather presented himself as a producer and editor who organised intellectual processes including the search for a new Russian ideology and possible future development. In 1995, Pavlovsky discovered the Internet as a new interactive and anonymous medium which allowed him to publish texts and to discuss any number of topics with others. It was an ideal space for his activity, so he founded first the Russkii Institut (Russian Institute) and Russkii Zhurnal (Russian Magazine) to provide a platform for Russia-related discussions and then Fond Effektivnoj Politiki (Foundation for Effective Politics, FEP) to provide publicity and support to the Kongress Russkikh Obschin (KRO, the Congress of Russian Communities, a nationalist organisation founded to promote the rights of ethnic Russians living in CIS) during the Duma elections. That same year two kinds of content were notably published online: the results of the Duma elections (Projekt “Vybory v Rossii”, 1999) and a two-volume book, called Inoe, written by philosophers who proposed their version of a new Russian ideology (Inoe, 1997). The latter included nationalist and neocolonialist ideas such as the Russkii Mir concept, developed by Schedrovitskii and Ostrovskii (Laruelle, 2015; Schedrovitskii, 2000). The publishing of the Duma’s election results was the first political project on the Internet founded by Pavlovsky and the libertarian Institute for Commercial Engineering (Institut kommercheskoy inzhenerii, 1999). Both trends kept developing online and astonishingly emerged in actual foreign and internal Russian policy in the 2000s. In spite of KRO’s failure in the elections, the FEP was not closed. On the contrary, the polittekhnologs from the FEP were invited by Yeltsin’s team to support his election campaign in 1996 and, later, in 1999, to run the next campaign, also known as Operatsiya “Prejemnik” (The Successor Campaign), which resulted in the presidency of Putin. This was proof of the final and absolute triumph of manipulative methods in Russian politics, which were not limited but were still related to Internet technologies. The Russian Internet had developed enough to be a source for information or statements, but its anonymity made for a lack of accountability. Traditional newspapers cited sources as “the Internet” without any reference to specific websites or authors. FEP took advantage of this anonymity and the lack of demand for accountability to the utmost and used the Internet to publish fake news, leaks, and kompromat, consequently ensuring that these publications would be referenced in 18 The word polittekhnologii emerged in 1996 and became a very important concept for both Russian political practice and the Russian Internet. Formally, political technologists were political consultants who borrowed their methods—such as manipulation of politicians’ public image, research of voters’ expectations, etc.—from American practice. However, the Russian political scene was different, so political consulting took on new significance and became a synonym of manipulation and double dealing (Wilson, 2005).

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traditional mass media; the FEP then went further, launching websites and founding entire online newspapers to influence public opinion. This simulation of politics and replacement of it with its own media representation can be qualified as the mediation of politics. Some researchers locate the cause of mediation in oligarchic activity enacted upon the mass media market, as such actions have tended to influence real politics by buying up newspapers and TV channels and creating informational wars (Zasurskii, 2016). Others consider polittekhnologs, whose ideology was “a Molotov cocktail of French postmodernism and KGB instrumentalism”, to be responsible for drop in trust in the mass media (Krastev, 2006). One can suppose that both oligarchical and polittekhnolog activity resulted from more fundamental processes related to the late and post-Soviet social and cultural history and the development of the public sphere. One way or another, the dominating concept of mass media in the late 1990s to the early 2000s was a formally postmodernist statement: “There is no truth. Everything is manipulation”. There was a total betrayal of trust in all kinds of information sources, not only for those who interacted with the Internet but for the entire Russian mass media audience. How did online literary games and political technologies co-exist on the Russian Internet? In some ways, these two phenomena were in fact one and the same. The Internet was still small, sparsely populated, and undifferentiated, so those users who developed literature or journalism worked directly for political projects or were paid by them. Russian Internet pioneers were hired by Pavlovsky to make online magazines and newspapers, to write columns and reviews. Still, Vesti.ru, Lenta.ru, and Gazeta.ru were founded with the intention of creating a new kind of media, as opposed to imposing upon their audience the order of the Kremlin or Russian oligarchs (Nossik, 2015). Everybody on the Internet was a member of the only existing virtual community: polittekhnologs and kulturträgers, people who were paid by the Kremlin or by other political agents and those who formed the opposition, including radical one.19 Sergey Kuznetsov explained in an interview that he had gained shocking and useful experience on the Internet in the mid-1990s, a meeting place for, and the site of involved discussion between, readers of the democratic newspaper Segodnya (Today) and the right-wing Zavtra (Tomorrow).20 Along with polittekhnologs, literary Internet activists contemplated a new Russian identity and a vision of the future. It was a time to revise the cultural settings for online users and residents of the extension of the virtual world into

19

Sometimes the online community reacted to the appearance of a new member. Thus, in the late 1990s, the arrival on the scene of Sergey Datsyuk, a Kiev-based philosopher related to Moscow polittekhnologs and an active user, did not go unnoticed. Unlike other participants, Datsyuk not only published his articles online in order to manipulate public opinion, but he was also interested in researching the Internet as a new medium and digital environment. As Datsyuk created a great deal of texts written in very sophisticated and near-esoteric language, other users created his double and launched a project called Robot Sergey Datsyuk. The website generated automated texts based on Datsyuk’s original work and ultimately forced him to leave the Internet (Robot Sergey Datsyuk, 2002). 20 Kuznetsov, Sergej. 2016. Skype communication with author, 26.01.2016.

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reality—both those who had emigrated from Russia and those who remained in the ex-USSR. An important source of identity in this new and uncertain situation was cultural background. In the context of online communication, all of the activities related to written text—such as Soviet humour, urban folklore, and creative writing—become essential to the development of such identity.21 Late and post-Soviet Internet users had resources such as spare time and the desire to write and produce. They developed network literature, criticism, journalism, interactive literature games,22 and network literary theory (Setevaja slovesnost). Old and new genres of literature, from interactive and automated poetry to virtual personalities to classical novels, blossomed during this time. It was the era of Sturm und Drang, which was accompanied by new media concepts such as the Russian cultural Sonderweg idea. Its authors explained that traditional Russian “literature-centrism” had finally found its afterlife in the online textual environment (Epshtein, 1998; Galkovskii, 1998). The word runet became popular, signifying that the Russian-speaking part of the global Internet had come to be regarded as a self-contained, different, and isolated cyberspace with its own rules, values, and heroes. The concept of runet as having its basis in literature was an important attribute of the Russian Internet, as it included both the old Soviet cult of the writer and the new idea of Russianness. It was along this same line of thinking that Schedrovitskii and Ostrovskii developed their concept of Russkii Mir a couple of years later. The authors did not pay particular attention to the Russian Internet, but their conception of a Russian-language space abroad as the new source for Russian identity and politics was able to become a reality due to the online networks already uniting Russian-speaking people across the world. Aside from this, their works on Russkii Mir were first published online. In the 2000s, these concepts of Russian identity became fundamental to aggressive Russian foreign policy, including, of course, the treatment of the wars in Georgia and Ukraine. While Schedrovitskii and Ostrovskii claimed that they did not mean to contribute to this political manipulation and extension of virtual reality into non-virtual reality, their own activity was far from pure theory: in 1998, they worked as polittekhnologs in Ukraine for pro-Kremlin candidates in the parliamentary election (Clove, 2015; Laruelle, 2015; Voytitskaya, 2013). Thus, neocolonial ideology and policy was at least related to the very mild concepts of Russian online language and literature, if not raised directly from them. Schedrovitskii and Ostrovskii did not use the word “Internet” but actively used the word “Net” in the meaning suggested by Manuel Castells: “Russkii Mir is a net structure of great and small scale communities who think and speak in Russian” (Castells, 1996; Schedrovitskii, 2000).

21 One can observe a similar trend in Russian cinema directed at answering the question: who are the Russians? (see Brat-2, Osobennosti Natsionalnoj Okhoty, Sibirskij Tsyrjulnik, and other popular movies of the 1990s–early 2000s). 22 On the early global Internet, which was primary American, the same role was played by multiuser games, or MUGs (Gorchev, 2000; Gorny, 2009).

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4 Runet: Age of Man In the early 2000s, the Age of Heroes, the age of cyberspace-pioneering explorers who created the first Russian-language projects online and researched the Internet by virtue of curiosity with various degrees of success, came to an end, and the Age of Man began. As a result of the influx of users in the 2000s, the Russian Internet community experienced a crisis: the users of the previous epoch, who had once formed a sort of an elite, were suddenly confronted with masses of users23 (Asmolov & Kolozaridi, 2017). At the same time, the new users were in no way typical Russians. The majority of them were well-educated young people from major cities, wealthy enough to buy a computer and to pay for Internet access. These factors determined their interests online. During the first decade of the twenty-first century, several divergent but still related processes occurred. On the one hand, the Russian government began to approach the networks in different ways, from hosting governmental contests and websites to introducing security and control programmes. At the same time, virtual communities were being developed exponentially, becoming differentiated and diversified as they grew. Finally, global social networks such as Livejournal and Facebook were launched and adopted by Russian users for their particular cultural and social needs. In this chapter, I will analyse how the trends of the 1990s were developed and what new ones emerged. The Internet continued to be a place of user-generated literature. Large new servers were launched, and the old ones were developed for masses of online writers. In 2000, Maxim Moshkov opened the samizdat section of his Russian online library Lib.ru. It was designed for the self-publication of Teneta writing contest participants but soon became separated into various projects.24 At the same time, Stihi.ru and Proza.ru websites were launched as self-publication platforms. Later these projects obtained official status being sponsored by the Russian Union of Writers, who tried to control the online literature movement, if not to lead it. Meanwhile, inside the movement, there formed different enclaves and communities, from guitar poetry and KSP fans to those who preferred science fiction or counterculture literature. While the former made up a virtual representative of an already existing traditional offline community, the latter extended traditional genres to Internet literacy—in terms of both international versions of online literature, such as fan fiction, and newer Russia-specific forms such as historical fantasy dedicated to an alternative history of the USSR and Russia (Martov, 2016). This counterculture community was most specific to online practice and could not exist outside of, let alone without, the Internet. Presenting themselves as new generation of online literates, the group developed Internet slang and formed subcultures based on Internet memes and practices. 23 Between 2000 and 2010, the Russian Internet audience increased by 1826% (Razvitije internet, 2010). 24 Moshkov, Maksim. 2016. Personal communication with author. Moscow, 25.03.2016.

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One of the first countercultural websites to promote obscene language was Fuck. ru. It was founded in 1998 through the IRC channel #flex, “whose policy was to generate flame wars and abuse of opponents” (Goriunova, 2012). In 2000, Fuck.ru was taken down and its fans launched many similar sites. The most popular was Udaff.com, a self-publication platform for short stories (kreativs) written in a community slang rich with intentionally mangled and obscene words. According to Olga Goriunova, users of Udaff.com were office workers who created male literature as a “folk culture of resistance” (Goriunova, 2012). One object of resistance was the question of grammar. This tension resulted in a movement for grammatical correctness on websites founded by Internet activists from Novosibirsk in 199925 (Laskin & Saprykin, 2000). They launched a contest for Russian-language websites Zolotaya Klyaksa (The Golden Blot) in order to check their use of grammar. The reaction was immediate: Internet writer Alexei Andreev, aka Mary Shelley, published on the Fuck.ru website his Manifezd Anti-Grammar Nazis (Manifesto of Anti-Literacy in mangled Russian) which became very popular not only among young resisters but also literary critics and theorists. Every word in the Manifezd was written with one or more grammatical errors and proclaimed total freedom of self-expression and creativity as opposed to the “militant literacy” of the Zolotaya Klyaksa activists (Krongauz, 2013). The text triggered the emergence of the padonki cultural movement, which later crystallised on Udaff.com and other counterculture websites. The launch of new Internet platforms was an important condition for the development of multiple projects and communities on the Russian-language Internet. Founded in 2001, Wikipedia became the basis for a number of alternative encyclopaedias such as Kaschepuzia (2008), Lurkmore (2007), NetLore (2007), and many others dedicated to “runet folklore” and FIDO-related communities. Another kind of content, visual media, was supported by imageboards, a type of Internet forum which operates mostly in terms of posting images. One of the most popular Russian imageboards, 2ch.ru26 or Dvach (portmanteau of dva for number 2 in Russian and ch), generated a new wave of counterculture based on geek humour. Like other imageboards, Dvach encouraged user anonymity—something that was also a sign of resistance to the emerging issue of online security. While geek humour and Internet memes were international phenomena, on the Russian Internet, one could find more specific projects related to a particularly Russian context and founded on platforms such as blogs or forums. The website Za chto my ne lyubim Maskvu (Why we don’t like Moscow) was launched in 1999 by 25

Novosibirsk users were very active from the early 1990s onwards because they had access to the Internet before other Russian cities excluding Moscow. The distribution of Internet access was related to Soviet science politics and planning, which resulted in the organising of scientific centres such as Akademgorodok near Novosibirsk or Puschino near Moscow. These scientific centres had well-developed communication channels with Moscow, human resources, and therefore access to the Internet. 26 2channel was a Japanese textboard launched in 2007. Many imageboards, regardless of their language, were named after this globally popular platform.

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Perm-based artist Sergey Teterin and supported by gallerist Marat Guelman27 (Teterin, 1999). Journalist Maxim Kononenko, aka Mr. Parker, wrote two blogs in the names of Vladimir Putin and Alla Pugacheva (Kononenko, 2002–2014, 2004). Media artist Andrey Velikanov developed the virtual personality Namniyas Ashuratova, who allegedly created the project Enemy processing system. On this website, users had to choose an image of an enemy from pictures of famous writers, politicians, and historical figures attested by their ethnicities (Velikanov). All of these websites were authorial projects made by artists and writers in order to analyse, discuss, or provoke the contemporary issues of the late 1990s and early 2000s (Goriunova, 2012). The most important impact on the Russian Internet was felt in response to social networks, which changed the entire architecture of online communication in the late 2000s. It was a global process with certain specificities in its Russian version. Livejournal—launched in 1999 and discovered by Russian users in 2001—was occupied by Russian net intelligentsia and functioned as a social network rather than the blogging platform shape that it had originally taken (Gorny, 2006b). In 2007, it was bought by the Russian company SUP Fabrik and developed for Russian users. Facebook was launched in the USA in 2006, came to Russia in 2008, and surpassed Livejournal with the difference that Facebook happened to be more politicised and functioned as a platform for liberal and democratic opposition. The social network Vkontakte was launched in 2006 as the Russian analogue of the littleknown American network Facebook and became incredibly popular among young users because it supported multimedia content. The Internet in the 2000s turned out to be an ideal environment for fringe political movements and ideologies. The more radical a movement was, the more actively it explored virtual space. Neoconservatives, socialists, situationists, anarchists, and trotskyists used the networks to create communities, to publish articles and announcements, to organise group actions, or to keep archives and documents (Avtonomnoje Dejstvije, 2002–2017; Globalrus.ru, 2002–2007). In the 2010s, some of these movements, such as the neoconservative movement and eurasianism, became politically mainstream.28 The quantity of communities and of topics they engaged in kept increasing against the backdrop of the development of new infrastructure. TV shows, new religious movements, parenting, and good old-fashioned Internet literature gathered users on websites and forums. Many different ratings and contests emerged, piggybacking on the wave of content and service development. One’s rating position became an important part of blogging and other kinds of writing; almost every 27 Marat Guelman was a polittekhnolog and co-founder of FEP. In 1999, he launched the website Gif.ru, which later was transformed into Kultura Information Agency. In 1999, the slogan of Gif.ru was “World without politics”. 28 Eurasianism was developed by Alexander Dugin and was widespread among Internet users who wanted to be anti-establishmentarian (Verbitskii, Mikhail. 2016. Personal communication with author, Moscow, 23.03.2016). In the 2000s and 2010s, it very nearly turned out to be official Russian policy.

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website, insofar as they possessed a noticeable amount of regular users, published its own rating or announced contests for its users to demonstrate quality control (Rinet, 2004; Setevoj konkurs, 2012). In 2004, the Federal Agency for Press and Mass Media founded the Runet Award. The best online projects, providers, journalists, and software and service developers were awarded with a bronze gilt statuette in the form of an Ionic column and crowned with the (huge) letters “ru”. The first ceremony set a precedent for all that would follow: it was organised as an official and posh event, comparable only to the traditional TV concerts and shows that had been held during Soviet times, such as events dedicated to the anniversary of the October Revolution (Schmidt, Katy, & Natalia, 2006). It was by these means that the government tried to invade the Russian Internet in order to evaluate its achievements, to manage its development, and to control its content. The most infamous case of governmental invasion of the Internet was SORM 2, a surveillance programme directed at online content. It was launched by the Russian security services in the late 1990s but was still being developed until the late 2000s. Under SORM, Internet providers are required to buy and install special devices that allow the security services to track the use of email, websites, and other kinds of online traffic.29 Neither providers nor users contested SORM sufficiently to overcome it (Soldatov & Borogan, 2015). SORM is still in use, the result of which can be counted in the increasing numbers of political prisoners in Russia. In the 2010s, a more effective method was invented and successfully applied: that of specially trained and government-paid users, known as “spoilers” and, later, “Kremlin bot”. This part of Russian Internet history started with youth movements organised by the government, such as Moving Together or The Young Guard of United Russia, and then degraded from an ideological phenomenon to a technical one much like Olgino trolls, who were paid per comment they wrote on social networks (Garmazhapova, 2013). As the government comes to the Internet, the virtual communities develop technologies to resist the official policy. Since the early 2010s, Internet users have organised political meetings and protests, exchanged actual information, taken a stand against fake news, hosted free discussions about politics and social issues, developed new ethical guidelines, supported charity, and taken on many other topics that official mass media failed to do. The social sciences refer to this process as the “second modernisation”, which results in the emancipation of society from the paternalistic control of the government (Beck, 1992). However, it pertains less to history than it does to the contemporary reality of the Russian Internet.

29

In August 2014, SORM was extended to monitoring of social networks, chats, and forums.

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References Antonov, V. (1990, October 9). Computer joke. Google groups. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://groups.google.com/d/msg/eunet.jokes/WRbjGhjcYp4/9HizLe8PHbkJ Aslanbekov, R. (1997). Chto Velikiy Dyadya dumal 11 iyunya 1997 goda [What the great man was thinking on the 11 June 1997]. Cityline.ru. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://web. archive.org/web/19970730114907/www.cityline.ru/uncle/thinks/110697.html Asmolov, G., & Kolozaridi, P. (2017). The imaginaries of RuNet. The change of the elites and the construction of online space. Russian politics 2, 54–79. Avtonomnoje Dejstvije 2002–2017. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from www.avtonom.org Beck, U. (1992). Risk society: Towards a new modernity. SAGE, Thousand Oaks, CA. Beertema, P. (1984). USSR on Usenet. Google groups (4/1/84). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://groups.google.com/forum/?hl¼en#!msg/eunet.politics/_WKpffStBPc/ JaaDBecKCM8J Beertema, P. (n.d.) The kremvax hoax. Piet Beertema’s web site. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://godfatherof.nl/kremvax.html Berlin, I. (1993). Poslednie svedeniya ob SCS conventin. Google groups (30.12.93). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/soc.culture.soviet/ 3xw27f0mfpI British Government. (1989, March 3). Security export control. British business 32(9), 1–108. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://www.scribd.com/document/22775456/CoComLists-1989 Castells, M. (1996). The rise of the network society. Hoboken, NJ: Blackwell. Clove, C. (2015). Black wind, white snow: The rise of Russia’s new nationalism. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Detkina, K. (1997). Nablyudeniya KaDetkinoy [Obeservations of KaDetkina]. Chertovy Kulichki. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.kulichki.com/kadet/index1.htm De Zyne, L. (1996). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.teneta.ru/DeLitZyne/ delitzyne.html Dodolev, J. (2011). Zamknuty Krug Manezhki [Vicious circle of Manwzhka]. Moskovskaya Pravda (10.03.2011). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://old.mospravda.ru/issue/ 2011/03/10/article26559/ Donath, J. S. (1999). Identity and deception in the virtual community. In P. Kollock, & M. Smith (Eds.), Communities in cyberspace. London: Routledge. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://smg.media.mit.edu/people/Judith/Identity/IdentityDeception.html Draper, J. (1988). Soviet access to Usenet. Google groups (11/13/88). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://groups.google.com/d/msg/comp.misc/xT5PUC64bfU/6FR-INCCHh8J Epshtein, M. (1998). O virtual’noj slovesnosti [On virtual literature]. Russkij Zhurnal (26.05.1998). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://web.archive.org/web/20000919215450/http:// www.russ.ru:8080/journal/netcult/98-06-10/epstyn.htm Galkovskii, D. (1998). Manifest novogo russkogo samizdata [Manifest of a new Russian samizdat]. Samisdat.aha.ru (17.01.1998). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://web.archive.org/ web/19981205061244/http://samisdat.aha.ru/11-manif.htm Garmazhapova, A. (2013). Gde zhivut trolli. I kto ikh kormit [Where the trolls live. And who feeds them]. Novaja Gazeta (07.09.2013). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://www. novayagazeta.ru/articles/2013/09/07/56253-gde-zhivut-trolli-i-kto-ih-kormit Globalrus.ru. (2002–2007). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.globalrus.ru/ Gorchev, D. (2000). Seteratura. Setevaya Slovesnost. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http:// www.netslova.ru/gorchev/seteratura.html Goriunova, O. (2012). Art platforms and cultural production on the Internet. New York: Routledge. Gorny, E. (2006a). The virtual persona as a creative genre on the Russian Internet. In S. Henrike, K. Teubener, & N. Konradova (Eds.), Control + shift: Public and private usage of the Russian Internet (pp. 156–176). Norderstedt: Books on demand.

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Gorny, E. (2006b). Russian LiveJournal. The impact of cultural identity on the development of a virtual community. In S. Henrike, K. Teubener, & N. Konradova (Eds.), Control + shift: Public and private usage of the Russian Internet (pp. 73–90). Norderstedt: Books on demand. Gorny, E. (2009). More than humor. Jokes from Russia as a mirror of Russian life. In G. Goggin & M. McLelland (Eds.), Internationalizing Internet studies: Beyond Anglophone paradigms (pp. 79–95). New York: Routledge. Hammer, D. (1990). The “traditionalist” opposition in soviet politics. Final report to National Council for Soviet and East European Research (October 1990). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://www.ucis.pitt.edu/nceeer/1990-804-02-Hammer.pdf Hauben, M., & Hauben, R. (1997). Netizens: On the history and impact of Usenet and the Internet. Washington, DC: IEEE Computer Society Press. Inoe. Khrestomatiya novogo rossiyskogo samosoznaniya [Other. A Reader of a new Russian identity]. (1997). Russkii Zhurnal. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://old.russ.ru/ antolog/inoe/ Institut kommercheskoy inzhenerii [Institute of Commercial Engineering]. (1999). Libertarium.ru. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.libertarium.ru/l_org_ice Klub, G. (1996). Istoria Shurochki Azarovoy [The story of Shurochka Azarova] (may-iyun’ 1996). Chertovy Kulichki. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.kulichki.com/gusary/ dokumenty/ordena/dubli/shurochka/ Klub, G. (1997–2008). Chertovy Kulichki. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www. kulichki.com/gusary/ Kononenko, M. (2002–2014). Vladimir Vladimirovich TM. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://vladimir.vladimirovich.ru/ Kononenko, M. (2004). Alla.borisovna.ru. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://web. archive.org/web/20040619101251/http://alla.borisovna.ru:80/ Konradova, N. (2016). The Usenet coup: How the USSR discovered the Internet in 1991. Open democracy Russia. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://www.opendemocracy.net/odrussia/natalia-konradova/usenet-coup Krastev, I. (2006). Democracy’s “Doubles”. Journal of Democracy, 17(2), 52–62. Krongauz, M. (2013). Samouchitel Olbanskogo [Teach-yourself-Albanian manual]. Moscow: AST, Corpus. Kuznetsov, S. (2004, April 7). Grob Khrustalny [Crystal coffin]. Lib.ru. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://lib.ru/RUSS_DETEKTIW/KUZNECOW_S/grob.txt Lapsley, P. (2013). Exploding the phone: The untold story of the teenagers and outlaws who hacked ma bell. New York: Grove Press. Laruelle, M. (2015, May). The “Russian World” Russia’s soft power and geopolitical imagination. Center on Global Interests. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://globalinterests.org/wpcontent/uploads/2015/05/FINAL-CGI_Russian-World_Marlene-Laruelle.pdf Laskin, A., & Saprykin, E. (2000). Konkurs Zolotaya Klyaksa [Golden blot competition]. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://web.archive.org/web/20000414152036/http://klyaksa.coun try.ru:80/index.shtml Leibov, R. (2003, May 20). Besedy s Dmitriem Maninym o poezii, teorii informatsii i lyubvi [Conversations with Dmitry Manin about poetry, information theory and love]. Russkii Zhurnal. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://old.russ.ru/netcult/20030520.html Likhachev, N. (2015, April 7). 21-letiye runeta [21st anniversary of runet]. TJournal. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://tjournal.ru/54646-runet-21 Markoff, J. (1989, February 19). New satellite channel opens computer link to the soviets. New York Times. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.nytimes.com/1989/02/19/us/new-satel lite-channel-opens-computer-link-to-the-soviets.html?pagewanted ¼1 Martov, I. (2016). Ot tolkinistov do popanadtsev [From Tolkinists to Popadanists]. Gorky (13.10.2016). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://gorky.media/context/ot-tolkinistovdo-popadantsev

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Naumovets, G. (2000). USENET FAQ. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://gn.org.ua/ usenetfaq Nossik, A. (2015). Anekdotov segodnya ne budet. Dorogaya redaktsiya. Podlinnaya istoriya “Lenty.ru”, rasskazannaya yeye sozdatelyami [There will be no jokes today. Dear editors. A real story of “Lenta.ru” told by its founders]. I. Kolpakov (Ed.). Moscow: AST. Oram, A. (2001). Peer to peer: Harnessing the power of disruptive technologies. O’Reilly Media. Peters, B. (2016). How not to network a nation. The uneasy history of the Soviet Internet. Cambridge: The MIT Press. Prouekt “Vybory v Rossii”: rezultaty golosovanija v realnom vremeni [Project “Elections in Russia”: Real time poll results]. Lenta.ru (17.12.1999). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://lenta.ru/news/1999/12/16/elections99/ Razvitiye interneta v Rossii [Development of Internet in Russia]. (2010). RIA Novosti. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://ria.ru/infografika/20100930/280796937.html Rheingold, H. (1993). The virtual community: Homesteading on the electronic Frontier. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.rheingold.com/vc/book/ Rinet. (2004). Itogi reytinga. Vesna (2004). Rating.rinet.ru. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://web.archive.org/web/20070428104003/http://rating.rinet.ru/ Robot Sergey Datsyuk. (2002). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://rosd.vniz.net/ Schedrovitskii, P. (2000). Russkii Mir i Transnatsionalnoe russkoje. Russkii Zhurnal [the Russian world and the transnational Russian] (2.03.2000). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http:// old.russ.ru/politics/meta/20000302_schedr.html Schmidt, H., Katy, T., & Natalia, K. (Eds.). (2006). Control + shift: Public and private usage of the Russian Internet. Norderstedt: Books on Demand. Senderov, V., & Kanevskii, B. (1980). Intellektual’nyj Genotsid [Intellectual genocide]. Moscow: Samizdat. Setevaya slovesnost [Network literature]. (n.d.) Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www. netslova.ru/ Setevoy konkurs Rossiyskii online TOR [Network Competition Russian Online TOR]. Ezhe.ru. (2012). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://ezhe.ru/POTOP/about.html Sock-puppet. (2017). Word Spy. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://wordspy.com/index. php?word¼sock-puppet Soldatov, A., & Borogan, I. (2015). The red web. New York: Perseus Books Group. Soviet Coup Archive. (n.d.) Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.cs.oswego.edu/~dab/ coup/ Sovok. (1992). Sovok. Google groups (4/8/92). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://groups. google.com/d/msg/talk.politics.soviet/91GTsuRX-BM/VJ4Tr2sWwL4J Szabo, N. (1991). Computer networks and the resistance? Google groups (8/30/91). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://groups.google.com/d/msg/talk.politics.soviet/yg3tK9m9v1w/ pJc8hZ-GPMwJ Templeton, B. (2001). I remember USENET. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://archive. oreilly.com/network/2001/12/21/usenet.html Teneta. Konkurs russkoi setevoi literatury [Teneta. Competition of Russian network literature]. (2002). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.teneta.ru/ Teterin, S. (1999). Za chto my ne ljubim Maskvu? Russkaya narodnaya anketa [Why do we dislike Moscow? Russian folk questionnaire]. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://www.teterin. raid.ru/maskva/ Velikanov, A. (n.d.). The system. http://namniyas.velikanov.ru/default.asp Verbitskii, M. (1992). Moscow university rector (repost). Google groups (4.24.92). Retrieved November 05, 2017, from https://groups.google.com/d/msg/talk.politics.soviet/ whpAWsGPSxA/JOTr96C_oq8J Verbitskii, M. (1997). The hateful, vile garbage. USENET archives. Retrieved November 05, 2017, from http://imperium.lenin.ru/~verbit/crankery.html

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Part II

Economy and Regulation

Investments in Runet Aleksandr Rozhkov and Margarita Zobnina

1 Investments: Types and Sources Investment can be defined as outlay of money for income, or profit, or an asset intended to produce profit or capital gains (according to Merriam-Webster dictionary). In this chapter, we discuss investments within Runet (or Russian Internet) including mostly but not limited to telecommunication companies, Internet service providers (ISPs) and e-commerce projects. As we will discuss in more detail further on, the rapid growth of the Internet startups has enabled significant profits for the investments made by venture funds. Profit gains are certainly a priority for the investments made, taking into account the rapid growth of the market. However, for the market at hand, immediate profit gains are not the top priority for investors. High risk and the technology intensity of the majority of the products call for a certain type or, rather, source of investment that is venture capital. Venture investors are focused on ultrahigh-risk investment portfolios, with few extremely successful projects balancing out the losses generated by the rest. Numerous factors like entrepreneurial firms’ characteristics, the nature of the financing transactions and market conditions would also affect the portfolio size of a fund (Cumming, 2006). The following research shows that venture fund portfolio can be optimised through the overall portfolio size and the established profit-sharing conditions (Bernile, Cumming, & Lyandres, 2007). Besides the profits, uncertain and postponed venture investments focus on several additional aspects while providing financial resources to a project (or a startup). Every new technology-intensive project, which is the definition of an Internet startup, has a lot of risk and uncertainty to it. Early stage development frequently results into project failure or a dramatic change in the project focus (pivot) that could

A. Rozhkov · M. Zobnina (*) National Research University “Higher School of Economics”, Moscow, Russia e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_4

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easily lead to a subsequent failure or significant time delay and therefore require additional investments. As the result, one of the key goals for a venture investor is to reduce risk and uncertainty. Some of the researchers call for agent theory to structure the process (Arthurs & Busenitz, 2003). The venture investor “community” is rather diverse and consists of a few different types of agents providing money to the entrepreneurs. They include friends, family and founders (usually referred as FFF), crowdfunding and crowdinvesting platforms, initial coin offering (ICO) initiatives, state R&D programmes, NGOs, business angels, venture funds and stock exchange, in the final stages. These groups are rather diverse in their funding capacity, risk perception, goals and contributions towards a given startup. Friends, family and founders (or “fools” as some put it) support the initial idea with their own funds; formal agreements are rare at this point and failures are very frequent. The amount of money provided is up to several thousand USD. Crowdfunding has been rather popular recently with numerous projects getting support and being delivered to the market. The general idea here is that a project started by an entrepreneur is promoted to the target audience at an early stage. Once the key product features and product design are announced, the potential customers (“backers”) can support it both through donations and product pre-orders. Their benefits include better prices (for a limited number of early “backers”) and early product access. A certain per cent of the funding (usually up to 5%) is collected by the crowdfunding platform that hosts the project and facilitates interaction. In this case, potential customers are not exactly investing money, yet are still providing funding for the product development. State R&D programmes and NGOs usually provide funding on the merit-based assessment of the project and possibility of the goal achievement that are considered essential for the community. All of the actors listed up till now are not exactly investors and have different criteria of project assessment apart from return on investment (ROI) through the decision-making process. According to the European Business Angels’ Network (EBAN), business angel investors (“Angels”) are high-net-worth individuals who usually provide relatively small amounts of finance (€25,000–500,000) in the form of equity investments done at an early stage. They have extensive entrepreneurial and managerial experience and never consider themselves ex-entrepreneurs but still entrepreneurs (Aernoudt, 1999). As a result, they invest both money and time, providing expertise to the startup and thus reducing the risks of their investment. Venture funds are the most professional and institutionalised investors in the venture industry with the most assets available. Such funds discover and nurture high-growth entrepreneurial companies which are frequently refused finance from conventional sources (Ray, 1993). In most cases, venture fund is created for a limited period of time, 8–12 years on average (Wagner, 2014). A venture fund has an investment period up to 5 years when the funding is granted to the startups and the investment portfolio is made. After that, the fund would manage the investments

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made, by assisting the financing at later stages with the ultimate goal to exit the project. The required ROI for successful projects is rather high, in order to cover the risks and the failed projects from the fund portfolio. The overall startup/venture ecosystem is more complex and includes knowledge centres (universities), technical skills (professional services and skilled employee), customers and networking environments (Mason & Brown, 2014; Zacharakis, Shepherd, & Coombs, 2003), but in this text we focus primarily on the investment agents/funding bodies. The funding process, as well as startup development, can be divided into several stages including pre-seed, seed, early growth and later stages. The final stage is the initial public offering (IPO), which is highly important for early investors as they usually exit the project at this stage in order to reinvest the money earned into earlier stage ventures. Startup development stages listed above refer to the investment stages and are mainly used by the venture market professionals. A simplified model of this process can be illustrated by the following (Bergemann & Hege, 1998): An entrepreneur has a business idea but lacks the money and applies for funding to a venture investor. Money is required to develop the idea and launch their product to the market. After some time the investor can provide additional funding based on the reported project performance. The investment allocation is managed by the entrepreneur and is not visible to the investor, neither is the actual project performance nor the managerial effort. This results in an increased temptation of investment abuse and redirection to the personal needs of the entrepreneur. Such opportunistic behaviour (moral hazard) is expected by investors, and they are suggested a number of tools to control this risk. Such tools include monitoring and management changing (Bergemann & Hege, 1998) and the use of convertible securities, syndication of investment and the staging of capital infusions (Gompers, 1995). Staging the investments means that venture investors do not have to commit to continue the relationship, so they maintain the option of discontinuing funding projects if their probability in going public is not feasible (Gompers, 1995). As a result, venture investors have developed a number of models classifying the stages of startup development that are presented in Table 1. According to OECD (2017): “There are no standard international definitions of either venture capital or venture capital investments by development stage. In addition the methodology for data collection differs across countries”. Each stage requires a startup to meet certain key performance indicators (KPI) and development milestones in order to qualify for the next investment round. As the project becomes more mature, overall the IPO and general survival chances increase, while investment risks decline which enables venture investors to increase funding to a certain capacity. Pre-seed is the initial stage of startup development; founders verify their ideas and make the first steps in the product development. Naturally, this is the most risky stage of any project as in many cases initial ideas get rejected and startups pivot. Project development efforts are very hard to monitor during the customer develop-

Product development

Mature

Later stages

Restart

Shipping product or revenue

Product in beta test (no revenue)

Turnaround

Scale

Efficiency

Profitable

Customer building

Customer creation

Product in development (no revenue)

Acquisition and merger

Bridge

Product development

Validation

Other private equity

Later stage venture

Startup/ other early stage

Seed

Pre-seed

Stability

High growth

Customer validation

Startup (no revenue)

Organisation creation

Startup

Discovery

Growth

Early growth

Customer discovery

Business concept development

Seed

Commercialisation

Startup

Growth capital/rescue/ turnaround/replacement, buyout

Later-stage venture

Other early stage

Startup

Seed

Invest Europe (2016)

Opportunity recognition

EY and RVC (2014)

Conception and development

Berman et al. (2011)

OECD (2017)

Blank (2007)

Investor perspective

Benjamin and Margulis (2001)

Kazanjian (1988)

Kim and Ha (1999)

Bhave (1994)

Startup perspective

Table 1 Startup lifecycle stages and financing stages

Buyout and mezzanine capital

Later VC

Early VC

Seed

Angel

Pitchbook (2018) and NVCA (2018)

Later stage

Expansion

Early growth

Startup

Seed

RVCA (2017)

IPO/exit

Later rounds (B, C, D)

Early growth (round A)

Seed

Pre-seed

Venture finance stages (Zobnina 2015)

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ment process; therefore, startups source funding from rather specific sources, i.e. friends, family and fools (FF&F). This agnomination refers to a rather low chance of getting any payout for the investment made. Other types of investors active at this early stage include business angels and accelerators. A common business practice in early stage investments is to place startups into the venture funds’ accelerators, which improves risk management and enables to control team decisions. During the acceleration period, which typically lasts for 1–3 months, the startup team is provided with educational programmes and is closely monitored and guided by their mentors and experts. This guidance and mentoring within the accelerator is aimed at ongoing process and KPI audit product and business process development so as to support customer traction and growth and to ensure the safety of the investments. As a result, acceleration facilitates product development and ensures easier process scaling in later stages. The main goal is to decrease the risks of project failure and funding misuse by the founders of the startup (Cohen & Hochberg, 2014). Due to the high risk level, the amount of funding is limited at this stage; according to the Rusbase database, the average check for pre-seed projects in Russia is 40,600 USD. Seed is the next stage of project development. At this stage, a startup is no longer just an idea but an emerging business enterprise with its first customers and sales. Although a new business model has been tested in the market, a pivot is still very probable so the risks are high. Also the funds attracted are mostly spent on marketing, i.e. customer acquisition. In case of an unsustainable business model, the funding will be burned in an attempt to grow the business. Also during this stage, a revenue is generated although the cashflow is still negative. According to Rusbase database, the average amount of seed stage financing in Russia is about 516,000 USD for Internet startups. At the Early Growth stage, the startup continues to grow while increasing its customer base and revenue. Funding is used to promote the product and acquire new customers. According to the Rusbase, the average Round A funding is about 2.2 million USD. During the Later Rounds (B, C, D) startup turns into an established business and is most likely profitable. At this point, investments are used to support acquisitions and/or expansion into new markets. Private equity funds join venture funds at this stage, as the risk level is rather low. The average level of funding for this stage is not available due to the high variance in the investments, and these are granted according to each project’s valuation and current needs. IPO (Initial Public Offering) is used as an exit tool for key investors and founders of the project. In some cases, an exit is formerly established as a buyout or acquisition by a larger corporation. In such a case, it can be driven by the need to acquire certain technology of the startup (Dushnitsky & Shaver, 2009; Wry & Lounsbury, 2013), to stomp out competition without exhausting price wars or to disguise the failure of the project (Bergemann & Hege, 1998). Numerous researches (Benjamin & Margulis, 2001; Berman, Herrmann, & Marmer, 2011; Bhave, 1994; Blank, 2007; Kazanjian, 1988; Kim & Ha, 1999)

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explore startup development from the organisational or product perspective. They focus on the development processes and key success factors. The investor perspective emphasises the funding stage and project achievements required to qualify for funding. Investment analysis is used to add startups to the investment portfolio; as such, the failure or mortality rate for each stage is also taken into consideration. As discussed above, investments in Internet projects are driven by a number of diverse investing agents, and startups can obtain funding several times at different development stages. Further, we move to explore the development trends of the Russian venture market in the Internet and IT sector, by identifying key funding actors and specifying the peculiarities of the Russian market.

2 Research Methodology and Data Sources This chapter is based on the available Internet and IT venture investment data. Systematic market data has been collected since 2011. Before that, the market was mostly closed and unstructured; there were unsystematic publications in the media about particular deals. The grand total amounts to 1652 deals with the Russian Internet companies and startups, between January 2011 and December 2017. The Russian Internet and IT investment market includes all investments and deals with recipient companies registered in the Russian jurisdiction, while only completed (closed) deals are included in the database. Due to the market’s specifics, certain deals (investments) were omitted from the analysis, in particular investments with undisclosed funding volume (2015–2016 deals, 2016–2014 deals, 2016–2033 deals, 2017–2075 deals). Some of the investors/ recipients disclosed the information after some time, so data correction for the past periods is possible and should be accounted for. As aforementioned, venture funding is usually acquired at several investment stages—every company receives investments through a series of consecutive rounds (two or more), and each of the rounds is registered as a separate deal. Data for the analysis was accumulated through the following data sources: Russian Venture Capital Association (RVCA), Rusbase, Venture DataBase, Firrma.ru, “Vedomosti”, “Kommersant”, Forbes, the Internet Initiatives Development Fund (IIDF), MoneyTree Report (PwC) and others.

3 Internet Investments: Key Figures and Development Stages In the 2012–2017 period, the Internet and IT sector accounted for the majority of all investments and venture deals in Russia (Fig. 1). The Internet and IT sector has come a long way in its development over the past 20 years, as has the Russian economy. More specifically, it experienced a particularly rapid growth in 2001–2012 (up to 50% y/y) and a dramatic decrease and

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by investment volume 100 %

4% 8% 14 %

15 %

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3% 5%

75 %

6% 8%

15 %

10 %

by number of venture deals 8% 13 %

9%

20 %

8%

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Other 11 % Industry Biotech Internet & IT

9%

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50 % 82 % 62 %

65 %

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2012

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75 % 67 %

66 % 58 %

59 %

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2011

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71 %

2015

2016

25 %

2013

2014

2015

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Fig. 1 Russian venture market structure (2012–2017). Source: RVCA and VIF (2017)

restructuring in 2013–2015, and most recently (2016–present) it has seen a recovery and new development. The main driver of the venture market development was IT/Internet, mostly e-commerce (Table 2). The number of venture funds investing in industrial production or biotech is vanishingly small. These funds are mostly stateowned and have to deal with longer investment cycles (EY and RVC, 2014). Though the Internet and IT sector has established dominance in the Russian venture market since the beginning of the analysed period and accounted for the majority of the deals both by count and in monetary value, the Internet and IT sector of the Russian venture market is relatively small. At its peak in 2013, it accounted for 710 million USD and in 2017 about 241 million USD (Fig. 4). As a result, big deals can substantially distort its structure representation. In order to avoid such distortion, we use the deal count as the major market indicator in this analysis. Moreover, the exits have been omitted from the analysis. According to the EY/RVC experts, the Internet and IT sector includes various industries, such as cloud services, telecommunications, e-commerce, media and tourism. Tourism startups mostly include airplane ticket and hotel Internet aggregators like AviaSales, OneTwoTrip and others. PwC MoneyTree report also adds entertainment/social nets and data.

3.1

Market Creation

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) gave an initial impetus to the Russian venture market towards its development between 1994 and

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Table 2 Number of venture deals in the Russian Internet market by sector (2011–2017) E-commerce, recommendations Social networks Games B2B EdTech Media and content Tourism Development FinTech Others Video-audio Advertising and marketing Medicine Crowd-sourcing Security AR/VR Big data e-Government IoT, M2M Artificial intelligence Communication and navigation

2011 53 23 13 11 11 9 9 8 6 4 3 3 2 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0

2012 48 11 4 6 7 15 10 4 11 1 5 8 9 1 6 0 0 1 0 0 0

2013 79 24 15 31 20 8 17 12 18 4 17 23 9 3 7 0 0 1 0 0 0

2014 69 16 0 58 19 15 10 0 9 7 12 14 4 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 5

2015 43 11 0 49 8 13 6 0 10 0 12 7 9 0 4 0 2 1 12 0 3

2016 51 6 0 76 16 6 6 0 12 5 5 14 13 4 3 0 0 2 16 5 5

2017 75 10 10 70 11 6 8 0 16 9 4 15 21 2 3 14 1 3 7 10 6

Source: Based on IIDF, Rusbase, RVCA, CB Insights

1996. The EBRD established 11 regional venture funds in Russia, totalling over 200 million USD (EY/RVC, 2014). These funds did not invest in the high-tech of the Internet, but nonetheless the deals were structured as venture investments due to the high country risks in the 1990s. The first Internet and IT sector investments were made around 2001 when Yandex, Rambler and Ozon received their first investments and established their leading positions and Russia joined the “dot-com” bandwagon.

3.2

Rapid Growth

In 2005, the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia established over 20 public-private venture funds focused on small research and development (R&D) companies. These funds were capitalised by federal (25%) and regional budgets (25%), as well as by private investors (50%). Some of the regions developed predominantly IT and Internet projects including Moscow region (Dubna, Zelenograd) and Tomsk. One of the funds called RIFIKT was created to leverage up to 1.2–1.6 billion USD worth of investments to the Internet and IT sector. This development kept its

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government-driven nature when major ecosystem agents like Rusnano and Skolkovo were established. From 2007 to 2013, the Russian venture industry showed outstanding growth and reached a record-breaking volume of 1213 million USD, having increased tenfold. It came second in Europe and fifth globally after the USA, China, the UK and India. In the first 6 months of 2013, there were 173 funds in Russia, managing a combined total of 5.2 billion USD (EY/RVC Report, 2014). At its initial starting point in 2007, the market accounted for only 34 deals worth 108.3 million USD. In 2012, the volume of Internet investments reached its peak values, showing over a 60% increase from year to year. After that, the growth rate dropped significantly as the market became more mature, in addition to the financial crisis that befell the market in 2014–2015. Due to the overall short history of the venture market, this continuous period has affected, in specific ways, the projects funded at different stages.

3.3

Dramatic Plunge

After the explosive growth in 2012, the venture market entered a correction phase and peaked in 2013 (Fig. 2). Then, in 2014, adjustments were made to the macrolandscape, and Russia’s investment attractiveness decreased dramatically, as well as the national currency exchange rate. Due to the rouble exchange rate drop (Fig. 3), the industry showed a dramatic decrease in the deals volume as many of the venture funds, especially with the state equity, were nominated in roubles. In 2015, both the number and the volume of deals

Fig. 2 Investments in the Internet and IT sector in Russia (2011–2017). Source: based on IIDF, Rusbase, RVCA, CB Insights

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Fig. 3 Russian national currency exchange rate (2011–2018). Source: Central Bank of Russian Federation (2011–2018)

substantially decreased, although they exceeded the 2011 levels. During this period, most investors in the Internet and IT were focused on the business-to-business (B2B) and e-commerce sector, including Avito, MasterTap, NOT (Novye Oblachnye Technologii) and Carprice as the most indicative deals of the period. The economic and political factors were the single driving force in the market’s sinking. Earlier years showed a disproportionate distribution of project funding by stages (see Fig. 8). Early stages “pre-seed” and “seed” did not get enough funding that resulted in projects failing to develop further in the pipeline due to high project mortality rates and generally low entrepreneurial activity. Since 2013, there have been significant efforts to develop such entrepreneurial activity that allowed the market to overcome the early stage project shortage by 2015.

3.4

Recovery and Market Formalisation

Since 2015, the number of deals has started to grow despite ongoing political uncertainty and harsh economic conditions. By 2016, the share of deals at pre-seed and seed stages stabilised around 80%, which is reasonable for the venture market. This trend is also responsible for the overall market volume decrease that corresponds to the growing number of deals. The number of startups will grow. The number of people who are ready to take entrepreneurial risks has increased, including new groups, such as students, corporate employees and such. Any crisis can be regarded as an opportunity, and there are an increasing number of people who are trying to take advantage of this. Such a positive attitude has been promoted by a number of well-grounded startups such as Take Bus, All Towtrucks, My Mechanic and others. We observe regional incubators development as they offer a more integrated approach offering acceleration programmes as well as educational events and other

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21,3

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Fig. 4 Runet Internet and IT venture investments in roubles and USD. Source: based on IIDF, Rusbase, RVCA, CB Insights

Fig. 5 Number of venture deals in Internet and IT by funding type. Source: based on IIDF, Rusbase, RVCA, CB Insights

service essential for the development of startups. As we can observe from Fig. 4, the investment market volume in USD has stabilised after 2015. Internet and IT projects get their investments from several sources in the Russian venture market (Fig. 5).

4 Venture Funds Venture funds have always been the most numerous and capable source of money for startups. The first venture and direct investment funds were created in the mid-1990s with the Russian government and international institutional input:

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EBRD, International Finance Corporation (IFC), etc. In 1999–2005, the Russian government established several development projects for high-risk investments and R&D that helped the venture community and boosted its development. Later, the focus of the government’s efforts shifted towards ecosystem development with the establishment of RVC in 2006, Rusnano in 2007 and Skolkovo in 2010, which promoted ideas for a new economy and new forms of entrepreneurship. State influence on the Internet and IT venture market has been maintained throughout the creation of venture funds with state participation such as IIDF, Skolkovo and RVC, as the most active examples (Fig. 6). In the real economy, the state’s influence is stronger, as up to 90% (RVCA, 2015) of funds have a state focus on the “real” sector, while only 7.7% are focused on the Internet and IT investments in their portfolio. The share of investments made by the funds with state participation in the Russian IT and Internet venture market ran up to 43% in 2014–2015 during the market plunge period when private investors nearly halved their investments in the Russian Internet sector; as such, the state-owned fund supported the venture market. In 2016 and 2017, the share of the funds with state participation had a tendency to decrease as business angels and private venture funds recovered from the economic shock of 2014. The IIDF that was founded in 2013 by the Agency for Strategic Investments (ASI) is one of the key funds focusing on IT and Internet investments on the pre-seed stage. Since then it has been the most active venture fund in Russia accounting for 1/3 of total venture deals in the Internet and IT sector (Fig. 7). 100%

75%

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Fig. 6 Number of venture deals in Internet and IT in Russia by capital type. Source: based on IIDF, Rusbase, RVCA, CB Insights

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0 2011

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Fig. 7 Share of IIDF in all venture deals by number (Internet and IT). Source: based on IIDF, Rusbase, RVCA, CB Insights

4.1

Angel Investors

The Russian Angel Monitor reports an increase in the “angel deals” count, from 142 (2015) to 146 (2016), approximately 50% (71 deals) of which are in the Internet and IT sector. The deals were closed at pre-seed and seed stages exclusively. After the Russian rouble collapse in 2014, Internet and IT projects became even more popular as they did not have any geographical limitations and allowed to generate profits from the global market. During this period, while the venture market dropped, angel investments were the only growth driver showing up to a 35% growth in deals and 20% in investment volume. There are several drivers for this increasing angel investor activity. The first one can be linked to active community development including Skolkovo’s International Business School Investor Club, Venture Club, StartTrack, SmartHub, Altair Club and others. Besides building the investment community through events, these companies provide educational support for those who would like to join venture investments. As a result, the number of new investors has increased by 25–30% (RAM, 2016). The second growth driver was purely economic. With the plummeting economy and severe liquidity decrease, venture investments became very attractive to IT entrepreneurs, top managers and Forbes rating members (RAM, 2016). This particular growth driver will possibly fade as major business angels tend to abandon the Russian market in favour of US and European investments. Corporate venture funds (CVFs) are the third most active investors in Internet and IT projects. Such funds have several differences from the regular venture funds in terms of their goals, structure and investment decisions. Corporate venture investments are made in various forms (rounds, acceleration and education programmes) and have a corporation as the principal investor. The key difference from regular venture funding is the corporate goal diversity that includes profits from the investment, ecosystem and market development, technology scouting and new product and technology access through mergers and acquisitions (M&A), partner network

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development or innovation-based market positioning. Generally speaking, CVFs invest in a well-developed business at later stages of its development or acquire relevant technology via M&A. Active CVFs in Russia include LIFE.SREDA, INFRAFUND RVC, VTB CapitalMoneyTime Venture and SBT Venture owned by Sberbank, Prof-IT Ventures (early stages), CommIT Capital (Rostelecom), Qiwi Venture, GS Venture, Softline Venture Partners, Intel Capital, Sistema Venture Capital and others. Some companies like Yandex and Microsoft do not establish dedicated corporate funds but still actively participate in funding and acquiring startups. Crowdfunding and crowdinvesting in Russia is in the early stages of its development, while stable business models have yet to be established. The crowdfunding market in Russia in 2012 accounted for 4 million USD, showing a 100% yearly growth rate. There were 15 active market players including Boomstarter and Planeta as the most active. In 2013, IIDF launched a crowdinvestment platform StartTrack (www.starttrack.ru) that enabled private investors to purchase a share or provide credit in Internet startups in the IIDF portfolio. Later, it was enhanced by professional investors and business angels. Full functionality became available in 2015. The platform was designed to provide funding for startups in their “seed” stage. In such cases, a startup would have a prototype and a business model with investment requirements (250–500,000 USD) that are well beyond the business angels’ capabilities, while project would still not be big enough to get money from a venture fund. The most well-known platform of this kind is the California-based AngelList (angel.co) that has provided over 200 million USD in funding from 21,000 private investors.

4.2

Project Stages and Deals’ Profile Dynamics

In the venture market, analysis investment deals are usually classified according to the stage at which the recipient project’s development is at. These classifications are quite numerous (Zobnina, 2015) but still fit the general classification of pre-seed (idea development), seed (startup) and later stages (rounds A, B and C for businessscale growth). The venture deal breakdown by stage is represented in Fig. 8. As we can observe, the early stage (the pre-seed and seed) deals surpass the later stage (rounds B and C) deals in the market from 2013. There are several interconnected reasons for this kind of dynamics. Firstly, the high number of early-stage projects is essential for the market development in the future, especially given the high-risk nature of venture investments. Naturaly major funds and other institutional actors in the market invest in entrepreneurship promotion and new project development. IIDF made major contributions in this area. Secondly, there has been an increase in activity by the business angels, who are focused mostly on rather small-scale early stage deals. The number of business angels and private investors has also been growing, as shown above.

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Fig. 8 Number of venture deals in the Internet and IT sector by investment stage 2011–2017. Source: based on IIDF, Rusbase, RVCA, CB Insights

5 Regional Development Regional development has also been quite rapid, and rather uneven, since Moscow dominates the market (Fig. 9). Among other significant venture destinations, we can see Saint-Petersburg, Yekaterinburg and Kazan. These regions have rather established venture and entrepreneurial ecosystems including universities, accelerator and venture funds. Moscow’s share still dominates throughout the period observed and accounts for 57–70% of all deals.

6 Conclusion and Implications What is special about the Russian venture market (including the Internet and IT sector) is the dominance of the state or state-affiliated funds, an emphasis on risk aversion which leads to an imbalance towards the later stages, geographic centralisation around Moscow, a low level of foreign investments due to the political situation and the fact that investors’ exits are usually done through acquisitions by corporations instead of IPOs or other tools. Russian venture market is dominated by the Internet and IT sector (58% of the investments by volume and 71% of the deals in 2017), and its share keeps on growing. The average deal volume is decreasing, caused by a shift in focus on the number of deals being invested in at earlier investment stages, in which the volume per deal is lower.

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100% 15%

75%

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22%

8% 10%

21%

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14%

Other Kazan Ekaterinburg Saint-Petersburg Moscow

50%

70% 57%

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65%

69%

2016

2017

0% 2014

2015

Fig. 9 Regional structure of investments in the Internet and IT in Russia by number of deals. Source: based on IIDF, Rusbase, RVCA, CB Insights

One of the major trends of the past 8–10 years is a rapid development in ecosystem. The first major institutional players like Skolkovo, RVC and IIDF invested in entrepreneurship promotion by creating accelerators and local communities. The IIDF course “Internet entrepreneurship” was implemented in over 157 universities in Russia and several CIS countries that engaged thousands of students. In 2013–2017, a number of investors’ clubs and communities were created to improve early stages of investment awareness and provide projects with additional sources of funding. Investors’ activity and the development of Internet projects followed certain sectorial trends or waves of popularity in different sections, including search engines (1990s), social media (2000s), collective buying and travel platforms (early 2010s) and cyber-sport (2015+). The Russian venture market is still centralised, and the geographic development is highly uneven, in its concentration around Moscow: more than 60% of the venture investments are made in Moscow-based companies. State-supported investment funds have been at the foundation of the Russian venture industry and have played a major role during the recent financial crisis. Currently, private investments are steadily reclaiming a major part of the market share, according to the number of deals being invested in. Overall, the venture ecosystem development, the business angel community and regional networking centres can be identified as the key industry growth drivers that are enabling a more balanced and sustainable growth in the Internet and IT sector.

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References Aernoudt, R. (1999). Business angels: Should they fly on their own wings? Venture Capital: An International Journal of Entrepreneurial Finance, 1(2), 187–195. Arthurs, J. D., & Busenitz, L. W. (2003). The boundaries and limitations of agency theory and stewardship theory in the venture capitalist/entrepreneur relationship. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 28(2), 145–162. Benjamin, G., & Margulis, J. (2001). The angel investor’s handbook. Princeton, NJ: Bloomberg Press. Bergemann, D., & Hege, U. (1998). Venture capital financing, moral hazard, and learning. Journal of Banking & Finance, 22(6–8), 703–735. Berman, R., Herrmann, B., & Marmer, M. (2011). Startup genome report 01. A new framework for understanding why startups succeed, Technical report. Startup Compass Bernile, G., Cumming, D., & Lyandres, E. (2007). The size of venture capital and private equity fund portfolios. Journal of Corporate Finance, 13(4), 564–590. Bhave, M. (1994). A process model of entrepreneurial venture creation. Journal of Business Venturing, 9(3), 223–242. Blank, S. (2007). The four steps to the epiphany. Quad/Graphics. Cohen, S., & Hochberg, Y. (2014). Accelerating startups: The seed accelerator phenomenon. SSRN Journal, 1–16. Cumming, D. J. (2006). The determinants of venture capital portfolio size: Empirical evidence. The Journal of Business, 79(3), 1083–1126. Dushnitsky, G., & Shaver, J. M. (2009). Limitations to interorganizational knowledge acquisition: The paradox of corporate venture capital. Strategic Management Journal, 30(10), 1045–1064. EY, & RVC. (2014). Issledovanie rossiiskogo i mirovogo venchurnogo rynka za 2007–2013 godu [Research on Russian and global venture market 2007–2013]. Moscow. Retrieved May 08, 2019, from https://www.rvc.ru/upload/iblock/aa4/201402_RVC_EY_venture_markets_ RU.pdf Gompers, P. A. (1995). Optimal investment, monitoring, and the staging of venture capital. The Journal of Finance, 50(5), 1461–1489. Invest Europe, Invest Europe Yearbook. (2016). European private equity activity. Retrieved March 15, 2017, from https://www.investeurope.eu/research/activity-data/annual-activity-statistics/ Kazanjian, R. (1988). Relation of dominant problems to stages of growth in technology-based new venture. Academy of Management Journal, 31(2), 257–279. Kim, Y., & Ha, S. (1999). An empirical study on growth stages of Korean high-tech ventures. The Korean Society for Technology Management & Economics, 8(1), 125–153. Mason, C., & Brown, R. (2014). Entrepreneurial ecosystems and growth oriented entrepreneurship. Final report to OECD, Paris, 30(1), 77–102. NVCA (National Venture Capital Association, United States). (2018). PitchBook data. Retrieved March 05, 2019, from https://nvca.org/research/venture-monitor/. OECD. (2017). Entrepreneurship at a glance 2017. Paris: OECD Publishing. Retrieved May 08, 2019, from https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/entrepreneur_aag-2017-en/index.html? itemId¼/content/publication/entrepreneur_aag-2017-en Pitchbook. (2018). NVCA venture monitor 1Q 2018. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https:// pitchbook.com/news/reports/1q-2018-pitchbook-nvca-venture-monitor RAM. (2016). Russian Angel Monitor 2016. Retrieved from https://www.rvc.ru/upload/iblock/301/ RAM_16_5.pdf Ray, D. M. (1993). Understanding the entrepreneur: Entrepreneurial attributes, experience and skills. Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, 5(4), 345–358. RVCA. (2015). Direct and venture investments report. Retrieved from https://www.rvc.ru/upload/ iblock/b60/Market_Review92015_Equity_and_Venture_Capital.pdf

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Regulation of Online Freedom of Expression in Russia in the Context of the Council of Europe Standards Elena Sherstoboeva

Despite the significance of the right to freedom of expression and Internet freedom in a digital era, threats to them are currently more prominent than ever, as suggested by David Kaye, the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression, in his 2017 report to the UN Human Rights Council.1 One such threat comes from a law that governments tend to use to legitimise or administrate online censorship and surveillance more often than to protect online free speech. Russian legal regulations have been a notorious example of this trend since mid-2011, when online platforms became popular sources of news in the country and contributed to the so-called 2011–2012 Snow Revolution (Ioffe, 2011). Governmental control has intensified since the 2014 Ukrainian crisis, and Freedom House has labelled the Internet in Russia as “not free” since 2015 (“Freedom on the Net. Russia”, 2015).2 Whilst all this may imply a misc5orrelation between Russian law and international legal standards on human rights, the Russian government has argued the opposite.3

The results of the project “Medialization of Social Institutions, Communities and Everyday Life” (TZ-46), carried out within the framework of the Basic Research Programme at the National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE) in 2017, are presented in this work. 1 Report of the UN Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression, A/HRC/35/22, 35th session of the UN Human Rights Council, 30 March 2017; http://ap.ohchr.org/documents/dpage_e.aspx?si¼A/HRC/35/22. Accessed 10 October 2018. 2 In the period 2011–2014, the Freedom on the Net reports characterised the Russian Internet as “partly free”. 3 See, for instance, Postojannoe Predstavitel’stvo Rossijskoj Federacii pri Otdelenii OON i Drugih Mezhdunarodnyh Organizacijah v Zheneve [Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the

E. Sherstoboeva (*) City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_5

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This chapter, therefore, aims at exploring the extent to which the Russian legal vision of Internet regulation is consistent with the perspective of the Council of Europe (CoE),4 the intergovernmental human rights organisation seeking to protect human rights, democracy and the rule of law in greater Europe. In joining this organisation in 1996, the Russian government committed itself to fully implement the CoE perspective in its national legislation. The CoE’s standards are universal, rather than being “Western European” ones. Apart from Russia, the CoE includes some other post-Soviet countries that don’t have membership in the European Union, such as Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Armenia. Furthermore, the CoE’s goals and principles are almost the same as the ones held by the United Nations (UN), which Russia joined back in the Soviet period. The 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR),5 the main CoE legally binding treaty on human rights, guarantees freedom of expression in its Article 10 Part 1,6 which employs a similar wording to the main UN international human rights treaties.7 Unlike the UN, however, the CoE developed its legal standards for free speech in more detail. National implementation of the ECHR is strictly supervised at the CoE level by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), whose judgements are legally binding for all members, including Russia. The core method of this study is the ECtHR’s three-tier test provided by the ECHR’s Article 10 Part 28 to assess the admissibility of national limitations to freedom of expression. The test means that each restriction must (1) be provided by law (the criterion of legality), (2) pursue a legitimate aim (the criterion of legitimacy) and (3) be necessary in a democratic society (the criterion of necessity).

United Nations and Other International Organizations]. Informacija Rossijskoj Federacii v Svjazi s Zaprosom Special’nogo Dokladchika Soveta OON po Pravam Cheloveka po Voprosu o SvobodeVyrazhenija Mnenija [Information of the Russian Federation in Connection to the Request of the Special Rapporteur of the UN Human Rights Council on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression]. No. 660, of 3 November 2016; http://www.ohchr. org/Documents/Issues/Expression/Telecommunications/Russia.pdf. Accessed 10 October 2018. 4 The Council of Europe (CoE) was founded in 1949 and, currently, it unites 47 members. For more information, see http://www.coe.int/en/web/portal/home 5 Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (or European Convention on Human Rights, ECHR), adopted in Rome on 4 November 1950; http://www.echr.coe. int/Documents/Convention_ENG.pdf. Accessed 10 October 2018. 6 Article 10 Part 1 of the ECHR reads: “Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This Article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises”. 7 They are the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), Article 19, and the 1966 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), Article 19, Parts 1–2. 8 Article 10 of the ECHR in Part 2 states: “The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation of the rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary”.

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In other words, the test implies that the laws regulating communication should be clear and foreseeable, that the measures should be adequate and proportionate to protect a legitimate aim and that there should be a “pressing social need” for interference (Keller, 2011; Oster, 2015, 2017). Similar criteria are established in the UN’s treaty, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).9 Although international standards allow a certain “margin of appreciation” for member-states to impose limitations in some sensitive areas (for instance, public morality), state interference is strongly limited with regard to political expressions and information of public interest (Keller, 2011; McGonagle, 2016; Oster, 2015, 2017). To avoid misinterpretations of the ECtHR case law, this chapter also refers to the CoE recommendations and declarations on Internet regulation. Despite their non-binding character, they are important to properly understand and incorporate the CoE’s legally binding standards. The CoE and Russian perspectives are shown through comparing their basic legal principles that govern Internet content, their online media and media-like services regulation and their standards for the right to online anonymity as well as for blocking access. This chapter starts by outlining the CoE standards on online freedom of expression and media freedom; however, its main focus is on examining the Russian legal vision of this issue. The Russia-specific material is prefaced by a historical overview and then explores the Russian national legal framework. This study goes beyond a purely legal analysis, as it also considers the issue from historical, political, anthropological and social perspectives. Particularly, it covers the issues on the connection between the Russian Internet law and Soviet speech regulations and the evolution of the Internet regulations in Russia and shows the impact of political regime’s change on them. It also tries to explain the genuine crux of the Russian Internet laws and policies as well as their implementation in the context of the European vision.

1 The CoE Standards on Online Freedom of Expression According to international standards,10 member-states must ensure equal and adequate level of protection for both offline and online freedom of expression “without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers”, as provided by international treaties on human rights. The ECtHR applies the same three-tier test to

9 ICCPR in Article 19 Part 3 says: “The exercise of the rights provided for in paragraph 2 of this article carries with it special duties and responsibilities. It may therefore be subject to certain restrictions, but these shall only be such as are provided by law and are necessary: (a) For respect of the rights or reputations of others; (b) For the protection of national security or of public order, or of public health or morals”. 10 See, for instance, UN Human Rights Council Resolution “On Promotion and Protection of All Human Rights, Civil, Political, Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, Including the Right to Development”, A/HRC/32/L.20, 32nd session, 27 June 2016; https://www.article19.org/data/files/ Internet_Statement_Adopted.pdf. Accessed 10 October 2018.

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assess the admissibility of limitations on online and offline expressions.11 For instance, the ECtHR ruled in Ahmet Yildirim v. Turkey that the Turkish law was unforeseeable and failed to provide the relevant free speech protection. Furthermore, the test must be also used to assess the restrictions on various online actors, such as “websites, blogs, or any other Internet-based, electronic or other such informationdissemination system, including systems to support such communication, such as Internet service providers or search engines”.12 At the same time, the UN and CoE suggest that the national legal framework for the Internet should be specific. To ensure an adequate protection of all human rights in this digital era, online policies should pay thorough attention to the Internet’s specific attributes, such as, amongst others, universality, lack of borders and decentralised management, which international law provides (Akdeniz, 2016; Vajic & Voyatzis, 2012). Regulations for the Internet and traditional media should also differ, as stressed by the ECtHR.13 Access to the Internet has been recognised by the UN as a basic human right since 2016.14 The ECtHR clarified that this right is inherently embedded in the right to access information—a right protected in national constitutions.15 International recognition of the right to access the Internet implies specific guarantees in domestic law. They concern not only the Internet’s availability and affordability without discrimination but also imply access to pluralistic and diversified content.16 As the

11

See, for instance, the cases of Ahmet Yildirim v. Turkey of 18 December 2012, Editorial Board of Pravoye Delo and Shtekel v. Ukraine of 5 May 2011 and Renaud v. France of 25 February 2010. 12 UN Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 34 on Article 19 of the ICCPR, adopted at its 102nd session, 11–29 July 2011; http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrc/docs/GC34.pdf. Accessed 10 October 2018. 13 See, for instance, the ECtHR judgements on the cases of Editorial Board of Pravoye Delo and Shtekel v. Ukraine and Wegrzynowski and Smolczewski v. Poland of 16 July 2013. 14 Resolution of the UN General Assembly, “Promotion and Protection of All Human Rights, Civil, Political, Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, Including the Right to Development”, adopted on 27 June 2016, at the 32nd session of the UN Human Rights Council, A/HRC/32/L.20; https://www. article19.org/data/files/Internet_Statement_Adopted.pdf. Accessed 10 October 2018. 15 Ahmet Yildirim v. Turkey. 16 See, for instance, Recommendation CM/Rec(2016)5[1] of the CoE’s Committee of Ministers to Member States “On Internet Freedom”, adopted on 13 April 2016 at the 1253rd meeting of the Ministers’ Deputies; https://search.coe.int/cm/Pages/result_details.aspx? ObjectId¼09000016806415fa. Accessed 10 October 2018; Recommendation CM/Rec(2016)1 of the CoE Committee of Ministers to Member States “On Protecting and Promoting the Right to Freedom of Expression and the Right to Private Life with Regard to Network Neutrality”, adopted on 13 January 2016, at the 1244th meeting of the Ministers’ Deputies; https://wcd.coe.int/ViewDoc. jsp?p¼&Ref¼CM/Rec(2016)1&Language¼lanEnglish&Ver¼original& BackColorInternet¼C3C3C3&BackColorIntranet¼EDB021&BackColorLogged¼F5D383& direct¼true. Accessed 6 November 2017; Recommendation CM/Rec(2015)6 of the Committee of Ministers to Member-States “On the Free, Transboundary Flow of Information on the Internet”; https://search.coe.int/cm/Pages/result_details.aspx?ObjectID¼09000016805c3f20. Accessed 10 October 2018.

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ECtHR ruled in the case of Ahmet Yildirim v. Turkey, blocking online access affects the rights of Internet users because ECHR’s Article 10 guarantees not only the right to communicate information but also the right to receive it; consequently, domestic courts have to convincingly justify their rulings on blocking access. The right to access information and freedom of expression online should nonetheless be adequately balanced with protection of privacy and personal data.17 The right to anonymity on the Internet is protected under both rights—freedom of expression and privacy.18 Any restrictions to anonymity, therefore, must comply with the three-tier test. The Declaration of the CoE’s Committee of Ministers, “On Freedom of Communication on the Internet”,19 allows disclosure of identity only “in order to trace those responsible for criminal acts” and proclaims this right as one of the main principles of online communication. The CoE provides certain standards regarding the adoption of Internet laws and policies. These ought to be developed “in an inclusive and transparent process” involving “all stakeholders, including the private sector, civil society, academia and the technical community”.20 In general, regulators and policy enforcers should be independent from the government and take decisions in a transparent manner. In Ahmet Yildirim v. Turkey, the ECtHR criticised the decision of the national court. The case concerned blocking access to the entire Google Sites service in the country because it had contained the content insulting the memory of Ataturk. The Turkish court ruled to merely uphold the lawfulness of the governmental regulator’s order without its proper consideration. The ECtHR stated that the national court had failed to consider applying less severe measures to stop the alleged violation. In general, the admissibility of governmental decisions on blocking or filtering is questioned by various CoE institutions, since free speech implies the lack of state interference. The ECtHR doctrine of a “margin of appreciation” is also relevant to online speech, which means that there is nearly no room for governmental restrictions on online political speech or expressions of public interest.21 Moreover, the CoE standards specifically emphasise the crucial role of the Internet “in enhancing the public’s access to news and facilitating the dissemination of information in general”.22 They also mark its prominence for discussing issues of public interest

17

Ibid. Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression (2015), UN Doc, A/HRC/29/32, 22 May; http://www.ohchr.org/EN/ HRBodies/HRC/RegularSessions/Session29/Documents/A.HRC.29.32_AEV.doc. Accessed 10 October 2018. 19 Declaration “On Freedom of Communication on the Internet”, adopted by the CoE’s Committee of Ministerson 28 May 2003 at the 840th meeting of the Ministers’ Deputies; https://www.osce.org/ fom/31507. Accessed 10 October 2018. 20 Ibid. 21 See, for instance, the cases of Renaud v. France and Aleksey Ovchinnikov v. Russia of 16 December 2010. 22 Times Newspapers Ltd v. the United Kingdom (No. 1 and 2) of 10 June 2009, Ahmet Yildirim v. Turkey and Mouvement Raélien Suisse v. Switzerland of 13 January 2011. 18

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including political issues.23 Therefore, the CoE standards suggest broadening the notion of censorship to include blocking and filtering measures as forms of prior state control and to shield hosting service providers.24 The CoE recommends that the framework for media regulation be revised with technological advances. Its standards stress that the media still play the role of “public watchdog”, which implies special media rights, duties and responsibilities.25 Furthermore, the ECtHR ruled that governments should ensure that journalists and their informers are well-protected from online surveillance.26 Yet, the CoE standards suggest expanding the legal notion of “media” to provide new “media-like” actors with a special journalistic status to maximise the contribution of such actors in the free circulation of expressions and ideas. For that, the CoE provides a “graduated and differentiated” approach. It includes several criteria to identify online media, amongst which the most significant are the purpose of a media platform, editorial control and its outreach and dissemination.27 A more simplistic approach would be insufficient to ensure proper media governance in a digital era. The legal notion of editorial responsibility has also become more complex, in that it may include liability for user-generated content. The ECtHR confirmed that communication intermediaries do not need to moderate users’ comments in advance.28 However, they may be requested to remove illegal comments by users, as the ECtHR ruled in the case of Delfi AS v. Estonia, whose strict perspective has been criticised by many scholars and experts (Article 19, 2015; Moody, 2015; Voorhoof, 2015). Nonetheless, each removal of information must match the threetier test since this limits media freedom. In cases of removals, the ECtHR always examines several criteria including the nature of the comments, the profitability of the platform, the efficiency of the removals as well as the severity of penalties.29

See, for instance, the Recommendation of the CoE’s Committee of Ministers “On the Protection and Promotion of the Universality, Integrity, and Openness of the Internet” which states that the Internet “provides essential tools for participation and deliberation in political and other activities of public interest”. 24 Declaration “On Freedom of Communication on the Internet” and Recommendation CM/Rec (2015)6 “On the Free, Transboundary Flow of Information on the Internet”. 25 Recommendation CM/Rec(2011)7 of the CoE’s Committee of Ministers to Member States, “On a New Notion of Media”, adopted on 21 September 2011 at the 1121st meeting of the Ministers’ Deputies; https://search.coe.int/cm/Pages/result_details.aspx?ObjectID¼09000016805cc2c0. Accessed 10 October 2018. 26 Telegraaf Media Nederland Landelijke Media B.V. and Others v. the Netherlands. 27 Ibid. 28 Rolf Anders Daniel Pihl v. Sweden of 9 March 2017 and MTE-Index v. Hungary of 2 February 2016. 29 Delfi AS v. Estonia of 16 June 2015, Rolf Anders Daniel Pihl v. Sweden and MTE-Index v. Hungary. 23

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2 Russian Legislation on Freedom of Expression Online Freedom of speech and media freedom appeared in Russian law less than 30 years ago, much later than in most CoE member-states. Before 1990, legal regulation for speech and the press in the Russian Empire and Soviet Russia had been aimed at governing censorship, rather than at protecting freedom of expression. MarxismLeninism, the official Soviet ideology, viewed the press as a tool of governmental propaganda, and the Soviet Constitutions interpreted press freedom as the government’s right to support or not to support the media (Sherstoboeva, 2017). Censorship was never explicitly allowed according to Soviet regulations, but the USSR’s government ran an intricate and effective system to censor any content at all levels, including the editorial one. Although the governmental policies of Perestroika and Glasnost triggered enormous speech and media liberalisation processes in the late 1980s, free speech in the USSR did not come from the top-down. It was mainly driven by journalists and supported by the audience who seemed to truly desire that censorship be lifted. That is why media law adopted at that period abolished censorship of mass communications and proclaimed free speech, rather than media freedom only, without any provisos for the first time in Russian history. The 1990 USSR statute “On the Press and Other Mass Media”30 really facilitated the rapid development of private media ownership and independent journalism in Russia, despite its declarative nature. Having been adopted just after the 1991 USSR’s collapse, a more robust statute “On Mass Media”31 helped to maintain these processes and shaped the constitutional provisions on free speech. This statute introduced the unique Russian legal concept of the freedom of mass information32 that allows its interpretation as freedom of mass communication in modern legal terms. The launch of the Internet in the USSR was interpreted in the overall context of the country’s democratisation. The first Internet enterprises were mostly developed with Western assistance and had symbolic names: the Glasnet combined the concepts of Glasnost and network, RELCOM represented RELiable COMmunications, and the Demos referred as to the ancient Greek notion of free citizens. As Rohozinski (2004) notes, the RELCOM/Demos network played an important role in the fight against the old anti-democratic political force in Russia in the early 1990s. It also

Statute of the USSR “On Press and Other Mass Media”, No. 1552-1, adopted by the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on 12 June 1990; http://pravo.gov.ru/proxy/ips/?docbody¼&nd¼102010233& rdk¼&backlink¼1. Accessed 10 October 2018. 31 Statute of the Russian Federation “On Mass Media”, No. 2124-1 of 27 December 1991; http:// www.consultant.ru/document/cons_doc_LAW_1511/. Accessed 10 October 2018. 32 Article 1 of the statute “On Mass Media” defines the freedom of mass information as a set of the following rights: (1) to seek, receive, produce and disseminate mass information; (2) to establish mass media outlets, to own, use and dispose of them; and (3) to make, acquire, keep and employ technical facilities and raw and other materials meant for the production and distribution of mass media content. 30

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helped to promote ideas of democracy, the market economy and free speech, as Rohozinski emphasises. However, freedom of speech and media freedom were introduced into the country too suddenly and mostly played the role of being new brilliant ideas that were worth fighting for in order to benefit from the same advantages that Western European societies did, instead of becoming concrete legal notions. Although Russia continued—on paper!—to expand legal guarantees for free speech in the early 1900s, in practice the content was regulated by political or extra-legal means, as it had been in the USSR. Nevertheless, the regime was different and, consequently, speech regulation was different too. Article 2933 of the 1993 Russian Constitution did provide a strong and detailed protection of free speech and enshrined a total ban on censorship, which is a rare case for European legal tradition. The Russian constitutional provisions on speech regulation are nearly fully in line with the international standards (Sherstoboeva, 2017). The constitutional criteria34 to assess speech limitations are similar to the ones of the three-tier test. The main challenge was in institutionalising the new liberal legal framework in a young Russian democracy, which became very complex against the backdrop of a harsh economic situation and the great turbulence of the early 1990s. When Russia was accepted to the CoE in 1996, all the legal initiatives to develop free speech and media freedom in Russia were terminated. Since the 2000s, when Vladimir Putin assumed Russia’s presidency, Russian laws and policies on the content have been mostly introduced to restrict it, including on the Internet (Jackson, 2016). As Rohozinski suggests, it became clear by the end of the 1990s that, rather than the Internet having transformed Russia, it was Russia that had adapted the Internet to fit its values. A new framework for speech and media regulations was outlined in the 2000 Presidential Doctrine of Information Safety of the Russian Federation.35 Having proclaimed the need to protect “national interests” from “internal and external informational threats”, the Doctrine was reminiscent of the policies of MarxismLeninism (Sherstoboeva, 2017). Although national security may be a legitimate reason to restrict free speech from both international and constitutional perspectives, 33

Article 29 of the Russian Constitution states that: “1. Everyone is guaranteed the freedom of thought and speech. 2. Propaganda or agitation exciting social, racial, national, or religious hatred and strife is not permitted. Propaganda of social, racial, national, religious, or linguistic superiority is banned. 3. No one may be compelled to express his or her opinions and convictions or to renounce them. 4. Everyone has the right to freely seek, receive, pass on, produce, and disseminate information by any lawful means. A list of information comprising state secrets is determined by federal law. 5. The freedom of mass information is guaranteed. Censorship is banned”. 34 The Russian Constitution states in Article 55(3) that the right to freedom of speech could be limited only by federal laws, and “to such an extent to which it is necessary for the protection of the fundamental principles of the constitutional system, of morality, health, the rights and lawful interests of other people, and for ensuring the defence and the security of the State”. 35 Doctrine on Information Safety. Adopted by the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation on 9 September 2000 No PR-1895.

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its protection should be balanced with free speech. The Doctrine lacked this balance and, as Fedotov (2001) notes, it mainly targeted national private media and foreign sources of information. National security protection was further proclaimed to be one of the guiding principles to govern the national Internet in the 2006 statute “On Information”,36 the key statute to regulate online content in Russia. However, the Russian vision of this principle is very specific, as seen from the Doctrine. Therefore, it is somewhat unclear what scholars mean when defining national governmental Internet policy before the end of the 2011–2012 Russian mass protests as the “hands-off” approach (Duffy, 2015). The Kremlin’s abstention to regulate the Internet can only be attributed to the modest popularity of the Internet amongst Russians, but the Internet had not been a free-for-all space at that time. The first blacklist in Russia was established under the supervision of the Ministry of Justice in 2007, long before the adoption of the notorious 2012 Statute on Blacklists.37 The 2007 blacklist registered both offline and online “extremist materials”. Being fairly vague, this notion covers not only terror and hate speech but also political dissent, in line with the 2000 Doctrine, rather than with the CoE perspective. The CoE invoked Russia to revise its anti-extremist legislation several times; however, it has only been expanded upon. Another illustrative example of pre-2012 restrictive policies is the 2011 amendments to the statute “On Mass Media”. By that time, this statute had already lost its liberal status due to several revisions instigated by the 2000 Doctrine. The 2011 amendments, however, were particularly exponential. They established excessive control by Roskomnadzor, a governmental agency and the only regulator of mass communication in Russia, over all online media services available in Russia. The amendments defined these platforms in an ambiguous way that contrasted with the CoE’s “graduated and differentiated” approach. The platforms are legally qualified as “media services” if only they have been registered with Roskomnadzor in this capacity before they become available online. Although so far the registration of websites as “media services” has been voluntary, the statute “On Mass Media” does not explicitly state that. Therefore, the government can make it obligatory at any time. As a result, Roskomnadzor’s Register of Mass Media Outlets (“Perechen”, 2018) includes many non-media and non-media-like websites, such as official web portals of state bodies, museums, universities, hospitals and even online shops. The more the Internet influenced public opinion in Russia, the harsher its regulation became. Such regulation as a need for society was easily justified by online criminality. Almost all Russian users stated they had become their victims by the early 2010s.38 However, Russia refused to ratify the 2001 CoE Convention on

36 Federal Statute “On Information, Information Technologies, and Protection of Information”, No. 149-FZ of 27 July 2006. 37 “On Amendments to the Federal Statute on Protection of Morals from Information Harmful to Their Health and Development, and to Some Legal Acts of the Russian Federation”, No. 139-FZ. 38 As the Norton Cybercrime Report (Norton, 2012) shows, 92% of Russians suffered from the violations of their rights, especially on social media platforms. Russian users complained they had

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Cybercrime,39 an international treaty on computer and online crimes ratified by 42 CoE member-states and 10 non-members.40 Most likely, the refusal was made on the basis of avoiding possible information leaks from Russia. Russian governmental vision of Internet safety goes by far beyond fighting online crimes and has been used to justify restrictions to online content. Since 2012, the government has adopted numerous amendments to existing laws to restrict online freedom of expression. They largely elaborate on the provisions of the 2000 Doctrine replaced in 2016 by a new presidential doctrine. The 2016 Doctrine on Information Safety41 expanded the number of Russia’s national “threats”. It became even closer to the Marxism-Leninism theory and reminded of the Soviet rhetoric in the period of the Cold War. The idea of Russia’s own Intranet emerged in 2014, when Putin explicitly called the Internet a “CIA project” (MacAskill, 2014). Two years later, Russian officials called for Russia to be disconnected from it (“Klimenkoprizval”, 2016). In order to eliminate the US and EU dominance online, Putin further approved the Security Council’s proposal to create a “separate Internet” for the BRICS countries which, alongside Russia, include Brazil, India, China and South Africa (“Rossija podgotovilas”, 2018). The idea of having their own Intranet has become a national idea, and Russian authorities confirmed in 2018 that the country is ready to apply to launch a domestic Internet “in the worstcase scenario” (Ibid.). Many experts argue that Russia will never go as far as establishing a Great Firewall as China did. Yet, the so-called Russian law on “national online sovereignty” to ensure a firewall was adopted in 2019.42 The national framework for the Internet lacks essential guarantees on the equal protection of human rights in offline and online environments, which is central to the CoE Internet policy. One of the highest Russian courts, the Constitutional Court, in a 2013 decision43 stated that the Russian Constitution is applicable to online information, but this statement only justified additional restrictions to online speech. Although laid down in the 1991 statute “On Mass Media”, freedom of mass

lacked protection from phishing attacks, cracking of accounts and receiving spam as well as obscene content. 39 Convention on Cybercrime, Budapest, 23 November 2001; https://www.coe.int/en/web/conven tions/full-list/-/conventions/rms/0900001680081561. Accessed 10 October 2018. 40 Chart of signatures and ratifications of Treaty 185, Convention on Cybercrime, Status as of 3 February 2017; https://www.coe.int/en/web/conventions/full-list/-/conventions/treaty/185/signa tures?p_auth¼iKp4JDIL. Accessed 10 October 2018. 41 Doctrine on Information Safety. Adopted by the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation on 5 December 2016 No. 646. 42 Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending the Federal Statute of the Russian Federation, on Communication, and the Federal Statute, on Information, Information Technologies, and Protection of Information”, No. 90-FZ of 01 May 2019. 43 Resolution of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation “On the Case of the Constitutionality Test of Paragraphs 1, 5, and 6 of Article 152 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, in Response to the Complaint of the Citizen Y. Krylov”, Saint Petersburg, 9 July 2013.

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communication has never been interpreted as being relevant to the protection of media-like services or creative media production in Russia, and neither has it ever been used for that. The notion of censorship has not been reconsidered in light of technological advances, nor has it been applied to resist any restrictions being placed on Internet content. In contrast to the international standards, the right to access the Internet is not recognised by Russian law. Most Russian Internet laws are adopted under the guise of protecting national safety from terrorism or extremism. These laws can hardly match the criterion of legitimacy articulated in the ECtHR’s three-tier test. They mainly go beyond the legitimate aims they seek to protect. For instance, to protect Russia from terrorism, the so-called Yarovaya Statutes44 have made it obligatory for any online platform or service that deals with users’ correspondence in Russia, including Facebook, Google or WhatsApp, to collect and store all of their users’ data and correspondence for a year and to supply this information to investigators upon request. Being legally qualified as “organisers of dissemination of information”, such services ought to stop communicating a given user’s message, simply upon governmental request. Similar but more specific regulations are targeted at messaging services,45 communication service providers and the national postal service. As a matter of fact, the Russian government has created an intricate multi-layered system of surveillance and excessive control over online content. Russian national laws force various Russian and global online enterprises to ensure and implement online censorship at their own cost, under threat of shutdowns and enormous money penalties. Edward Snowden, the world-renowned whistle-blower and a former US Central Intelligence Agency employee, compared the Yarovaya laws with the imposition of an “Internet tax” noting that complying with its requirements would cost Russian online businesses an estimated 33 billion US dollars (nearly 31 billion euro) or more.46 Although the provisions of the Russian Civil Code’s Article 1253.1 regulating the liability of information intermediaries can correlate with CoE standards,47 they fail to prevent online companies from censoring the Internet content because of the Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending the Federal Statute of the Russian Federation, on Counteraction of Terrorism, and Other Legal Acts of the Russian Federation in the Parts Establishing Additional Measures to Counteract Terrorism and Ensure Public Safety”, No. 374-FZ; Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation in the Parts Establishing Additional Measures to Counteract Terrorism and Ensure Public Safety”, No. 375-FZ of 6 July 2016. 45 Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending Articles 10.1 and 15.4 of the Federal Statute on Information, Information Technologies, and Protection of Information”, No. 241-FZ of 29 July 2017. 46 See Edward Snowden’s Twitter account at https://twitter.com/snowden?lang¼ru. Accessed 10 October 2018. 47 See, for instance, the Declaration of the CoE’s Committee of Ministers “On Freedom of Communication on the Internet” and Recommendation CM/Rec (2011)7 of the CoE’s Committee of Ministers to Member-States “On a New Notion of Media”. 44

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severity of many other Russian Internet laws. Amongst them are the so-called statute “On Messengers”,48 which obligate messengers to stop transmitting a message or providing services within a day of Roskomnadzor’s notice. The statute “On News Aggregators”49 forces these platforms to remove any news item upon the agency’s request. Russian laws considerably challenge users’ right to anonymity. Article 10 Clause 2 of the statute “On Information” explicitly prohibits anonymous online expressions. The statute “On Messengers” demands users to disclose their identity to the messaging service. Apart from the legislation establishing online surveillance, Russia has also adopted a law banning VPNs and anonymisers.50 It has also introduced penalties for search engine services that provide the links to such services upon users’ requests.51 Anonymous access to the Internet in public places in Russia is banned.52 The statute “On News Aggregators”53 challenges the right to protect journalistic sources, instead of protecting them in line with the CoE standards. Additionally, Russian laws fail to provide protection to journalists from online surveillance. Whilst surveillance measures may be justifiable under some circumstances, they are globally debated. The European Court of Justice, the main judicial authority of the European Union, ruled in 2016 that legal regulations permitting the blanket collection and storage of location and traffic data are possible only in cases of serious crimes and that the obligatory storage of data should be strictly supervised by independent courts (“European Court of Justice”, 2016). However, in Russia, almost all Internet regulations are overseen by one governmental agency, Roskomnadzor, which has received enormous power to develop and administrate restrictive policies. The statute “On Information” and the subsequent governmental regulations54 give considerable power to Roskomnadzor to request blocking access to online

Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending the Federal Statue on Information, Information Technologies, and Protection of Information”, No. 241-FZ of 29 July 2017. 49 Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending the Federal Statute on Information, Information Technologies, and the Code of Administrative Offences”, No. 208-FZ23 of June 2016. 50 Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending the Federal Statute on Information, Information Technologies, and Protection of Information”, No. 276-FZ of 29 July 2017. 51 Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending the Code of the Russian Federation on Administrative Offenses”, No. 396-FZ of 20 December 2017. 52 Regulations of the Government of the Russian Federation “On Amending Some Acts of the Government of the Russian Federation Due to the Adoption of the Federal Statute, on Amending the Federal Statute on Information, Information Technologies and Protection of Information, as well as Some Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation Concerning the Issues of Exchange of Information with the Usage of Information and Telecommunication Networks” of 31 July 2014, No. 758, Moscow. 53 Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending the Federal Statute on Information, Information Technologies, and the Code of Administrative Offences”, No. 208-FZ23 of June 2016. 54 Regulations of the Government of the Russian Federation “On United Automatized Information System, the United Register of Domain Names, Website Addresses on the Information and Telecommunication Network, Internet, as well as Net Addresses Allowing the Identification of 48

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publications without a court’s ruling. Whilst some of the grounds for such blocking may be legitimate, such as child pornography or digital piracy, others can hardly be justified in light of the CoE standards, such as sending the general public online invitations to peaceful opposition rallies. Blocking procedures in Russia insufficiently comply with the CoE standards, particularly, elaborated in the ECtHR’s ruling in the case of Ahmet Yildirim v. Turkey. According to the Russian statute “On Information”, hosting providers must terminate the access to an entire website if its owners fail to remove the allegedly infringing content within one day after Roskomnadzor has sent—and not necessarily received—such a request (or after three days if it concerns copyright infringement). In 2015, the Russian Constitutional Court ruled that legal measures, such as the blocking of entire websites, are fully consistent with the Russian Constitution and international standards.55 Furthermore, the Court recommended that lower courts would impose the harshest possible sanctions in cases concerning online extremism, which contrasts with the CoE approach. Conversely, another high Russian court, the Supreme Court, tried to contribute to the implementation of the CoE standards on online content through the decrees of its organ, the Plenum, which instructs the lower courts on how to implement specific laws. The Plenum tried to formulate certain guarantees regarding the right to access the Internet by proclaiming that anyone can access online content “from any place and at any time, at one’s own choice if the appropriate infrastructure is available and Internet connection shall be possible”.56 The Supreme Court’s Plenum has regularly and consistently issued guidelines to national courts on the most problematic issues of the Russian law, such as extremist content, defamation and media freedom. If fully implemented, they could get the Russian judicial practice closer to the CoE standards (Richter, 2012). For instance, some controversial criminal cases on online extremism were closed in Russia soon after the Supreme Court’s Plenum had instructed national courts on the limited liability for reposting or liking extremist materials (“V Rossii nachinajut”, 2018). An earlier example is the 2010 Plenum’s clarification that media services would not be required to get Roskomnadzor’s registration certificates or licenses to start operating online or to launch Internet broadcasting.

Website Addresses on the Information and Telecommunication Network, Internet That Contain Information the Dissemination of Which Is Banned in Russia” of 26 October 2012, No. 1101, Moscow. 55 Resolution of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation “On the Admissibility of the Complaint of the Foreign Organization Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc., Complaining About the Violation of Its Constitutional Rights by Article 1, Paragraph 3, and Article 13 of the Federal Statute of the Russian Federation ‘On Counteraction of Extremism Activity’” of 17 February 2015 as well as Article 15.1, Paragraph 2, Part 5, of the Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Information, Information Technologies and Protection of Information” of 22 December 2015. 56 The decree of the Plenum of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, “On the Practice of Application of the Statute of the Russian Federation, on Mass Media, by Courts” of 15 June 2010.

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However, unlike the Constitutional Court’s rulings on constitutionality, the decrees of the Supreme Court’s Plenum are non-binding from a legal perspective. Their effectiveness can hardly be predicted, as they are ensured by the authority of the Court itself. They cannot lead to the abolishment or revision of laws and can be challenged by a governmental body. For instance, Roskomnadzor reconsidered the Supreme Court’s liberal perspective on limited editorial liability for users’ comments, which had been consistent with the CoE standards (Richter & Richter, 2015). Russia’s own legal interpretations (or re-interpretations in fact) of universal or European legal notions related to the Internet content show that protecting “national” interests from illegal content often means shielding the political establishment from online criticism. The statute “On Information” imposes some journalistic duties on the owners of some large media-like services, namely, messengers, social media platforms, news aggregators and online audiovisual services. However, the statute doesn’t provide the owners with specific journalistic privileges that are necessary to perform these duties. For instance, the so-called statute “On News Aggregators” obliges popular news aggregators to verify information before being published, unless the information refers to governmental websites or other mass media outlet registered with Roskomnadzor. This duty is excessive because news aggregators cannot ensure an editorial control over the news they aggregate and automatically publish. However, this requirement may be used to prevent aggregators from disseminating news from alternative sources and to facilitate the dissemination of governmental information. Disregard for the notion of public interest is one of the main problems of the Russian statute “On the Right to be Forgotten”.57 It forces search engine services to remove search results containing false, outdated or illegal information about a person regardless of whether this information is of public interest or not, as the representatives of the biggest Russian search engine service Yandex (2016) complained. Additionally, they criticised the statute for its unclear criteria for removals. They also claimed that Yandex processes users’ requests automatically and they lack legal and other tools to verify information. However, the law has not been revised to overcome these problems. Moreover, Russian criminals already used this statute to request the deletion of search results containing information about their criminal past (see “Businessman Sergei Mikhailov”, 2016). For the most part, Russian Internet laws fail to meet the criterion of legality laid down in the three-tier test. Most laws are adopted and become enforceable too quickly and without proper debates. Legal rules are often neither foreseeable nor even realistic enough, whilst they tend to ignore the specific characteristics of the Internet, in contradiction to the CoE standards. For example, the statute requiring the

Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending the Federal Statute on Information, Information Technologies, and Protection of Information, and Articles 29 and 402 of the Code of Civil Procedure”, No. 264-FZ of 13 July 2015.

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storage of personal data of Russians within the country58 fails to take into consideration that the Internet is a transboundary medium, although Article 12(2) of the CoE’s Convention for the Protection of Individuals with Regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data,59 ratified by Russia in 2013, directly prohibits the restriction of transborder flows of personal data for the purpose of privacy protection. Whilst some foreign companies, such as Google, eBay and PayPal, have already agreed to store Russians’ personal data on Russian servers, others, such as Facebook and Twitter, claim that this would be technically impossible. In turn, at the end of 2018, the Russian government urged to block access to these platforms if they fail to pass the Roskomnadzor’s inspection. It should be noted that the violation of this statute also led to Russian users being blocked from having access to the global social media site LinkedIn in 2016. Upon the requests of Russian authorities, the access to more than almost four hundred thousand sites is blocked and over 9 million sites were subject to blocking at least once, according to the data of the Russian NGO Roskomsvoboda.60 Apart from the content that would be interpreted as explicitly illegal from the CoE perspective, Russian authorities also apply blocking procedures against political dissent. This can be exemplified by the judicial order to remove from YouTube an investigative videos by Alexei Navalny, who is often considered to be the main oppositional leader in Russia, or the order to restrict access to an online portal, Open Russia, created by a former Russian tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky. The authorities also blocked public accounts of several communities on the most popular Russianlanguage social media VK that were created to discuss various sensitive issues, including the annexation of Crimea, homosexual rights and excessive power of the Russian Orthodox Church, to name a few. Although neither the blocking of LinkedIn nor of Telegram messenger (“Russia to block”, 2018) was directly associated with disseminating dissent, they may have had political connotations and revealed the vulnerability of online enterprises in Russia. It should be noted, however, that these cases are very selective. Nonetheless, many Russian sites instructing users how to bypass blocking are available in Russia, and users tend to overcome restricted access with the use of those anonymisers, VPN or other similar services. Most likely, these practices have adverse effect for democracy in Russia. Whilst they may contribute to the awareness of Russian users, they also undermine the idea of the rule of law and promote bypassing or even subverting laws. In conclusion, regulation of online content in Russia has been insufficiently consistent with international standards, despite its membership to the CoE. The Federal Statute of the Russian Federation “On Amending Some Legal Acts of the Russian Federation for Specifying Order of Personal Data Processing in Information and Telecommunication Networks”, No. 242-FZ of 21 July 2014. 59 Convention for the Protection of Individuals with Regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data. ETS No. 108, adopted on 28 January 1981; http://www.coe.int/en/web/conventions/full-list/-/ conventions/treaty/108. Accessed 10 October 2018. 60 Roskomsvoboda (2019); https://reestr.rublacklist.net/visual/. Accessed on 9 June 2019. 58

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governmental speech policies were deliberately liberal only in the early 1990s, before Russia’s accession to the CoE, when the country’s democratisation was supported by the Russian regime and society. Contrasting policies have been developed since the 2000s under the guise of protecting “national interests” or “information safety”, whose specific meanings in domestic law mainly imply content restrictions that may be used to shield Russia’s political establishment from criticism coming from both inside and outside the country. The Russian government does not reject the idea of online freedom of expression as such, but its vision of this freedom conceptually contrasts the one provided in the CoE standards. The government still views Internet regulation in light of the Soviet legal tradition that implies strong state interference in online expressions, whilst the CoE standards prohibit this. Russian government has assumed the role of Russian society’s only protector from various “information threats” and has excluded civil society and online businesses in Internet policy-making. No matter how detrimental these restrictions are to individual freedoms, such as free speech or the right to privacy, these are still mainly viewed in a Soviet way as “collective values”. The Constitutional Court is assigned to legitimise and promote the governmental vision amongst the Russian courts. Censoring practices in Russia have been digitalised but they still operate in a Soviet way. A state agency Roskomnadzor oversees their implementation by information intermediaries that have become new editors (or censors) to remove or filter content under the supervision of the governmental regulator (or censor, as well). Meanwhile, “the severity of the law in Russia is offset by the unlikelihood of its enforcement”, as the Russian (and Soviet) saying goes. With the rare exceptions of the Supreme Court’s clarifications, the implementation of the excessive Russian regulation of the Internet content is smoothed over by their selective and arbitrary implementation, whilst harsh Russian Internet laws mostly serve propaganda and deterrence. The Russian Internet keeps a room for free speech including the right to express alternative viewpoints or openly debate issues of public interest. However, they are mostly marginalised, whilst freedom of expression is subverted. In the long term, this approach might lead to a growing tension, as the Russian evolution of free speech has shown. The liberalisation of Russian regulations in the near future remains unlikely. Nevertheless, it can be suggested that online platforms might find a way to resist such restrictions by leading (rather than only maintaining) a dialogue with the Russian authorities if online services want their businesses to keep operating in the country which needs to develop a digital economy. The CoE, in concert with other international organisations, should assist Russian online services in this process. Russia’s dismissal of international standards signals to the other members that membership to international human rights organisations can be only a formality and that international standards can be ignored. Such a perspective considerably challenges the prestige of any system that protects human rights and values the Internet as a platform for communication and, therefore, should be addressed with adequate peaceful and effective measures.

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References Akdeniz, Y. (2016). Media freedom on the Internet: An OSCE guidebook. Vienna: The Representative on Freedom of the Media Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. Article 19. (2015, June 16). Europe: European court confirms Delfi decision in blow to online freedom. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://www.article19.org/resources/europe-euro pean-court-confirms-delfi-decision-blow-online-freedom/ Businessman Sergei Mikhailov took advantage of the “right to be forgotten.” (2016, May 30). World news, breaking news. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from http://sevendaynews.com/2016/ 05/30/businessman-sergei-mikhailov-took-advantage-of-the-right-to-be-forgotten/ Duffy, N. (2015). Internet freedom in Vladimir Putin’s Russia: The noose tightens. American Enterprise Institute Research. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://www.aei.org/wp-con tent/uploads/2015/01/Internet-freedom-in-Putins-Russia.pdf European Court of Justice rules against mass data retention in EU. (2016, December 21). DW. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from http://www.dw.com/en/european-court-of-justicerules-against-mass-data-retention-in-eu/a-36859714 Fedotov, M. (2001). Rossijskoe Pravo Massovoj Informacii na Fone Obshheevropejskih Standartov: Kontrasty i Polutona [Russian law on mass information against the background of common European standards: Contrasts and nuances]. Konstitucionnoe Pravo: Vostochnoevropejskoe Obozrenie, 3(36), 105–108. Freedom House. (2015). Freedom on the net: Russia 2014. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-net/2014/russia Ioffe, J. (2011, December10). Snow revolution. The New Yorker. https://www.newyorker.com/ news/news-desk/snow-revolution Jackson, C. (2016). Legislation as an indicator of free press in Russia. Problems of Postcommunism, 63(5), 354–366. Keller, P. (2011). European and international media law: Liberal democracy, trade, and the new media. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Klimenko prizval gotovit’sja k otkljucheniju Rossii ot mirovoj seti [Klimenko urged to prepare to disconnect Russia from the global network]. (2016, December29). Lenta.Ru. https://lenta.ru/ news/2016/12/29/klimenko MacAskill, E. (2014, April 24). Putin calls Internet a ‘CIA project’ renewing fears of web breakup. The Guardian. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/ 24/vladimir-putin-web-breakup-internet-cia McGonagle, T. (2016). Freedom of expression and defamation. Strasbourg: Council of Europe. Moody, G. (2015, June 16). Shock European court decision: Websites are liable for users’ comments. Ars Technica UK. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://arstechnica.co.uk/ tech-policy/2015/06/shock-european-court-decision-websites-are-liable-for-users-comments/ Norton. (2012). Norton cybercrime report. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from http://now-static. norton.com/now/en/pu/images/Promotions/2012/cybercrimeReport/2012_Norton_ Cybercrime_Report_Master_FINAL_050912.pdf Oster, J. (2015). Media freedom as a fundamental right. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Oster, J. (2017). European and international media law. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Perechen’ naimenovanij zaregistrirovannyh SMI. (2018). Register of mass media outlets. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from http://rkn.gov.ru/mass-communications/reestr/media/ Richter, A. (2012). One step beyond hate speech: Post-Soviet regulation of “extremist” and “terrorist” speech in the media. In M. Herz & P. Molnar (Eds.), The content and context of hate speech: Rethinking regulation and responses (pp. 290–305). New York: Cambridge University Press. Richter, A., & Richter, A. (2015). Regulation of online content in the Russian Federation: Legislation and case law. IRIS Extra, 5–24.

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Rohozinski, R. (2004). How the Internet did not transform Russia. Current History, 18(4), 334–338. Rossija podgotovilas’ k sozdaniju al’ternativnogo interneta [Russia has prepared to create alternative Internet]. (2018, July3). Lenta.Ru. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://lenta.ru/news/ 2018/07/03/internet/ Russia to block Telegram app over encryption. (2018, 13 April). BBC. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-43752337 Sherstoboeva, E. (2017). The evolution of a Russian concept of free speech. In M. Price & N. Stremlau (Eds.), Speech and society in turbulent times: Freedom of expression in comparative perspective (pp. 213–236). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. V Rossii nachinajut zakryvat’ ugolovnye dela za posty v internete [In Russia, criminal cases are closing for posts on the Internet]. (2018, October7). Roskomsvoboda. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://roskomsvoboda.org/42208/ Vajic, N., & Voyatzis, P. (2012). The Internet and freedom of expression: A “brave new world”and the European Court of Human Rights’ evolving case law. In J. Casadeval, E. Myjer, M. O’Boyle, & A. Austin (Eds.), Freedom of expression, essays in honour of Nicolas Bratza (pp. 319–420). Oisterwijk: Wolf Legal. Voorhoof, D. (2015, June 18). Delfi AS v. Estonia: Grand Chamber confirms liability of online news portal for offensive comments posted by its readers. Strasbourg Observers. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://strasbourgobservers.com/2015/06/18/delfi-as-v-estonia-grandchamber-confirms-liability-of-online-news-portal-for-offensive-comments-posted-by-itsreaders/ Yandex. (2016, March 15). O primenenii zakona o prave na zabvenie [On applying the Statute on the Right to Be Forgotten]. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://yandex.ru/blog/company/ o-primenenii-zakona-o-prave-na-zabvenie

Part III

Digital Culture

Digital Literacy Concepts and Measurement Sergey Davydov, Olga Logunova, Daria Maltseva, Alexander Sharikov, and Igor Zadorin

1 Theoretical Background The concept of “digital literacy” came into widespread use after the release of Paul Gilster’s book Digital Literacy edited in 1997 (Gilster, 1997). Gradually, the term has been actively used by other authors. Since the introduction of the book by Gilster a significant growth of publications on digital literacy has been observed. If, before 2004, this book was almost the only one in English on the subject, the number of publications on this topic has increased in recent years (see Digital . . ., 2013; Sharikov, 2018 et al.). It is important to emphasise that the concept of “literacy” arises in a world in which a certain phenomenon of sociocultural order appears and is widely spread. Thus, in the 1970s, the notion of “media culture” emerged as a generalised category, uniting such phenomena as “television, radio, audio and video recording, books, magazines, newspapers, cinema” (Monaco, 1978). At the same time, the concepts of “media literacy” (Houk & Bogart, 1974) and “media education” (Media Education, 1984) come about, within the framework of which the task is to master these mass media, to understand the specifics of their activities, including the threats that they

S. Davydov (*) · O. Logunova · A. Sharikov National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected] D. Maltseva National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia ZIRCON Research Group, Moscow, Russia e-mail: [email protected] I. Zadorin ZIRCON Research Group, Moscow, Russia e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_6

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may have towards the development of man and society. With the proliferation of personal computers, in their becoming widely implemented in various areas of professional activity and part of everyday life, the concept of “computer culture” (Evans & Clarke, 1984) and the corresponding need to create “computer literacy” ultimately translates into a compulsory school subject—computer science. Since the Internet has been widely spread in society, they started talking about “Internet culture” (Moore, 1995) and its corresponding “Internet literacy”. However, this state was short-lived, since it was covered by a new concept, which various authors refer to differently—“electronic culture” (e-culture) (Druckrey, 1996), or “digital culture” (Lister, 1995). The second term gave rise to the derivative concept of digital literacy. In Russia, the notion of digital literacy has been used in scientific publications since 2010 and was originally interpreted as “literacy in the use of modern technical digital tools” (Kuznecova, 2010). By the end of 2018, more than 200 publications— articles, books, et al., in the Russian language—were downloaded to the database of the Russian Science Citation Index (RSCI). Within the framework of this set, four basic approaches of Russian authors can be distinguished, which are conceptually different from each other, the infocommunication and technological approach (ICT approach), psychological and pedagogical approach, media and information literacy approach (MIL approach) and “industrial” approach, while each of these four approaches also has their own branches. The identified areas were comprehended in the framework of the “four-component model of digital literacy” proposed in 2016.

1.1

ICT Approach

Historically, this concept is an overarching term that encompasses earlier approaches to the formation of knowledge, skills, abilities and competencies at the time of the rapid spread of computer technologies and relies on the concepts of “computer culture”, “computer literacy”, “information culture” and “information literacy”, formed in the 1970s. This approach is distinguished by accented instrumentality, which is often expressed by the words “use”, “application”, “introduction”, etc. It is within the framework of this approach that the largest number of scientific publications in Russia is produced—approximately two thirds of the total number of papers are published with the keywords “digital literacy”. The scenario for the introduction of new components of the ICT approach is essentially the same, from case to case, and is triggered by a new technological achievement (new hardware or software, new channels of information transfer, etc.). Immediately the question is raised about how the professional community, and, later, the population, must master them, for which it is necessary to form a certain set of competencies. As such, the study of methods of use, application and implementation of these technological advances in various fields of human activity begins. A characteristic feature of the ICT approach is a relatively weak level of generalisation

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of the considered practices and the absence of a special theoretical platform in the consideration of the described processes. The concept of “digital literacy” in this approach does not carry any conceptual beginning, but simply fits into the general logic of the introduction of any innovation. This, in particular, is indicated by a very small number of theoretical publications, which are mainly of a thesis nature (Berman, 2017; Semenov, 2017).

1.2

Psychological and Pedagogical Approach

Within the framework of this approach, there are attempts to create theoretical concepts that, on the one hand, are based on the traditional achievements of the age and pedagogical psychology and, on the other hand, try to comprehend the realities of the newest practices. Thus, in connection with the expansion of access to the Internet in modern society, the problems of computer and Internet addiction of children and adolescents, cyberbullying, their involvement in dangerous games with calls for suicide, etc., are of great concern. Therefore, in addition to recognising the need for people to develop new competencies in the development of information and communication technologies, this area focuses on the problems of cybersecurity and on learning skills to withstand negative phenomena of a social nature. And one of the most important elements of such an approach is the formation of a person’s ideas about threats of a socio-psychological nature in the process of using new information and communication technologies. Within the framework of the general psychological and pedagogical approach in Russia, the concept of digital competence has been highlighted, developed by a group of researchers from the Faculty of Psychology of the Moscow State University under the direction of G.U. Soldatova. In the understanding of G. U. Soldatova and her colleagues, digital competence includes four components: knowledge, skills, motivation and responsibility; the last is related to security. The authors also highlight areas of life in which cyberspace creates problems. Among them are informational environment, the sphere of communication, the sphere of consumption and the technosphere. On this basis, the authors identify “four types of digital competence”: information and media competence, communicative competence, technical competence and consumer competence (Soldatova & Rasskazova, 2014). Within its framework, specific recommendations were developed on the formation of digital competencies among high school students, their parents and teachers (Soldatova, Zotova, Lebesheva, & Shlyapnikov, 2013).

1.3

Media and Information Approach

This approach is most often labelled as the concept of “media and information literacy” (MIL). It originated in the framework of the UNESCO international project

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“Information for All” and was established as an independent at the international conference “Media and Information Literacy in Knowledge Societies”, held in Moscow in 2012, in the final document entitled “The Moscow Declaration on Media and Information Literacy”. The MIL concept was the result of combining two directions that had existed autonomously since the 1970s—media education and information literacy. The first of these two areas unfolded at the intersection of communities of media researchers and educators, concerned about the negative impact of the media on the younger generation. The second largely united the library communities and those close to them. From the point of view of the MIL concept, digital literacy is only a special case tied to new media. Leading researchers from several dozen countries took part in the development of the concept of media and information literacy, which gives this area considerable weight. This approach emphasises the humanitarian features of information and communication technologies, both opening up to new opportunities for human development and creating threats that impede such development. This movement in Russia is coordinated by the Russian Committee of the UNESCO Information for All Program under the leadership of E.I. Kuzmin. The committee is active in this area—it organises conferences, inviting the most prominent specialists to attend, publishes collections of articles and other materials (Kuzmin & Parshakova, 2013; Kuzmin, Parshakova, Murovana, & Borisenko, 2017) and conducts workshops in Russian regions. As part of the media and information approach, a project was also launched to measure the media literacy of the Russian population, which in 2009–2016 carried out by a group of research companies ZIRCON1 (led by I.V. Zadorin) under the auspices of the Ministry of Communications of the Russian Federation (Voynilov, Maltseva, & Shubina, 2016; Zadorin, Maltseva, & Shubina, 2017). Below we will focus on the empirical achievements of the ZIRCON group of companies in the field of research.

1.4

Industrial Approach

Representatives of the information and communications technology industry, primarily the online business community, began to show an interest in digital literacy issues after they realised that their business development often rested on the lack of users’ competence. And they can only assess the prospects for their development by assessing the prospects for the development of digital literacy of the population. This promise led to the organisation in 2014 of the project, which received the code name

1 ZIRCON is an abbreviation, which, translated from Russian, means “Centre of intellectual resources and cooperation in social sciences”. http://www.zircon.ru/en/about/

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“Index of Digital Literacy” (IDL), that was implemented under the leadership of S.G. Davydov by a group of researchers from the National Research University Higher School of Economics and the non-profit organisation ROCIT.2 The development of the IDL and its operationalisation based on mass surveys made it possible to identify the level of digital literacy of the Russian population, which, in turn, made it possible to see how the regions of the country differ in terms of their capacity to introduce digital technologies. Conceptually, the IDL questionnaire uses in its reduced form the “four-component model of digital literacy”, which we will discuss below. In developing the IDL, three factors were used that were operationalised as three sub-indices, namely, the sub-index of digital consumption, the sub-index of digital competencies and the sub-index of digital security (Davydov & Logunova, 2015). Surveys conducted within the framework of the Index of Digital Literacy project have revealed a number of interesting trends and, in particular, allowed us to find the regions with the largest and smallest levels of the IDL in Russia. Below we will briefly consider the main achievements of this project. From 2016, the concept of “digital literacy” in Russia began to be linked to financial and economic problems of the country’s development as one of the main tools for the development of the digital economy. “Digital literacy” is now often viewed in conjunction with the concept of “financial literacy”. Publications such as “Possibilities of ensuring financial literacy of Russians in a digital society” (Kitajceva, 2016) or “Digital literacy as a growth driver” (Cifrovaya. . ., 2018), etc., appeared. The number of such studies increased rapidly in 2017, when at the level of the country’s top leadership, the priority development of the digital economy was announced. As a result, in 2017–2018 most of the scientific publications on digital literacy in Russia were of an economic nature.

1.5

Four-Component Digital Literacy Model

In 2014–2015, within the framework of the Index of Digital Literacy project, an original model was developed that took into account many years of international experience in the above-mentioned fields of media education, computer and information literacy, Internet literacy and other related areas (Sharikov, 2016, 2018). This model is based on two substantial oppositions: firstly, the opposition “technicaltechnological/socio-humanitarian” and, secondly, the opposition “opportunities/ threats”. The first follows from the traditional opposition of the technocratic vision of the problem (ICT approach, industrial approach, etc.) and humanitarian consideration (psychological-pedagogical and media and information approaches, etc.). The second opposition relies on the idea of development, which can be facilitated or

ROCIT is an abbreviation, which, translated from Russian, means “Regional Public Center for Internet Technologies”. ROCIT promotes the development and dissemination of Internet technologies in the interests of Russian citizens. https://rocit.ru 2

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Fig. 1 Dominant segments of digital literacy in the conventional space of “Socio-humanitarian— Technical and technological” and “Opportunities—Threats” (Sharikov, 2016, p. 92)

hindered by external forces. Then either new opportunities open up or threats to the normal development of the subject are created (both at the individual and social levels). In the designated conditional space in Fig. 1, there are four dominant areas of digital literacy. These are, primarily, technical and technological approaches, where the task of mastering the basics of using the Internet, including abilities and skills to find relevant information, as well as its storage and transmission (quadrant “technical and technological opportunities”) are considered. With this approach there is an obligation to master numerous information transfer tools, including e-mail, Skype, Viber, Telegram and systems, browsers and search engines similar to these, as well as information transfer form with the use of mobile devices and their possible connection to the Internet. In addition, an idea is given on how to store information on the Internet, use cloud technologies, FTP servers and others. The second group of approaches can be defined as “information and communication opportunities”. It develops traditional media literacy achievement, complementing their elements associated with the specifics of the new media. Here the focus is on the development of communicative skills and knowledge, especially in forums and chat rooms, blogs and social media. It also entails the task of creating one’s own information material—from simple texts and photos to the development of video, audio and their combinations. It also entails practising aspects of understanding media content, as well as one’s ability to evaluate and interpret. The third leading direction is connected with the technical and technological aspects of information security while using the Internet via computer and mobile devices (quadrant “technological threats”). Here the focus is on the protection of information from unauthorised access problem and its detractors: kidnapping, corruption, blocking, etc. Here we are taught how to get rid of spam, which has antivirus

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tools, Trojans, worms and other malware and spyware. Other issues concerning the protection of devices, software and information are also discussed. Finally, the fourth area of digital literacy focuses on the problems of psychological and socio-psychological security, as well as the ethical and legal aspects in the use of new media (quadrant “socio-psychological threats”). It includes the problems of Internet addiction and other addictions, cyberbullying, understanding the implications of a number of information and communication operations, such as putting some photos and videos online. On the other hand, this area also concerns piracy problems, the consequences of violation of the legislation on intellectual property and others. So, by 2018, in Russia there are at least four major areas in the study and practical application of the concept of “digital literacy”, designated above as: ICT approach, psychological and pedagogical approach, media and information approach and industrial approach. A synthesis of these approaches is reflected in the fourcomponent model of digital literacy.

2 Empirical Surveys: ZIRCON Studies on Media Literacy (2009–2016) The project “National monitoring of media education and media literacy” has been implemented by the ZIRCON Research Group since 2009 on the initiative and with the support of the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications of the Russian Federation. The project captures the self-assessments of Russian residents regarding various parameters of literate behaviour in the media and is carried out in the format of mass representative polls of the population. In 2014, the concept of media literacy was revised, and the studies of 2014–2015 were conducted with renewed methodological tools (Voynilov et al., 2016; Zadorin et al., 2017). In 2016, representative surveys were conducted in ten pilot regions of Russia, which made it possible to compare literacy in the field of media consumption of representatives of regions with different social and economic conditions (ZIRCON. . ., 2018).

2.1

Methodology

The project proceeds from the definition of media literacy presented by the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications, which includes five types of competencies: ● To effectively search and find the necessary information ● To protect oneself from malicious and redundant content ● To verify and critically evaluate information using alternative sources of information ● To adequately perceive information and effectively use it

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● To effectively and correctly disseminate information, taking into account the requirements of legislation (protection of personal data, copyright, counteraction to extremism, etc.) The research methodology allows not only to reveal the skills of handling information but also to build separate (based on the five types of competencies) and integral indices of information and media literacy of the Russian population. Separate indices are calculated as the sum of the points that are given to the respondent for each “competent” answer to questions related to each index. The integral index is a sum of separate indices, which can vary from 0 (no “correct” answers) to 35 (all “correct” answers). In 2009–2015, the data was collected through the all-Russian mass surveys using representative sample (by parameters of gender, age, education, type of settlement) of 1600 respondents. In 2016, the project implied the use of representative samples in ten Russian regions (500 respondents in each, 5011 respondents in total). Personal formalised interviews at the place of residence, based on a multistage stratified territorial random sample, were conducted according to a unified methodology of data collection.

2.2

All-Russian Surveys (2014–2015)

The general picture of the media literacy skills in Russia in 2015 is presented in Fig. 2 (Voynilov et al., 2016, pp. 107–108). For each skill, the share of respondents possessing it is indicated. The cells are coloured according to skill prevalence. The average values for the five separate media literacy indices for the 2 years of measurement are presented in Table 1. The obtained values are not high. Skills related to the ability to search and critically evaluate information (1, 3) are more common than those associated with skills to effectively use and correctly disseminate information (4, 5) and to protect oneself from unnecessary content (2). Based on the results of the integral indices, all respondents were divided into three groups according to their level of information and media literacy: 1. Low (0–11 points) 2. Medium (12–23 points) 3. High (24–35 points) Next, the shares of respondents having corresponding self-assessments of media literacy were calculated (see Fig. 3). A low level of media literacy is characteristic of 26% of the population of Russia, the medium, of 44%, and high, of 30%. Comparing to 2014, no significant changes were recorded. Table 2 presents this comparison (Voynilov et al., 2016, p. 111).

Can use the functions of parental control on the computer – 25%

personal data using the services via the Internet – 19%

Are able to determine the degree of confidentiality and security of the transfer of Are able to reveal the hidden information about additional payments for the use of the service – 28%

Strives to find out whose interests the media represents to evaluate information from newspapers, magazines, TV, radio – 41%

Are able to determine what information contains advertising – 67%

Are able to recognize the indication that a certain program is suitable for children and adolescents – 53%

Are able to recognize the situation of blackmail of information in the Internet – 18%

We agree that the Internet primarily provides opportunities for the transfer of professional and educational information – 57%

Familiar with the concept of “compromising evidence” - 68%

Are able to determine whether the information found in the Internet is trustworthy – 43%

Can notice the differences between information and other messages - opinions, judgments, criticism – 51%

Can make backup copies of files stored on the computer – 33%

Can check the computer for viruses – 55%

Are able to clean the computer of junk files – 57%

Are able to determine the degree of confidentiality and security of the transfer of personal data when using the services via the Internet – 21%

Know that it is inadmissible to transfer information about one`s passwords, codes (in Internet and bank) – 86%

Agree that posting some of the messages in the Internet can negatively affect one`s career and personal life – 61%

Agree that anonymity on the Internet is often deceptive - each user can be identified – 72%

6

Can create multiple user accounts on the same PC – 27%

Are able to change the settings of access to their information in social networks for different groups of users – 42%

Are able to delete the “history” of their actions on the Internet – 56%

Can change personal passwords on PCs and online services – 64%

Apply for e-government services – 24%

Managed a bank account through the Internet (Internet banking)– 25%

Paid for goods and services with electronic money (Yandex.Money, Web-money) -25%

Looked for work through the Internet – 34%

Bought and ordered goods and services in Internet shops – 38%

Played online games – 39%

Downloaded and updated the software – 48%

Specific skills, ability to use new media, , use internet-services and technical devices

Fig. 2 Indicators of media literacy by groups of skills and knowledge with quantitative estimates—the proportion of Russians with this skill or knowledge (2015)

Used search Internet services (Yandex, Google, etc.) during the last year - 90%

Can correctly formulate search queries - 60%

5 To effectively and correctly disseminate information

Familiar with the concept of Agreed that the usage of "plagiarism" - 54% electronic means of communication (sites, social networks, etc.) always implies the Familiar with the concept of collection of personal data– 60%

Familiar with the concept of "network addiction" - 60%

Agree that newspapers, radio stations, television channels and Internet portals can be both private and public – 68%

To adequately perceive information and effectively use it

"information war" - 56%

Agree that information received from the media can influence the thoughts and behavior of a person - 70%

Are able to collect information from different sources in order to get a full picture of the topic of interest - 69%

To verify and critically evaluate information using alternative sources of information

4

High

76 – 100 %

Familiar with the concept of "computer viruses"- 68%

To protect oneself from malicious and redundant content

To effectively search and find the necessary information

3

51 – 75 % Rather high

Familiar with the notion of “manipulation with information”- 58%

2

Low

1

26 – 50 % Rather low

0 – 25 %

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Table 1 Average values for separate media literacy indices

2.3

Separate index 1 2 3 4 5

2014 4.22 3.14 4.44 9.35 7.48

2015 4.23 3.12 4.38 8.69 6.83

Max, points 7 7 7 18 18

Survey in Ten Pilot Regions (2016)

Integral indices of information and media literacy for the ten surveyed regions are presented in the Table 3 (Zadorin et al., 2017, p. 134). Figures show that 36% the population of ten pilot regions assess their skills as low, 20% as high and remaining 44% as medium. These results differ quite significantly from the data on the whole population obtained in 2015. The obtained data confirmed the existence of differentiation in the levels of information and media literacy between ten pilot regions, which can be considered very significant. Leaders are Omsk and Sverdlovsk regions, as well as Moscow, where high average self-assessments of respondents can be associated with a higher level of criticality. Outsiders are the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania and the Astrakhan region. In spite of some limitations related to respondents’ self-assessment of their skills, the implemented methodology of studying the information and media literacy of the population makes it possible to measure the overall picture and differentiate individual objects of measurement.

3 Empirical Surveys: Index of Digital Literacy in Russian Regions (2015–2018) As mentioned above, since 2014 the National Research University Higher School of Economics in collaboration with non-profit organisation Regional Public Center for Internet Technologies (ROCIT) has conducted empirical research aimed to construct the Index of Digital Literacy (IDL) in Russian regions. This was the first project in this field aimed at measuring digital literacy in Russia. Three waves of research (once a year) were conducted in 2015–2017.

3.1

Methodology

The conceptual model to construct the Index of Digital Literacy consists of three parts:

0%

1%

2%

3%

4%

5%

6%

0

1

2

3

Ind_sum+

4

5

6

Low level

26%

7

8

9

10 11

Points

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

Middle level

44%

Fig. 3 Integral index of information and media literacy, 2015 (Voynilov et al., 2016, p. 110)

Share of respondents, %

7%

21 22 23

20%

24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32

33 34 35

Guaranteed high level

High level

30%

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114 Table 2 Integral index of information and media literacy, 2014–2015

S. Davydov et al. Level of index Low Medium High

2014 (%) 25 42 33

2015 (%) 26 44 30

● Digital consumption sub-index. This includes such parameters, as desktop and mobile Internet penetration, level of online news consumption, the availability of personal digital devices, the number of online media, the consumption of social media and the digital public services, etc. ● Digital competence sub-index. This includes such parameters, as competence in Internet search and critical perception of information, competence in the usage of online social networks, competence in online financial operations and consumption of goods and services via the Internet, competence in the use of mobile communication tools and producing multimedia content for the Internet, etc. ● Digital security sub-index. This includes such parameters, as attitude to software and media content piracy, ability to secure personal information and computer, level of communication culture in social networks, ethical norms in the placement of digital content, etc. In total, there were estimated 20 parameters in accordance with the results of the digital literacy concept. The IDL and its constituent sub-indices were given on a scale from 0 (no symptoms) to 10 (the most pronounced symptom). Briefly describe how each sub-index is constructed. The index and its sub-indices were based on main statistical sources—representative survey of Russians aged 18 years and older by research company WCIOM3 and Zircon (in 2018). The sample size was 1600 respondents. Method of data collection was face-to-face in-home interviews. A multistage stratified territorial random sampling was used. The universe is an all-Russian population aged 18+, represented by gender, age, level of education, type of settlement and regions. Interviews were collected in 46 regions of Russia, number of sampling point— 132. Random sampling error is ±3.4% (at the 95% confidence level). Data on the fixed and mobile Internet penetration, as well as on the level of social media consumption, was provided by TNS Russia research company. Data on the number of online media registered in the region was extracted from the Roskomnadzor4 database. Also demographic information of Rosstat5 by federal districts of the Russian Federation was used to calculate the parameter.

WCIOM is an abbreviation, which, translated from Russian, means “All-Russian Center for Public Opinion Research”, one of the leading research companies of the Russian Federation. https://www. wciom.com 4 Roskomnadzor is the short name of the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media of the Russian Federation. http://eng.rkn.gov.ru 5 Rosstat is the short name of the Federal State Statistics Service of the Russian Federation. http:// www.gks.ru/wps/wcm/connect/rosstat_main/rosstat/en/main/ 3

Arkhangelsk region (%) 34 44 22

Astrakhan region (%) 44 47 9

Moscow (%) 24 60 16

Kostroma region (%) 35 45 20

Omsk region (%) 30 38 32 Primorsky Krai (%) 39 42 19

Republic of Crimea (%) 32 45 22

Figures marked with bold type indicate results that are significantly higher than the average for ten regions

Low Medium High

On average in ten regions (%) 36 44 20

Table 3 Integral indices of information and media literacy for ten regions Republic of North OssetiaAlania (%) 50 40 10

Saratov region (%) 34 48 18

Sverdlovsk region (%) 35 34 31

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Results

From 2015 to 2017, we observed an increase of the index. The average figure of digital literacy is almost around 6 points in 2017. The level of digital literacy in Russia in 2015 was only 4.79 (see Fig. 4). The overall index this year increased and amounted to 5.99 with values of 6.41–4.17 according to the federal districts. The 2018 index is only 4.52. Figure 5 presents the results for the three sub-indices over the period 2015–2018. In 2015 the sub-index of digital consumption had the best rates (5.17), while the digital competence had the worst (4.48). The important point was the differences between the values of the three sub-indices. For instance, digital competence was between 7.89 and 2.16; thus the fluctuations in the values was more than 5.5 points. Moreover, the results of different sub-indices in the region were also not the same. In one federal district, we could observe the difference in the values of the sub-index by about 4.5 points.

4.79

2015 2016 2017 2018

5.42 5.99 4.52

0.

1.5

3.

4.5

6.

7.5

Fig. 4 Dynamics of the digital literacy index in Russia in 2015–2018

4.48 5.28

digital competences

6.84 5.44

digital consumption

5.17 5.49 5.35 4.49

digital security

4.85 5.57 5.43

2015 2016 2017 2018

3.30 0.0

1.75

3.5

5.25

7.0

Fig. 5 Dynamics of the IDL sub-indices in Russia in 2015–2018

8.75

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The results for IDL-2017 are higher. The first trend for the 2017 index relates to the growth of digital competence, which received the highest value among the sub-indices (in the last wave they took the third place). There is a noticeable trend of growth in the majority of competencies—from financial transactions via the Internet to the production of multimedia content. The second trend is associated with a stable growth of digital security; this positive trend of development was observed for 3 years. The gap between regions is minimised, while sub-index has ceased to be a “weak link” due to the growth of the online culture and the formation of a negative attitude to piracy media content and software. And the third sub-index (digital consumption) has not grown so fast; this is connected with the level of Internet penetration that has increased only slightly, in terms of the consumption of social networks. The main driver in this sphere is the consumption of digital public services. In 2018, the situation is different: the value of the digital security sub-index is the lowest, while the highest is for the digital competences. Digital consumption is in second place. Digital competencies are growing and expanding in diversity; people have many devices going constantly, which entails a tendency for people to selfimprove and master all new behaviours, for the convenience of communication, payment, data transfer, etc. The active usage leads to a higher level of knowledge, which can explain the decline in digital security—now the users understand the difference between legal and pirated content and software and think about the security of online payments. The research reveals significant disproportions in the level of digital literacy in the federal districts of Russia. In 2016 the regions have shown an overall growth and reduction of imbalances. The highest integral value of the index is observed in the Northwestern Federal District, which is also leading in many separate indicators. Second place goes to the Central Federal District, in which there are significant differences between the situation in Moscow and other regions around the capital of Russia. The Northwestern Federal District also takes first place in terms of digital consumption (high level of the desktop Internet penetration, the consumption of social media and digital public services) and digital competence. It is important to note that the high level of the competence is in the use of mobile communication tools. At the same time, the Northwestern Federal District region ranks only seventh in the value of digital security sub-index. A similar situation is observed with the protection of personal data. Although the expected leaders, Saint-Petersburg and Leningrad region, demonstrate a high level of digital consumption and digital competence, their position in terms of digital security ranks as an average figure. The Northwestern Region has retained its place in terms of the ICG in 2018. Such as the case 3 years ago, it is the leader in digital consumption and digital competencies. That district has significantly improved digital security position, having moved from seventh place to second. Second place goes to the Central Federal District in 2016. This includes Moscow, the city with the highest level of digital literacy in relation to other regions of the

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Russian Federation. The Central Federal District holds second place in terms of digital consumption as well. Other two sub-indices of the IDL’s give the third places to the region. In the case of digital competence it is important to note a high level of competencies in the field of consumption of goods and services via the Internet and a relatively low level of consumption of multimedia content for the Internet. In 2018, the Far Eastern District went from third to second place. It retained the leadership in the field of digital security and increased in terms of digital consumption from third to second place. However, it managed to get ahead of the Central Federal District primarily due to the significant development of digital competencies (from seventh to second). We noted the potential of this region in the first wave of measurements. Over the last 4 years, an outsider has emerged. In 2015, the Crimean Federal District became part of the Southern Federal District. In 2016, the Southern Federal District including Crimea came last. As of 2018, the North Caucasus Federal District closed the list of regions, being in eighth place. It takes the same rank in the sub-indices of digital competencies and digital consumption. Regional disproportions of media systems development in Russia are associated with the size of the settlement. In large cities the media environment is significantly better developed than in small towns and rural settlements. The results of the study indicate that different federal districts of the country do have some features of media systems. As such, an important direction of IDL development is its calculation for the subjects of the Russian Federation. The value of the data collected in the framework of the project is not limited by the ranking of regions. Calculation of sub-indices and indicators show the gap in development of digital literacy in each region. For example, the Far Eastern and Southern Federal districts demonstrate a high level of literacy in the field of digital security; however, the status of digital competences in the first case and digital consumption in the second case doesn’t look so optimistic. The next step in the development of the Index of Digital Literacy should be the ratings of separate subjects of Russian Federation. Finally, it is necessary to mention that digital literacy “and its friends”6 are being actively discussed at various levels. However, the international discussions organised by UNESCO within the framework of the “Information for All” programme put emphasis on the integrative role. The so-called Moscow Declaration on Media and Information Literacy defines MIL as a “combination of knowledge, attitudes and skills, and practices, required to access, analyse, evaluate, use, produce and communicate information and knowledge in creative, legal and ethical ways that respect human rights” (Kuzmin & Parshakova, 2013, p. 348). Digital literacy is proposed to be viewed as a part of media and informational literacy, and in general this concept can be accepted. The participants of UNESCO discussions are mostly representatives of academic circles, media and state cultural institutions.

Expression used by A. Boekhorst to underline a big variety of “literacies” as “media literacy”, “information literacy”, “Internet literacy”, et al. (Boekhorst, 2013).

6

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4 Conclusion Thus, we have looked at the field of digital literacy studies in Russia since 2010. We have identified four main theoretical areas that describe the notion of digital literacy in actual Russian scientific publications, namely: ICT approach, psychological and pedagogical approach, media and information literacy approach and “industrial” approach. The mentioned areas were generalised within the “four-component model of digital literacy”. We also considered two areas of special surveys aimed at identifying the competence of the population in digital literacy at the empirical level: first, within the framework of the concept of media and information literacy and, second, within the “industrial” approach (Index of Digital Literacy). The general trend of both empirical surveys shows the growth both of the media literacy and digital literacy. It should be noted that the problem of digital literacy is actively discussed both in the academic community and in public, which allows us to expect new research in this sphere.

References Berman, N. D. (2017). K voprosu o cifrovoj gramotnosti [On the issue of digital literacy]. Sovremennye issledovaniya social’nyh problem, 8(6–2), 35–38. Boekhorst, A. (2013). Media- i informacionnaya gramotnost’ i eyo “podrugi” [Media and information literacy and its “friends”]. In E. I. Kuzmin & A. V. Parshakova (Eds.), Media- i informacionnaja gramotnost’ v obshhestvah znanija [Media and information literacy for knowledge societies] (pp. 32–39). Moscow: Interregional Library Cooperation Centre. Cifrovaya gramotnost’ kak drajver rosta [Digital literacy as a growth driver]. (2018). Universitetskaya kniga 5, 34–39. Davydov, S. G., & Logunova, O. S. (2015). Proekt “Indeks cifrovoj gramotnosti”: Metodicheskie eksperimenty [Digital literacy index project: Methodological experiments]. Sociologiya: Metodologiya, metody, matematicheskoe modelirovanie, 41, 120–141. Digital literacy: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications. (2013). Hershey, PA: Information Science Reference. Druckrey, T. (1996). Electronic culture: Technology and visual representation. New York: Aperture. Evans, S. H., & Clarke, P. (1984). The computer culture. Indianapolis: White River Press. Gilster, P. (1997). Digital literacy. New York: Wiley. Houk, A., & Bogart, C. (1974). Media literacy: Thinking about. Dayton, OH: Pflaum/Standart. Kitajceva, O. V. (2016). Vozmozhnosti obespecheniya finansovoj gramotnosti rossiyan v cifrovom obshchestve [Opportunities to ensure financial literacy of Russians in a digital society]. In L. N. Ruliene, I. A. Malanova & N. A. Lobanova. Ulan-Udeh, Obrazovanie cherez vsyu zhizn’: nepreryvnoe obrazovanie v interesah ustojchivogo razvitiya Materialy vtorogo ehtapa 13-j Mezhdunarodnoj konferencii [Life-long education: continuing education for sustainable development. Materials of the second stage of the 13th International Conference] (pp. 189–193). Kuzmin, E., & Parshakova, A. (Eds.). (2013). Media and information literacy for knowledge societies. Moscow: Interregional Library Cooperation Centre. Kuzmin, E., Parshakova, A., Murovana, T., Borisenko, A. (Eds.). (2017). Media and information literacy for building culture of open government. Proceedings of the international conference

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(Khanty-Mansiysk, Russian Federation, 7–10 June 2016). Moscow: Interregional Library Cooperation Centre. Kuznecova, A. V. (2010). Znachenie profilaktiki komp’yuternoj addikcii u mladshih shkol’nikov [The value of the prevention of computer addiction in younger students]. Gercenovskie chteniya. Nachal’noe obrazovanie 1(2), 181–187. Lister, M. (1995). The photographic image in digital culture. London: Routledge. Media Education. (1984). Paris: UNESCO. Monaco, J. (Ed.). (1978). Media culture: Television, radio, records, books, magazines, newspapers, movies. New York: Dell Publishing. Moore, D. W. (1995). The emperor’s virtual clothes: The naked truth about Internet culture. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books. Semenov, M. S. (2017). Struktura IKT-kompetentnosti [The structure of ICT competence]. In Informatizaciya obrazovaniya: teoriya i praktika sbornik materialov Mezhdunarodnoj nauchno-prakticheskoj konferencii [Informatization of education: Theory and practice, a collection of materials of the International Scientific and Practical Conference] (pp. 299–302). Sharikov, A. V. (2016). O chetyrekhkomponentnoj modeli cifrovoj gramotnosti [On the fourcomponent model of digital literacy]. Zhurnal issledovanij social’noj politiki, 14(1), 87–98. Sharikov, A. V. (2018). Koncepcii cifrovoj gramotnosti: Rossijskij opyt [Digital literacy concepts: Russian experience]. Communication Media Design, 3(3), 96–112. Soldatova, G. U., & Rasskazova, E. I. (2014). Psihologicheskie modeli cifrovoj kompetentnosti rossijskih podrostkov i roditelej [Psychological models of digital competence of Russian adolescents and parents]. Nacional’nyj psihologicheskij zhurnal, 2(14), 27–35. Soldatova, G., Zotova, E., Lebesheva, M., & Shlyapnikov, V. (2013). Cifrovaya gramotnost’ i bezopasnost’ v internete: Metodicheskoe posobie dlya specialistov osnovnogo obshchego obrazovaniya [Digital literacy and Internet safety: A manual for specialists in basic general education]. Moscow: Google. Voynilov, Y. L., Maltseva, D. V., & Shubina, L. V. (2016). Mediagramotnost’ v Rossii: Kartografiya problemnyh zon [Media literacy in Russia: Cartography of problem zones]. Kommunikacii Media Dizajn 1(2), 95–114. Retrieved May 23, 2018, from https://cmd-jour nal.hse.ru/article/view/4478/8404 Zadorin, I. V., Maltseva, D. V., & Shubina, L. V. (2017). Uroven’ mediagramotnosti naseleniya v regionah Rossii: sravnitel’nyj analiz [The media literacy level of the population in the regions of Russia: A comparative analysis]. Kommunikacii Media Dizajn 2(4), 123–141. Retrieved May 23, 2018, from https://cmd-journal.hse.ru/article/view/7477/8462 Zircon Research Group. (2018). Sociology of media and mass communications. Retrieved May 23, 2018, from http://www.zircon.ru/publications/sotsiologiya-smi-i-massovykh-kommunikatsiy/

Journalistic Cultures: New Times, New Gaps? Svetlana Bodrunova and Kamilla Nigmatullina

1 Introduction The changing professional standards and values of modern journalists constitute an important topic of today’s media research for several reasons. The development of digital environment, production technologies and content distribution, and changes in the nature of work itself have led to a need to rethink and re-assess the standards and values of the journalistic profession in the context of these technological changes (Saltzis & Dickinson, 2008), as well as to battle new ethical challenges in journalists’ work (Christians, 2009). This worldwide process has had its peculiarities in the post-Soviet space where a major political transition coincided with the outburst of media technologies. Due to this, modernisation of journalistic deontology was multidimensional. First of all, it went along the “post-Soviet vs. Anglo-Saxon” axis (Litvinenko, 2013) which comprised paradigmatic differences in the mission of journalism and its societal functions, style, and construction of audience trust, including objectivity rituals. The differences mirrored a particular structure of sociopolitical cleavages also echoed strongly in the media market, including the audience niches, political alignment, and sets of standards and practices that the media chose (Bodrunova & Litvinenko, 2013, 2015; Toepfl, 2011). Second, journalism has gone through the tech-based innovations in print and TV production, the newspaper crisis, and globalisation of formats and platforms, but ex-Soviet newspaper brands (like Komsomolskaya Pravda or Izvestia) and later home-grown projects (like Kommersant) remained at least as powerful as the local offspring of the global media giants. Thus, despite the fact that both dimensions of change lay within the logic of westernisation, they did not necessarily go along

S. Bodrunova (*) · K. Nigmatullina St. Petersburg State University, St. Petersburg, Russia e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_7

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together in all cases—that is, technological advancement did not guarantee the shift in professional ideology. The third dimension of change has been media hybridisation (Chadwick, 2013)— that is, the growth of the online segment of both “classic” journalism and usergenerated content. As elsewhere, it has brought along both hybrid and online-only media and drew new lines of audience segmentation. But Russia differed substantially from the Western democracies due to the relatively low importance of usergenerated content in reshaping the deep sociopolitical fragmentation of the media market, while, in 2000s, online-only media outlets played a significant role in the formation of the liberal “alternative-agenda” media cluster (Bodrunova & Litvinenko, 2015; Kiriya, 2012). Each of the three axes, as well as generational differences, fostered particular kinds of gaps and divisions within the journalistic community. Despite the appearance of several important research projects featuring contemporary Russian journalistic culture in a comparative perspective, we argue that the values-based heterogeneity of today’s journalistic community in Russia has, so far, not been well addressed. We, thus, aim at showing group differences in the Russian journalistic community, including differences in media format, personal and professional features of journalists, and the values they adhere to. To do this, we use data obtained by a survey of 121 questions answered by 194 journalists from all around Russia. In our analysis, we focus on hybrid and online-only textual media, as analysing both textual and audiovisual media markets in one grasp would potentially blur the picture for each of the segments. To validate our results, we have also conducted six in-depth interviews with leading editors in Moscow and St. Petersburg and used a database of 30 interviews with younger-generation media managers provided by Mail.ru Group.

2 Media and Modernisation in Russia: Values-Based Cleavages and Political Polarisation in an Environment of Growing Digitalisation To elaborate upon our research questions and hypotheses, we need to assess the relevant context of media development in Russia of the recent years. For that, we will (in very short) reflect upon how the societal, technological, generational, and deontological cleavages mentioned above have affected the journalistic life in today’s Russia. Beside the peculiarities of the Russian media model well described before, including the coexistence of formal rules and informal conventions, and state-driven vs. market-driven trends in the market (Vartanova, 2012), we see the necessity to address several more gaps that could have influenced the structure and integrity of the Russian journalistic community.

Journalistic Cultures: New Times, New Gaps?

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Socio-economic and Values-Based Divisions in the Society and Media

The country-level research links Russian journalism to modernisation theories and practices (Vartanova, 2013). As both historians and social economists show, the multi-speed modernisation of the Russian social strata in late Soviet and perestroika times has led to deep socio-economic cleavages in today’s Russia (Vartanova, 2013; Zubarevich, 2011, 2014). The post-Soviet “declassed” society lacked class identity and economically bound competitive politics. In such circumstances, the main ground for social divisions, unlike in established democracies with developed free trade economies, was not class but the value gap that may be defined as “innovation vs. stability”. In the case of Russia, as Zubarevich (2011) notes, the cleavages are even more complicated, as there are also huge rural and “ethnic” societal clusters, and they belong neither to the “first” cosmopolitan and innovation-accepting Russia nor to the “second” Russia of stability seekers. These “four Russians”, in turn, demanded the formation of media clusters that would correspond to these societal strata (Bodrunova & Litvinenko, 2015; Toepfl, 2011), with several implications. First, these divisions have been sharp enough to produce the idea of “four media systems in Russia” (Toepfl, 2011), “nationwide public counter-sphere” (Bodrunova & Litvinenko, 2013), or “parallel media” (Kiriya, 2012) within the hugely divided Russian media system (Kachkayeva & Kiriya, 2012). All these definitions tell of the low capacity for the fragmented public sphere to create discussion milieus shared by societal macro-clusters, which further contributes to the divergence of journalism practices and value sets oriented to the socially limited “filter bubbles”. Second, for the “third” and “fourth Russia”, one media anthropological study (Kiriya, 2014) problematised “identification denial” in medium- and low-wage sociocultural communities as a result of consuming media that did not represent the respective audiences in topicality and identity. The same study captured the crisis of value orientations (traditionalism in the presence of consumerism): both traditionalist values and vital needs dominated the minds of individuals and organised their media consumption practices.

2.2

Media-Political Divisions

The socio-economic cleavages described above have found their explication in the country’s political life. The Russian political spectrum is based not on classic leftright principle but on the division between the “systemic powers” and “non-systemic opposition” (Gel’man, 2012; White, 2012) who, in political marketing terms, are targeting the “pro-stability second Russia” and “pro-innovative first Russia”, respectively. With rare exceptions, federal-level media have been adhering to one of these camps. This polarisation gradually formed in the beginning of the 2000s (Becker, 2004) but did not radically manifest itself until after the global recession, leaving

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room in the 2000s for journalistic neutrality despite the growing ties between national media and political establishment (Bodrunova, 2013), quite in line with the elite continuity theory and its implications for media systems (Nordenstreng, 2001; Sparks, 2008). The polarisation opened up during the “protest winter” of 2011–2012 (Bodrunova & Litvinenko, 2013; Denisova, 2016) when the national business dailies moderately solidarised with the oppositional movement while the post-Soviet tabloids and the federal TV channels continued to promote “traditional values” and spoke of a threat of Ukraine-like “orange revolutions” (Sherstobitov, 2014; Strukov, 2012b). At this point, the national and regional authorities demonstrated high efficiency in both managing public outrage (Toepfl, 2011) and neutralising autonomous media (Fredheim, 2017; Morev & Byhovskaya, 2012), thus putting to question the aggregate survival of Western-oriented standards in the Russian journalism. The second wave of polarisation was linked to the Crimea referendum, the military conflict in the Donbass area, and the operation against ISIS in Syria. Due to the international nature of these events, most English language scholarly research has focused on Russian efforts to influence public opinion abroad (see, i.e., BonchOsmolovskaya, 2015; Gerber & Zavisca, 2016; Khaldarova & Pantti, 2016; Stent, 2017). Only a handful of works have reviewed the changes in the in-country practices of news production and control of Internet media (Oates, 2016; Slavtcheva-Petkova, 2018; Zvereva, 2016). But from these works, as well as reflections by journalists and commentators, one could conclude that the division between pro-establishment and anti-systemic discourses in the Russian media became deeper. Political polarisation in media content and editorial orientations has led to two phenomena in the journalistic community. First, the two journalistic groups became much more hostile, sometimes “non-handshakeable”, towards each other (see, e.g., Lenta.ru, 2012). Low journalistic solidarity has manifested itself in conflicts between trade unions and associations of publishers. Second, neutrality in reporting attained by equally distancing themselves from politically polar views fostered not unification but further fragmentation of the public sphere and journalistic community: pursuing balanced reporting often led to being labelled “oppositional”. The regional dimension of the same process has been linked to the ownership status of the local media, as many of the small newspapers are published by city authorities or local municipalities. Scholars have described regional peculiarities in perceptions of roles (Pasti & Pietiläinen, 2008) and of the community itself (Lowrey & Erzikova, 2013), as well as in avoiding political pressures (Erzikova & Lowrey, 2010), but not in other professional values.

Journalistic Cultures: New Times, New Gaps?

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The Russian Print and Online Media: Regionalisation and Hybridisation

The trends on the Russian market of text-based media followed the general global trends only to a certain extent. National trends that seem to matter for heterogeneity of the journalistic cultures were the following. First, in the early 2000s, regionalisation of the print media market took place, with national, regional, and local and rural newspaper segments, each comprising roughly one third of the consumed circulation (Vartanova, 2013: 75). In the 2010s, the overall circulation has fluctuated between 8 and 10 billion copies annually (according to Rosstat), while the market has been stable enough to integrate a lot of technological innovations. But, on the other side, levels of advancement of the Russian regional media vary greatly, according to the Development Index of the Russian Media Sphere (2014–2017), thus adding to the widening gap between the cities and the periphery. Second, it is the peculiar face of offline/online media parallelism. Dominance of online-only media among the online citation leaders throughout 2010–2017 (according to Medialogia telemetric agency) was the marker of the gap between the audiences of “TV-oldies” and “digital aborigines” (see Vartanova, 2013: 72). In 2010s, print media have dominated the regional markets with 56% of print-only consumption plus 15% of hybrid (print + online) consumption (according to Association of Audited Media for 2017), while the share of hybrid consumption of the national titles is significantly higher. This squeezed the online-only outlets into searching for audience niches; nonetheless, several online-only outlets, like Lenta. ru or Gazeta.ru, occupied a notably bigger share in online media consumption in Russia than their online counterparts in most West European democracies. Growth of consumption of online media added to the feeling of “post-broadcast era” (Strukov, 2012a), but, especially for the population of 35+ years old, it is not yet the case (Vartanova & Kolomiets, 2017: 30). Third, the gap between online-savvy outlets and digital beginners continues to grow, not diminish. On one hand, there are the websites of local papers that replicate their pages online; on the other hand, there are “meta-media” that parasitise a communicative platform and its ecosystem, such as Telegram media-like channels or public pages in Vkontakte. Despite the fact that there is no nationwide The Huffington Post-type media giant based on user-generated content, in several regions, e.g., in the Far East region, messenger channels have become important local news sources. Recently, cross-regional media projects (like Znak or Sol’) have started to appear. By 2011, this gap gained a qualitative dimension when a range of alternativeagenda media appeared throughout Russia (Bodrunova, 2013). Their way of discussing international, social, and cultural events turned them into means of social and political critique and, along with the “classic” oppositional outlets, contributed to forming the pre-protest consensus of 2011–2012 (Bodrunova & Litvinenko, 2013). For them, the cleavage was not online/offline based, as some of them were

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hybrid; the gap lay in orientation to the individual rather than to mass audience, politicisation via asking common-sense questions, and resistance to simplification. A meeting point for the “creative class”, these media slightly blurred the boundaries between media and activism, as their editorial goals implied the construction of “we” identity in their audiences (Eltsova, 2014). This has, allegedly, added to the divisions in the understanding of journalistic roles in the Russian media community.

3 Studies of the Russian Journalistic Community: Is Heterogeneity Addressed? Recently, major cross-country research projects that featured the Russian journalistic community in comparative perspective were five: “Worlds of Journalism” (2007–2011, 2012–2015), “The Global Journalist for the 21st Century” (2012), “Journalism in Change: Professional Journalistic Cultures in Poland, Russia and Sweden” (2011–2015), “Media systems in flux: the challenge of the BRICS countries” (2012–2016), and “Journalistic Role Performance” (2013–). They have provided valuable input on most aspects of journalistic life in today’s Russia. They addressed cleavages in wages, age, and other data but did not focus on finding the gaps in professional orientations and described the community as a whole, just as other comparative works did (Balaban & Meyen, 2011). Also, in these projects, the studies of journalistic communities were conducted either before or within the second polarisation wave, and the gaps that were found were not linked to each other. Today, we see a need for reassessment of the state of the journalistic community and the cleavages that have recently shown up. So far, almost no research has questioned the unanimity and integrity of the Russian journalistic culture, even after national-level differences were shown in other countries (Nygren, 2012; Willnat & Weaver, 2014) and the complexity of journalism culture was theoretically interpreted as linked to both national traditions and more universal professional cultures (Harro-Loit, 2015). Today’s Russian context presents a case in which national journalistic culture is a mosaic containing practices and value sets of a post-Soviet, newly bred Russian, and Western-oriented nature. The Russian case has a potential to show whether the integrity of journalistic cultures should be rethought. First, a nation-state might not be that appropriate as a unit of analysis in crosscultural studies of journalistic practices; second, there may be cross-country similarities in how national journalistic cultures split within themselves. Research claims that the post-Soviet vs. Anglo-Saxon paradigmatic differences in journalistic value, norm, and practice sets have been crucial throughout the postSoviet period (Litvinenko, Smoliarova, Bekurov, Puiy, & Glinternik, 2015; Wu, Weaver, & Johnson, 1996). Gavra and Strovsky (2016) show that, historically, the post-Soviet paradigm was in many ways rooted in the tsarist tradition of censorship, thus making it more long term than most critics would think. During the second

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polarisation wave, one sees the revival of the Soviet model for which values, including the professional ones, were part of the mechanisms of ideological dominance. But, in the climate of new polarisation and technological renovation, one needs to re-assess whether “the post-Soviet vs. the Western” remains relevant for the description of the major cleavage between the Russian journalistic cultures. To do this, we will focus on the value sets used in previous studies (see, e.g., Anikina, Frost, & Hanitzsch, 2017, as based on questionnaires of 2011 - see Hanitzsch et al. 2011) but (1) adapt them more to the Russian context and (2) expand the understanding of post-Soviet vs. Anglo-Saxon cleavage to “stability vs. modernisation” one, making it multidimensional. Other researchers have shown that there are also generational and national/regional differences in journalistic role conceptualisations, media management practices, and use of digital tools (Anikina, 2012, 2013; Pasti, 2007; Pietiläinen, 2002; Smirnova, 2013). One study has also found that, in Russia, unlike in the USA, the differences between the strong “state order” and weak “professional order” are linked to the divide in acceptance/ neglect of “digital network” logic (Lowrey & Erzikova, 2014). One more study (Juntti-Henriksson & Ivanishcheva, 2011), qualitative by nature, used an approach similar to ours in terms of predefining the online/hybrid, national/regional, and format variables and showed the differences between Ekaterinburg and St. Petersburg in these respects, similar to the differences in values between journalists in traditional and new media shown by Gavra and Strovsky (2016). We will follow and expand this approach. Thus, based on the previous studies, the axes of our research will be four: 1. Standards and models: orientation to the best practices of the twentieth-century Soviet/Russian journalism vs. to the Anglo-American model with separation of fact and comment, impartiality, and balance of sources 2. Functions: enlightenment, upbringing, and analysis vs. informing, scrutinising authorities, and providing a forum for diverse social groups and political ideologies 3. Role of technological changes: non-substantial vs. substantial for transformation of the core of the profession 4. Role of new communication formats: separation between professional and userbased media projects vs. blurring of professional boundaries and pursuing universal media literacy and participation These axes need to be studied in conjunction with sociopolitical changes in the society, tech-based working conditions, political polarisation, and generational structure of the journalistic community. Of what is said above, one can expect that the divisions in the journalistic community of Russia may form along two types of lines. First, there are natural divisions that derive from working conditions: 1. Personal: ● Generational, which includes age and time of entering the profession (Erzikova & Lowrey, 2012; Juskevits, 2002; Pasti, 2005; Rodina, 2010) and

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remains relevant despite the “systemic continuity” (Nordenstreng, 2001: 221) of the (neo-)Soviet features in the Russian media system (Oates, 2007) ● Gender-based (on which the research is so far minimal) ● Educational (whether journalistic education matters for standards and acceptance of innovations) 2. Professional: topicality of publications (public affairs/not), editorial position (journalists/editors), belonging to a journalistic union, and the amount of experience in profession 3. Organisational/industrial: ● Platform-based: the differences between journalists working for hybrid and online-only media ● National/regional, which, with regard to the “four Russias” divisions, we would re-conceptualise as “Moscow + St. Petersburg vs. other regions” ● Ownership-dependent: the differences between working in state-owned/ affiliated and private media enterprises (Rodina, 2010) ● Political: the differences in political positioning of the media outlets Second, there are gaps in practices and value orientations that form more as a result of various types of pressures: 4. Normative: the differences in personal values, journalistic norms, role perceptions, and standards in newsgathering, content creation, and relations with audience 5. Tech-based: the differences in wish and capability of catching up with technological innovations and using them in working routines In our study, we aim to see whether conditions for professional performance (1–3) are linked to the resulting professional views (4 and 5). Thus, three major research questions arise from this list: RQ1: Are differences in professional deontology and in willingness to accept innovations linked to the other gaps, and in what way? Does acceptance of tech innovations go along with the cleavages in values, or, rather, does it represent a separate ground for divisions in the journalistic community of Russia? RQ2: Are the gaps big enough to say that there are several journalistic cultures in Russia, either norm, platform, reach, or generation based? RQ3: Is the “post-Soviet vs. Western cleavage” still relevant for the description of the gaps in the journalistic community? As our study is of exploratory nature, we will not reformulate the RQs as hypotheses; instead, we will address the RQs from several methodological angles.

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4 The Research Design and Methodology 4.1

The Research Design

To address our research questions, we have conducted a mixed-method study. First, we have conducted a survey among Russian journalists and used descriptive statistics and clustering to define the divergent groups within our respondent panel. Second, we have amplified our results with six in-depth interviews with leading journalists and editors; we have also used a set of 30 interviews about today’s trends in journalism of 2015–2017 based on Russian editorship from the Mail.ru Group database.1 For the quantitative part, we surveyed the Russian journalists. We used a questionnaire partly based on those by “Worlds of Journalism” and “Media systems in flux” but adapted it for the in-country level of enquiry. The survey contained a list of questions that we regrouped into eight domains, including respondents’ metadata, journalistic approaches, basic motivations and functions in profession, (un)due practices, ethical constraints and freedoms, factors of impact (on individual, organisational, and external level), factors of change (on the same levels), and journalists’ trust towards social actors. To shorten the questionnaire and raise the response rate, we excluded several questions on salary, employment, contract, and paid activities, as well as ethnic group belonging and religious affiliation as seemingly less relevant within the Russian media community, according to the literature review. Also, birth year was replaced by three age groups, for us to be able to trace generational gaps; we also enlarged topical specialisations and added a group of questions to the first section of the questionnaire, namely, the amount of professional experience, number of job changes within the last 15 years, changes of media ownership in the media a given respondent belonged to, and ideological positioning of the media (pro-/anti-establishment). We also added a ninth domain for selfreporting categories on perceptions of general change in the profession, orientation to the best examples of the Soviet times, openness to experimenting, and acceptance of competition, including that with amateur reporters. The questionnaire contained 121 questions altogether.

4.2

Sampling

With the absence of clear criteria of belonging to the profession, the overall number of journalists in Russia is hard to determine; neither Rosstat nor the Federal Agency on the Press and Mass Communication can provide data on this. Earlier estimates tell of roughly 150,000 journalists in Russia of mid-2000s; of them, 8% worked for online media (Anikina & Johansson, 2013: 69); this figure also appeared in other 1

Courtesy to Mail.ru Group.

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studies (Smirnova, 2013). Since then, the proportion of online-only media channels has grown substantially; we assume that the number of journalists working for them has also grown. But, at the same time, their formal belonging to the profession may be put under question, as many news websites, especially regional and local, do not register as media and, thus, cannot formally accredit their staff as journalists. Also, hybridity in terms of multichannel content production is definitely there (Anikina & Johansson, 2013: 75), as the average number of platforms that every journalist works on was 1.5 as early as in 2013. All this made us cautious in terms of sampling; we would include into our survey sample the journalists formally attached to their editorial offices, but in this case we might get highly distorted results if we focus only on online media staff. Our sampling strategy, thus, was built on understanding the proportions of online/offline media in the federal and regional media markets. Unlike in previous studies (Gavra & Strovsky, 2016; Pasti & Ramaprasad, 2016), we did not formally divide our sample into journalists from hybrid and online media but made this distinction one of the variables. In total, we contacted over 400 journalists in 56 of 87 Russian regions; the response rate was almost 50%, and we managed to receive 200 questionnaires, of which 194 were used, as 6 were only half-filled out. We aimed at the largest textbased (print and online) media in the regions, to compare journalists in Moscow and St. Petersburg to their regional counterparts; 50 respondents represented the two cities and 144 regional journalism. The resulting sample had slight biases in terms of age and gender representation: thus, there were 80 men and 114 women (the actual rate of women in profession is higher, but this figure formed due to the fact that senior editors are more often men). Age distribution was the following: 98 respondents fell into 18–30, 77 were 31–50, and 19 were 51 or older. As we were not aiming at equal gender representation and contacted leading journalists in the largest media in the regions, this may be evidence that journalism in Russia is becoming younger. In terms of education, higher education dominated (93 respondents had communication degrees and 80 other degrees in social sciences and humanities). These figures show that today’s journalists tend to have media education more than what was reported in the 1990s. In short, almost half of the sample consisted of young educated women with degrees in journalism who worked as correspondents. The majority of respondents wrote about economics and politics; almost half of the sample had over 10 years of experience in journalism. For further interviews, only those with careers of 15 years or more were selected. We also paid special attention to individual professional life trajectories. As such, 40% of the respondents changed their workplace 1–2 times within the last 15 (or fewer) years; this tendency sharply intensified in 2015–2016. Sixty-seven percent do not belong to any professional organisations, since the role of the latter in the Russian media industry is unremarkable. Sixty-five percent work for private media, most of which did not change their owners within the last 10–15 years. Eighty-six percent work in public-agenda media (as opposed to niche media). More than half of the sample claim they work within a pro-government or conservative ideological framework.

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Survey Data Analysis

The resulting data array was subjected to descriptive statistics (correlation analysis by Spearman’s rho and comparison of means) and cluster analysis (by k-means with sorted cluster centres). Correlational analysis was used to assess the links between individual variables, in an exploratory manner; t-test for comparison of means for independent samples was used to detect the differences between groups of journalism, as based on gender, age, education, professional socialisation, the editorial status of journalists, as well as on region, media niche, ownership, and political stance of their editorial offices. By doing this, we not only saw links between the variables but also found the domains where the subgroups in our sample diverged (and those where they did not). Subsequently, we supposed that not individual variables (like region, freedom of editorial decisions, or trust to politicians) but rather combinations of them would show the widest gaps between subgroups of journalists. We tested the combinations of those variables that induced subgroup divergence, to see whether the gaps between the groups were multidimensional. We used k-means clustering with sorted centres. Before clustering, we estimated the clustering potential of variable combinations by Silhouette metric (S) and then clustered only the variable combinations that showed good potential for clustering (S > 0.5). To define the best clustering solutions, we estimated the variance metrics of each solution made from 2 to 4 clusters per combination of 2–4 variables; the metrics included Euclidean distances, within-/between-cluster square sums, variable means in each cluster, and pvalues for variables. Altogether, 48 combinations were assessed.

4.4

Interviews with Journalists/Editors and Media Managers

To cross-validate and explain the survey results, we conducted six semi-structured in-depth interviews with senior editors and media managers who have witnessed key current changes in the profession and professional environment. Experts represented leading national print and online public-agenda media which underwent significant ideological and technological transformations over the past 15 years, namely, national newspapers Rossiyskaya Gazeta and Kommersant, magazine City 812 of St. Petersburg, two national news agencies TASS and Regnum, and online-only Gazeta.ru. We also used a set of 30 interviews with leading young media managers (age mean ¼ 30 years) provided by Mail.ru Group, to compare their views to those of journalists and editors.

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5 Results To address the first research question, we, as stated above, have explored: 1. Relations between individual variables by correlational analysis (Spearman’s rho). 2. Divergence of respondent groups by comparing means of values-based and technological variables against respondent metadata on themselves and their editorial offices. 3. Grouping of the respondents based on constellations of the variables which made the respondents diverge most. According to the latter, we defined the main gaps in the journalistic community. We have divided our metadata variables into three domains: personal (gender, age, and education), positional (topicality, editorial position, experience in media, and belonging to professional organisations), and industrial (region, ownership, mass/niche status, hybrid/online-only status, and political orientation of the media a respondent works at).

5.1

Cross-Domain Differences

First of all, there is no divergence on questions about unduly journalistic methods (the respondents mostly agree to avoid them), which corresponds with previous findings by Anikina and colleagues (Anikina, 2013) on the interiorisation of journalistic standards. Nonetheless, a lot of individual value and practice orientations make the respondents diverge paradigmatically, across personal, positional, and industrial features. In terms of values, the differences between groups lie at the level of basic principles: universality of ethical guidelines, impartiality and watchdog function, agenda setting and impact upon public opinion, and acceptance of support to authorities and big businesses. These basic orientations look divisive and, thus, vulnerable to multilevel pressures upon Russian journalists. When asked about these directly, agreement with situational application of ethical rules and acceptance of personal-level ethical decisions is a bit below 50%, non-divisive across all domains. Also, freedom in news selection and in putting a slant upon the story diverges by a lot of factors; thus, they are mostly based on a case-by-case situational construct rather than exhibit stable patterns across the community. This crossvalidates our previous findings on the nature of self-censorship in Russian journalism where we see that many journalists perceive professional ethics as situationally interpretable and individually decided upon, which makes it highly vulnerable to personal impact and shows the organisational weakness of the professional community (Bodrunova et al. forthcoming; Bodrunova & Nigmatullina, 2018). This finding is also supported by the fact that, in our dataset, belonging to a journalistic union does not make much difference.

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In assessment of the importance of non-advocacy values, the gaps exist but are not that big. More interestingly, the two groups combine both impartiality and advocacy orientations. For example, the new generation sees being an absolutely impartial observer as very important (4.16 of 1:5), while it is a bit less important for older journalists (3.70 of 1:5). At the same time, they all share that they are to advocate change (3.76 vs. 3.54 of 1:5, no group differences) and to influence public opinion, though to a different extent (3.92 vs. 3.60 of 1:5). The groups statistically prove to diverge only in regard to whether journalists are to support the authorities; for older generations the level of compliance to the idea reaches practically 50% (2.99 of 5). In terms of orientation towards innovations, paradigmatic differences show up only in general perception of importance of changes: for women, for youngsters, and less experienced, the changes are slightly more noticeable than for men, older, and more experienced journalists (1.55 vs. 1.37, 1.58 vs. 1.36, and 1.56 vs. 1.36 of 1:2, respectively); for the employees of mass outlets vs. niche media, changes are felt stronger (1.50 vs. 1.30 of 1:2), but altogether there is no overwhelming feeling that the changes in the profession are fundamental. For “change of the essence of the profession”, “change of conditions in profession”, and “competition with newer forms of online communication”, the means fluctuate between 1.4 and 1.6 in all potential subgroups, making “yes” and “no” equally probable. Regarding “feeling pressure from competitors with higher tech skills”, all potential subgroups quite assertively say “no” (around 1.75 of 1:2). The respondents self-report as extremely preferring experiments with genres and forms (maximum 1.19 of 1:2 where 1 ¼ yes, mostly 1.09–1.13 for all possible subgroups). But when asked whether they take the best examples of the twentieth-century journalism as models, the results show equal probability of “yes” and “no”, which shows that willingness for innovation might be a self-reporting artifact. It would seem that the older generations reflect the changes on a bigger lifespan, and this is why they perceive changes as more salient. But what is interesting is that all age groups similarly assessed the role of technological skills (mean ¼ 1.04 of 1 ¼ yes and 2 ¼ no) and social media (mean ¼ 4.17 of 1:5) as significantly growing. Thus, technological changes are perceived as growing in importance, but without creating fear, while willingness to experiment and the introduction of innovations must not be overestimated.

5.2

Domain-Based Differences

Beyond the aforementioned paradigmatic cleavages, personal, positional, and industrial features also matter for several other value and practice differences. In terms of personal features, men and younger journalists are less likely to allow their personal views to influence reporting than women and older journalists; youngsters also adhere more to reporting based on proven facts only. Assessment of individual harm vs. public interest and necessity of providing facts and opinions both vary not only by age but also by region (capitals/province) and by ownership

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(state/private). Perceived impact of personal traits, religious views, and family ties upon journalistic decision-making varies by age, gender, experience in profession, and editorial status. Finally, regarding social trust, differences appear vis-a-vis the national government and parliament and the military and police; and they are not based on personal features but on topicality and editorial position, as well as on all the industrial features: region, owner, market niche, and political stance. Interestingly, journalists from Moscow and St. Petersburg tend to trust the powerful significantly less than those from other Russian regions, but the levels of trust never reach 50% on any of these variables.

5.3

Personal-Level Differences

As we see, generational divisions are paradigmatic for our sample. They are linked to general perception of change, personal freedom in work, and impact of ethics upon everyday routines; existence of fundamental ethical principles on the whole and importance of impartiality; avoidance of personal bias, non-proven facts, and contextualisation; risks of collateral damage; impact of censorship, authorities, media law, and access to information on journalistic performance; and relations with sources and feedback. Proven divisions between journalists under 30 and the rest of the sample show that these two groups understandably vary in all the positional variables but also vary in terms of the preferred workplace: the older generations work more in hybrid media (73%) while the younger journalists prefer online-only outlets (59%). Gender differences are also important and are shown in general perception of changes, as well as, surprisingly, ethics on the whole, impartiality, objectivity, and support of the powerful: women tend to treat ethics as important (0.224**), but at the same time are more willing to support the government (0.230**) and report it as positive (0.190**), while men value impartiality more (-0.214**) and are more willing to be objective (-0.188**) and impartial (-0.167*). Perhaps this is because men and women in the profession feel differently about whether norms may be situationally abstained from, as well as they have differing feelings of freedom to select what and how to cover. They also assess differently the impact of public pressure from censorship and the authorities (more important for men, -0.313** and -0.226**, respectively), as well as of personal factors like religious beliefs and family and friends (more important for women, 0.305** and 0.223**, respectively). But they are the same in assessing most factors of pressure and trust to social actors. At the same time, they form divisive groups in assessing what factors grow in importance, including audience factors (involvement, feedback, and audience studies) and competition, both within the profession and with user-generated content. Overall, education plays a minimal role in group divergence if taken as an individual variable. It matters, though, in terms of how journalists treat the necessity to stay impartial and in their treatment of the changes related to social media (and employees with no higher education in humanities consider the changes related to

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user content and social media slightly more important, Spearman’s rho ¼ 0.237** and 0.184*, respectively). Interestingly, the perceived increase of impact of audience studies, user-generated content, and social media matters more for respondents with journalistic education; thus, education seems to affect attention to audience behaviour. Nonetheless, the presence of journalistic education starts to matter in group divergence if taken together with other individual variables (see below).

5.4

Editorial-Level Differences

Experience in the profession also makes the journalistic community diverge, especially in terms of understanding the basic societal roles of journalism—from impartial provision of information to support of the ruling elite, formation of public opinion, and motivation of political discussion and action. The same goes for the feeling of professional freedom, as well as for the censorship pressure: with growth of experience, freedom to pick up the aspects rises (0.227**) and impact of censorship diminishes (-0.219**). Interestingly, strictly personal factors like personal and religious beliefs and relations with friends and family are also treated in varying ways: for more experienced journalists, they slightly grow in importance (0.192**, 0.230**, and 0.211**, respectively). What unites experienced and less experienced colleagues is levels of trust in social actors, treatment of changes, and non-acceptance of undue practices. We observe that the professional cynicism, naturally, grows with experience; but there are still grounds for unification of the community. At the same time, undue practices in the profession, like staging news, publishing unchecked information, fake pictures, or made-up quotes, show slight differences between senior and junior editorial staff, unlike in all other respects. Thus, it is not experience but editorial pressures that seem to matter regarding the acceptance of ethically doubtful decisions.

5.5

Industrial Differences

Here, the regional gaps are the most significant: they relate to the watchdog function in relation to government and elites, as well as to the belief of journalists’ ability to reconstruct the “real picture”. Also, the community feeling is different—in particular, the respondents differ on whether they can choose aspects of coverage and listen to colleagues. Also, unlike in other cases, the intervention of politicians, police, and pressure groups is felt slightly more in Moscow and St. Petersburg (0.144*, 0.168*, and 0.188**, respectively); the same goes for trust in politicians (parliament and government) and the police. Journalists from thematically specialised media (political, economic, city outlets) and generalist media differ in general assessment of change and orientation in the twentieth century. But when we look at how they differ specifically, we see that their

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differences are natural: they vary in assessing the roles of agenda setting and providing information (as niche media are more analysis-oriented), as well as in the perception of author freedom (perhaps due to higher industrial restrictions for niche media). They vary in perceived impact of the authorities and police on journalistic work, as well as in the treatment of audience demand and sensationalism. But the groups divided by their market niches share core values and perceive technological changes in the same way. With regard to ownership and perceived political bias of the media outlets, we will describe the results together, as these variables quite strongly correlate in our sample: it is probable that an outlet is pro-governmental/conservative if it is stateowned and that it is liberal if it is private (Spearman’s rho is 0.557**, 0.503**, and 0.633** for all, hybrid, and online-only media, respectively). For both variables, there is group divergence in terms of supporting the powerful and depicting their positive role in society; editorial freedoms; pressure from editors and owners; impact of authorities, politicians, and police; censorship; and trust to government. This clearly contributes to the values-based cleavage in the community, while monetary and technological factors, editorial policy, or orientation towards twentieth-century style/experimenting does not.

5.6

Age, Experience, and Political Stance as Clustering Agents Within the Journalistic Community

The results of cluster analysis, though, change the picture regarding the importance of personal features. We do see two distinct clusters based on three parameters: age, region, and professional education, with significantly younger journalists with professional education working more in Moscow and St. Petersburg. This shows the educational gap between the generations in the two capitals and the province (see Fig. 1—graph of means for the two clusters). It is, thus, not surprising that age and education-based divergence also matters in terms of general perception of intensity of change in profession, being a watchdog for businesses, and editorial freedom. Nonetheless, all other cluster-based gaps we have detected are political, not only when ethics, political pressures, or trust towards the institutions are concerned but also when one speaks of the growing pressure from professional factors and technologically new forms of communication. One such gap is based on age and experience. More aged and experienced journalists see their media as pro-state/conservative; maybe this is due to their concentration in such media, but elaborating on this goes beyond the goal of our study. More than their younger and less experienced colleagues, they support provision of political information, as well as support of the powerful (see Fig. 2) and covering of the leading role of political and business elites in the society while prioritising support of fact-based information less. Perhaps this is because they feel

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Fig. 1 The plot of means for k-means clustering on age, professional education, and region

significantly higher pressure from the authorities, politicians, censorship, and senior editorial staff. Other forms of pressure do not create any distinct clusters. Even more clearly, this gap configures when not age but political stance of the media is considered. Here, on the contrary, the gap lies between more experienced journalists from liberal media and their younger counterparts from pro-state outlets. “Liberal media veterans” accept more their agenda-setting impact, but also have bigger editorial freedom. For them, their “circle” (family, friends, colleagues, and religious beliefs) matters more, while pressures from the editors, authorities, and censorship (see Fig. 3) are highly less significant; they also trust the government much less. For them, competition in journalism has not grown, unlike for their younger colleagues. Altogether, it shows “liberal veterans” as a tightly linked and closed-up community with a surprisingly lower feeling of pressure from the political arena and rather cynical towards it. Other gaps show up on acceptance of advocacy, “impact and political support” values, importance of facts and objectivity, editorial freedoms, pressures from professional limitations (deadlines, ethics, and law), perception of external pressures, and trust towards the political and judiciary institutions. Advocacy values are accepted by slightly more experienced journalists from more pro-state media, but actually the differences cannot be clearly linked to meta-variables. The gaps in acceptance of support to authorities, necessity of objectivity, editorial freedoms, and professional limitations are all linked to perceived political stance of the media,

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Fig. 2 The plot of means for k-means clustering on age, professional experience, and support to authorities

along with state/private ownership (for support of authorities) and experience (for the latter three). Political stance alone matters for differences in perception of external pressures (see Fig. 4): journalists from pro-state media feel them as higher across the variables such as political actors, businesses, the military, and security services. Here, even three clusters are possible, ranging journalists from “low pressurised” to “mid and high pressurised”. A similar picture shows up for trust (see Fig. 5a, b): journalists quickly develop distrust when coming into the profession, then with growth of experience their trust grows in a pendulum way, while the most experienced have a balanced feeling of trust. Journalists from political “spectrum edges” develop higher trust towards political actors (perhaps, due to linkages to those with corresponding views), but the more politically diverse group appears to be pragmatically cautious. And regarding perceptions of the growing impact of professional changes, such as competition, sensationalism, the impact of PR and advertising, audience factors, and user-generated content, these are all linked to professional experience but are better seen in relation to the political biases of the media outlets (see Fig. 6): the journalists in pro-state media feel changes more than those in the liberal media, but the least pressurised by changes is the politically diverse cluster. Interestingly, the variables that deal directly with the Soviet past (e.g. “I orient myself to the best examples of the twentieth-century journalism”), as well as the

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Fig. 3 The plot of means for k-means clustering on professional experience, perceived political stance of the media outlet, and impact of censorship

variables on perception of major changes in essence and conditions in profession, were not relevant for clustering. This is a sign, perhaps, of the vanishing importance of “the post-Soviet” as the interpretative frame, while politicisation related to the current political process becomes substantially more relevant.

5.7

“The Harshest Natural Selection”? Editors Versus Media Managers in the Interviews

The in-depth interviews cross-validate our results in terms of the ambiguous treatment of Western journalistic orientations and with regard to the relatively modest role of technological innovations in defining today’s profession. For the former one, the in-depth interviews display high levels of self-criticism (e.g. “. . .professional standards of the Russian journalism are, at best, abstract, subjective, multilayered, and, at the same time, blurred”, Svetlana Babaeva, Gazeta.ru). For the latter one, “[w]hether there has been any breakdown in the brains of journalists because of technical innovations—probably not,” said Oxana Zadunayskaya from Rossiyskaya Gazeta. Key factors that foster change, for the editors, are political events and the introduction of new laws, as well as political disasters that have made the community

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Fig. 4 The plot of means for k-means clustering on perceived political stance of the media outlet vs. importance of external pressures (authorities, politicians, pressure groups, businesses, army and security services)

face ethical dilemmas and revise their professional approach (e.g. taking hostages in Beslan in 2004), not technological changes. The latter are perceived not only as new forms of media development but as grounds for social change: “Internet allows avoiding centralisation, and this is good. [What matters is] not closing ranks but escaping from rigid imposition of an agenda” (Oxana Zadunayskaya). The interviewees were inclined to formalise the editorial processes, in order to implement more transparent editorial standards. The age-and-experience gap showed up in mistrust towards young newcomers: “48 of 50 people [come] without knowledge or interest, I feel like these guys are reluctant to the very option of whatever professional work” (Modest Kolerov, Regnum information agency). Technological change is perceived more as a “window of possibilities” than a challenge, while the interviewees underline that “mental transformations” and “persuasion” are necessary throughout all the editorial levels (Gleb Cherkasov, Kommersant). The editors reframe technological innovations in a narrower way; the changes are linked to new chances (and challenges, too) for audience engagement, and the Internet is described as “a separate field for profit attraction” (Svetlana Babaeva). This naturally distinguishes the chief editors who fluctuate between managerial and editorial functions from journalists who produce content.

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Fig. 5 The plot of means for k-means clustering on institutional trust (to parliament, government, the military, police, and law courts) vs. (a) professional experience; (b) perceived political stance of the media outlet

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Fig. 6 The plot of means for k-means clustering on perceived political stance of the media outlet vs. variables of perception of growing/diminishing change

An even sharper contrast can be found between our sample and the interviews with young media managers (including editors) collected by Mail.ru Group for the project “Field exploration of the media guild”. Here, the general reference point is the description of uncertainty: “In terms of defining media success, we’re now at the uncertainty point” (Alexander Amzin, The Bell). Unlike journalists, young managers sharply underline the highly competitive and rapidly changing state of the media market: “We’re witnessing the harshest possible process of natural selection” (Alexey Ametov, Look at Media) where “the media competes with everyone and with no one” (Nikita Belogolovtsev, Mel). This group of interviewees uses a highly different professional jargon and speaks of media ecosystems and expresses hopes for algorithmisation and robotisation of content production and adaptation, as well as programming of advertising. Despite the fact that such changes would demand significant reassessment not only of the journalistic routines but also of professional standards and ethics, rhetoric on these aspects of media production is hardly present in the managerial discourse. Only rarely, the interviewees addressed external (political, social, or legal) factors of impact upon journalistic autonomy; their attention was focused on understanding media as service providers, rather than as actors in the public sphere or conveyors of views and opinions.

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6 Conclusion From all the described above, several more general conclusions can be made. Thus, we see that the professional journalistic culture in Russia is not a monolith. Our initial idea was to test whether the journalistic culture in Russia was split between post-Soviet and Western-oriented norms and practices, and this normative distinction was expected to show up on personal, professional, and/or organisational levels. Also, the same splits were to show up for the technological advancement of editorial and managerial practices. In the results, we have seen that the split may be, indeed, described as valuesbased, rather than monetarist, regional, online/offline, or purely generational. Regarding value divergence, age and number of years in the profession do play a crucial role, as well as editorial bias, while differences between the “capitals” and “regions”, the divisive role of education, and competition with the younger tech savvies are to be demystified. Different generations in journalism still treat the postSoviet transformations differently, but it is not technological change that makes the community split but different understandings of societal roles and relations with political actors. We see that “the post-Soviet” as an interpretative concept gradually loses its direct relevance, but the major gaps in the community still form along the “state-supporting/conservative vs. liberal” orientations. We have also seen the liberal part of the journalistic community as a “circle-oriented” group with higher editorial freedom and a certain cynicism towards the political establishment. Politicisation of the professional divisions goes across domains of deontological and professional thinking, namely inclinations to non-informational journalistic roles (formation of public opinion, support of the powerful, and positive portrayal of the government’s leading role); impartiality and objectivity as ethical principles; perceived impact of authorities, censorship, and editorial freedoms upon daily routines; and trust towards the authorities, politicians, and police. Of technological changes, in some respects, only user-generated content and social media play a divisive role, while the community is unanimous in acknowledging their growing importance. Larger technological advancements do play a divisive role, too, but not within the journalistic community. Rather, it is between journalists, on the one hand, and senior editors and media managers of the new generation, on the other hand. The former do not perceive the changes as crucial and, thus, are more reluctant to change, while the latter, in their obsession with tech-based audience engagement and monetisation, rarely take into account the public roles of new media formats. The starting point for raising professional solidarity should, perhaps, be the undue practices in journalism, as, in many respects except for generational differences, assessment of these practices is a unifying, not a separating factor. But whether it is possible in the near future remains questionable, as the community lacks unanimity is defining its own societal roles. Our results allow us to describe the split between the Russian journalistic cultures not as a range of journalistic practices in between two abstract normative poles but as

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a real-world division in the professional community that actually shapes working conditions, including selection of workplaces, career paths, and group identities. This may limit application of our idea to other journalistic cultures, but we see that, today, values-based, political, and technological dimensions of journalistic cultures grow in importance across the world; we hope for further development in the methodology of comparative assessment of journalistic cultures based on these dimensions.

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Diversity of the Internet in Russia’s Regions: Towards an Alternative Research Agenda Polina Kolozaridi and Olga Dovbysh

1 Introduction Research today tends to focus more on the variety of ways of understanding the internet in different contexts. We can subdivide this into varieties of usage (Miller et al., 2016), varieties of history (Goggin & McLelland, 2017), varieties of culture (Hongladarom, 2000) and other detailed research programs that seem to be a reasonable part of internet studies. Moreover, we cannot ignore the role that changes in technology itself has had nor the emergence of what is called the “ubiquitous internet” when we observe the internet as a part of people’s everyday lives, rather than as a portal to a virtual world or a cyberspace, separate from everyday and “real” life. The change in the dominant type of access from cable to mobile, fibre instead of copper wires, smartphones and other mobile devices, as well as cheaper tariffs, have all been the technical and organisational prerequisites of the changes (Rainee & Wellman, 2012). Another change concerns the emergence of platforms as the main point of entry to the internet. It is also arguable whether it is still relevant to talk about “platforms” as a part of the internet or as a separate object of study as far as they have become an infrastructure of our everydayness, business processes, education and political life (Sandvig, 2013). However, all the ideas about the fragmentation of the internet as a research object are lost when we try to work at a country level. Inside the borders of a country, the internet is still often treated as an umbrella term combining heterogeneous P. Kolozaridi (*) Higher School of Economics, National Research University, Club for Internet and Society Enthusiasts, Moscow, Russia e-mail: [email protected] O. Dovbysh University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland e-mail: olga.dovbysh@helsinki.fi © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_8

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phenomena and practices (in the press, policy strategies and academic research). For instance, policy strategies on internet development focus, as a rule, on the internet as an infrastructure and assess internet penetration, while mass media discuss the internet as a space for content and are more concerned about freedom of speech on the internet. Nationwide polls show that online and offline are still treated as virtual versus physical reality, as naturally different phenomena. For instance, people are asked whether they trust online or offline sources more, while a plenty of those sources might coexist online and offline (like TV and newspapers having the same content online and offline). We argue that the internet in Russia can be treated and examined not simply as a wholesome homogeneous object, but with special attention to its inner diversity and the variety of peculiar cases within it. Such cases are introduced, for example, by journalists, who emphasise the role of WhatsApp in Yakutia or the incredible importance of Instagram in Chechnya (Tjournal, 2015; Vasiliev, 2016). These cases are indicative in of themselves, but rarely give us a better understanding of the variety of the internet histories and their contemporary context. On the contrary, they are perceived as exotic examples of particular internet practices, due to a lack of normative understanding of what is considered “typical” or “normal” internet in a region or in a city. We lack any sustainable analytical framework to describe how the internet in its various forms—as a technology, platform and media—have evolved and been transformed in different regions and cities. The internet in Russia has been a focal point for researchers, mostly as factor in economy, education, politics or as an entity of cyberspace which is often referred to as RuNet (Schmidt & Teubener, 2006). RuNet is usually described as a specific phenomenon combining intellectual, political and media activist experiments in communication. It has been a crucial countrywide phenomenon, especially in the late 1990s and 2000s (Kuznetsov, 2004). We suppose that due to the huge growth of internet users in 2007–2011 the term became less significant, but has been nevertheless kept in public and academic fields as a common word for the multiplicity of services, technologies and communication spaces (Ekonomika Runeta, 2018). In this article, we suggest an alternative approach to discover what the internet in Russia is: to consider it not as common space of RuNet, but as a variety of histories and usage patterns in different parts of the country. Instead of drawing common “top-down” features of the internet in Russia, we aim to explore a variety of “internets” and the form these take in various cities across the country. In order to provide an alternative framework we start with the cases of Russian cities, paying precise attention to the factors that shaped particular internet developments in these parts of the country. Instead of focusing on a single particular technology or practice, we aim to explore the intersections and interrelation these technologies and practices take within a particular territory, placed in wider historical and sociocultural contexts. The “bottom-up” approach to study what the internet in contemporary Russia is will help to expand and improve our understanding of the internet in Russia in all of its diversity. In the following part we review the key indexes and figures that quantitatively describe the internet in Russia and its regional dimensions. We analyse them critically in order to distinguish when they are enabling an understanding of the internet in its diversity and when they are

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oversimplifying the picture and need to be supplemented by qualitative ones. We then move to the cases of Russian cities, each of which illustrates specific implications for internet diversity. This division is not comprehensive, but is rather illustrative so as to explore the complex and multifaceted phenomenon of the internet in Russia. We use a body of qualitative empirical materials (interviews, observations, archival documents), collected in fieldwork in six Russian cities between 2017 and 2018.1 Case analysis allows us to reveal determining factors of internet variety that can be uncovered through a historical perspective, while the implications of this diversity help to understand the current state of the internet in Russia. In the final part of this text, we discuss our findings in order to understand how this variety of development patterns and diversity of user practices can be conceptualised and treated as an internet in Russia. We focus primarily at internet studies approach, in which the internet is treated as a combination of its technological aspects, usage practices and policies (Dutton, 2013). This approach has some limitations, since we are not studying particular cases, e.g. the internet in educational or bank systems. Nevertheless, we intend to maintain a broader focus, on the complexity of the internet that can be seen as a ground and platform for different kinds of diversity (practices, policies and technologies) as well as a heterogeneous object to be studied on its own.

2 The Internet in Russian Regions: Figures Prior to a discussion of the internet in Russia’s regions, we provide a brief explanation of what Russia’s regions are and discuss the several dimensions of their inequality and diversity. As of 2018, the Russian Federation includes 85 federal subjects of 6 types: republic, region (krai), region (oblast), city with federal status, autonomous region (oblast) and autonomous region (okrug). Each type differs in legal status. In the present paper, we call all federal subjects of Russia “regions”, since their legal statuses are not relevant to this research. These federal subjects, located in geographic proximity, are grouped into Federal Okrugs (districts).2

1

In 2017–2018 we organised several expeditions to Russian cities on the behalf of National Research University—Higher School of Economics and Сlub for internet and society enthusiasts. These cities are Voronezh, Tyumen’, Pereslavl-Zalessky and Tomsk in this article. 2 Federal Okrug is district that includes several regions. Division into federal districts was introduced by Presidential decree in 2000. At the moment there are eight federal districts—Central, Northwestern, Southern, North Caucasus, Volga, Ural, Siberia and Far Eastern. Each of them includes from 18 (Central) to 6 (Ural) regions. Federal districts are highly unequal in terms of territory, population, GRP and other indicators.

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An important aspect to mention is that all the regions are extremely diverse in terms of geographical area, population size, socio-economic indicators, climate, etc (Regions of Russia, 2016) . For instance, the biggest region, the Sakha Republic (Yakutia), has a territory of over 3 million square km, while the smallest one, the Republic of Ingushetia, has 3.6 thousand square km only.3 At the same time, the highest regional GDP rate (Moscow) is 330 times greater than the lowest one (the Altai Republic). Another approach to diversity lies at the level of settlements. N. Zubarevich (2013) conceptualises this diversity as “four Russias”: big cities, middle-size industrial cities and towns, small towns and villages and the underdeveloped republics of North Caucasus. Residents of each “Russia” are characterised by different level of cultural capital (education, etc.), different economic behaviour and political participation. In subsequent research, Zubarevich reconsidered this centre-periphery model and she argues that at the beginning of 2014, the differences between four types of settlements got blurred due to new turn of the economic crisis (Lipskiy & Polukhin, 2014). Existing knowledge about the internet in Russian regions is based primarily on quantitative data. Below we observe the existing industrial research on the internet in Russian regions that provide such data. The main organisations that perform such research are as follows: • Large IT companies: Yandex, Mail.Ru Group, Rambler • Non-commercial organisations, foundations and associations related to internet development: RAEC, ROCIT, Mediastandart, IIDF, AKIT4 • Federal and regional executive authorities • Research and consulting companies, international or national: GfK Russia, TNS Kantar, Mediascope, J’son&Partners, Brand Analytics, Zirkon5 • Research companies, focused on public opinion measurements: WCIOM, Levada, FOM6 Each group has its own interests and motivations in relation to regional internet. This has an influence on which indicators and characteristics of the internet in Russia they assess. We can group the quantitative data they produce into the following categories:

3

Cities with federal status Moscow, St. Petersburg and Sevastopol (became part of Russia after Crimea annexation in 2014) are even smaller, but cannot be seen as region in territorial sense. 4 http://raec.ru/; https://rocit.ru/; http://www.msindex.ru/; http://www.iidf.ru/; http://www.akit.ru/ 5 http://www.gfk.com/ru/; http://kantartns.ru/; https://mediascope.net/; http://www.json.ru/; https:// br-analytics.ru/; http://www.zircon.ru/ 6 https://wciom.ru/; http://www.levada.ru/; http://fom.ru/

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• Indicators of internet development: – Data on the internet’s infrastructure in Russia. Indicators in this group represent broadband and other types of access coverage, the number of internet users, costs of internet access, providers of internet access, etc.7 – Data on internet audience in Russia. The main stats of this group are focused on audience and indicate how people connect to the internet, what types of gadgets they use, what web pages they visit on the internet as well as assess the level of internet literacy, etc.8 • Statistics on social networking sites (SNS): – Data on SNS audience. Here we distinct such indicators as the distribution of audience between different types of SNS, characteristics of users (age, gender, occupation, location, etc.) of SNS.9 – Data on SNS economy. This includes data on consumption within SN platforms, such as gaming, micropayments, video consumption, etc. • Statistics on online shopping. These data assess the supply and demand of e-commerce in Russia as well as information on what, where and in what way users buy on the internet.10 • Pollster research of public opinion on some internet-related issues (such as copyright and other internet legislation, censorship and internet freedom, etc.).11 The polls analyse the internet as a holistic phenomenon, ignoring the fact that, for instance, practices of online communication might vary depending on whom this communication involves—friends and relatives, or colleagues, or anonymous people on an image board or in Youtube comments, etc. Big data researchers make ratings of popular websites and platforms. Nevertheless, they do not explore how differently people might use these websites. UX researchers analyse the usage practices, but do not combine data with broader patterns and social meaning of the internet itself.

7 To mention but a few: Monitoring of information society development in Russian Federation http://www.gks.ru/free_doc/new_site/business/it/monitor_rf.xls. Accessed 25 March 2019. Internet development in Russian regions https://yandex.ru/company/researches/2016/ya_internet_regions_ 2016. Accessed 25 March 2019. 8 To mention but a few: WEB Index Desktop and Mobile https://mediascope.net/services/media/ media-audience/internet/description/. Accessed 25 March 2019. Internet in Russia: dynamics of penetration. Winter 2018–2018. https://fom.ru/SMI-i-internet/13999. Accessed 25 March 2019. Digital literacy of Russians 2018. Accessed 25 March 2019. http://www.zircon.ru/upload/iblock/ a63/Index_cifrivii_gramotnosti_2019_rocit.pdf 9 To mention but a few: Social networks in Russia: figures and trends, fall 2018 https://br-analytics. ru/blog/socseti-v-rossii-osen-2018/. Accessed 25 March 2019. 10 To mention but a few: Online shopping in Russia 2018 http://datainsight.ru/sites/default/files/DIRIF2018.pdf. Accessed 25 March 2019. 11 Some examples: Internet: copyright or open access. https://fom.ru/SMI-i-internet/12503. Accessed 25 March 2019. Youth survey: free time and internet practices. https://fom.ru/Obrazzhizni/13103. Accessed 25 March 2019.

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Therefore we can never understand how the “traffic”, “user percentage” and “behavioural preferences” are interconnected. As a rule, these stats cover three territorial levels: Russia in general, the Federal districts and the cities.12 The data represent a “top-down” picture of the internet in Russia that excludes the inequalities and diversities of regions and settlements. In particular, Federal Okrugs are quite artificial constructs that combine extremely unequal regions in terms of their socio-economic and technological indicators. For instance, Siberian Federal Okrug includes three quite depressive regions, five average regions and two more or less prosperous ones. Nevertheless, the state of internet development in this Federal Okrug is based on average figures from all the regions. As a result, the differences between regions are blurred. Such imbalance can actually be resolved with a more complex quantitative research and usage of medians instead of their combined averages. Another limitation with such kind of quantitative data is rooted in the commercial nature of stakeholders of internet research. As a result, their interests and goals revolve around big cities. Therefore, a significant number of the stats cover cities with 100K+ population. 100K+ is a standard size of settlements, used in media audience measurements (usually for TV, radio). This cut-off line is less relevant for the internet audience; nevertheless we observe some “path dependence”, in which cities with less than 100K and rural settlements are often excluded from the observations. At the same time, these areas might demonstrate completely different patterns of internet development. Quantitative data let us see some biases of internet indicators in the various regions but do not help to explain the prerequisites and consequences of these deviations. For instance, according to the quantitative data, Far Eastern Federal Okrug is the most atypical in terms of internet development. Before 2014, the Far East was the district with one of the lowest internet penetrations. Yet from 2014 onwards, the Far East demonstrates high rates of penetration growth. In spite of such development, in 2016 the level of penetration in the Far East remains the lowest in comparison to other okrugs—63% of adults in the Far East use internet regularly (Razvitie interneta v regionakh, 2016). At the same time, the share of mobile internet users is almost the highest13—almost 53% of internet users utilise mobile access (ibid). We have two different indicators: types of internet infrastructure and types of internet usage. What can we learn from these two indicators about the internet in this area? How do local people use the internet there? How do they make sense of it? How does the dominance of mobile internet influence different groups of people and their lives in this area? The case of the Far East demonstrates that we can observe a certain disproportion in internet development. However, additional qualitative data is needed to explain

12

The most frequent type of division is the following: Moscow, cities with more than 1 million people, with 500K–1 million people, with 100K–500K people, with less than 100K, rural settlements. 13 This indicator is higher in Moscow and St. Petersburg only.

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what implications this disproportion has on internet usage by various groups of citizens and on life in this area in general. When it comes to usage and practices, we suggest that qualitative data could be quite a difficult addition that can expand the linear representation of the quantitative indicators. Why is this so? What is important to add is that the numeric indexes are not neutral. For instance, statistics on internet development usually mean that the higher position a region obtains, the better. The faster and cheaper internet citizens have, the better. Social networking statistics also include this implicit linearity of users quantity—the more users, the better. One can suggest that the stakeholders of these data (companies, officials, organisations, etc.) will aim to increase their indicators. But what does the growth of users, minutes spent on smartphones or minutes spent on popular SNS say us about internet development in a particular place? Does a region with a lower position in the rating of internet development (as above-mentioned example of the Far East Okrug) have “worse” internet than a region with higher position? The intersection of quantitative indicators with qualitative data will allow us to go beyond this vision and explore a more detailed and nuanced picture of the internet in particular areas. According to this approach, the “inequality” of internet development should be critically analysed as “variety” or “diversity”. We suggest to consider the internet not solely as technology, but at the very least as a combination of technology and usage, as it is supposed to be in research on the digital divide (DiMaggio & Hargittai, 2001; Van Dijk & Hacker, 2003). These studies state that not only technical access is important for understanding how people deal with the internet and how they benefit from it. Individual and collective practices of usage, skills and other factors should also be taken into consideration. To sum up, stats and numbers are important data to see the general picture of internet development in Russia. However, the explanatory power of these data about the diversity of the internet in Russian regions is quite limited. The above-mentioned reports demonstrate features and even some disproportions of internet development without reflections of what is beyond the numbers. Therefore, internet development in Russian regions described by some authors (Nagirnaya, 2015; Perfilyev, 2003) as a discrete and gradual process should be complemented by an alternative view. This alternative approach ought to rely on both qualitative and quantitative views on the internet in Russia. We also suggest that the techno deterministic studies be revisited and complemented by sociocultural points of view. This is important in order to fix the lack of social meaning of this technology, which lies at the source for misunderstanding the numbers (as in the example of Far East, above). As such, we propose to go further and take a look at what’s behind the numbers in order to explore a more voluminous picture of regional internet, with all its disparities and diversity.

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3 Beyond Numbers: Operationalising the Internet Research of Diversity Across Country Understanding the internet as a complex of infrastructure, usage and policies goes beyond the measuring statistics. Sometimes we’re presented with examples such as the Far East, where cable internet was established very slowly due to severe environmental conditions and some areas still do not have broadband connection. On the other hand, their mobile networking is highly developed. As such we have to take into consideration a number of historical, cultural, infrastructural and demographic factors. What we suggest is a more precise look at each region, city and town. We start with the city level for three reasons. First of all, since there was no nation-wide program towards the internet’s establishment in the USSR (Peters, 2016), each settlement ended up with a unique combination of factors when an initial connection to the internet was made in the 1990s. Secondly, in the 1990s the state was mostly ignorant about the internet as technology that needed to be regulated, and therefore, in the early years of its emergence, the internet and its development were not centralised. Finally, the cities themselves are quite different. Some of them are ancient while others were established several dozen years ago, during the Soviet period. Many of these relatively new settlements, so-called single industry towns, were formed near industrial objects (plants, factories). Some of them occupied a special position as centres for the industry of science during that period. If we add to this list cultural, religious and climate diversity, we end up with a huge matrix of variables. Regions are mostly city centric (excluding the Northern Caucasus) and the majority of people in Russia (74%) live in cities (Federal State Statistics, 2018). Therefore we suggest that cities are a more productive object of analysis than the regions in general. In our research we study both big cities, the region capitals (such as Kazan, Tyumen, Tomsk, Voronezh) as well as ones (such as Pereslavl-Zalessky, Arzamas). Our approach started with a historical perspective which reveals the roots of each issue and brings to the surface some factors hidden in synchronous analysis. The passages below present the first results of the research designed to fit these needs, which included fieldwork and desk research. Prior to the fieldwork, we performed desk research including the investigation of website archives and media archives. We aimed to understand who the main actors were, as well as the events and places of the internet development in the cities where we went to the fieldwork expeditions. The result of this desk research was a preliminary timeline for how the internet had developed in a given city. A preliminary timeline became the starting point to find out the peculiarities of the internet in the region and was further elaborated on later. The time when the broadband connection was first made, the first websites, FIDO usage, grant programs’ initiation and realisation were all important to take note of before collecting field interviews. Then we went to the cities themselves. We conducted semi-structured interviews with those who participated in the internet’s development. These include the first

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internet providers, web designers, bloggers, journalists, activists, public figures, government and university officials of present and past. We included questions appealing both to their expert knowledge and to their personal experience as participants of the process of internet development. We suppose that some of the results of the research complement the quantitative research. These are (1) the connection between infrastructure and internet usage, (2) diversity of access infrastructure as a factor for diversity rather than inequality, (3) user activity and social meaning of the internet, (4) critical approach to the linear understanding of “more internet, better internet”, and (5) precise attention to smaller cities.

4 Key Terms and Theoretical Basis As we have mentioned above, our approach is based on internet studies research. We analyse the internet as a heterogeneous object; as technology, usage practices and policies (Dutton, 2013); as well as being a platform for media and user communication (Sandvig, 2013). Following this logic, we further describe the internet as a configuration of elements, avoiding more specific terms. The elements we take into consideration are as follows: • Its technological basis, aka infrastructure of the internet (wires, cables, etc.), as well as its historical change (we sometimes include other networks, BBS systems, Usenet and FIDO) • Services and media, web content from the first websites till nowadays • Usage practices which entail not only consuming the internet as a service but also in its ability to allow for participation in collective projects, activism, organisation of web-based activity, etc. • Regulation and policies including local norms, city and region administration Following Sandvig (2013), we consider infrastructure itself to be a part of the internet as a technology and service. This has not been a common approach until the recent interest towards internet histories (instead of history) which brought together technology historians and social researchers (Goggin & McLelland, 2017). Such an alliance is rather typical for Science and Technology Studies, but is still rare in other research projects. We treat the internet as a configuration of all the listed components, taking into account that each person might consider the internet in some particular way. Therefore we build our understanding on the idea of technology’s social shaping. We use this approach in order to combine social and technological determinists. The idea of the social shaping of technology includes understanding what each piece of technology means and allows us to include a category of social meaning as a factor. This approach might be more productive according to our key aim to provide an approach that can be combined with others.

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One of the first studies of the internet in the local Russian context was done by linguists Orekhov and Reshetnikov (2014). They were interested in Wikipedia entries in the non-Russian languages which exist in Russia, such as Tatar, Chechen, Udmurt, etc. (see in Krylova, Orekhov, Stepanova, & Zaydelman, 2015). These people make their own language parts of Wikipedia and there is a competition among the languages which are close to each other (for instance, Mountain Mari and Meadow Mari). They use bots and produce articles describing rivers, flowers, mountains and so on. Such a mode of usage cannot be understood if we consider that Wikipedia is only a space for knowledge distribution (Krylova et al., 2015). Such examples of indirect usage and the diversity of reasons why people start developing the internet are not only scattered in Russia like a series of deviant stories about people from far-off regions. These examples oppose the dominant understanding of the internet as a tool for universalisation and a space for freedom. When conducting interviews we asked local stakeholders about their reasons behind internet usage and its development in different regions. As mentioned in the first part, we talked about how quantification entails a linear comparison which might be not productive. We suggest that this might be completed by a qualitative analysis of internet elements in different cities.

5 Voronezh: Why Infrastructure History Matters Voronezh is the capital of Voronezh oblast, located in the Western part of Russia, 500 km southeast of Moscow. During the Soviet period, the city was home to several companies of national importance in the radio-electronic industry. These innovative organisations attracted researcher and engineers to settle in the city. Since then, the city is famous for strong human capital in the IT and telecom sphere, even though the radio-electronic companies were closed in soon after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Its technological background from Soviet period, together with the contemporary importance of the IT sphere, made this city relevant to our research purposes. The first impressions from the fieldwork were controversial. On the one hand, there was almost no place in the city centre without Wi-Fi. On the other hand, some parts of the sector with private houses had no legal connection and was full of flyers on which people were offering to provide internet illegally. Inequality in access emerged due to infrastructure reasons and the stakeholders’ poor communication. The infrastructure of the internet requires wires and pillars, upon which the wires hang, in order to provide internet. The owner of the pillars is the city department, which has monopoly on them, as far as the pillars are also a part of city’s infrastructure. Insofar as this organisation increased the rent by several times, it became very expensive to have internet there. This case illustrates how the internet hardware/infrastructure history shapes the development of the internet in different territorial parts of the city. There is not so much research on this topic, for instance, a study of Wi-Fi activist network in Leiden (Van Oost, Verhaegh, & Oudshoorn, 2009). The Leiden case explores how people with some specific

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technology and set of skills become part of a network and influence that network’s structure. A further observation of the Voronezh case compelled us to look at the history of the internet providers. There were historically several networks there and local providers had peering which had hardly anything to do at all with service or content development. They did not give free access to any communal resources, except to Big Voronezh Forum. This Forum used to be a key place for the entire city-based communication and also promoted internet access in the 2000s—people set up their internet connection in order to have access to this Forum. All the other needs, such as films and music, were available on torrents. “We have created home-based networks, there were torrents and neighbour chat rooms, everything we needed” says one of forum’s former users. The forum and local media have coexisted for quite a long time. Probably one of the key features in Voronezh is the unexpected digital divide that comes from both historical and urban reasons. According to Yandex research (internet development in Russian regions, 2016), Voronezh is an “average” city in terms of internet access. But this “averageness” is a sum of an extremely developed IT cluster and very low internet penetration in vast area private houses. We have evidence that this inequality is not unique to Voronezh, as other settlements also face this territory-determined “digital divide”. However, the case of Voronezh is probably one of the most salient due to its specialisation in the IT and telecom sphere. Nevertheless, the city’s internet cannot be thoroughly understood without knowing the peculiarities of pillars’ rental fees and of the connection history of the first providers.

6 Tomsk: To Bring Them All Tomsk is a university city in Western Siberia. Being rather small in comparison with neighbouring regions (about 500 thousand in population), it has six universities and about 1/5 of the population are students. As such, the history of the internet’s adoption began with universities and research centres, which became a significant factor for the city itself. Providers and universities collaborated and according to the documents and oral histories it was more about technological enthusiasm than profit. There was also a business innovation which changed the way the internet developed in Tomsk. “We realised, that it was more prospective not to count the megabytes of traffic, but to take money for access because it will increase quantity of users”, says the head of one of the early Tomsk providers. The decision was made by the providers and Tomsk University, a recipient of the grant programs aimed at bringing the internet to universities and also cities (RFBR,14 Soros grants) in the 1990s. Tonet, or “Tomsk 14

https://www.rfbr.ru/rffi/eng

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internet”, is a common word for the network. It has been used since the late 1990s until the 2010s. The term Tonet is still in use now, but very rare (much rarer than the term Runet, for instance). In Tonet people had their own city-scale forums, mass city media, digests of what is going on in “external internet”, subcultures, designers, artistic life, torrents, chat rooms and so on. Some of the media later developed into independent projects surviving in the world of social networking sites. Almost every family could use Tonet, provided they lived in a place where connection was sufficient. Tonet has been treated as a unique cultural phenomenon and simultaneously as a “village”, too small for serving as an inner market (Tomskiy Internet, 2004). Being so close to each other brought up a dense network of journalists, IT specialists, programmers, designers, etc. It persisted until broadband connection and mobile connection became widespread in the region and connection to these came at a price affordable to the masses. The first adopters worked at the banks and universities, and they first met in the big chat rooms, after which they created own chats. Chat rooms were more popular in Tomsk and had the same function as forums had in other cities (e.g. in Voronezh). In Tomsk, both forums and chat rooms were popular. The Tonet connection cost very little (about 6–8 USD for that time) and was not dependent on the amount of traffic. Traffic was crucial if people from Tomsk used the “external” internet (called “vneshka” and which was rather expensive and slow). Consequently, for about 10 years Tonet has been an example of the interconnection between all components of the internet we listed above: infrastructure, services, use and policies. This is one of the most obvious examples of interconnection of infrastructure, market policies, content and use. It is also important to emphasize the city history and specifics here, as Tomsk has been one of the key university centres in Siberia with plenty of mathematicians and physicists working at the city’s universities. Since it differs significantly from the “common” internet, Tonet has become a part of local culture and historical memory. This might be similar to how Minitel is still perceived in France (Mailland & Driscoll, 2017). However, this does not mean that people use services in a completely different way. Such alteration rather addresses how the internet might exist when the local infrastructure and use become so connected. Therefore we suggest to take the history and specifics of early forms of internet use into consideration. Similarly to paying attention to important industrial projects (such as the Soviet hydroelectric power station DneproHES; see Graham, 1993), we need to note how early internet projects developed. Despite the fact that its period of most active platform use is over, the history of Tonet is in some sense not finished, since the configuration of the Tomsk traffic exchange is still the same.

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7 Pereslavl-Zalessky: “Botik” and “Pochemuchka”—An Alternative Way of Internet Development Pereslavl-Zalessky was the capital of one of the duchies in Medieval Russia, before it grew into a province with plenty of monasteries, some museums and mostly wooden houses. In 1984, the Institute for Program Systems was built there. Established in the period when the USSR built ambitious programs similar to the American “star wars”, the organisation is now a Russian research institute. The first connections were established here between the Institute and Kurchatov institute, Russia’s pioneer organisation in terms of their connection to the internet. After the collapse of the USSR, institute researchers went on with their research programs, as well as educational ones, such as their ongoing international computer camp for teenagers, originally launched in the 1980s. In the early the1990s, a kindergarten was built with a network for both kids and parents. This kindergarten “Pochemuchka” (“the why-child”) was a perfect place to locate the main server—between the houses where people from the Institute for Program Systems lived. In the kindergarten, children learned to program with Logo language, and all their tasks were automatically downloaded to the local network so the parents could have access to their children’s work and compare it to the work of their classmates in the kindergarten. Later on, the institute collaborators organised an internet service provider called “Botik”15 that does not only provide connection, but uses its own technology “adapted for local conditions”. The internet was treated as a global network and, at the same time, as a local instrument for children and adults who participated in Botik initiatives. It has also been a local city-scale network, like the Tomsk one, but unlike the Tomsk example, it was only one network, issued from one provider who was not affiliated with media projects. Similar to the Tomsk example, Pereslavl seems to be an example of how local history might be important in understanding the development of the internet. However, this history might be important also due to its contradiction with the idea that small cities are radically different from the big ones in terms of internet access. The citizens of the 40 thousand-strong town of Pereslavl-Zalessky had sophisticated practices of internet use and not due to market reasons, but because of the scientific networks and the will of the Botik organisers. Another important factor is that internet penetration in Pereslavl started in a different way and about 10 years earlier, than those initiated by the federal programs, so this example provides an enigmatic alternative to the state-organised development and modernisation which is often treated as the most “natural” for Russia. What we also see here is an example of the social meaning of the internet that is unique and differs from all the listed above. The first provider was simply interested 15

Botik, small boat in Russian, is one of the symbols of Pereslavl-Zalessky. In 1692 young tsar Peter I built his “amusing fleet”, small copies of warships, in the village close to contemporary Pereslavl. The only surviving boat, Botik “Fortuna”, is now exhibited in local museum.

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in having a local connection for the Kurchatov institute, and being a provider came later, which transformed that network for the city. At the same time it remains an engineering project, as Botik technology is also involved in hardware projects.

8 Arzamas: How One Group in SNS Serves Local the Citizens, the Authorities and the Mainstream Media Having focused on infrastructural issues in the previous cases, in Arzamas we explore the peculiarities of this regional internet as a media space. Arzamas is a provincial town located in Nizhny Novgorod region, 112 km from Nizhniy Novgorod itself and 460 km from Moscow. The town was founded in the sixteenth century and in the seventeenth it became and important transit point between Moscow to Southeast Asia. Many cathedrals saved from this period attract religious tourists to the town. During the Soviet period, several plants were founded in the town. One of such plant was a complex for the Defence Industry which continues to be a central enterprise for town in terms of employment and taxes for the local budget. We chose this town for our sample as a representation of a typical Russian provincial town where all the indicators are “in-between”. The town is not very depressive, but not very prosperous as well. The economic conditions are harsh but not critical since some profitable enterprises continue to operate. Internet penetration is of relative significance, but is not as advanced as in big cities with their pan-city Wi-Fi coverage. During the fieldwork we found a specific internet object that shapes local communication practices of the people of Arzamas. The object is an extremely popular and powerful group in SNS (VKontakte) that operates as an information and communication hub for local people and authorities. The group “Ves’ Arzamas VKontakte” (“All Arzamas in VKontakte”) or VAVK was established at the end of 2011 when two young men started this group “just out of interest”. They posted photos, memes and other funny stuff without any ambitions of it to grow into their town’s main informational resource. It changed dramatically in December 2013 when a murder occurred in one of the town’s cafes. The murder was covered by the local traditional media as a domestic incident, while internet sources claimed that one of the fighters was an Armenian immigrant and that this had been a xenophobic rather than domestic incident. VAVK was the main internet source that published such kind of information, supported by UGC (user-generated content) videos and photos. The re-conceptualisation of the media coverage of this incident resulted in mass riots in the town. Later it was covered by all national media outlets. Being at the centre of the information flows, VAVK got several thousand new subscribers. It led to a shift in the group’s development: from an ordinary group, it turned into the largest group in town.

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Since then the group has strengthened its positions within the town’s media landscape. The main group with more than 62 thousand subscribers and 6000–7000 unique visitors every day posts different kinds of local news—from anonymous pieces from citizens to press releases of local government and re-posts of legacy media. There is also advertisement and fun content (memes, photos). The groups are very dynamic and post around 30 publications daily. Eighty percent of the content is generated by users; however each publication needs to be approved by group’s moderator that acts as gatekeeper. Besides the main group, there are three subordinate groups with almost 50 thousand subscribers where people can chat, place practical questions and announcements, sell and share goods. At the moment the group rents out an office, where 12 employees (moderators and advertising managers) work. In fact, the group is the town’s central informational hub. The group’s owner argues that VAVK is the locals’ substitute for all other information and communication resources: “there is no need for anything else [to provide information for locals]”. The group reposts or rewrites important materials from traditional media. Simultaneously, traditional media themselves use the group as a source of news for further development and as a channel to distribute their content online. Moreover, the local officials use the group to find out about accidents and as a source for citizens’ complaints. The local government’s media relations officer says she looks through the group’s post every morning, makes screenshots of important accidents and forwards them to the relevant officials. The local government also uses the group to convey information to the general public. Interestingly, the previous mayor gave his first interview to this group, rather than to town’s state-owned newspaper. Close interrelations between SNS groups and the local government are not unique for Arzamas only. We got the same evidences from Lobnya, a small town outside of Moscow. The city administration’s officials came to the owners of the town’s popular group in VKontakte and asked to inform them in case of any posts about local problems. The group needs to send this information to the city administration first, and if the officials are able react within 24 h, the post appears in the public group with the administration’s comment. If not, the group publishes the original post. These cases illustrate how the internet has opened communication channels for grassroots initiatives that can, in turn, transform their town’s informational flows. The group in SNS, which is not registered as mass media, in fact, operates as the town’s local mass media and as a platform for citizen engagement. Previous research argues that digital media are additional tools for the local mainstream media to disseminate vital civic information (Firmstone & Coleman, 2015). However, case of Arzamas demonstrates the opposite: that the SNS group can act as the main local news media. This case also explores new ways of how engagement with the local government can work. The combination of peer pressure from the group’s participants, along with the control from the authorities, is different, depending on how the internet can serve as a networked extension of the public space. This suggests a significant

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contrast to the earlier conceptualisation of the internet as a space for a networked public (e.g. Alexanyan et al., 2012). The example of Arzamas helps to build an alternative view of the internet in the Russian provinces. A town with a lower level of internet penetration and less internet services in comparison to that of bigger cities can invent a very unique way of serving its local citizens via the internet.

9 Tyumen: The Internetisation of Everything Tyumen is the capital of the Tyumen oblast, the biggest region in the geographical centre of Russia (slightly east of the Urals) that covers the territory from the Arctic Ocean in the north to country’s border in the south. Tyumen is located in the south of this region. The Tyumen oblast is famous for being a region rich in oil and gas, although all the oil fields are located in the north of the region, not in or around the city of Tyumen itself. Tyumen has never had powerful academic or science communities in comparison to the other big cities in Siberia, such as Tomsk or Novosibirsk. Therefore, the internet in Tyumen has never been developed or supported by universities or research centres. Enthusiasts and ideologists also did not play significant roles in internet in Tyumen. Taking into account a relatively high level of citizens’ income, it led to a specific pattern of internet development in Tyumen. From the very beginning, business actors were the main stakeholders of the internet. Therefore they developed this technology for their own—preferably commercial—purposes. As a representative from one of the first internet providers in Tyumen describes the nature of the internet in Tyumen: “[it] was not a hobby for early users. I think that the internet in Russia was purely a commercial [idea] from the very beginning. Well, in Tyumen it was so too”. As such, the first local internet providers grew and established themselves as actors in a competitive market. Their early competitive advantages were based mainly on access to a limited communications infrastructure, inherited after the collapse of the Soviet Union. This infrastructure included the automatic telephone exchange station, the governmental communication network “Iskra” (“Spark”), an intercity communication centre, etc. The distribution and privatisation of these scarce facilities foreshadowed the city’s internet providers’ formation in its early market, while further years are characterised by more transparent market competition for clients and market share. The local authorities were not involved in the internet development in Tyumen in the early stages (before mid-2000s). Either they did not understand the potential of internet technologies or they were not interested in them. This “lack of interest” is assessed by early local internet providers as positive driver for the internet’s development. One of owners of Komtel (internet provider that operated in Tyumen in 2000–2008) argues that “they [state officials] helped because they didn’t care about hanging cables between buildings. Actually, it was not help but their oversight. But at that moment it was a real help for everyone”.

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Only in the mid-2000s did the local officials start to actively expand into Tyumen’s internet. This expansion occurred earlier in comparison to other regions. Since this time several internet projects have been launched, among them “Tyumen free” (free Wi-Fi access in the city public places), cyberpatrol, free-of-charge courses of internet literacy for seniors, etc. The organiser of the free-of-charge courses of internet literacy for seniors says that now all the elderly people who wanted to go online are taught how to use the internet, so they moved to the educational programs for bureaucrats. In an interview with one of the Tyumen officials, he explained that local policies are really somewhat important for region’s internet development. People, who work in the region’s Ministry of Informatisation, have a greater awareness of data politics, saying that “the power of the future is a power dissolved in things”16 and the data might give the “real” knowledge which is crucially important for the state and local power. Taking into account these local governance peculiarities, Tyumen seems to differ significantly from the Voronezh case, in which the IT cluster’s access to the internet contrasts people’s private homes with no broadband connection. The Tyumen model of governance seems egalitarian: it supports internet access, adoption and benefits for a broad range of users, without a focus on start-ups, or to encourage business. However, we observe how the idea of “internetisation of everything” has been re-conceptualised as a source of control and power. This illustrates the importance of studying only local internet policy, but also how local bureaucrats make sense of it.

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Diversity Revisited: The Decline of Runet and Start for the Internet in Russia

The goal of this chapter was to introduce an alternative approach to understanding the internet in Russia and the specifics of its diversity by shifting the focus to local contexts of internet studies. The case studies in our research demonstrated completely different configurations from the first internet stakeholders in each city. In addition, their inputs and powers were unequal and unbalanced. For instance, business actors and universities as stakeholders of internet development had different values. Therefore, diversity of the internet in Russia’s regions should be explained not only according to different stages of internet penetration and development but also in terms of local history, local peculiarities and the role internet played at the very beginning of its diffusion. These case studies are part of an initial attempt to explore city internet as a complex phenomenon rooted in previous development, local cultural and societal

16 This phrase looks like an unconscious periphrasis of Michel Foucault idea of biopower and politics as hierarchy that is embedded into things.

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norms and political and economic situation. Therefore, we suggest that the main outputs of this chapter, discussed below, should be seen as a direction for further research. We revealed two new objects, important for understanding the internet’s development in particular locations. Firstly, the economic, demographic and mostly cultural contexts of the regions influence the configuration of the early internet. Research on internet configuration should include the interrelations between urban development and the internet’s development, an analysis of the local networks and means of internet use, as well as region- and city-scale information resources. Secondly, alternative platforms are the subject for further more detailed study. Starting from the networks such as Usenet and FIDO, which are still used in Russia, we see that the diversity of platforms is still important. It contradicts the linear understanding of the internet as a globalising technology, which doesn’t take into consideration the fact that people might use this technology in a very localised way. Also, we argue that the alternative qualitative approach to Russian internet studies would be a fruitful addition to existing data on regional internet. The current dominating quantitative research about the Russian internet at the federal districts and whole regions’ levels do not reflect the full, multilayered picture of the country’s regional internet. A shift to the level of regions, cities and villages would allow to see the diversity and complexity of the internet in Russia. The case studies showing the variety of “internets” in different Russian cities reveal such divergences—not only as alternative modes of use and development, but as peculiarities and histories that had not been made explicit prior. We do not only suggest that people in Voronezh use the internet differently than the people in Arzamas. We aim to address another logic of fragmentation. This fragmentation is based on a variety of factors that constitute the internet as an intersection of infrastructure, service, use and policy. The combinations and quality of these elements are also unequal and require further investigation. At the same time, we need to take into consideration the connections and mutual influences of these factors. For example, usage and infrastructural specifications might be densely connected, like it was in cases of Tomsk and Voronezh. It is never a linear story, but an entanglement of specific factors. We have distinguished three important clusters of such factors. Firstly, a city’s history, research and business organisations and infrastructure (e.g. in the examples of Tomsk and Pereslavl-Zalessky) demonstrate the interconnection of hardware, services and use. The local networks influenced the emergence of city-scale projects, media and chat rooms. In Pereslavl-Zalessky, the research institute established the first internet provider and forced internet penetration in the town. In Tomsk, local providers collaborated with Tomsk University to establish and run the city’s intranet. Secondly, alternative and basic platforms for communication (e.g. in the examples of Arzamas and Tyumen) challenge the idea of linear development of services. Neither of these cities is a leading one in the terms of the quantitative stats. However, we found out that the usage of online media and services within the cities include innovatory approaches to the role of such media and services. In Arzamas, the local

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group in SNS gained extremely in high popularity and unexpectedly became the most important information channel and communication platform for its local citizens, authorities and traditional mass media. Thirdly, the inner configuration of access divide might be a significant supplement for understanding the quantitative data. More egalitarian local policies in Tyumen suggest that usage is a key factor in understanding what the internet is. In the future, this logic could become a basis for datafication. In contrast, an understanding of the internet as an infrastructure in the local policies of the internet’s development brings forth this the following result. There needs to be more focus on the business-oriented models of (the internet’s development), rather than on usage penetration. We suppose that the impact and variety of such examples will grow as long as we continue to study the internet as more complex phenomenon, rather than only as a “virtual” or “alternative” space. Today, the internet is used not only as a tool, space or representation board, but it is getting densely embedded in people’s lives and is being shaped by different ways of living. In the chapter we explored such evidence from different regions, about how internet development is dependent on local conditions. We have been aware of the technical determinism in this chapter, but let us make one final assumption to bring our research further from the Russian regions towards the broader discussion of the internet. The internet is sometimes said (and works) to develop the existing variety of social patterns, mixing them with each other and going beyond locality. However, our research investigates the opposite logic: that internet services themselves increase the diversity of how we understand society, its variety and local features. Further investigation could lead us to rethink, both theoretically and methodologically, what social life and its fragmentation in this digital age mean.

References Alexanyan, K., Barash, V., Etling, B., et al. (2012). Exploring Russian cyberspace: Digitallymediated collective action and the networked public sphere. Berkman Center Research Publication, no. 2012-2. Retrieved March 12, 2019, from https://cyber.harvard.edu/sites/cyber.law. harvard.edu/files/Exploring_Russian_Cyberspace_2012.pdf DiMaggio, P., & Hargittai, E. (2001). From the “digital divide” to “digital inequality”: Studying internet use as penetration increases. Princeton, NJ: Center for Arts and Cultural Policy Studies, Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University. Dutton, W. H. (Ed.). (2013). The Oxford handbook of internet studies. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ekonomika Runeta. (2018). Runet economics. Report by RAEC. Retrieved March 25, 2019, from https://raec.ru/activity/analytics/9884/ Federal State Statistics Service. (2018). Retrieved March 12, 2019, from http://www.gks.ru/wps/ wcm/connect/rosstat_main/rosstat/en/main/

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Firmstone, J., & Coleman, S. (2015). Public engagement in local government: The voice and influence of citizens in online communicative spaces. Information, Communication & Society, 18(6), 680–695. Goggin, G., & McLelland, M. (Eds.). (2017). The Routledge companion to global internet histories. New York: Taylor & Francis. Graham, L. R. (1993). The ghost of the executed engineer: Technology and the fall of the Soviet Union (No. 87). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Hongladarom, S. (2000). Negotiating the global and the local: How Thai culture co-opts the internet. First Monday, 5(8). Krylova, I., Orekhov, B., Stepanova, E., & Zaydelman, L. (2015, August). Languages of Russia: Using social networks to collect texts. In Russian summer school in information retrieval (pp. 179–185). Cham: Springer. Kuznetsov, S. (2004). Oshchupyvaia slona. Zametki po istorii russkogo interneta [Thouching the elephant. Notes on the history of Russian internet]. Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie: Moscow. Lipskiy, A., & Polukhin, A. (2014). Natalia Zubarevich: Chetyre Rossii otmenyautsya [Natalia Zubarevich: Four Russians are cancelled]. Novaya Gazeta. Retrieved May 12, 2019, from https://www.novayagazeta.ru/articles/2014/12/20/62443-natalya-zubarevich-chetyre-rossiiotmenyayutsya Mailland, J., & Driscoll, K. (2017). Minitel: Welcome to the internet. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Mesto v Instagrame: Grozny [The place in Instagram: Grozny]. (2015). Tjournal. Retrieved May 12, 2019, from https://tjournal.ru/flood/55345-grozny-instagram Miller, D., Costa, E., Haynes, N., McDonald, T., Nicolescu, R., Sinanan, J., Spyer, J., Venkatraman, S., & Wang, X. (2016). How the world changed social media (Vol. 1). London: UCL press. Nagirnaya, A. V. (2015). Development of the internet in Russian regions. Regional Research of Russia, 5(2), 128–136. Orekhov, B. V., & Reshetnikov, K. Y. (2014). K otsenke Vikipedii kak lingvisticheskogo istochnika: sravnitelnoe issledovanie. Sovremenniy russkiy yazyk v internete. [Assessing Wikipedia as linguistic source: Comparative study. Contemporary Russian language in internet]. Moscow: Languages of Slavonic culture. Perfilyev, Y. (2003). Rossiyskoye internet-prostranstvo: razvitie i struktura [The Russian internetspace: Development and structure]. Moscow: Gardariki. Peters, B. (2016). How not to network a nation: The uneasy history of the Soviet internet. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Rainee, L., & Wellman, B. (2012). Networked: The new social operating system. Boston: MIT Press. Razvitie interneta v regionakh Rossii [Internet development in Russian regions]. (2016). Report by Yandex corporation. Retrieved March 25, 2019, from https://yandex.ru/company/researches/ 2016/ya_internet_regions_2016 Regions of Russia. Socio-economic indicators. Statistical collection by Rosstat. (2016). Moscow. p. 1326. Sandvig, C. (2013). The internet as infrastructure. In The Oxford handbook of internet studies. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Schmidt, H., & Teubener, K. (2006). Our RuNet. Cultural identity and media usage. In H. Schmidt, K. Teubener, & N. Konradov (Eds.), Control+ shift: Public and private usages of the Russian internet (pp. 4–20). Norderstedt: Books on Demand. Tomskiy Internet kak phenomen [Tomsky internet as phenomenon]. (2004). Retrieved March 12, 2019, from http://travin.msk.ru/webplanet/tomsk.html. Van Dijk, J., & Hacker, K. (2003). The digital divide as a complex and dynamic phenomenon. The Information Society, 19(4), 315–326. Van Oost, E., Verhaegh, S., & Oudshoorn, N. (2009). From innovation community to community innovation: User-initiated innovation in wireless Leiden. Science, Technology, & Human Values, 34(2), 182–205.

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Data Turn and Datascape in Russia Marina Shilina

1 Introduction: Is Big Data Made a “Great Revolution” in Russia? In 2010s, transformations of both the informational society and the individual as such are driven by the growth of digital information (Bromwich, 2018; Buckland, 2017; Hintz, Dencik, & Wahl-Jorgensen, 2018; Lupton, 2016, 2017; Pew Research, 2016, 2018) in the “always-on society” (Belsey, 2005; Mandiberg, 2012), and are mostly defined by a marketing metaphor: “big data” (Gerbaudo, 2016; Laney, 2001; Lynch, 2008; Puschmann & Burgess, 2014; Thatcher, O’Sullivan, & Mahmoudi, 2016). Data is the “material produced by abstracting the world into categories, measures and other representational forms (. . .) that constitute the building blocks from which information and knowledge are created” (Kitchin, 2014a: 1). Despite the unprecedented growth in the speed, scope and volume of data and applications (Gartner, 2015; IDC, 2014; Pybus, Coté, & Blanke, 2015), the definition, concept and practices of Big Data are still in their early stages of development (Dalton & Thatcher, 2014). But experts predict that by 2026, Big Data-driven industry around the world will grow to $61 billion or up to $85 billion (Wikibon, 2017). The young Russian market is only 1% of the global one, but growing twice as fast as the world market (IDC, 2014; RBC, 2018). Big Data influences everyday lives (Kitchin & Dodge, 2011) and other processes (Coté, Gerbaudo, & Pybus, 2016; Schwab, 2016). Data-driven practices structure the economics of capitalism, both cognitive (Ross, 2005; Walliser, 2008) and data colonial (Couldry & Mejias, 2019), class struggle and the labor market where a digital “cognitariat” has appeared (Berardi, 2005). Now, society can be labeled as M. Shilina (*) Department of Advertising, PR and Design, Plekhanov Russian University of Economics, Moscow, Russia Department of Advertising and PR, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow, Russia e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_9

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“datafied” (Hintz et al., 2018; Schäfer & van Es, 2017). The influence of Big Data on the economy and society has been termed “revolutionary” (Andrejevic, 2014; Davis, 2016; Fuchs, 2016; Marr, 2016; Mayer-Schönberger & Cukier, 2013; Pybus et al., 2015; van Dijck, 2014), a “data revolution” (Kitchin, 2014a), and “revolution 4.0” (Schwab, 2016). Is the essence of data-driven changes in economics and society really so revolutionary, especially in Russia? According to Marx, “capital is in itself indifferent to the particular nature of every sphere of production” (Marx, 1976)—and the extraction of value from data. Nowadays, practitioners and theorists are just starting to analyse all these processes, growing in relevance to the social sciences (Bello-Orgaz, Jung, & Camacho, 2016; Boellstorff, 2013; Gerbaudo, 2016; Ishikawa, 2015; Kaplan, 2015; Manovich, 2011; Pentland, 2014; Rieder, 2016), provoking critical questions about Big Data (boyd & Crawford, 2012; Crawford, Gray, & Miltner, 2014), critical data studies (Dalton & Thatcher, 2014, 2016; Kitchin, 2014b, 2017), contextual and inclusive data studies (Taylor, 2015), and even the end of theory (Anderson, 2008). But a holistic conceptual framework to answer these questions both in practice and in theory still does not exist. As of this decade, the Russian Federation lags far behind the world’s most developed countries in terms of indices of the digital datafied economy. But Russia is becoming an “always-on” and data-driven society (McKinsey Global Institute, 2017) due to rapid datafication and support of digital data-driven economics by the state through Russia-wide strategies and programmes (since 2012). The level of datafication, e.g. the use of ERP systems (automated systems of enterprise resource planning) and cloud services in Russia is comparable to that in the EU (specifically, in Great Britain and France, Germany, and Austria). The number of Internet users and the penetration rate increased to 90 million people (16+), and up to 75.4% (GFK, 2019), etc. According to the Russian Association of Electronic Communications (RAEC), the contribution of the digital economy to the overall Russian economy is estimated at 2.1% of GDP in 2017, while the contribution of the mobile economy is estimated at 3.8% of GDP (total: 4.35 trillion roubles). Internet segments of the market are growing at 11% per year (RAEC, 2017). The officials compare these processes to the revolutionary Russia-wide electrification programme in the Soviet era. So what do (Big) data really mean? What are the main elements of the Russian datafied landscape? What is the “working” national model of datafication in Russia? What does it mean for Russians? In other words, what are the social effects of digital datafication state strategy? In Russia, social aspects of digital datafication are a rather new field of research. The first few data studies on media using Big Data analysis (Kol’tsova, 2012; Radchenko & Sakoyan, 2014; Shilina, 2016a), conceptualisation (Shilina, 2013, 2016b), and collection (Shashkin & Davydov, 2016) were published in the mid-2010s. In 2015, practitioners at Rusbase & Global Innovations Lab Big Data Conference and TAdviser conference and theorists with Grushin Readings began to discuss data-driven practices. New digital state strategies and statistics growth are provoking a new wave of publications (Gokhberg, Kislyakov, Kuzminov, &

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Sabelnikova, 2019; Gokhberg, Kuzminov, & Sabelnikova, 2018; Medovnikov, 2018; Shilina & Vartanov, 2019). But in general, researchers have not paid special attention to clarifying the phenomenon of Big Data as such or its effects on Russian society yet. Therefore, the value of this chapter lies in the following. Firstly, the genesis of the Big Data concept will be presented. Then a theoretical approach to this issue as proposed by the author will help to identify this phenomenon from micro- to metalevel (using the framework and metaphor of a turn). In this way, the author will emphasise the various data-driven practices while opening new opportunities and problems in their relevant use and research, especially in Russian data art projects. In order to achieve these goals, a comparative analysis of relevant data, media monitoring, survey and interviews with Russian communication researchers (n ¼ 6), experts (n ¼ 6), along with online and offline surveys of practitioners living in Russian cities (n ¼ 100, 2018) are used because in growing industries on the introduction stage of its development professional opinion is only relevant (Grant, 2016).

2 Genesis of “Dead” Big Data: From Tech to Bio–Socio– Technological Phenomena Digital dating suggests that all aspects of life have now been transformed into quantifiable data (Mayer-Schönberger & Cukier, 2013), and can be connected, used and analysed online, in real time. First and foremost, Big Data is a tech phenomenon. The technological essence of data (microlevel) and its analysis is rather universal and similar all over the world and in Russia (RAEC, 2017). Big Data, despite the metaphorical nature of the term and the lack of a generally recognised definition, is universally characterised by large volumes, high refresh rates, a great variety, and a need for new forms of processing to improve decision-making, insights and process optimisation (Beyer & Laney, 2012; Gartner, 2015; Sallam et al., 2017). These data properties describe a series of so-called V-characteristics that have grown from the beginning of the century, from three technical characteristics (volume, velocity, variety) (Laney, 2001) to a dozen “social” ones (veracity, validity, venue, virtue, etc.) (Shilina, 2016b). Now, the tech basis of the datafied system is changing. Despite the fact that Big Data is still extremely relevant, it is no longer the hottest topic of discussion. According to Gartner, Big Data as a technological trend has fallen off since 2015 because it graduated to the status of being core technology, and is gradually being replaced by wearables, the Internet of Things, machine learning and advanced analytics (2015), artificial intelligence (2016), the convergence of search and analytics (2017), natural languages analysis (2018), and so on. Today, Big Data is becoming a catch-all term for the entire complex of data-driven technologies and is

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determining the development of information and communication processes, all of which are dominated by “digital non-humans”. It means that on the current second stage data-driven processes are based on digital “things” as a central element (e.g. since 2008, non-human sources of data have been prevailing and growing rapidly, reaching up to 50 billion connected devices by 2025) (Gartner, 2015). New sources and networks of data-driven communication—the Internet of Things (IoT), the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), the Internet of Nano-Things (IoNT), the Internet of Bio-Nano-Things (IoBNT), and the Internet of Everything (IoE)—provide an unprecedented opportunity to obtain a new type of real information, in a new non-discrete streaming format online, from any networked object, human and non-human. There is now the possibility to have a single online representation of information about living and inanimate nature, on an unprecedented scale. A person, having digitised their data and participating in hybrid human and non-human systems, becomes a part of these networks (Akyildiz, Pierobon, Balasubramaniam, & Koucheryavy, 2015). Networks that unite living and non-living nature in hybrid systems are universal, because they are based on digital data and become a prerequisite for creating new formats for personal and social communication. According to Russian scientist Yevgeny Koucheryavy, a new challenge lies in the interconnection of heterogeneous networks composed of different types of biological and artificial nano-things. These will create an interconnection between the cyberworld and the biological environment, blurring boundaries between digital–virtual and physical–material beings. In this new world, the “nonhuman being” becomes programmable (meaning more intelligent) and humans “receive” a new corporeality from other humans (Koucheryavy, Kirichek, Glushakov, & Pirmagomedov, 2017). Therefore, Big Data is not only a universal technical phenomenon, but is quickly becoming a bio–socio–technological metaphenomenon. The concept demonstrates progressive technical development and a huge economic and social dynamic. First, large amounts of data are just “raw data”. The potential of any data set can only be identified through analysis: Big Data has always been “baked” (Dalton & Thatcher, 2014; Gitelman, 2013). Thus, it is a priori a social phenomenon, and the essence of Big Data from society’s point of view is both socially mediated and paradoxical: It reflects the influence of IT technologies on society based on the reflection of various spheres of social life in information systems. Last century was a time for data collection and the maturation of data science (in a proto-stage of its development) in Russia and around the world. The main generators of data were sensors and Internet users, especially social network users and corporations (RBC, 2018; Wikibon, 2017). In 2010s, the concept of Big Data was mostly associated with the communications of a “digital human”, who would have digital social interactions (Ishikawa, 2015; Olshannikova, Olsson, Huhtamäki, & Kärkkäinen, 2017) and produces Big Social Data (BSD) mostly on social networks. A person became a generator of different types of data, to be analysed and used by corporations and politicians to optimise their marketing strategies and get value in real time (Mayer-Schönberger & Cukier, 2013). Now data relations are “the new

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types of human relations that data as a potential commodity enables” (Couldry & Mejias, 2019: 27). Paradoxically, that the model of data-driven communication in society is changing from automatic data collection (machine-to-human, M2H) to a machine-tomachine (M2M) or hybrid machine-to-machine-via human model, becoming a hybrid part of systems of various types of actors in the Internet of Things, the Internet of Everything and the Internet of Bio-Nano-Things. Thus, in the public sphere, the machine-to-machine model of communication dominates. A society labeled as “datafied” becomes literally more and more non-human than when it was previously labeled “post-human” (Braidotti, 2013; Hayles, 1999). Now the new and powerful actors in this new hybrid corporative reality and (corpo)reality, and social non-human landscape are the owners of various data and ICT, software and other technologies. What do these bio–socio–technological changes mean for Russians? We asked Russians (n ¼ 112). All the respondents of our surveys are active Internet users who spend several hours (from 1 to 5) daily on the Internet. They are academics (n ¼ 6) and experts in communication (n ¼ 6), and professionals (n ¼ 100), connected with digital projects in creative industries, marketing, and retail. According to our surveys, all the respondents are familiar with the terms “big data”, “AI”, but only a few of them know what it really means. Respondents are not familiar with all of the terms connected with the IoT, IIoT and IoBNT. Most of the respondents are sure that data collection and analysis makes processes in society more effective (74) and our everyday lives more comfortable (83). All of these signs point to an “initial” stage of understanding of what Big Data really is and what it means for Russians on the newest stage of datafication.

3 Data Turn Versus Data-Driven Divide? A “Datafied” Methodological View on the Controversy of Capitalism The basic element for understanding Big Data is a unit of digital datafied information, becoming a universal constant for both humans and non-humans, hybrid systems, living and inanimate nature, humans, and the world at large. Literally all of the information about a person (and connected “things” and “everything”) is becoming available for analysis. This volume of data is used over and over, and is virtually unlimited in access, 24/7. Data analysis is becoming an instrument of cognition, both of individual persons and of reality as such. Communication in the “data age” is mediated not only by unique programmes, but is also connected with constant online replenishment of data and machine learning. It becomes possible to analyse information that comes as “feedback” and to respond to it. This opening up of human (and non-human) data to externally driven data extraction is “the capitalization of human data without limit” (Couldry & Mejias, 2019: 4). However, for the first time, prerequisites are arising for a common digital “datafied language” and a

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two-way model of communication between the subject and the object—between a person and the world as such. This means that the aforementioned analysis of the technical characteristics of datafying (micro-level) led to a holistic understanding of the essence of the phenomena and metaphor of Big Data at the metalevel. This is possible within the paradigm of the “turn” so often used in modern studies since the twentieth century. Let us note that in the European tradition, the whole picture of the world (metalevel) as proposed by Christian religion was destroyed in the Enlightenment. The ideas of personal self-development and linear progress, beginning with the scientific and technical (Mumford, 1991), came to the forefront, which are continued today in the form of digitalisation, internetisation, and digital datafying. In the twentieth- and twenty-first-century search for integrity, a single foundation reflects the concepts of various turns—linguistic, iconic (not to mention many others: the anthropological, medial, theological, spatial, narrative turns, etc.). For instance, everything is text, image, etc. The concept (and metaphor) of “turn” reflects the meta-concept (metalevel), the ontological status of a human being and the world at large, and determines the level of the social changes (partial/reflexio in Latin or radical/ conversio in Latin, or Die Kehre in Old German, according to Heidegger (1962)). According to our analyses, the basic element of the reality model in the majority of turns is information and the way it is created, received, analysed and consumed. Despite the differences in the interpretation of information, all of the turns only describe a specific understanding of reality (reflexio). Models of subject-to-object interaction between a person and the world were described following the classical canons of communication models as subject-centric, one-sided, or indirect. References to reality (language, image, etc.) were mediated by technologies, the impact of which is becoming more radical. In the case of Big Data, the digitalisation, mathematisation and algorithmisation, computerisation of everything implies a new universality—and, consequently, the computational turn. Digital unification equally represents physical, real and virtual objects (and their simulacra) from the point of view of information. In the development of human interaction with the subject world, internetisation is the next turn: the Internet and the World Wide Web allow us to generate, broadcast and use large amounts of digital data that a person produces (not only texts in social media, but digital tracks from wearables, CCTV cameras, etc.), and from the surrounding world (IoT, IIoT, etc.). The Internet opens up new possibilities for human-to-machine communication (H2M) and forms not only an archive, as was the case with the computational turn, but also a space of constant mostly direct interaction between human beings and the world (e.g. the Internet of Everything). On the Internet it has been made technically possible for the first time in history to implement a model not only of computer-mediated machine-mediated anthropocentric (human-to-machine-to-human, H2M2H) communication in society, but a hybrid heterarchical two-way communication model as well, involving robots (programmes) as independent actors (Shilina, 2012). Take, for example, the robot as an independent press officer, such as the one made by Yandex.

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On the Internet of Everything and the Internet of Bio-Nano-Things, the interconnection between human beings, the biological environment, and the cyberworld blurs boundaries between digital and physical, virtual and material beings. The model of communication becomes universal for both human and non-human beings. This new hybrid reality returns us to the idea of a single unit of information in the datafying of everything—as an instrument for understanding everything. The “always-on society” becomes the “always-on world” and everything in it is connected, just as it seemed to be before the Enlightenment (but digitally). Thus, a new digital data-driven world is born. This is more than a revolution. This is a turn of the universal type, because it allows a universal, synthetic awareness of reality—conversion, Die Kehre (according to Heidegger). Thanks to the Data Turn, a holistic vision of the Universe is opening to turn us back (or ahead) to the harmony between mankind and the world around it, which was destroyed by capitalism and the advent of the “man-versustechnology” opposition. Datafication does more than open up such a holistic vision. The power over knowledge (cognitive power) and economic power (the power to make value) converge as never before (Couldry & Mejias, 2019: 10). The data-driven world might be totally “driven”, operated and controlled by owners of data sets and ICT, software and other technologies. In other words, this means that under data-driven capitalism in Russia (and beyond), the main question is “Who cares for data?” (Shilina, Couch, & Peters, 2017). How do you care for your data? How do you take care of your data? Who cares for your personal data and uses it? Who cares for/manages/manipulates your data? Who cares for all human and non-human data flows? Who cares for data use in business, politics, culture and society? Datafication is primarily an area of state and corporate responsibility. Today, the balance of power is tilted towards the state or big business. They have the power to collect, trade and make decisions based on personal data, whereas a person can only hope to gain control over their data. This situation of digital divide1 in a datafied society is paradoxical. For example, traditional levels of digital adoption (access, actual usage and effective adoption) could make the data divide deeper: on the one hand, the more access to the Internet that one has, the more risky it is, because users leave more and more digital traces. On the other hand, it is not as important to provide physical access to digital information as it is to provide access to the results of its analysis. Data then has to be analysed, and as a result, data-driven communication analysis results are not accessible to users. It creates a risky zone and grounds for the development of the digital divide at the level of meanings.

1

A digital divide is an economic and social inequality with regard to access to, use of, or impact of information and communication technologies. There are several types of divide: the divide within countries, between differing countries or regions, etc. Different authors focus on different aspects (e.g. different choices of subjects) which led to more than 200 different ways to define the digital divide. The term is also referred to as digital inclusion, participation, media literacy, etc.

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New strategic forms of data management, whether centralised by the state (as is the case in China) or decentralised by corporations (as with developed economies), create a new form of digital divide: the data-driven divide. We define the digital datadriven divide as access to/use of/impact of information and communication using data-driven technologies that is (un)protected by legislation, which leads to economic and social inequality. It is possible to identify the situation not only in terms of the digital, but political, economic, and social data-driven divide. (In the case of the Data Turn, there could be a dramatic manipulation of the problems of global existence.) Such a thing as “data ecology” principle needs to be created and affirmed. Personal data cannot become “a new oil” or a new fuel for capitalism machine. In this case, only the state might be able to defend its citizens by providing relevant legislation. So, the state’s paternalistic model of a data-driven economy and society looks optimistic. In Russia, the economy is defined as state-corporate, in which civil society institutions are developing, and the problems of Big Data regulation are still controversial even within the new national economic development strategy for the digital economy (2017–2024) and AI programmes (2019). This determines the special severity and national specifics of the problem, as well as the peculiarities of data-driven processes in Russia. Now this model stands on the point of bifurcation. Is the future data-driven harmonious development or destruction? According to our survey results, respondents mentioned that personal data collection and usage by the state is preferable (5 academics, 3 experts, 67 professionals) to use by corporations, while a third of respondents had not reflected on such a problem before. While a transparent digital state and society would be a step towards the development of democracy for the majority of respondents (4, 3 and 82 respondents, respectively), a few thought this not to be true (1, 1, 8). As for foreseeable problems, the main one identified is the lack of legal support (6, 5, 78), the alienation of digital personal data (5, 5, 75), and the absence of an alternative (4, 5, 65), while a third of professionals are not aware of any problems connected with datafied processes. Thus, in the age of radical datafied ontological changes, the majority of respondents believes in a data-driven future.

4 Forming a Data System in Russia The modes of business and governance, as well as the social specifics of datafication and data usage (meso-level of research), differ from country to country (macro level of research). In Russia, the system and models of governance of data historically used are state-paternalistic. The prerequisites for the creation, accumulation and use of large amounts of data, primarily statistical ones, were formed by the economics and public administration of the seventeenth century. In pre-revolutionary Russia, where the development of capitalism was rather implicit, data were used primarily for government purposes. The parameters and regularity of statistics collection

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became more active in the late nineteenth century and the first decade of the twentieth century2 (e.g. in 1897 and 1916, the first all-Russian and peasant population censuses were carried out3). In the Soviet economic system, data were used in support of the goals and objectives of the Soviet Union’s Communist Party (CPSU) policy. It was not purely for analytical usage, but quasi-analytical and politicised. It is another Russian data paradox that economic data and analysis becomes a political issue. This paternalistic and politicised position of the Soviet state was used not only for propaganda, but also for the transformation of social life. From the early 1980s, practices of data collection, storage, visualisation, analysis, and transmission from industrial equipment to optimise production and business were all developing on a new level. Automated control systems, computerisation, and artificial intelligence programmes in the USSR were advanced for their times. Nowadays, the development of Big Data in Russia is in line with global trends, but so far it is not that considerable (Program, 2017; RAEC, 2017). According to experts, in the development timeline of the Big Data phenomenon, the first decade of the twenty-first century can be considered the proto-stage (the accumulation period of digital data, the development of technologies, and the optimisation of storage conditions). The stage of using Big Data as a resource to search for insights and make decisions in various fields began worldwide in the first decade of the century, whereas in Russia, such practices only began in the 2010s. In mid-2010s, data is used in science (to search for correlations in large volumes of scientific data), state structures (in the security, finance, transport, healthcare, and education fields), business (for studying consumers, marketing research, and forming data-driven strategies), and humanitarian technologies (by marketers, advertisers, PR specialists, and journalists to improve the effectiveness of projects and their personal work with the audience) (Shilina, 2016b). Since 2012, we have seen the creation of the Open Data and Open Government state programmes and data-driven systems. The importance of data-driven technologies is established in the “Strategy for the Development of the Information Technology Industry in the Russian Federation for 2014–2020” (2013) as a breakthrough for the global industry, and because of this, Russia’s global technological competitiveness in the next 10–15 years looks promising. In the “Digital Economy” Program (2017–2024), which appeared in June 2017, Big Data is the main end-toend digital technology for the development of a “national data ecosystem”. The concept of Big Data cannot be separated from the external infrastructure in which it is produced and stored and the profit generation for which it is destined

2

See also about global aspects at: Buckland (2017) and Kitchin (2014a). Nevertheless, even with the not-always-structured data collected in Russia since the eighteenth century, the Soviet and Russian historian, Prof. B.N. Mironov, using mathematical methods of analysis, among other things, found significant insights in the country’s social history since the end of the seventeenth century until 1917 (Mironov 2012; Mironov & Eklof 2000). The newly researched “old” data led to reinterpretations of fundamental problems of Russian history, including the prerequisites and causes of the Russian Revolution and overturning widespread negative myths about Russia. 3

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(Couldry & Mejias, 2019: 11). The Program is focused on creating platforms, technologies and infrastructure. Its main goal is “to create an ecosystem of the digital economy of the Russian Federation in which data in digital form is a key factor of production in all spheres of socio-economic activity. The priority tasks of the development of the system are ICT, telecommunication and legislation. The digital datafied system is defined in terms of structure and management mechanisms. It is represented by three levels: markets and sectors of the economy, platforms and technologies, as well as an “environment”, encompassing normative regulation, information infrastructure, and personnel and information security. Effective interaction, including cross-border, business, scientific and educational community, the state and citizens, and also creation of necessary and sufficient conditions of institutes and infrastructure, elimination of existing obstacles, increase competitiveness on the global market” (Program, 2017: 5). The maturity of the data-driven economy is determined by strategies and goal-setting for data application. According to RAEC experts, the national digital economy is a system where added value is produced by ICTs (RAEC, 2017). The key actors in the system are the state, businesses, the scientific and educational communities, and citizens. This is also set forth in the Program. Their interactions could be described as a quadro helix4 of the digital datafied economy (Shilina, 2012; Shilina & Vartanov, 2019). So what is the “working” national model of datafication in Russia at this “infrastructural stage”? What does it mean for Russians? In spite of the fact that the first projects in the field of ICT (e.g. cybernetics, artificial intelligence) appeared in Russia already in the 1960s, followed by analytical systems in the late 1990s, the data infrastructure is just developing. According to experts of ICS Consulting and Orange Business Services (2018), the Internet of Things in large Russian companies amounted to 20.8 billion roubles in 2017, and is expected to grow by 12% per year by 2020. For example, in 2017, about 1000 RPA apps were implemented in Russia, primarily in banks (VTB, Sberbank, Tinkoff, etc.) (Center of Robotic Process Automation & AI Annual Report, 2017). According to IDC, investments in IoT (equipment, software, services and communications) will grow by 22% per year from 2017 to 2021, and by 2021, the costs of the IoT market will exceed $9 billion (IDC, 2017). According to IDC experts, more than half of these investments would be in transport, manufacturing, telecommunications and energy. The main growth factors are the digital transformation of companies, the creation of a system and a mutual partnership between solution providers—and a significant interest from the state. According to experts, IoT solutions will massively penetrate “smart cities” with populations of more than 1 million people by 2025, while the economic effect will increase up to 375 billion roubles. Technologies optimise the interaction between the main city stakeholders—business, residents and the city authorities—and make the

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Quadruple and quintuple innovation helix frameworks include the media and natural environment (Carayannis & Campbell 2009, 2010).

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urban space more transparent and convenient. Moscow, the capital city, is an example of an “ideal smart city”, with its strategic programme “Smart City 2030” that was started in 2018 with a discussion on the Internet between businesses and citizens. The main idea is to digitalise all city processes and establish a new administration in Moscow as the smart city platform. In 2019, Moscow becomes the main city to implement the national AI beta-programmes. A common secure digital space (the smart city platform) is planned in St. Petersburg as well, followed by other cities. A “safe city” system includes tools for monitoring basic real and artificial threats, and is already in use (e.g. in Nizhny Taghil, telemetry systems are used in schools; in Kursk and Vologda, intelligent security systems detect threats to public safety, etc.). These are joint projects of private IT companies, authorities, industry associations, and universities as the basic members of data systems. According to industry experts, many cities in Russia are not ready to implement datafied solutions because they have more pressing problems, and in many cases, they have not even been able to digitise information flows or create architecture for data collection and storage. They also have infrastructure problems (no regulatory framework and business models), and a “smart scenario” is still too expensive. The market for the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) in Russia is growing rapidly and has already reached 85 billion roubles, which is still less than equivalent segments in developed economics (RAEC, 2017). However, companies’ investments in IIoT technologies increased by 42% per year, and total sum of incomes of Russian operators was 7.6 billion roubles (2016). The main drivers of IIoT implementation are state-owned enterprises. This distinguishes the Russian model of the digital economy from others, where private companies are the key actors. The problems of implementing IIoT technologies are similar to those with IoT—datafied technologies are too expensive, while existing solutions remain more cost effective. In Russian “smart agriculture”, intelligent technologies are being introduced in the spheres of grain growing, small-scale field farming, livestock and fisheries. So far, smart technologies have been used only for 5–10% of territories, but experts predict that the use of IoT devices will grow to 75 million devices by 2020 (In 2015, the figure only reached 30 million). It is expected that 30% of Russian farms will actively use the Internet of Things by 2019. For example, GLONASS/GPS navigation sensors will increase the accuracy of planting seeds through constant monitoring and automatic adjustment of machinery routes. Innovative machines are being developed by both scientists and entrepreneurs (e.g. the innovative Agrobot tractor (Ryazan region, 2015), a prototype for the first domestic unmanned tractor (Kazan, 2016), and a tractor-drone (the Ural State University of Agriculture and Ural Federal University, 2017)). Russian drones as a part of everyday practices are used not only in Russia, but abroad. AR/VR-simulators are modelling the use of agricultural machinery and training personnel. In addition, these solutions based on 360-degree video are used to promote agricultural projects. For example, the Russian company Krok developed an AR application based on a virtual holographic table to demonstrate high-tech farms’ automation solutions for both their customers and industry tech fairs.

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Datafied healthcare reform in Russia includes the computerisation of medical institutions, the development of high-tech areas, and most importantly, the unification and digitisation of offline medical data. In eHealth, Russia is focused on the creation and production of domestic technologies as drivers of development in the healthcare sector. While medical information is monopolised by the state, it is heterogeneous: for example, about 38 million personal electronic medical data sets are filed in accordance with different classifications, and about 80 scientific research institutes have their own independent information arrays, etc. There has been no functioning electronic system that would allow the exchange of medical information between various public and private medical institutions. However, the development of the Unified State Information System in Public Health (EGIS) should solve these problems. The Russian healthcare reform requires the development of a legislative framework for advances like telemedicine technologies. In 2017, a federal law on telemedicine was adopted. According to the industrial experts, mobile mHealth technologies will be in demand in Russia no earlier than in 2020, after laws and standards for the exchange of medical data are adopted, EGIS is completed, and protocols and methods for e-consultations are created. This is possible only with state support. In the Russian datafied system, new promising sectors are appearing. For example, investment awareness of biotechnologies will be comparable with that of the IT industry soon. In Russia, despite 50 years’ history of biotechnology development, domestic biotech holds less than 0.1% of the global market5 (2013). In 2012, the government approved the Comprehensive Program for the Development of Biotechnology in the Russian Federation-2020, which promises a contribution of up to 1% of GDP by 2020 and 3% of GDP by 2030. This means that biotech production levels need to increase 33 times, consumption levels 8.3 times and export levels 25 times. Specialised technological platforms like Biotech 2030, Bioenergetics, and Medicine of the Future, as well as 10 innovative biotechnological clusters (in Altai, Dolgoprudny, Kaliningrad, Kaluga, Novosibirsk, Pushchino, St. Petersburg, Tomsk, Vyatka and Yaroslavl) will unite science, education and business. Nowadays, this sphere is supported by the state primarily because private investors in Russia are not particularly interested in biotechnology. According to experts, there are several directions in which cooperation between the state and business can be improved, such as through creation of conditions for equal competition, formation of common technological platforms, changes in legal regulation, and the stimulation of standards and culture of a wide range of “qualified customers” and their digital identity first and foremost. Datafication provokes significant changes in the structure of employment and the qualifications required of IT professionals, programmers, so-called “digital leaders” and digital entrepreneurs, and qualified users who can work in a digital environment. For this, special info and PR programmes are needed. There are clear shortcomings when it comes to

5

According to Frost & Sullivan (2018), the global biotechnology market will grow up $600 billion by 2020.

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ensuring cybersecurity, as a critical condition of development—the digital economy is being developed the confidence of all economic actors that the data collected, stored and used have to be protected from criminal encroachment. In Russia, only the state can provide such assurance (Medovnikov, 2018). The scientific and educational community is another basic actor of the data system. In a digital economy, the path from basic exploratory research to commercial application is extremely short. In these circumstances, the state should not only maintain a high level of budgetary funding for research projects, but also find the right tools to attract non-state funds, stimulate the development of corporate science, develop initiative research projects, and prepare managers of scientific organisations capable of combining the qualities of both a scientist and an entrepreneur. Only the state is able to realise transboundary cooperation and promote Russian data-driven projects in foreign markets (Medovnikov, 2018). The state has declared its support for technical universities and IT education, including secondary school programmes to improve digital skills. The number of Russians with digital skills will grow up to 40% by 2024. For example, it is planned to train 120,000 people at universities, and 800,000 people at higher and secondary schools per year within the Competence Center of the ANO “Digital Economy”. But the concept of new institutional data management is wider. Datafication in education means that on the one hand, different personal indicators, rankings and data-based accreditations make academic life clearer and more comfortable. On the other hand, this digital “formalisation” is about formal results (e.g. formal, quantitative competition). According to Dr. Anna Kostikova (Lomonosov Moscow State University), in higher education, satisfaction—individual or social—is based not on the final data indicators but on the values of education itself. In a paradoxical way, this concept is something separate from the tendencies of Big Data, she said. First of all, the method of gathering data has apparently transitioned from being formal to qualitative. Technically speaking, such methods are not something really new for Russian society. This interpretation lets us be more optimistic about datafication as it is. In this multi-level system, citizens have been identified as ‘consumers of goods and services’ (Program, 2017), although it is obvious that their participation as prosumers of data-driven innovation must be ensured at all levels. Let us mention that since the seventeenth century, there have been about 200 attempts at modernisation in Russia, but all of them failed due to the absence of the people’s involvement and activity. Nowadays, in strategic programs, there are not so many concrete steps for strengthening the links inside the system among the four main actors of quadro helix of the digital datafied economy. Large-scale studies of the audience as the basic actor of the digital datafied economy are not yet available, but the data of the Digital Literacy Index of Russians in 2017 (ROCIT, 2017) shows a high level of knowledge, as well as skills and competencies that are necessary for the safe and efficient use of digital technologies, the Internet, cultural resources, and digital consumption. In 2018, the Digital Literacy Index results are lower (_14, 7%), due to disproportions between the level of digital competencies, digital consumption and digital security of Russians

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(ROCIT, 2018). The “datafied” activity of Russian civil society mostly concerns services, open data hackathons and activity of NGOs like Informatsionnaya Cultura, Platforma and web sources such as rospravosudie.com. However, new forms of citizen involvement in datafied modernisation are appearing. The Sharing Economy is a promising field based on network principles, non-hierarchical interaction and a new socio-economic model. According to experts of the Sharing Economy (SE), practices of joint consumption appeared in Russia in 2017. These unite online users, online services, companies and even entire cities for more efficient use of resources. It helps to develop not only micro-entrepreneurship, but social responsibility and civic engagement as well. About 80% of Russian users (25–44 years old) believe that SE also makes it possible to care for and save the environment. This socio-economic model is becoming an increasingly important component of the Russian datafied system, with the volume of transactions up to 190 billion roubles (2016).6 But Sharing Economy, as a platform economy, provokes many dramatically new social problems for its workers and real citizens regarding their social and legal protection. In the Russian data system, new relevant institutional actors are involved primarily by the state. It creates an organisational infrastructure that supports such activity. In 2015, the Institute for Internet Development (IRI) was founded with the main goal of expanding the reach of the Internet, software and media technologies in Russia. In 2017, an autonomous ANGO “Data Economy” was founded. It supports socially significant projects and initiatives in this area and interaction between the business community, scientific and educational organisations, and other communities, and everyday citizens. In this way, the state creates new types of programmes (e.g. “Human Sources for the Digital Economy”) and actors in order to implement its data strategies. Innovation institutions involve and train young Russian innovators at open government data hackathons (since 2016) and educational projects (e.g. National Science-Tech Initiative University 2035 or “Ostrov 10–21”), where young talented people have the chance to study innovation and data-driven technologies while making their first steps towards developing a national datafied system. The formation of other subjects (e.g. data owners, developers, decision makers, data brokers, data warehouses, etc. in business) is in its initial stages and is deeply connected with the development of the main end-to-end digital technologies as part of the “Program for Digital Economy”—and state strategies as well. In the Russian datafied system, both prospects and problems are noted in legislation, the cooperation between the state and businesses, and in the openness of state data (Program, 2017: 5). The problem is that the legislation of the Russian Federation regulates only personal data. The regulatory specifics of Big Data are noted as the most important tasks for the system behind the digital economy, but for the time being, the state, the expert community, and civil society represent different development scenarios: centralised (implemented by the state since the seventeenth

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According to PwC forecasts, the global volume of sharing economy could reach $335 billion by 2025.

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century) with mandatory introduction of standards for the use of Big Data;national, political and economic systems; and decentralised (recommended by business and citizen experts), as is the case in most developed economies. An absence of clear legislation means that the Russian data-driven system still stands at a point of bifurcation in its development. In 2018, about 50 new laws in this field developed by experts for this field and for ANGO “Data Economy” have yet to be discussed by officials. According to the results from our surveys, only a third of respondents know that Big Data is the core issue of the state Digital Economy Program 2017–2024. The majority of respondents knows about the main directions of the Program and uses these data-driven technologies (4 academics, 4 experts, 86 professionals, respectively). Only a few of them (2, 3, 12) have joined open discussions devoted to datadriven state or business projects. This means that the data-driven projects are on demand but the practice of involving citizens in open discussions around data-driven projects is not so widespread. In 2019, another our survey regarding the trust of Russians have towards digital economy initiatives (theorists, n ¼ 12, practitioners of communication, n ¼ 12 and everyday citizens, n ¼ 50), within the framework of one-parameter formula calculations, indicate a rather high level of trust (and personal participation) in digital economy initiatives (80, 75 and 60% respectively) with different levels of trust in interaction with non-anthropomorphic actors (56, 69, 43%). Confidence in the “state–business–science–citizens” quadro helix of digital economy is distributed as follows: maximum trust in the state and the scientific community, low in business (Shilina & Vartanov, 2019). Thus, the data-driven system in Russia is in the initial but intensive stages of development. Datafication, as a process in the tech modernisation of economics, has been declared and supported by the state. The paternalistic position of the state distinguishes the Russian data-driven system from foreign ones, which are determined by business. The state needs big business and the scientific community to put this strategy into effect. At this stage, the state and big business are primarily concerned with the success of data technologies and data system infrastructure. But the “quantitative” growth of the datafied system and the openness of the Internet and Runet might provoke “qualitative” change within it. Would it be positive or negative for Russian society?

5 Non-Human–Non-Places Landscapes: Social Clairvoyance of Revolutionary Russian Data Art In Russia, data-driven technologies and strategies have been under development for just a few years, and social problems and effects provoked by Big Data are just starting to appear on the agendas of the actors of quadro helix of digital economy (while, conversely, in developed economies, activists and civil society are actively involved in critical dialogue on these issues with business and scientific community

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and the state, and such discussions are a constant part of the public discourse, e.g. European and global MyData movement). Since the very beginning, the social aspects, problems and effects of datafication are clearly articulated in the public sphere by modern Russian artists. Data-driven technologies become indispensable elements in a new relationship between the author, the audience and “machine”. For instance, a new type of artist and creative team have appeared, most of whom are participants with professional technical and IT backgrounds (e.g. eeefff group—Dina Zhuk and Nikolai Spesivtsev, Digital Immortality group—Natalia Alfutova and Yaroslav Kravtsov). Art always provides social clairvoyance to the challenges of the time. Russian artists in particular have traditionally had a special social mission. According to famous Russian poet Yevtushenko, “a poet in Russia is more than a poet” (Yevtushenko, 1965). The situation of huge social and economic transformations of the explosive periods of capitalism in Russia on the edge of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries resulted in the brilliant clairvoyance of the avant-garde, very similar to the current situation with the formation of data-driven capitalism. Data artists continue the traditions of the Russian avant-garde—such as the (ego) futurists, budetlyanie (Russian futurists), constructivists, and so on. Russian avant-garde artists searched for new metaphysical foundations, new “units” in painting (color, line7), poetry (elements, “samovitoye slovo”/a self-spoken word8), and music (microchromatism, synthetic music9). They attempted to create a new synthesis of everything10 and a new life-building model on the basis of mathematics (e.g. music, by I. Schillinger). These correlated with the contemporary scientific research of that (and this century) time to form a unified basis for the integrity of the world and different “turns”. However, as a result, non-standard ideas by the avant-garde did not fit the state standards of socialist realism and socialism as it is. Nowadays Russian artists are among the first to experiment with data, because the creation of digital and data-driven works have allowed art projects to serve as a permanent technical experiment and radical social manifesto. (For example, the latest global and European robotic and data art exhibition in Parisian Grand Palais in 2018 or Venetian Biennale in 2019 mostly shows technologies as a creative tool.) The development of data art in Russia reflects the developmental evolution of any new toolkit and technology: In 1990–2010s, artists used digital information as a

7 Abstractionism (V. Kandinsky), suprematism (K. Malevich), lutchism (M. Larionov), lineism (A. Rodchenko), architectonics (L. Popova). 8 V. Khlebnikov, A. Kruchenykh, I. Zdanevich, and others. 9 The music of the highest chromaticity of A. Lurie, the ultramochromatic music (microchromatism) of I. Vyshnegradsky, etc. 10 V. Kamensky’s “Rebel Concrete Poems”, I. Zdanevich’s verse-performances, sculpture A. Arkhipenko, nature music N. Kulbin and music of noise, “total harmony” by N. Obukhov, etc. For example plans of K. Malevich, as well as experiments with the viewer: “extended viewing” and interaction of color, sound, form (M. Matyushin); research of the physiology of visual perception (group “Zorved”); graphic sound (A. Avraamov, E. Sholpo, M. Tsekhanovsky), “synthetic music” (G. Rimsky-Korsakov), etc.

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tool11 and in the mid-2010s, they criticised capitalism as an “art of consumption”.12 In 2018, they presented projects of new hybrid corporeality.13 What problems of the datafied society are most essential for artists now? First of all, data-driven technologies are used to clarify the dichotomy of real and virtual, person and capital, by making distinctions between “shocking” and “provoking”. The first interactive tools for discovering human–machine “behaviour” in the datafied society and new hybrid (corpo)reality were neurointerfaces and neural networks, e.g. an electroencephalogram that reflected biological signals of the brain in order to control sonorous and visual algorithms of the human behaviour, in the “Neurointegrum” by Yury Didevich (2014). In 2016, the first neuropera “Noor”, based on a Russian plot and libretto, was presented in Shanghai as a showcase for the development of neuroimaging data techniques. Data-driven technologies made it possible not only to control the sound and visual effects, but also the actions of the actors and spectators who were involved in the play. The transition from projects showcasing technology’s capabilities to deeply analytical ones was held in 2017, at the 101. Mediapoetry Festival in Saint Petersburg. These experiments by Russian artists in an interdisciplinary paradigm confirm that data and online data analysis open up new opportunities for human cognition to examine the paradoxical features of its existence, behaviour, and communication, which is especially important in a data-driven economy and society. According to Ivan Ninenko, data helps to understand human-to-human communication better. In his “Neuro Sync Poetry” experiment, the author observes through experimentation the realities of data-enhanced real-time communication between two persons connected to digital data collectors of brain activity. As a result, communication is becoming non-synchronised because the processes happening in our brains are controlled by our neural networks, yet the human beings have only an illusion of freedom and conscious communication (Ninenko, 2017). Russian researcher Evgeniya Samostienko (Suslova) tracks processes of direct attention between two digital partners in the web project “Fiber”, developed with Alexander Sudaev and Alfia Miftakhutdinova. They have attempted to turn the cognitive faculty of attention into data and design the non-semiotic behaviour of a partner (one of the pressing issues of cognitive data-driven economics). This The first experiments with digital information began in the Soviet era and came to the surface with the abolition of socialist realism. In the post-Soviet period, projects initially reflected the desire to master the new toolkit in simple interactive formats (e.g. Shulgin 1992; Didevich 2004). In Russia, even today, new relevant terms are rather unusual (e.g. “cyberature” was first used in 2001 (Riabov 2001), “electronic literature” in 2011 (Vizel 2011)). It is based on networked literary projects of the fests of the Teneta (1994), Ventilliator (2008), The Fifth Leg (2013), Randomness (2014) and 101. Mediapoetry (since 2014) Festivals in St. Petersburg, Manifesta 10 (2014), Projections of Avantgarde, and on two Media Poetry Laboratories in Moscow (2013, curated by Elena Demidova and Anna Tolkacheva) and an art residence Mediapoetic Machines at the Skolkovo art gallery (2015). 12 For example, projects of A. Shulgin and A. Chernyshev, from the new media art and net art in 1990s to the works of Electroboutique (2005–2010 and 2017 within the framework of Techne, NCCA, Moscow). 13 For example, projects of N. Alfutova and Ya. Kravtsov (Rabbit heart, Faced2Faced). 11

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experiment shows how Big Data changes our imagination in specific ways: for example, how datafication allows a person to control the process of subjectification. According to the author, the more a person knows about himself/herself, the greater the alienation becomes. In other words, data flows (and data analysis) help to understand that a human being is, a priori, datafied in a data-driven environment, but not understandable either by themselves, or by any other algorithm or “machine”. Data as a research tool in the art project concerning an individual’s perception of information (poetic, musical, visual) made it possible to detect a person’s inability to know themselves, artificially create communication or become more attentive to another. These art experiments essentially reaffirm the idea of the incomprehensibility of the inner world of a person and harmony inside them, with or without machines (Samostienko & Mironova, 2017). Thus, artists put forth ideas about the person’s essential superiority over the machine, and the existing parallelisms of our “worlds”. Ultimately, it returns us to the holistic idea of the integrity of the person and the universe before the Age of Enlightenment (and reflects the idea of the Data Turn too). Datafied projects can also immerse the viewer in a parallel 3D reality (“Causes of sparking”, audiovisual performance by Mikhail Maximov and Cisfinitum (2016)14) or hybrid phantasmagoria (in the movie “Obmyak” by Mikhail Maximov (2016)) in order to expose real problems in today’s Russia. The digital characters of the movie “Obmyak” are in a grotesque situation. They are named after the famous film director A. Tarkovsky and the writers Yu. Mamleev and A. Platonov, who in their own times were also creators of alternative realities. In this short movie, they discuss the law of gravitational acceleration which allows Russian citizens to fly into space, and simultaneously nails them to the Russian earth (as it was in tsarism times). In the movie, the desolate Russian landscape, composed of villages and the city, is more than real, while a virtual reality is integrated into it. Another non-human focus on Russian land and human data was reflected in a project by Alexei Buldakov, “The new leaders of regional development” (2017). The artist created a satirical “business project” to develop the territory of a former GULAG camp in the ever-frozen tundra. Heating systems from data hubs were seen to provoke climate change, while a new species of living organism emerged as a result. Buldakov’s next idea was to create a heating system using heat emitted from Ethereum miners in his “Boiler room” (2017), presenting several metaphors of people as a source for more and more various national and global data projects. In data art projects by Valya Fetisov and the eeefff group, the next step is taken towards the personal comprehension of human–machine social life. Surveillance, previously associated with the fight against crime or the police state, has become an option and product of daily mass consumption (in our smartphones) and a norm for 14

The project involves an analog synthesizer Polyvox, the software environment MAX/MSP and Ableton Live, as well as audio recordings of Russian religious thinkers in the refraction of the Doppler effect. Video and audio are synchronized with each other: The vintage Soviet synthesizer of 1982 reproduces in real time audio sequences converted from a digital video signal parallel to the control of the lighting equipment of the installation.

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social relations. In “Paranoiapp” (2015), an application developed by the artists turns a geolocation application—effectively shadowing the owner of the phone—into a game, and the participants themselves share their location with other users. The project, implemented in Russia and Norway, showed again that the boundaries between total surveillance and manipulation have become transparent—a fact which appeared to worry the artists more than the audience, both in Russia and Norway. Does it mean that being a “used” consumer and user is more comfortable than being an active citizen? To provoke us as unconcerned not-citizens-but-users, Valya Fetisov puts viewers again and again into direct interaction with a machine in “My little prism” (201615) or artificial intelligence programme in “A confessional box/Diane” (201716) to discover the correlation between datafied information and behaviour, tracking and manipulation. The author’s statement is clear: When we give devices the ability to automatically read information, we become a data set in someone’s datafied project, regardless of whether such data belongs to the state or business (Samostienko & Mironova, 2017). Lately, Russian data art projects have grown into a social collective action in the real world to tell about real threats. “The Data Expeditions” by the eeefff group (2016, 2017) were devoted to studying the real social effects of virtual digital “data relations”. The authors’ aim for this project was for a viewer to be physically present in the data centre (like the musicians of the Russian avant-garde, who listened to the noise of factories and city streets with everyday citizens). As such, the artists want us to perceive the real essence of data hubs as the universal digital element of a datafied system and focal point of all-information-about-everything, operating businesses, the state, and the person. In a cognitive cartography (Jameson, 1988), this is a repository of information and a generator of value. In “Platform Perplex and Cloud Bushes: fermenting the digital platforms” (2017), the eeefff group presented sessions of emotional computations, radical intimacy and solidarity with (Uber) drivers who are the workers of the platform economy, making “invisible risks of local platform workers” visible. These sessions which look like a quest or meditation17 put us face-to-face with “the workers of the platform economy” to focus on our datafied behaviour and non-machine-identity. (Just as it was before, in the previous project, when users were face-to-face with computer monitors and artists recorded their gaze as a part of everyday “relations” with machines.) But only a few volunteers took part in these data art projects.

15

The artist made visible the mechanisms of accounting data in the social network Facebook. Visitors passing the red-lighted room and entering human-sized confession box are welcomed by voice of the Diane (AI program). One can send to Diane an audio message by phone and will receive his/her public voicemail consisting of audio messages sent by other users. 17 A session of emotional computations, radical intimacy and solidarity with drivers who are the workers of the platform economy: I think of a driver. I focus on the eyes. The eyes are blinking. Our blinking is being synchronised with the LEDs of routers, Where an algorithmic geography of our time Is born, Where the distance is pulsating In tune with the results of computations. 16

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According to our surveys, Russian data art projects are practically unknown among experts and wider audiences. Most respondents do not recognise these datafied processes as social problems and possible subjects for art, even if they know about data and data-driven strategies (2 academic, 3 experts, 97 professionals, respectively). It would seem that, although the majority of us—as everyday Russian citizens—form one of the key elements of data-driven strategies, we do not think about how data, apps, or datafied landscapes are filled with data hubs, as active citizens, as opposed to users. Thus, Russian data artists are trying to break the code of the datafied order of things, resist cognitive economics and data colonialism, and preach “algorithmic solidarity”. However, unlike the Soviet avant-gardists, they are too “avant” from citizens, state programmes or strategies with their social clairvoyance.

6 Findings and Future Research Big Data is the newest state strategy of “Big” Russia. The national digital economy would be a system where added value is produced by ICTs. The state strategy and programme of “total” datafication seems to be revolutionary, not dissimilar to the state paternalistic all-Russia electrification programme in Soviet times. Because of this, Russia’s global technological competitiveness in the next decade looks promising. However, the Russian economy remains largely rental based, the digital economy is still being formed, and at this stage, the implementation of new datadriven technologies is supported by the state first and foremost, and large businesses. The state-paternalistic model of modernisation is an established Russian tradition. The state’s paternalistic position distinguishes the Russian data system from foreign ones, which are determined by big business. The datafied system as a quadro helix of innovation includes the state, (big) business and the scientific community. Russian citizens have included in such modernisation projects for the first time in modern history. Despite 200 attempts at modernisation in Russia, which have failed without citizen engagement, the management mechanisms of this system are set up to optimise legislation, ICTs, and telecommunication, state and big business partnership, first and foremost. However, paternalistic state position, the “quantitative” growth of the datafied system and the openness of the Internet and Runet could provoke “qualitative” changes in a data-driven Russia. While in developed economies, social data-driven problems are part of public discourse, in Russia, data artists are raising their voices for “algorithmic” solidarity. Thanks to these avant-garde artistic experiments, data analysis are helping us to understand that a human being is, a priori, datafied in a data-driven environment, but not understandable either to themselves, nor by any other algorithm or “machine”. In any case, using the Data Turn as a universal theoretical framework, a holistic vision on the Universe could be forming, in Russia and beyond. Alas, this holistic vision like other pre-Enlightenment ideas contradicts data-driven capitalism as well

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as its new economic and social order, and actors. This means that a (Big) datafied Russia is still on the edge of bifurcation, which opens up two paths—that of human/ everyday citizen-centered, and that of machine and data and their owners-centered for its data-driven development and future research. Or will Russia choose its own path for the future Data Turn and “Great Datafied Revolution”?

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Elite Russian Students’ Internet Strategies: Trust, Persuasion, and Rejection Ellen Mickiewicz

1 Political Significance of Trust The literature on interpersonal trust finds it essential to the development and maintenance of democracy, even if, as shown in Robert Putnam’s research (Putnam, Leonardi, & Nanetti, 1993), it is a slow process, for example, from the development of small choral circles to politically significant institutions. Interpersonal trust plays a fundamental role in the acquisition of the social capital that underlies and gives motive power to institution-building. Essential is the presence of established, smoothly working, accountable, and trusted institutions. Typically, trust significantly reduces transaction costs and thus its centrality to the functioning of society in general and the problematic of its absence. Trust eliminates or reduces the need for overseers, intrusive surveillance, and coercive institutions to enforce agreements. It is the development of such institutions that today’s leadership in Russia shuns in a perceived zero-sum game, as a centralised, personalised, and frequently arbitrary power can retain strength and flexibility that institutionalization might limit. An observation has been made about the structure of the Russian state: “. . .[it] presents a rare combination of tremendous power and tremendously little institutionalisation” (Greene, 2014, p. 221). At the level of interstate interactions, it is difficult to identify a relationship of trust. Numerous studies of negotiation begin from a game-theoretical perspective and focus on the certainty, uncertainty, and asymmetry of information among the parties (Raiffa, 1985; Raiffa, Richardson, & Metkalf, 2007). Interstate trust, especially at the height of the Cold War, focused on “credible commitment.” This is a form of signaling to the adversary that by taking on vulnerability, the state making that commitment projects a powerful incentive to move toward trust. The basic issue E. Mickiewicz (*) James R. Shepley Emeritus Professor of Public Policy and Political Science, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_10

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is how to identify a trusting relationship between or among states in an anarchic international system. Summing up voluntary constraints during the Cold War, Keating and Ruzicka argue that “. . .despite the presence of cooperation, trusting discourse and voluntary acceptance of vulnerability. . .the presence of each side’s nuclear hedge [i.e. possession of deterrents and war-fighting potential] is the best indicator that trust was not placed in the other side’s nuclear intentions” (Keating & Ruzicka, 2014). Thus, confidence based on a trusted means of security that makes for a hedge is more reliable in assessing interstate relationships. Serious pitfalls come from an automatic assumption that trust is understood in the same way by researcher and subject of research. Western cognitive studies reveal that human mental capacities are “modular,” that is, “domain-specific” and independent. We have one module for attending to danger, another for judging character, and so on (Kuklinski & Quirk, 2000). Domain-specific reasoning might, on the surface, appear contradictory when the basis is actually differences in domains. In national opinion surveys, Russian viewers say that Vremya is their most trusted source of information, but domain-specific questions yield more thoughtful responses, especially when personal knowledge can be used as an alternative source or heuristic. If the story has low salience for the audience, it will be sloughed off by the brain, not stored in short-term memory, and, effectively, disappear. In these cases, it is not clear what “trust” means to the respondent and has a politically wavering foundation. Regarding less global and arguably more meaningful (to the respondent) questions, the picture may be quite different: when viewers were asked in 2015 in a national survey by the Public Opinion Foundation whether they trusted experts, businessmen, and/or political officials and administrators that appeared on television and, if so, to name any who came to mind, 53% said that there were none they trusted, while another 27% could not or would not answer (Osveshchenie ekonomicheskoi situatsii na tsentralnykh telekanalakh, 2015). From several focus groups come comments such as “First Channel news is mere propaganda and censored,” “just lies”—they say. “Guys, we know there’s no free speech here.” For correctives, which they deem critical, they engage in Internet searches of foreign media. However, they also know that they will graduate from university as professionals obliged to track the presentation of the state’s agenda, no matter what the coverage. They follow the government’s narrative, although they do not trust what they see and hear without comparisons with international sources and personal observation.

2 Methods This study analyzes a watershed for Russia: elite students at upper levels of three universities at which many current and past leaders have been educated—Moscow State University, Moscow State University of International Relations, and the National Research University Higher School of Economics. These universities educate and recruit future leaders, much as Oxford and Cambridge play a dominant

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role in educating British leaders and as do Les Grandes Écoles for French leaders. This is the first generation to “live” so intensely on the Internet; it is a group set apart from current leaders by an online/offline divide, while current officials express suspicion, frustration, and an incapacity to cross the divide.

2.1

Which Instrument to Use?

Mass face-to-face or telephone (landline and cell) public opinion surveys have the advantage of representativeness, if they are indeed truly random, and thus can be generalized to larger populations from which the sample is drawn (except that, among other design difficulties, validity cannot be a priori assumed if there are gaps between researchers’ and respondents’ understanding of questions). Startling decreases in response rates, in Russia, as in the United States and elsewhere, increasingly undermine randomness and the capability to predict (Zukin, 2015). Participants often reject the mediated projections television brings. They probe Internet sites to determine the presence or absence of intent to persuade, especially political persuasion coming from the seat of power. As seen below, persuasive communications conveyed from official sources have not been notably successful in achieving persuasion, although it should be said that it is very difficult to do and it is not known, even in experiments, how long a change of attitude might last (Iyengar 1994; Iyengar and Kinder 2010). The students access a wide range of international sources that can (and most often do) collide with the preferred framing by domestic political officials. They form images of other countries through international travel, consumption of Western European and American news and cultural sources on the Internet, as well as family stories and the opinion environment at home, work, and school. Some of the characterizations of foreign countries are related to travel experiences, but always assessed through the previously stored images and schemas, many of which have been mediated by digital sources. The study of attitudes in political science has relied heavily on opinion surveys. The method has been expensive, if face-to-face, or less expensive, if reliant on telephone connections, providing that the population to whom the researcher wants to generalize is saturated with telephones. In both categories of subjects, however, there has been a significant decline in potential respondents willing to answer. The prestigious Pew Research Center, for a poll on Internet use in the United States, conducted a telephone survey accessing both landline and cell phones. Of landline phones, 40,985 numbers were dialled and, of cell phones, 27,000. Of these, 27.5% of the landline and 58.4% of the cell calls reached a working number. Of the contacted numbers 14% of the landline phones and 15.2% of the cell phones expressed consent initially. Not all were completed. In fact, the response rate [completed calls] was 8.4% of the cell phone users and 9.5% of the landline users. As is usually the case, the completed calls were weighted to approximate demographic and other characteristics. This widely accepted method should not obscure the fact that in this meticulous survey of an important topic, almost 68,000 numbers were dialled;

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1802 were actually completed. The issue of dwindling numbers of respondents is a major problem in Russia as well. The online survey is much less expensive and far less labor-intensive, but raises the much-debated question: is randomness really necessary for generalizing to a larger population? Chang and Krosnick (2009) found that “Internet data collection from a probability sample yields more accurate results than telephone interviewing and Internet data collection from non-probability samples.” The expense of face-to-face surveys and dwindling participation numbers for both face-to-face and telephone surveys, even though probability samples may be used, suggest that companies providing online probability sampling for surveys are becoming increasingly dominant. In addition to the N problem, there arises the question of validity: is the survey question understood exactly as intended by the interviewer?—even in the same language, much less in translation. Sutherlin’s research in Africa is a remarkable model for multiple refinements to eliminate divergence in meaning (Sutherlin, 2015). Among Western scholars who study construction of comparative national indicators, it is increasingly accepted that the understanding of central concepts underlying questions in mass opinion surveys is at least partially dependent on culturally based constructs. Researcher and respondent may not necessarily share that understanding (Coppedge, 2012). For this study, I worked from Russian and wrote in English. The process was not machine-assisted: there were so many non-standard, unique, or idiosyncratic words, phrases, and expressions of affect that, in many instances, AI searches would lose too much data. Below is such a case—an example significant for the participants in a complex conversation operating on multiple levels in Russian. One participant made a remark about carrying an umbrella. Without hesitation other participants took the image to describe Stiva Oblonsky in Anna Karenina [nothing about the book nor the character had been brought up until that point nor appeared thereafter]. Stiva always sported an umbrella and a particular newspaper to identify his political attitudes. The participant expected this image to be identified, understood, and related to not only for being significant in its nineteenth-century context but also in the present day. Furthermore, the remark, though compact, was clearly relevant to our study, and it led to several observations about political self-identification in society and shared values of a stratum that regarded a newspaper as one of its hallmarks. All these multiple meanings were energetically discussed.

2.2

Focus Groups

I wanted to drill down to the granular level and therefore used focus groups to reach deep-seated attitudes to the greatest degree possible. When a group was in session, distractions were minimized—there were no breaks in the 2-hour discussion. The Director of Qualitative Research at the Public Opinion Foundation conducted the sessions. An early iteration was pilot-tested with a focus group in Moscow. It is important to underscore that the groups were not asked about their political attitudes

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and preferences. If political issues or politicians were brought up—and they were—it occurred spontaneously, from the participants themselves. No one was interviewed separately, or interviewed at all. The format was always a group discussion. Furthermore, confidentiality was strictly preserved: all records were destroyed as was all contact material; participants could choose whatever first name they wished for purposes of discussion. Such complete confidentiality served to ensure that participants would have maximum freedom, and it did help, I believe, to enable the free flow of discussion and accompanying emotion. Since contact records had been destroyed, it would be impossible to contact these individuals again in the future to discuss new developments, but this was a trade-off well worth any loss. A single moderator led each focus group in a nearly identical configuration of the room. In this way, it was possible to control for variables, such as the personality or idiosyncrasies of the moderator, atmosphere, and particularities of the setting. The main subject was Internet use, in particular, the Internet. If political issues arose in the discussion, they came from the participants spontaneously and were discussed by the group to the extent the students wished to do so. It is for these reasons and the capacity of a focus group to probe deeper attitudes, that I have used that instrument. The focus group has often been viewed by the social science research community as problematic; it is definitely non-random, and methods used in the design and conduct of focus groups can differ radically from one study to another. But, as William Gamson has pointed out, “[focus groups] are useful when it comes to investigating what participants think, but they excel at uncovering why participants think as they do” (Gamson, 1992, p. 192). Further, these sessions revealed a range of attitudes that are apt to be stable over time. “Opinions can change quickly, but deeply seated attitudes change slowly if at all” (Heberlein, 2012). Data drawn from focus groups are sensitive to the person of the moderator. Moderators who are Russian and attuned to youth culture are most successful in stimulating lively discussion. The conversationwas enabled by the ease and safety the participants experienced, aided by the decision to meet in the evening within their schools, their “home turf,” undisturbed by any member of the university staff. Our goal is not to study the universities themselves, but rather the ideas and attitudes that surfaced. We did not seek to research what is typical or representative of each school. The usual recruiting process was employed. A recruiter (staff member skilled in this step of the process) encountered students on campus in their cafeterias and asked a few filter questions to determine whether particular students were appropriate for our focus groups (enrolled as a student in the upper classes) and asked about their university specialization and if they were interested in joining a focus group; she noted their contact information and called later to remind the potential participant of the upcoming focus group. We got permission from high-level university officials for the recruiter to be on campus, where her freedom of movement and conversation was unimpeded. Twelve groups were formed—four in each university—for the most part with ten in each group, yielding 108 students from a wide range of fields; about half of them were women. The focus groups were conducted from the end of March through the beginning of April 2011.

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Before each session, they completed a short questionnaire asking basic information (age, their specialization, where they completed secondary school, media use of all kinds, Internet activism—such as having a personal blog—and short questions asking to identify leaders of France and Great Britain and a political knowledge question about the Duma). Roughly less than half of our focus group participants were not from Moscow. The data was pooled, rather than divided by school, to reduce the possibility of identification.

3 Trust on the Internet: To Trust or Not to Trust Sites Trust is understood to have a particular drawback: risk in areas of interpersonal trust, where face-to-face interactions in fairly close quarters are typical. Online the dynamics differ; there is more safety in the greater anonymity of online communication. Online participation is “more individualistic, and consequently not so demanding in terms of trust in others” (Serek and Machackova, 2014). In the focus groups it was clear that participants considered themselves to be a new generation, largely because of their attachment to the Internet and modernity. Many participants believe the governmental legislative institutions to be ineffectual, in that officials are ignorant when it comes to sophisticated use of the Internet. The Internet factor could be visualized thus: it has put horizontal criteria ahead of vertical ones. As one student said, “On the Internet, it’s not important how important someone is.” For these young elites the Internet has undercut a hierarchy of status. Trust given or withheld will depend on content, not status. They have no illusions about civic rituals. They are aware that they should pay due honor to commemorative holidays and constitutionally mandated political processes, most of which are empty shells, they believe, with no change visible as outcomes. Almost half of the participants neither intend to vote nor keep it as an open question, when it should rather be an unquestioned duty. As one participant put it, voting—“it’s absolutely useless.” The government, unable to fathom what is not readily seen, has developed a construct, a locus of opposition of young people undermining the political status quo. It is they who are “deaf, behind a wall,” a “wall [i.e. computer screens] of hatred” (Kononenko, 2011). When Dmitry Medvedev launched his blog intending to participate in Internet culture, most of the focus group participants thought it amateurish and clearly a public relations tactic. The word “propaganda” has been largely subsumed by “public relations,” a sector of the economy they say they scorn. The Kremlin has created websites that are easily unmasked by the focus group participants, who call them an “imaginary attempt” to pacify critics and prevent “social riots and shock waves about what is happening.” On the Internet, they identify and reject propaganda and political jargon and despise a “pseudo-patriotic style.” Many said they would leave a site that has any connection to “the apparatus of United Russia [the government’s party].” If the site does not display diverse views, it is judged unworthy. These shortcomings in attempts to persuade users derive partly

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from astute analytical skills of well-educated, skeptical users and, no less, the online incompetence of officials, who, they assume, rely on their personal self-styled experts in public relations. As we shall see below, the basic level and competence of these experts had not sufficiently improved when, by 2015 and 2016, as part of a campaign, Facebook posts and advertisements aimed to persuade potential American voters were used. The focus group participants from these three Russian universities are aware that domestic media do not provide sufficient information, so as to be called genuine news. They have developed ways of enlarging the scope of their sources, but it calls for considerable effort, even though they know the languages of the sources. They have learned to apply correctives, routinely accessing such sites as The Economist, The Guardian, BBC, Der Spiegel, Agence France Presse, National Geographic, and The New York Times. They have to work hard to extract accuracy and they insist that comparison of sources is absolutely essential. They neither expect nor receive complete agreement across these sites on every newsworthy event or analysis; their own observations and experiences may also diverge from both domestic and foreign analysis. When this happens, they confidently employ what they call “intuition,” which I discuss below. In addition, when the comparative method has been exhausted, they say they rely on their own minds to make decisions about which characterization they will choose. Reliance on their own education and prior experiences enables these Internet users to employ comparison, but not to be rendered incapable of individual judgment. When all their tests are exhausted, most say that they then rely on their intuition. It comes into play when they have recourse to nothing else. What they then trust unconsciously is experience. “Intuition. . .the ability to judge stimulus properties on the basis of information that is activated in memory, but not consciously retrieved” (Bolte & Goschke, 2005). Kahneman and Klein (2011) regard intuition as patternmatching if the experience is already stored. Such pattern-matching is done quickly and produces an emotional “gut feel” that is the completion of a process in the brain. The brain has been building the parts slowly and, to the individual, unconsciously . At the end-point, all of a sudden, the individual is gripped by the wholeness of emotion. The tests that the students apply online are similar to the ways in which they probe for safety in trust in their offline world. Appearance is important, and for the same reasons, it is as important in their offline decisions as an indicator of closeness to the values and identity of the evaluator, which is thought to lower the risk and vulnerability involved in trust. In some ways for some users in our study, “friends” found on the Internet by definition pose fewer dangers: they are not located in the offline world of these universities, and there is little chance of them doing harm. It is a world that is either thinner (only skimming profound concerns) or confessional, because of the remoteness of the Internet “friend.” This “passenger effect” is created when vulnerability is reduced, owing to the context in which the “other” is a stranger never to be encountered in the real offline world. A few participants in the focus groups find value in this type of online friendship: since risk has been removed, while the burden of cares can be lightened by talk, most think of it as a waste of time, and some are opposed to such activity, regarding it as “exploitation” by one of the other.

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“Therapy,” as the participants sometimes called it, is only unilateral satisfaction and therefore unequal and unfair. But there is no doubt that in online encounters, gating (exclusion or condescension on the basis of physical deformities and speech impediments) is less likely to take place than in the offline environment.

4 Self-Censorship, Self-Segregation The Pew Research Center Internet Project on “Social Media and the ‘Spiral of Silence’” (2014) finds that in the United States, there is increasing self-segregation on the Internet: users prefer to seek sites and sources with which they agree and shun those of different views, attitudes, information, and opinions. Moreover, American users are increasingly reluctant to reveal an opinion or a response that does not agree with others displayed in social media. Such a perceived divergence of opinion either on social media or in an offline setting led to self-censorship and silence. The trend captured by the Pew Study is grounded in fear. There is anxiety regarding losing friends, not fitting in, rejection by a potential employer, angering one’s family, etc. Russian participants in our study believe their personal offline world is in less danger on the Internet, than in real-world relationships. In our group of elite students, we find that confidence in one’s own knowledge and salience of issues are moderating factors, as are the connections they have. The participants’ refusal to self-segregate online is typical of this very untypical population. They seek online views, opinions, and information that run counter to their own. As several said, how is it possible to “develop” and to “expand one’s knowledge” if one does not push further and take contradictory arguments seriously? These students differ markedly from the population-at-large. Mass public opinion surveys conducted by Russian organizations show a public lack of support for Internet freedom, while state-imposed limitations and barriers are found to be acceptable (Asmolov, 2015; Nisbet, 2015). The authors of the survey analysis are discouraged that the “stakeholders,” that is, Internet users, do not object to regulation and that, without a change in public opinion, greater intrusiveness by the state cannot be held back. Heavy users of the Internet, however, differ quite considerably from others in the expected direction: they oppose greater regulation and the imposition of any obstacles to their access to the broad spectrum of the Internet. Most respondents in mass public opinion surveys in Russia say they are disinclined to join a public protest or demonstration. The finding is not surprising: as Timur Kuran (1995) has shown, publicly stated attitudes can differ substantially from privately held views, and only when it is safe enough is the tipping point reached and safety achieved to voice the private truths that can suddenly outweigh the “public lies.” These elite students are divided from the rest of the world, not by material impediments, but by political and cultural distance. The Internet has been and will continue to be essential to the way they live their lives. It also divides them from the current leadership, whose suspicion has been aroused, and from the narratives of

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their own media. Status is less important than content, and with their superior education, they have at hand sources of information, views, and cultural pictures they have tested and learned to navigate. The strong risk aversion and fear of betrayal of self-disclosure reduces trust at all levels. These more cosmopolitan, better educated, linguistically prepared young people tilt strongly toward expectations of betrayal. Russia, having adopted a “market economy,” has embraced a kind of competition, in which the successful curb disclosure and are always advantaged by a broad asymmetry of information. Moreover, in this competitive world without enforced and fair rules, as participant Artyom says, curbing self-disclosure makes sense “because 95% of the population as a rule does not follow any ethical or moral principles.” Nariman, participant in a different group, says “the majority of people are liars; they are all egoists and follow their own personal values.” Or Georgy, who says he lives in a “world of lies.” In regard to the international system, participants in every group were most interested in America, because of its power. They do not equate great power with admiration. America may be the most powerful country in the world, but most participants do not like it. In their minds, pushing NATO to the edge of Russia so soon after the collapse of the Soviet Union was an aggressive move. They saw no mission for NATO—unless the perceived threat from Russia was due to their simply being Russian. They talk about the Bush doctrine and bombing that exceeded the UN mandate in Serbia and Libya and the inciting and supplying of the color revolutions. No matter what organization or country was said to lead, these movements in the minds of most in the focus groups are the work of the United States. The ultimate goal is to dismember Russia. There is a degree of real fear among these participants. One young woman asked what would stop the bombing from continuing right through to her in Russia? There is also praise of America regarding the “development of medicine,” “new technology,” and the “standard of living.” Airat, in one focus group, added an emotional tribute to the discussion: “You know, I consider myself a patriot of our country, Russia, but still, when I hear about United States of America, right away I feel grow inside me an association with the homeland of democracy. And from this history of its existence as a state—it’s not such a long history under the operating constitution—I feel I have some special relationship.” This was the only example of a sense of shared identity. The focus group participants were also profoundly disappointed by another aspect of contemporary America. These future leaders have observed—either mediated by online sources or travel in the United States—gross inequality and its effect on those left out. The inequity, due to unfair application of rules and all too often corrupt big business, was discussed as tarnishing the country, and this has had a certain impact on the Russian Federation. The West intended to export market-based democracy to Russia, they say. Instead, these young Russian elites saw export of a model of constant and fraudulent competition. They do not claim that corruption in their country was caused by the United States; of course, they know well that their homegrown oligarchs and the corruption that has permeated Russia are not the direct product of American assistance. They put it more subtly: the particular model of democracy on which the West based its assistance may have been ill-considered.

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That model, unlike the consensual model of Scandinavia, results in a kind of competition unsuited for a society without mechanisms for protection of the many and reining in the appetites of the few. It is impossible to trust unreservedly. The focus group participants—all of them—were angered that Western media displayed what they called a “double standard”: blaming Russia without foundation, while ignoring parallel behavior in Western policy. The case of the Georgian, Abkhazian, Russian war was often put forward as a prime example: multiple accounts from different media accessed on the Internet were disparaged in the groups—e.g., identifying Russia as the first to invade were numerous and incorrect. The New York Times attributed its inaccurate reporting to a consequence of the “fog of war.”

5 Persuasive Communication Online: Posts and Ads The elite students in the focus groups easily rejected online sites and posts attempting to target them for persuasion. They were often poorly constructed (and careless—in some cases clearly ungrammatical and stilted language was used), with repeated graphics and themes, and were not up to the level of graphics used by the more experienced. They say they would stay away from government sites and these features. In a later campaign to persuade users in another country—in this case, the United States—there was a notable weakness in precisely those factors that would have turned away the Russian students.

5.1

Scale Matters

In a detailed analysis of what is termed a “disinformation campaign” related to the 2016 US presidential election, the Senate Intelligence Committee analyzed datasets provided by Facebook, Twitter, and Google for several years up to mid-2017. The advertisements favored the candidacy of Donald Trump. The buyers of Facebook advertisements appeared to be inexperienced, ignoring sloppy material in their ad-purchasing as well as odd, ungrammatical expressions in the narratives of some of the ads (Timberg and Romm, 2018). To evaluate the social media aspect of these messages, it is crucial to embed them in the larger online world of users’ exposure to Facebook and the competition for users. It is useful to get a sense of the larger environment in which Facebook functions. As of 2017, there were 3.74 billion Internet users worldwide and 1.24 billion websites. Only 51.8% of all Internet traffic is generated by human beings; the rest are bots. There are 2.79 billion active social media users in the world. As of 2017, during one month, 2 billion monthly active users logged into Facebook; that figure for Twitter is 328 million. Competition is massive. To get one’s message to cut through

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the clutter, so that it will at least be noticed, is very rare. These are the parameters: for example, between 2015 and 2017, 80 thousand Russia-linked posts appeared on Facebook. During the same period, Americans saw 10 trillion posts. To increase the probability of success, the advertising market is another option. Differentiated levels of pricing offer more or less assistance in, for example, placement, size (least expensive is the size of a postage stamp not placed at the top of the screen), length of time shown, and graphics. Russia-linked buyers spent at the bottom level, in which ads would be small, cheap, and pushed down quickly. Facebook offers buyers the opportunity to designate desired features of an audience for the ad: demographic categories as well as other factors. One-quarter of the ads that were customized by these buyers could not run, because there was no population to conform to the overcrowded menu of attributes. On Twitter too, spending more can result in better ads and a higher probability of reaching the desired audience, but it is at least hundreds of times more expensive than the presumed Russian outlay. A“promoted” ad gets better placement, a longer period to be seen, and the advice from the advertising department about effective graphics. This option can run from $200,000 up to $750,000. Facebook has a similar method for pricing advertisements with respect to those likely to have an impact and in terms of the professionalism of the advertisement. Social media posts can be multiplied. The follower can register “like” or re-send it to one’s “friends,” and, theoretically, the concentric circles widen. In testimony before the US Congress, a Facebook official said that “more than 126 million users” potentially saw posts linked to Russia on Facebook, but as the company’s lawyer clarified the comment, many who were reached by these kinds of posts may not have seen them. The number is a construct. We do not know what would make these posts and re-posts competitive enough to capture the attention and serious thought of users who see more than 10 trillion posts in 2 years on screens where the lifespan of any given message is vanishingly small. This discourse is similar to that sometimes used by electronic media as a substitute for a low number of viewers. RT, for example, often claims its audience consists of the entire population that can receive RT’s signals—whether actually seen or not. It all depends on how the persuasion of individuals works. It is far more complex than fleeting exposure, even if the small square advertisement or the post happens to land on your computer. Exposure does not equal persuasion.

5.2

Factors Affecting Persuasion

It has been notoriously difficult to research media-induced change of attitude— persuasion. Persuasion is understood to have occurred when an individual with certain attitudes changes or replaces them with significantly different ones put forward by the persuasive communication. If a user or follower holds, for example, fascist or other discriminatory views and goes to sites where others agree—often on the dark web—it does not at all mean that the sites have changed his attitudes or

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persuaded her. The sites may help to reinforce the attitudes, but persuasion has not occurred. Widely accepted among social scientists is the theory that there are two fundamental routes in the brain’s processing: “attitude changes via the central route appear to be more persistent, resistant, and predictive of behaviour than the changes induced by the peripheral route.” The central route involves thoughtful consideration of arguments, relevant knowledge, and capacity for analysis; the peripheral route is based on affective associations or simple inferences tied to peripheral cues in the persuasion context and relies on heuristics to a greater degree. Persuasion through the central route lasts longer, although we do not know how long that is. Many policymakers, research scholars, and marketing agencies study persuasive communications. An observational study may show differentiated mass voting, for example, but does not examine the individual’s change of attitude as a result of messages intended to do just that. Analysis of mass voting patterns exposed to persuasive communication finds that Russian Television Channel One “had a major impact on electoral outcomes in Ukraine by increasing electoral support for pro-Russian candidates and parties” (Angrist, Imbens, & Rubin, 1996). However, in our definition, that outcome may not be termed persuasion, as the outcome occurred “by strengthening attitudes of those voters who already had pro-Russian priors rather than by altering the beliefs of pro-Western voters who in fact remained unpersuaded” (Angrist et al., 1996). Among the many other approaches, perhaps the most common is the study of content. Content analysis may illuminate what the sender’s positions are, but it does not extend to reception. With the development of brain science and work on neural networks and the impact of hormones, new insights are being developed. Experimental work on persuasion is done offline and online. It is the individual’s change of attitude after persuasive communication that is the question we should ask, and we should do so in a natural setting, if possible. Further, if an attitude does change after persuasive communications, we need to know how long it lasts, if we are to determine the influence and potential of the process. The subject’s engagement with the persuasive communication would certainly be a pre-condition. If, on a highly kinetic computer screen, filled with videos, colorful posts, messages, and advertisements, a persuasive communication no larger than 2–3 inches square races down the screen among all the others, the user’s engagement is—if engaged at all—shallow. Adding all the competing “static” or “noise” and the tempo of appearance and disappearance on the screen makes it a matter of almost pure chance.

6 Conclusions We have heard from the students at the top of the pyramid of education. They voluntarily take on time-consuming work. In addition to the demands of the university, they go to online news sites; they consume Russian-language sources. They also check the news websites of Western prestige papers and the BBC and CNN. They are determined to know what is newsworthy and then compare the coverage.

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In doing so, they tend to apply the methods they have used in the real world for years to gauge interpersonal trust and to estimate the depth of trust to offer, even at early ages—in primary and secondary school. Observation over time is the basis, upon which prudent calculations may mature about personal habits, speech, and presentation. They speak of their “circles” of friends; they may not last beyond secondary school or university; they tend not to speak of “friend for life.” Necessary self-disclosure is meted out prudently for fear of betrayal; secrets may be shared but to a small group of close friends and only after trust has been tested. In our focus groups, with few exceptions, the likelihood they will trust people at this stage and in the future has given way to a greater predisposition to avoid risk. An Internet friend has limited or no ability to threaten the stability of the offline life. Students in the focus groups expect misrepresentation from individuals seeking friendship on the Internet. It is more challenging to navigate sites and seek information. To do so they rely on the same tests they use to make decisions about interpersonal trust: appearance, speech, time, and integrity. In parallel, an Internet site should have the appearance of modernity: updated frequently, modern graphics, and sleek and interesting design. Advertising, public relations, and propaganda have been folded into something called PR, and when these students encounter it, they leave the site and do not return. They are indignant that their self-worth is vastly underestimated by propagandists and avoid sites related to the largest political party. Any site they believe is engaging in PR is an immediately identifiable insult. A mindset such as what most of the students exhibit presents obstacles for political leaders to address the population, and not only because their attempts at political persuasion fall on deaf ears. The students have seen the online attempts of a number of officials seeking to persuade users and show that they inhabit the same online world as do youth. But, the students say, their amateurish attempts to persuade or propagandize are, as one said, “idiotic.” For now, their elders have come too late to the digital world. These students have penetrating insights and the profound belief that their dignity should be respected. They bristle when officials talk down to them. It would be simple to say that they are arrogant and cynical. On the contrary, they are probably disillusioned idealists. Josiah Ober wrote that, in ancient Athenian democracy, it was understood that: . . .Humiliation is incompatible with the sort of liberty necessary to sustain democracy because the individual who suffers or is subject to humiliation is not in a position to employ free speech or free association in the robust manner demanded of participatory citizens. . . . Likewise infantilism is incompatible with the sort of equality necessary to sustain democracy. (Ober, 2012)

The most effective instrument with which to approach the mass of statements and counter-statements on the Internet is doubtlessly a posture of skepticism. The elite Russian students do not have to be taught skepticism—they make it difficult to gain their trust and the environment does not foster it. Reciprocal trust takes time and observation to build. A society in which the most highly educated lack an inclination to trust and self-disclose forfeits the considerable benefits of trust that reduces the cost of every interaction.

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References Angrist, J. D., Imbens, G. W., & Rubin, D. B. (1996). Identification of causal effects using instrumental variables. Journal of the American Statistical Association, 91(434), 30. Asmolov, G. (2015). Welcoming the dragon: The role of public opinion in Russian Internet regulation. Philadelphia, PA: Center for Global Communication Studies and Internet Policy Observatory. Bolte, A., & Goschke, T. (2005). On the speed of intuition: Intuitive judgments of semantic coherence under different response deadlines. Memory and Cognition, 33(7), 1248–1255. Chang, L., & Krosnick, J. A. (2009). Comparing sample representativeness and response quality. Public Opinion Quarterly, 73(4), 641–678. https://doi.org/10.1093/poq/nfp075. Coppedge, M. (2012). Democratization and research methods (Strategy for social inquiry). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Gamson, W. (1992). Talking politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Greene, S. (2014). Moscow in movement: Power and opposition in Putin’s Russia. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Heberlein, T. A. (2012). Navigating environmental attitudes (p. 35). New York: Oxford University Press. Iyengar, S. (1994). Is anyone responsible? How television frames political issues. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Iyengar, S., & Kinder, D. S. (2010). News that matters. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Kahneman, G., & Klein, G. (2011, June). Conditions for intuitive expertise: A failure to disagree. The American Psychologist (2009), 64, cited in Cinla A. and Sadler-Smith, E. Intuition in Management Research: A Historical Review. International Journal of Management Review, 14(1). Keating, V. C., & Ruzicka, J. (2014). Trusting relationships in international politics: No need to hedge. Review of International Studies, 40(4), 753–770. Kononenko, M. (2011). Natsionalny Interes. Rossia 1 Television Channel, December 10, 6:05–6:50 p.m., Moscow Time. Kuklinski, J., & Quirk, P. (2000). Reconsidering the rational public: Cognition, heuristics, and mass opinion. In A. Lupia, M. McCubbins, & S. Popkin (Eds.), Elements of reason (163). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kuran, T. (1995). Private truths, public lies. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Nisbet, E. (2015). Benchmarking public demand: Russia’s appetite for Internet control. Philadelphia, PA: Center for Global Communication Studies, Annenberg School for Communication and Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VTsIOM). Ober, J. (2012, November). Democracy’s dignity. American Political Science Review, 106(4), 831. Osveshchenie ekonomicheskoi situatsii na tsentralnykh telekanalakh. Obektivny li tsentralnye telekanaly v osveshchenii ekonomicheskoi situatsii? [Coverage of the economic situation on the central television channels. Are the central television channels objective in their coverage of the economic situation?] (2015). Retrieved 2015, from http://fom.ru/SMI-i-internet/11939 Pew Research Institute. (2014). Social media and the spiral of silence. Retrieved 2015, from www. pewinternet.org/22014/08/26 Putnam, R., Leonardi, R., & Nanetti, R. (1993). Making democracy work: Civic traditions in modern Italy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Raiffa, H. (1985). The art and science of negotiation. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Raiffa, H., Richardson, J., & Metkalf, D. (2007). Negotiation analysis: The science and art of collaborative decision making. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Serek, J., & Machackova, H. (2014). Online only: Which Czech young adults prefer online civic participation? Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, 8, 3. Retrieved September 2015, from www.cyberpsychology.eu/view.php? cisloclanku¼2014092901&article¼6

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Sutherlin, G. (2015). The myth of the universal user: Pursuing a cultural variable in ICT design for conflict management through quantitative analysis: Implications from a Ugandan case study. Ph.D. thesis, University of Bradford. Timberg, C., & Romm, T. (2018, December 17). New report on Russian disinformation, prepared for the senate, shows the operation’s scale and sweep. The Washington Post. Retrieved December 2018, from https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/12/16/new-reportrussian-disinformation-prepared-senate-shows-operations-scale-sweep/ Zukin, C. (2015). What’s the matter with polling? The New York Times, 21 June, 1, 9.

Part IV

Participation, Representations and Discussions

Russia in International Social Media Discussions: Pro and Contra Greg Simons

Castells states that “communication is the essence of human activity, all domains of social life are being modified by the pervasive uses of the Internet” (2003, p. 275). The Internet has evolved to become an indispensable tool of social interaction and communication. Every conceivable topic and perception of those topics can be found there. Social media have revolutionised the way that people interact and perceive their surrounding physical environment(s). A number of studies exist on the potential power of social media as a means of politically challenging the power of an incumbent and inherently undemocratic political system (Castells, 2012). But what about the uses of information by politically motivated groups that may stop short of the will or intent to force political change in the real world and are instead satisfied in sharing content to reinforce their particular world view? The different communication styles, regardless of political orientation, are becoming more engaged in a personalised form of politics. These groups can be quite insular to external influences and messaging, and neither evidence nor reasoned debate is likely to sway them from their emotional stance and perception (Bennett, 2012, p. 23). This chapter shall examine and analyse different groups on Facebook; some of the groups will be critical of Russia and its policies and the other groups positive. The aim is to see how the individual members of these groups communicate and interact with one another on the common country topic of Russia. What is important and resonates with the members of these groups? Which are the expressed norms and values? How

G. Simons (*) Institute for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Uppsala University in Sweden, Uppsala, Sweden Department of Communication Sciences, Turiba University in Riga, Riga, Latvia Business Technology Institute at Turiba University in Riga, Riga, Latvia Ural Humanitarian Institute, Ural Federal University, Yekaterinburg, Russia e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_11

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are relationships formed and maintained? What are the concrete images, brand and reputation of Russia, and how does this differ between the groups? Before the material of the study of the Facebook groups is presented, a conceptual background will be created in order for the reader to better understand the empirical content of the study. This will include how activism takes place on social media, together with the quality and nature of the information. The topic of how social media affect the brand image is the next subject of the section.

1 Information, Activism and Social Media Although the Internet is held as a potentially positive force for freedom of expression and ideas, there are those who understand the dual-use potential of this “free” medium of communication by both activists and governments as a mechanism for freedom or suppression (Morozov, 2011). There are different ways and means of waging activism on and in the Internet. David Resnick made three distinctions between different activist groups use of the Internet. The three forms of Internet politics are “politics within the Net; politics which impacts upon the Net; and political uses of the Net”. The first group is the most relevant for the purposes of this chapter. This group refers to the internal politics of Internet communities, which is based upon information sharing interaction, through which participants attempt to create and police a cohesive group identity (Meikle, 2002, p. 3). This has a certain public relations and relationship-forming potential to it. New media have facilitated a more open, transparent, and interactive society. Organisations and their publics now have more equitable footing on which to check each other’s activities and motives. Public relationships are a critical component of this communication conundrum. (Duhé, 2007, p. x)

Although not specifically related to organisations only, individuals are able to form groups irrespective of location and to engage in activism and discussions on specific themes and topics of importance and relevance to them. The developments taking place in new information and communications technologies enable a more diverse level of interaction and a levelling of the playing field between different stakeholders, which in turn creates a conducive environment for establishing transnational networks. World politics at the end of the twentieth century involves, alongside states, many non-state actors that interact with each other, with states, and with international organisations. These interactions are structured in terms of networks, and transnational networks are increasingly visible in international politics. (Keck & Sikkink, 1998, p. 1)

Social media provide the technical means for such groups to instantaneously communicate amongst themselves and even more widely. The quality and effectiveness of the communication is found in the nature of the relationships that are formed in online groups. Individuals coalesce around a particular group whose topic or theme resonates with them. The attraction is determined not only by the topic or issue but how it is framed in terms of the central vales and norms that are expressed

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and associated by the activism that takes place. “Such networks are most prevalent in issue areas characterised by high value content and informational uncertainty. At the core of the relationship is information exchange” (Keck & Sikkink, 1998, p. 2). These groups are bound together by shared values, visions and a discourse that reaffirms their particular world view. Activists frame issues by identifying and providing convincing explanations for powerful symbolic events, which in turn become catalysts for growth of networks. Symbolic interpretation is part of the process of persuasion by which networks create awareness and expand their constituencies. (Keck & Sikkink, 1998, p. 22)

These observations are confirmed by Bennett, who notes that there are more fragmented and diverse mobilisations that are based around the personal life-style values of individuals, which they use to engage in their different causes (Bennett, 2012). This takes place in the public sphere, which Castells defines as being “the space of communication of ideas and projects that emerge from society”. He adds that “global civil society is the organised expression of the values and the interests of society”, further noting that “the process of globalisation has shifted the debate from the national domain to the global debate” where power relationships are built upon shared cultural meaning (Castells, 2008, p. 78). The commonality of values, norms and visions can currently be shared more freely and widely than at any other time in the past with the development of means of communication. As a result, the way in which individuals communicate is also in a state of change. Social media and new media have transformed the way that people communicate. When communicating through traditional media (newspapers, radio and TV), it is monologic in nature, based on a one-to-many message flow. One message is sent to many individuals and the audience has little to no possibility to interact with the message. New media communication is based upon a dialogic approach, which is a many-to-many message flow. Many individuals are simultaneously exchanging, sending and receiving messages amongst themselves via platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and so forth. This is a much more interactive form of communication, where participants become prosumers (both producers and consumers of the content). Therefore content in new media gives direct access with an intended audience, even if the gatekeeper role has been removed from the equation (Cunningham, 2010, p. 111). The nature and quality of the communication also has implications for the relationship that forms in response to the activity. Dialogic communication involves a negotiated exchange of ideas and opinions. However, the individuals do not necessarily have to agree, but it is the willingness to share and communicate. In addition, the process is not about some sort of objective truth or subjectivity, but rather it concerns intersubjectivity (Kent & Taylor, 1998, p. 325). Activist-oriented groups on the Internet and on social media possess the necessary means with which to create dialogic relationships. They also have been noted as being better prepared to address the needs and desires of their member publics rather than media needs (Taylor, Kent, & White, 2001). The net result is to make the communication much more complex as there may be a number of credible interlocutors that influence the context as to how prosumers decode and interpret messages.

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Shaping the brand and reputation of a country is often seen as a state-led/directed pursuit, where public diplomacy is defined as nurturing the soft power of a state (Nye, 2004). This includes the marketing and branding of nations (Anholt, 2002) and international public relations by governments (Grunig, 1993; Signitzer & Coombs, 1992), which involves understanding, planning, engagement and advocacy (Bruce, 2011). Furthermore, the latest variant of interactive public diplomacy (“public diplomacy 2.0”) would encourage the free flow of discourse and engagement across boundaries (Hayden, 2011). These communicational means are intended to assist in the creation of a national brand and reputation. Simon Anholt states that “the rapid advance of globalisation means that every country, every city and every region must compete [. . .] for the attention and respect of the international media, of other governments, and the people of other countries” (2007, p. 1). A distinction needs to be made between brands and branding. Brand is an entity or service, in which identity and reputation are linked to its name, whereas the activity of branding is the process of designing, planning and communicating the name and identity as a means of building or managing the reputation (Anholt, 2007, p. 4). The branding of a nation is an exercise that can result in a more coherent sense of identity and purpose, if performed successfully (Aronczyk, 2013). However, a flawed notion has existed, which assumes that a government can control communications, which has a tendency to ignore the interactive and dialogic nature of the contemporary global communication environment (Cornish, Lindley-French, & Yorke, 2011, p. 6). Studies have shown that traditional media and social media have different impacts upon brand. Traditional media have been shown to exert a stronger impact upon brand awareness than social media communications. Social media have a tendency to have a stronger impact upon the positive influence of brand image (Bruhn, Schoenmueller, & Schäfer, 2012, p. 781). This chapter intends to examine and analyse groups present on social media that communicate positive and negative impressions of Russia. With regard to previous academic research on groups and individuals on social media that convey a positive impression of Russia and its political leadership, there are a broad spectrum of reasons and motivations to do so, many of which resonate emotionally with those involved. Various norms and values attract these groups and individuals, such as cultural conservatives being attracted to Russia and President Putin through the perception of shared traditional and family values, which is contrasted against the negatively perceived ideals of liberalism and multi-culturalism. Those individuals and groups more aligned with a leftist world view and politics find attraction in Russia’s challenge to the United States’ global hegemony (Simons, 2014, 2015). There are also a number of groups present on Facebook that are highly critical of Russia and Russian policy, which form a political opposite of those groups expressing positive views and sentiments, and therefore consequently produce a negative brand and reputation.

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2 Clashing Realities in Cyberspace: Anti- and Pro-Russian Communities on Facebook 2.1

Method

In 2017, Facebook remains the world’s most popular social media of choice by the number of active users and is situated well ahead of its rivals.1 Facebook is an international communicative platform, which means that the quality and nature of the communication and relationships is correspondingly international, rather than restricted to within Russia’s international borders. Therefore, this motivated the choice of Facebook as being the social media site for locating the community pages and interest groups on and about Russia. Other social media are certainly available to search and study, such as international social media like LinkedIn and YouTube or social media that are associated with the domestic context and Russianlanguage users such as LiveJournal, VKontakte and Odnoklassniki. However, Facebook is more universally used by divergent groups and that is not always the case with the others. It was a goal of the study to find the diverging groups operating within the same social media platform and, preferably, the content language (or at least the resultant discussions of the content) in English. Even though Facebook in Russia is not the most popular social media platform and has an association with the political opposition,2 the study is one that includes a very diverse and an international membership. It should be noted that this is intended as being an indicative and qualitative study on the issue of the activism of opposing realities in social media. The search and analysis was conducted by the author during the first week of June 2017. A manual search was done on Facebook using the terms “Russia”, “fans of Russia”, “love Russia”, “stop Russia”, “Russian propaganda” and “Russian aggression”. The relevance and importance of the communities and groups were decided on the basis of the size of the membership (looking for higher membership), the frequency of postings and quality and quantity of the resulting discussion. The latest postings of each community or group shall be analysed and listed. The first groups to be examined are those with a negative view of Russia and Russians.

1 Most famous social network sites worldwide as of April 2017, ranked by number of active users (in millions), Statista, https://www.statista.com/statistics/272014/global-social-networks-rankedby-number-of-users/, April 2017 (accessed 6 June 2017). 2 Balmforth, T., Russian Opposition “Likes” Facebook, RFE/RL, https://www.rferl.org/a/russianopposition-likes-facebook/24585388.html, 18 May 2012 (accessed 1 June 2017).

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Negative Groups

Although there were various groups present amongst those individuals that held a negative view of Russia (in terms of the country’s image, its politics/policies or the Russian people), communities seemed to be much more popular and active. As a consequence, three were selected, based on the above-mentioned criteria, for further analysis and examination of content and communication. There were different clusters of such pages, which engage in issues and topics such as Russia’s involvement in Ukraine, Russian propaganda and how to stop it, gay rights in Russia and stopping Russian policy. Although there was no formal membership to this particular form of social media community, the minimum level of commitment was to “like” a community; “following” a particular community signified a greater level of symbolic dedication to the issue or cause. One of the three communities that were ultimately selected is Stop Russia: Crowdfunded Public Awareness Campaign (https://www.facebook.com/stop.rus sian.reich/), which is a community with 2158 people liking and 2074 people following it (as of 1 June 2017); the page claims to “spread the word against Russia’s crimes against humanity”. Another page that was analysed was Boycott Russia Today (https://www.facebook.com/boycottrussiatoday/) that has 11,490 people liking and 11,059 following it (as of 1 June 2017); the page carries the slogan “Putin’s propaganda”. Under the about section is the description and aim of the page—“demanding that US cable/satellite providers suspend Putin’s “Russia Today” (RT) Television until the Kremlin respects Ukraine’s sovereignty”. The third page that was examined and analysed was Russia, Hands Off Ukraine (https://www.facebook.com/russiahandsoff/), which is a community with 15,166 likes and 14,422 followers (as of 1 June 2017). The main picture has the caption—“after the last Ukrainian soldier falls, Putin will come for you, ladies and gents”. Under about, there is the brief description that the community is “against Putin’s policy of occupation and military invasion in Ukraine”. Each of the Facebook communities mentioned above will be examined and analysed in the order that they appear. Stop Russia: Crowdfunded Public Awareness Campaign is the first community and its purpose is linked with crowd-sourced fundraising (through PayPal) to support its activities. Those activities are directed towards what is seen as, broadly speaking, Russian influence activities. This is done through “exposing” different Russian-inspired conspiracies, which is complemented with projecting Russia as being a weak state and the West as strong. A pinned post from 9 May 2017 (this is also the anniversary of Russia’s Victory Day over Nazi Germany) exalts visitors to “help us expose Russia: LIKE, SHARE, INVITE! Support this project”. Following from Keck and Sikkink’s (1998) work with non-state transnational activism, this is a call for a symbolic political action against Russia; the participants involved are united in their negative interpretation of the country and its political course. These are the emotional shared values that are described by Bennett (2012) and Castells

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(2008), which are being widely communicated and used to engage and mobilise individuals to spread this vision as noted by Bruce (2011). There are regular posts each week, mostly sourced from mainstream Western media or critical (of Russia) sources, which are used to construct the image of the threat from the Russian state, yet simultaneously attempting to convey Russia as a weak state.3 The nature of the communication suggests an “anti-brand” approach to Anholt’s (2007) vision of managing a national brand image and reputation. Different reactions and sharing of the posted information are observable. Only one actor is seen to post material on this community (with the same name as this community), although material has been shared from other communities, such as Russia Unmasked. Boycott Russia Today is the next community, which, as suggested by the name, is engaged in activism against Russia Today and the Russian government. A pinned post from 15 April 2017 informs the visitor—“updated ‘RT reading list’ now in our BRT Notes section, with a dozen 2017 citations having been added”. There is a long list of critical and negative articles on RT, together with the links that are following this caption. The community postings are done solely by a member bearing the name of this community. It is possible to see different reactions and comments on the postings; the material used is drawn from different negative media sources that are critical of Russia and some postings from other social media, such as Twitter. Postings appear regularly on the main pages of this community, which deal with different negative and critical aspects of Russia as a country and a political/social system.4 The postings tend to reinforce each other and form the image of Russia as an aggressive and deceptive country and people. This community is much more active in the sheer number of posts on the homepage of the community with multiple

3

For a selection of the most recent postings: From 1 June 2017—Alexandrova-Zorina, L., Russia on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Granta, https://granta.com/russia-verge-nervous-breakdown/, 31 May 2017; from 18 May 2017—The Moscow Times, The Kremlin Reportedly Paid $35,000 for an Anti-Protest Music Video, https://themoscowtimes.com/articles/the-kremlin-reportedly-paid35000-for-an-anti-protest-music-video-58016, 17 May 2017; from 15 May 2017—Lockie, A., An F-35 pilot explains why Russia and China’s counterstealth can’t stop him, Business Insider, http:// www.businessinsider.com/f-35-russia-china-radar-counter-stealth-2017-5?IR¼T, 15 May 2017; from 14 May 2017—63% of Georgians said Russia is the biggest threat to their country, UA Wire, http://uawire.org/news/63-percent-of-georgians-said-russia-is-the-biggest-threat-to-theircountry, 14 May 2017. 4 For a selection of the most recent postings: From 2 June 2017—Whitmore, B., The Daily Vertical: Vladimir Putin, Art Lover (Transcript), RFE/RL, https://www.rferl.org/a/daily-vertical-transcriptvladimir-putin-art-lover/28524628.html, 2 June 2017; from 2 June 2017—Kevin Rothrock, Behold the non-disparagement agreements RT employees are forced to sign. Just wow. Great work by @MoscowTimes. Twitter, https://twitter.com/KevinRothrock/status/870235929100865536, 1 June 2017; from 2 June 2017—Gertz, M., What Megyn Kelly didn’t tell Today show viewers about the “Russian broadcaster” she interviewed, https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2017/06/01/whatmegyn-kelly-didnt-tell-today-show-viewers-about-russian-broadcaster-she-interviewed/216738, 1 June 2017; from 2 June 2017—Rubin, S. & Bekker, T., In Russia, Geography Class Has Heavy Dose Of Patriotism, Vocativ, http://www.vocativ.com/434771/russia-geography-class-patriotism/, 1 June 2017.

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posts per day as the norm. It should be noted that this is a larger community than the previous one. The final community to be studied in this section is Russia, Hands Off Ukraine, which unlike the previous two communities did not feature a lead pinned post. This community engages in a very specific cause, which is political activism that is aimed at criticising Russia’s stance and engagement in the Ukraine crisis that flared from the end of 2013. As such, the community is involved in attempting to shape a positive country image of Ukraine and a negative country image of Russia. It shares similar expressed values and norms found in the other two communities in terms of a dualistic and simplistic construction of the world of clashing sets of values and norms, one of them “good” and the other “bad”. In May 2017 there were relatively few postings, which are only done by an administrator who uses an identity that features the community’s name. Some materials from other groups and individuals are shared in the content of this community. However, there is a much greater level of interaction and feedback from those who view the materials. Given the nature and aims of the community, a lot of the materials featured relate to the themes of war and the consequences of war.5 Active participants were seemingly motivated to interact along the lines of cultural/social liberalism that favours an agenda of multi-culturalism and globalisation, which is something that they perceive Russia stands against on a norm and value basis. A general observation across these communities is that although the participation possibilities are more open in following and commenting on the posts on these owing to their “community” nature as opposed to the more closed nature of groups, it does not lead to the expected result. There is relatively little in the way of observable intense dialogic communication on these pages, in spite of the relatively large number of likes and followers. All of the communities examined here highlighted the Russian threat to their viewers, whether it was propaganda, fake news and manipulation or military aggression. This threat is being projected as something that not only affects the immediate object or subject of interest, but a sort of domino-effect theory is invoked. The next groups to come under scrutiny are those that express a favourable and positive outlook towards Russia and Russians. How do the quality and nature of the communications coincide and differ from those expressing unfavourable views? 5

For a selection of the most recent postings: From 5 May 2017—shared NATO video on wounded Ukrainian service personnel, https://www.facebook.com/NATO/videos/1416506525039341/?hc_ ref¼PAGES_TIMELINE; from 11 April 2017—Shipman, T. & Harnden, T., Russia accused of complicity in Syria war crime, The Times, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/russiaaccused-of-complicity-in-syria-war-crime-k6nb0whsk, 9 April 2017; from 31 March 2017—Peterson, N., In Ukraine, Russia Weaponizes Fake News to Fight a Real War, Daily Signal, http:// dailysignal.com/2017/03/30/in-ukraine-russia-weaponizes-fake-news-to-fight-a-real-war/, 30 March 2017; from 28 March 2017—shared an RFE/RL Facebook video on new military equipment supplied to the rebel side, https://www.facebook.com/rferl/videos/ 10155264165349575/?hc_ref¼PAGES_TIMELINE; from 2 February 2017—shared a post from Edmond Huet “If Russia stops fighting, there will be no more war. If Ukraine stops fighting, there will be no more Ukraine and then no more Europe”, 1 February 2017.

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Positive Groups

The searches for the groups and communities that held a positive view of Russia, Russians and Russian policy/politics produced a much more diverse set of search results. These topics and subjects included alumni to Russian institutions (such as universities), expat communities of Russians living abroad, Russian official and semi-official institutions and people, Russian language and culture interest groups, in defence of Russia and Russian policy (and sometimes in opposition to the West) and political and policy discussion groups. Unlike the communities that held negative views of Russia and Russian policy, groups were a more popular and common platform for bringing individuals together around a common theme or topic. There was a mixture of open and closed groups within this field. Groups on social media offer the creator and administrator the ability to better monitor and control who is joining and part of a more “exclusive” community, which is the product of a potential member’s desire to join combined with a group’s willingness to accept them. The three groups that were eventually selected, based upon the criteria mentioned in the method section that appears above, are With Russia in Heart (https://www. facebook.com/groups/222571261537218/) with 5191 members (as of 1 June 2017), which is a public group (as such, non-members can view the content, but cannot participate in posting and commenting on material on the group page); The Power of Russia (https://www.facebook.com/groups/235885833266763/) with 1666 members (as of 1 June 2017), which is a closed group; and From Russia with Love (https://www.facebook.com/groups/291263241070709/) with 2475 members (as of 1 June 2017), which is an open group. These three Facebook groups shall be examined and analysed in the order that they are listed. The first group to be scrutinised in this category is With Russia in Heart. The group has a pinned post from 3 June 2017, which features a biography of the famous Russian aircraft designer Andrei Tupolev. There is a very high volume of postings by members of the group, with multiple postings appearing each day. Some individuals emerge as being more active than others in the group through the sheer number of postings. Topics and subjects of the posts are wide and varied, which include Russian culture and customs (such as tea drinking), critique of NATO and the West, Russian people and professions (such as police officers), greetings or expressions of love/admiration for Russia, USSR and anti-Fascist memes, Russian cities and regions, geopolitical commentaries (such as in support of Syria) and Russian weapon systems. The material is sourced from a wide variety of different origins and formats, and much of the material is used to confirm the positive stance

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on Russia,6 but some negative material7 is occasionally posted and subject to group mockery and ridicule. Pathos is often used, to stir both positive and negative sentiments (positive towards Russia and negative towards key opponents such as NATO and McCain), but there is also an element of ethos to build and project a strong sense of strength and capability yet modesty of Russians (including President Putin). Attempts to create an emotional relationship are being done by attempting to instil a sense of liking or admiration through creating a feeling of familiarity. A second group within this current category to be investigated is The Power of Russia. The group posts begin with a pinned message from 6 September 2016 on the aims, rules and conduct—“News and views on Russia and anything to do with Russia politics/culture/military power/Vladimir Putin. Personally I wouldn’t mind helping to make this a platform a form of support due to the West’s double standards towards Russia. Rules: No spamming/advertising and such”. This is the group’s description, which also appears on the discussion page. There are posts appearing in languages other than English, such as German and Russian. The postings are much less frequent in this group than in the previous one, and although a number of more active key personalities are observable in this group, there are overall far fewer signs of reaction and much less interactivity amongst the group members. Overall, the posts tend to be highly politically charged, which paint Russia in a favourable light in the global arena. On 5 June 2017 the most recent posts include the following: On 31 May 2017 a photo was shared from the group Фото, факты и события из реальной жизни (Photo, Facts, and Events from the Real Life) concerning the visa situation for Ukrainian citizens travelling to the European Union; on 25 May 2017 an article was posted from Geopolitca.ru8; on 24 May 2017 a post from the Orthodox Mission in Austria was shared (in German); on 22 May 2017 a link from Geopolitica.ru was

6

Most recent postings observed on 5 June 2017—a photo of a samovar from 5 June 2017; a photo of a Russian police woman is shown from 4 June 2017; 4 June 2017 a blog post on Russian hypersonic missiles is posted, Hussein, S., Russia Successfully Completes Tests of its Brand New Hypersonic Missile, Fort Russ, http://www.fort-russ.com/2017/06/russia-successfully-completes-tests-of.html, 4 June 2017; post from 5 June 2017, Russia Expects Qatar Diplomatic Crisis to be Resolved Peacefully, Russia Beyond the Headlines (from TASS), https://www.rbth.com/news/2017/06/05/ russia-expects-qatar-diplomatic-crisis-to-be-resolved-peacefully_776752, 5 June 2017; posting from 5 June 2017, Guzeva, A., 7 Things to Explore at Moscow’s Red Square Beyond the Mausoleum, Russia Beyond the Headlines, https://www.rbth.com/arts/2017/06/05/7-things-toexplore-at-moscows-red-square-beyond-the-mausoleum_775647, 5 June 2017. 7 Most recent postings observed on 5 June 2017—a meme with the caption “when terrorists keep attacking you but NATO says Russia is your main threat” on; Fox news link is shared and ridiculed on 5 June 2017, Shoen, D. E., Senator McCain is Right: Russia is a Greater Threat Than ISIS, Fox News, http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2017/05/30/senator-mccain-is-right-russia-is-greaterthreat-than-isis.html, 30 May 2017. 8 Manchester Suicide—Bomber Family Supposedly Cooperated With UK Intelligence Agencies Against Gadaffi, Geopolitica, https://www.geopolitica.ru/en/news/manchester-suicide-bomber-fam ily-supposedly-cooperated-uk-intelligence-agencies-against-gaddafi, 24 May 2017.

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shared9; on 11 May 2017 a member shared her own post on the meeting of the Russian president and Japanese prime minister; there were a number of shared posts from the group Фото, факты и события из реальной жизни and links from Geopolitica.ru. Unlike the previous group, there were no posts on “soft” topics, such as culture and traditions. The third and final group in this section to be analysed is From Russia with Love. This group’s description is posted as follows: “Do you want to learn more about Russia, discuss news, discover Russian culture, customs and traditions? Talk with Russians and people, from whole world, who loves Russia? Then you are on the right address! Join us and find out more!” A pinned post from 26 February 2015 by the group’s sole administrator reminds the members of the expected behaviour and rules for the group and their interactions. There is a warning of expulsion from the group with the second warning for infractions. Posts appear often and regularly on the group’s discussion page, and most of them are not political in nature (some exceptions being favourable and some positive posts concerning Vladimir Putin). As stated in the group’s description, the posts are oriented towards Russian culture, identity, nature, customs and greetings from members to the group. As with the other groups that have been previously studied, there are some key posters of information that emerge. The majority of the posts are written in English, but there are also some in Russian; there is more interaction and reaction to the posts than in the second group, but far less in terms of quantity and quality than in the first group. Different memes, posts, photos and links from other groups and individuals are shared on the group’s discussion page. From the first posts appearing on 5 June 2017: the first one on 5 June 2017 is a greeting from one member to the others that features a meme with a nature scene and the words “good morning, from Russia with love” by one of the top posters; also from 5 June 2017 is a shared photo with a caption “good morning to all my beloved mother Russia have a lovely day and new week with love”; from 22 May 2017 is a post by another member with facts and figures on eco-settlements in Russia and eco-products for sale; from 4 June 2017 is a photo of a group in Russian folk dress with a caption “from Australia with love!”; from 4 June 2017 is a photo of a Russian Orthodox church with the caption “happy Holy Trinity!”; and from 3 June 2017 is a posting by an individual member to the group with a personal photo and a caption “I love Russia so much, please feel free to contact me on Facebook”. The majority of the material is based upon a mutual interest and/or fascination of the group members in aspects of culture, customs and traditions in Russia. The style of communication is informal, non-political and friendly between the members of this community. Individuals in these groups seemed to be attracted by certain associated values and norms with the country and its politics, such as cultural/social conservatism or being seen as a geopolitical opponent to the US-led Western foreign policy agenda of regime change. There was no overt evidence to prove that any of these members

9 Trump: Recognition as Princeps Huius Mundi, Geopolitica, https://www.geopolitica.ru/en/article/ trump-recognition-princeps-huius-mundi, 21 May 2017.

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were working for official Russian agencies; rather they seemed to be sympathetic and attracted to the perceived symbolism of the values and norms associated with Russia. The group (as opposed to community) format of the pro-Russia groups permitted a much more interactive form of dialogic communication and encouraged an environment that permitted prosumers to be more active. This occurred in spite of the smaller number of members, in comparison to those liking and following the anti-Russian communities. The three groups demonstrate a noticeable diversity in terms of the content posted and the level of interaction between and amongst the group members, with the first two groups being very politically motivated in terms of the content and resultant discussions.

3 Conclusion The following conclusion should be considered within the framework of an indicative finding and not a generalisable finding, which would require a quantitative analysis with a much larger N of groups and communities to be analysed. Castells’s (2003) observation that communication is the essence of human activity and the Internet is shaping the domains of social life is evident in this brief study of six communities and groups on Facebook. These groups were all insular to external messaging and influences that challenged their particular held perception and world view, which supports Bennett’s (2012) remarks, where contradictory information was emotionally dismissed. The messaging and communications were based on the premise of a relationship of confirmation of the group’s core values. As such, Castells’s (2012) view on the potential power of social media as a means of challenging a power of an incumbent and inherently undemocratic system is not entirely true. These studies indicate that the power of social media can be potentially harnessed to challenge or support any political or social system, but it is dependent on the will and motivation of the participants of a particular issue/interest community. In this case, the different communities were engaged in online activism either for or against the political and/or social system of Russia. This was done, as described by Keck and Sikkink (1998), through a core relationship based upon informational exchange, binding the individuals of the group through a common vision, discourse and shared values. The creation and maintenance of emotionally based relationships seems to be the key to maintaining group cohesion and a sense of purpose and energy. This is done through what Meikle (2002) noted as creating and policing a cohesive group identity. Although a gatekeeper role in social media is not a viable option, which is noted by Delahaye-Paine and Duhé (2007), and managing the relationships becomes more important, it is interesting to note how the subjects of study responded to this challenge. The community format of the anti-Russia communities on Facebook meant that posts were somewhat controlled and policed by the “owner” of the page. Allowing individuals to like or follow the page enables them to receive information and to interactively react to communications. Membership is not

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controlled, but the ability to communicate seems to be more “restricted” than in the group format. This may account for the lower level of communication and interaction observed between and amongst the likers and followers of the communities in question. However, the pro-Russia communities studied opted for a different approach and chose to adopt a group format. This enables a greater control over the membership and who is able to join. But once a member, the individual can engage much more proactively and dialogically in communicating with other members of the group; they are able to act in the capacity as a prosumer. The established dialogic communication in both sets of groups (anti- and pro-Russia) follows Taylor et al.’s (2001) conclusion that it is intended to meet the emotional and psychological needs of the group and its members rather than their media needs. It should be noted that the composition of the members of the various pro- and anti-groups was very diverse and international according to the individual Facebook profiles. There are also many communications based upon perception and emotion rather than clear facts and reasoned logic that affect the quality of the discussions in general. What are the resultant effects on the project images, brands and reputations of Russia? An initial point is the confirmation of the observation by Cornish et al. (2011) that a government is unable to control communications and information flows in the contemporary global communication environment, which is interactive and dialogic. There has been demonstrable effort by the groups to create a sense of “understanding” about their world view through planning, engagement and advocacy, which was outlined by Bruce (2011), although by governments. This signifies the possible loss of a monopoly by state and government actors in shaping the information environment concerning the image and brand of their country. Hayden (2011) spoke of a free flow of discourse and engagement across boundaries, which is evidenced by the activities of the six afore-discussed communities on Facebook. Further research would be needed though, in order to conclusively prove those people or organisations who initiated the groups and the identities of the administrators of these groups. According to Anholt (2007), branding is a process of designing, planning and communicating as a means of building or managing a reputation. Both of the opposing sets of groups worked according to this logic; the pro-Russia groups were emphasising the positive aspects of Russia in terms of culture, people, traditions, identity, language (“soft” issues), military strength, geopolitics and positive portrayals of Russia’s political leaders (“hard” issues). The “ethical” and “moral” behaviour and intent displayed by Russia are contrasted against the exact opposite of Western leaders and organisations. Russia is projected as being a humane and benevolent force, which is countering the destructive and imperialistic ambitions and behaviour of the US-led West. Conversely, the anti-Russia communities tend to focus on narrower and more specific issues and/or topics than their pro-Russia counterparts, but they also use sets of emotionally resonating values and norms. There is a tendency to ignore “soft” issues and to focus on the “hard” aspects; these communities emphasise the Russian “threat” in both a tangible and intangible sense. Tangible threats are stressed as being

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military and other forms of aggression against other countries and peoples. In order to make this message resonate more, some groups, such as the one focusing on Ukraine, stress that the threat is much wider than just Ukraine. Intangible threats are used also, which is especially evident in the anti-RT community that stresses the subversive threat of propaganda and manipulation against global political and social systems (viz. against the world’s system of democracies). The West is projected as being a powerful and benevolent force in the world with many positive aspects, which is contrasted against a weak and unattractive Russia that is trying to undermine it.

References Anholt, S. (2002). Foreword. Journal of Brand Management, 9(4–5), 229–239. Anholt, S. (2007). Competitive identity: The new brand management for nations, cities and regions. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Aronczyk, M. (2013). Branding the nation: The global business of National Identity. New York: Oxford University Press. Bennett, W. L. (2012). The personalisation of politics: Political identity, social media, and changing patterns of participation. Annals, AAPSS, 644(November), 20–39. Bruce, G. (2011). American public diplomacy: Enduring characteristics, elusive transformation. Hague Journal of Diplomacy, 6(3–4), 351–372. Bruhn, M., Schoenmueller, V., & Schäfer, D. B. (2012). Are social media replacing traditional media in terms of brand equity creation? Management Research Review, 35(9), 770–790. Castells, M. (2003). The Internet galaxy: Reflections on the Internet, business, and society. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Castells, M. (2008). The new public sphere: Global civil society, communication networks, and global governance. Annals, AAPSS, 616(March), 78–93. Castells, M. (2012). Networks of outrage and hope: Social movements in the Internet age. Cambridge: Polity Press. Cornish, P., Lindley-French, J., & Yorke, C. (2011). Strategic communications and national strategy, a Chatham House report. London: The Royal Institute of International Affairs. Cunningham, T. (2010). Strategic communication in the New Media Sphere. JFQ, 59(4), 4th Quarter, 110–112. Delahaye-Paine, K. (2007). Introduction. In S. C. Duhé (Ed.), New media and public relations (pp. xiii–xxiv). New York: Peter Lang. Duhé, S. C. (Ed.). (2007). New media and public relations. New York: Peter Lang. Grunig, J. E. (1993). Public relations and international affairs: Effects, ethics and responsibility. Journal of International Affairs, 47(1), 137–162. Hayden, C. (2011). Beyond the “Obama Effect”: Refining the instruments of engagement through U.S. public diplomacy. American Behavioural Scientist, 55(6), 784–802. Keck, M. E., & Sikkink, K. (1998). Activists beyond borders: Advocacy networks in international politics. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Kent, M. L., & Taylor, M. (1998). Building dialogic relationships through the world wide web. Public Relations Review, 24(3), 321–334. Meikle, G. (2002). Future active: Media activism and the Internet. London: Routledge. Morozov, E. (2011). The net delusion: The dark side of Internet freedom. New York: Public Affairs. Nye, J. (2004). Soft power. New York: Public Affairs. Signitzer, B. H., & Coombs, T. (1992). Public relations and public diplomacy – Conceptual convergences. Public Relations Review, 18(2), 137–147.

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Simons, G. (2014). Putin’s international supporters. UI brief, No. 3. Simons, G. (2015). Aspects of Putin’s appeal to international publics. Global Affairs, 1(2), 205–208. Taylor, M., Kent, M. L., & White, W. J. (2001). How activist organisations are using the Internet to build relationships. Public Relations Review, 27, 263–284.

Runet in Crisis Situations Gregory Asmolov

1 Introduction While the World Wide Web is a relatively recent invention, some scholars and writers had already envisioned networked structures that linked people together many years prior to the rise of the Internet. One early model of the Internet can be found in the novel Timur and His Squad (1940) by the Soviet writer Arkady Gaidar. Gaidar describes a vigilante group of children who in secret undertake to do a charitable activity and protect their fellow villagers from local hooligans. The secret headquarter of their organisation is in an old barn at the centre of which is a steering wheel linked through a network of strings to the houses of all members of this secret organisation. Whenever Timur, the leader of the squad, needs his team, he uses the wheel to call them. The number of times he turns the steering wheel indicates the different types of alert or calls for help. Strings can also be connected to or disconnected from the wheel in order to call on specific members of the network. The wheel is a tool that allows targeted mobilisation of the resources of a distributed network in a crisis situation. Using the wheel both define the crisis and address it. It also constitutes the nature of the informal network of Timur’s squad. To what extent, we may ask, does Runet embody Gaidar’s networked mobilisation wheel vis-à-vis their respective capacity to response to emergency situations? Research on the Internet, and specifically Runet, has addressed a broad range of issues including the economy, digital literacy and the digital divide, regulation, media, security, politics, social movements and games. While all these topics appear diverse, most of them share a common denominator. They each deal with issues that

This work was funded as a part of Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship. G. Asmolov (*) Russia Institute, King’s College London, London, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_12

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are related to the everyday life of users. However, there is one issue which is distinctively different from everyday life: crisis situations. The purpose of this chapter is to explore the role of Runet in crisis situations. To address this issue, we first need to define the term “crisis” and how to conceptualise the role of digital platforms in crisis situations.

2 Role of Digital Platforms in Crisis Situations There is an ongoing discussion about the notion of crisis (Coombs, 2010). Seeger et al. propose that “a crisis may be defined as a specific, unexpected, non-routine event or series of events that creates high levels of uncertainty and a significant or perceived threat to high priority goals” (cited in Sellnow & Seeger, 2013, p. 7). Rosenthal and Kouzmin (1993) distinguish between intentional man-made crises and natural external causes. Lerbinger (1997) distinguishes between “crises of the physical world” (e.g. natural disasters), crises of the “human climate” (e.g. criminal actions and political conflicts) and “crises attributable to management failure” (pp. 15–16). James and Wooten (2005) offer typology that relies on differentiation between sudden and smouldering crises. According to them, natural disasters, terror attacks, explosions and technological incidents can be considered as unexpected sudden crisis situations. Weick (1993) addresses a crisis as a cosmological episode, where “people suddenly and deeply feel that the universe is no longer a rational, orderly system” (p. 633). The notion of crisis, however, cannot be distinguished from people’s behavioural changes in response to a crisis. Sellnow and Seeger (2013) point out that “When people believe there is a crisis, they are likely to behave differently than they would in so-called normal times” (p. 5). According to Barton (1969), the transformation of society in the face of crisis can be conceptualised as a transition from an everydaylife social system to an “emergency social system”, suggesting an alternative normative structure, behaviour and set of roles that are formed around the need to address the crisis and resolve it “either by starting new activities to meet people’s needs or by inducing people to accept a lower standard of goal achievement” (p. 66). This may include polar forms of behaviour including a significant rise of altruism or the opposite, antisocial and violent behaviour (Barton, 1969; Sorokin, 1942). According to chaos theory, crisis opens up a space for new forms of self-organisation and is necessary for evolution to a higher order (Sellnow & Seeger, 2013, p. 110). Solnit (2010) suggests that crisis presents a window of opportunity in which new types of society, driven by altruism, can be introduced. Emergency situations can be also approached as moments of technological innovation and sociopolitical development, driven as they are by the need to address the crisis (Cuny, 1983). From an informational point of view, a crisis can be considered as the “production of uncertainty” (Sellnow & Seeger, 2013, p. 258). Flows of communication around crises can both diminish uncertainty and increase a degree of confusion and mistrust. One of the central issues in crisis communication is the cause of the crisis and who needs to be held accountable for it (Coombs & Holladay, 2004). At the same time, communication also has an instrumental dimension and can provide instruction on

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how to survive and how to address the crisis. However, communication is not only the process of information provision about a specific crisis; it also constitutes the core process in constructing the crisis: “Defining an issue as a crisis means that some action must be taken in response and that resources should be made available” (Sellnow & Seeger, 2013, p. 10). The link between the construction of the crisis and the mobilisation of resources to respond to the crisis highlights the broad role of digital technologies in crisis situations. The role of digital platforms and social networks in crisis situations is not limited to increasing transparency around these situations, the attribution of responsibility for them and holding someone accountable. Various forms of crowdsourcing practices have the potential to allow the resources of digital users to be mobilised to respond to a crisis (Asmolov, 2014; Meier, 2015). While the availability of big data (Castillo, 2016) and user-generated information contribute to the capacity to construct the crisis, crowdsourcing practices support various types of online and offline activity that can be considered part of an emergency response (Meier, 2011; Ziemke, 2012). In this way, the role of digital technologies for defining what crisis is and for the facilitation of emergency response is interrelated. Digital technologies play a dual role while they mediate meaning (Silverstone, 2002) as a part of the crisis construction and mediate activity (Leontiev 1978; Vygotsky, 1978) as a part of the crisis response. In that sense, the role of digital platforms and the Internet in particular can be approached as a mediator between users and crisis situations. Various forms of digital mediation constitute the position of users in regard to a crisis either as passive spectators of the crisis or active participants in the emergency response. The mediational perspective on technologies (Kaptelinin, 2014) suggests that we’re asking about mediation opportunities that could offer new forms of relationship between user and crisis. The role of digital platforms in the mediation of the usercrisis relationship can, however, differ depending on the cultural and sociopolitical context. In some cases, digital platforms mediate collaboration between traditional institutions and Internet users. In other cases, the digitally mediated mobilisation of citizens’ resources addresses traditional institutions’ lack of appropriate emergency response. The latter makes any type of crisis, including natural disaster, a sensitive political issue. Pelling and Dill (2006, pp. 4–5) suggest that “the failure of the state to respond adequately to disaster can create a temporary power vacuum” and call for “opening to scrutiny dominant political and institutional systems”. Hewitt (1998) highlights that in situations of natural disaster, one of the major goals of emergency management by the authorities is to control the population in affected areas rather than to respond to the disaster. In that context, traditional institutions also seek to use the media to construct the crisis either, that is, to avoid criticism and responsibility, and/or to legitimise action that is more radical than that which is considered acceptable in the context of everyday life. In that light, digital affordances (Hutchby, 2001) and mediational opportunities for the mobilisation of the digital crowd’s resources, as well as users’ participation in crisis-related activities, can be interpreted and realised in substantially different ways in different sociopolitical and cultural contexts. In other words, similar tools can play

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a substantially different role in the construction of meaning around crisis, offer different modes of relationship between citizens and traditional state institutions as well as introduce different types of crisis-related activity systems (Engeström, 1987). Therefore, investigation of the role of digital platforms for crisis communication requires not only interdisciplinary but also intercultural comparative projects, which cross the borders of national states (Schwarz, Seeger, & Auer, 2016). As such, this study concentrates on a specific segment of global cyberspace— Runet. A focus on the Russian Internet, also known as Runet, provides us with a specific case for examining the role of a national segment of the World Wide Web in situations of crisis. The notion of Runet requires further clarification. As argued by Schmidt and Teubener (2006) the boundaries of Runet may rely on a variety of factors including “language, technology, territory, cultural norms, traditions or values and political power” (p. 14). In this chapter Runet is addressed as a sociocultural segment of cyberspace that is dominated by Russian language content and Russian language social interaction and open to Russian-speaking users from all over the world. However, the notion that Runet as a dedicated term for a specific segment of cyber space “has almost no analogue in Western languages” (Schmidt & Teubener, 2006, p. 14) also requires specific attention. “Runet” as a concept can also be considered as an object of continuous social construction and, accordingly, a set of dominant and alternative Internet imaginaries of the information environment that are promoted by different actors who belong to the Russian scientific, technological, cultural, media and political elites (Asmolov & Kolozaridi, 2017). This chapter is focused on exploring the role of Runet in the mediation of meanings and the mediation of activities around crisis situations. It asks “What role does Runet play in the construction of crisis and in crisis response participation”? New forms of digital mediation of user-crisis relationships are explored as a manifestation of digital innovation that seek to address crisis-related challenges. The role of digital innovation is addressed in terms of how digital platforms that have been used by Runet users constitute their position in regard to crisis situations. In addition, digital innovation is also explored in the context of relationships between Internet users and traditional institutions that are responsible for crisis response. Finally, responding to the above questions may assist in the examination of how digital innovation in crisis situation can be associated with the development of Runet in everyday life.

3 Russia and Crisis Situations: A Sociopolitical Context Russian history includes key episodes when natural disasters had political consequences. For instance, famine and fires in what is called the “Time of Troubles” (“Smutnoe vremya”) number among the factors linked to political instability during the regency of Boris Godunov (1601–1603). Alexander Pushkin (1825) described Godunov’s frustration about the people’s lack of appreciation for his actions in response to the crisis: “They blamed me for the fire! Such is the mob”. According to

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Barton (1969), “In nineteenth-century Russia the overcentralisation of power by the Tsar left local government so weak and unpopular that its efforts to control a disaster led to riots, and there was massive disobedience” (p. 293). That said, in the nineteenth century volunteer firefighters “consistently supported the traditional values of an authoritarian state” (Raab, 2011, p. 4). In the USSR, the authorities made a significant effort to conceal information about disasters, as in the case of the nuclear explosion in Chernobyl which was addressed by the state with a “politics of invisibility” (Kuchinskaya, 2014). Samoilenko (2016) argues that blame games, shifting responsibility and concealing crises are traditional practices for Russian institutional actors which can be approached as a legacy of Soviet totalitarian practice in which the state plays a dual role as both “crisis manager” and as “risk producer” (p. 406). Roffey (2014) argues that concealment of the “real magnitude of the problem” can often be seen in Russia: There is a risk that a natural disaster and the crises it generates will undermine the influence and legitimacy of key actors and leaders. Controlling the flow of information to the public is therefore seen as essential. (Roffey, 2014, p. 79)

Bertrand (2012) also points out that during the wildfires of 2010 the government sought “to hush up the role played during the emergency phase by a large and spontaneous organisation of citizens” to allow the government “to construct an image of a capable state and leaders to prevent any loss of credibility at the national and international levels” (p. 39). To explore the role of Runet in crisis situations this chapter suggests focusing on three types of emergency. The first type of crisis is major incidents and terror attacks. The second type of crisis are natural disasters; the chapter looks specifically into the role of Runet in response to wildfires in 2010. Finally, some additional aspects of the role of Runet in crisis situations are explored through a focus on domestic and international conflicts. That includes internal political unrest, specifically protests around the parliamentary and presidential elections of 2011–2012 and international conflicts, specifically the conflict between Russian and Ukraine. All three situations offer an opportunity to examine the role of Runet in its transition from everyday life to emergency-related social systems and the various modes of digitally mediated user-crisis relationship that are linked to this transition.

4 The Role of Runet in the Constitution of the User’s Position in Crisis Situations 4.1

Major Incidents, Terror Attacks and Alternative Sources of Data

One of the major characteristics of crisis situations is a contradiction between a scarcity of information and the immediate demand of the public to know what is happening. This contradiction may become even more significant in political environments in which the major traditional media are controlled by government and

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where there is some degree of mistrust in the information that is distributed through official media. Even before Runet became known as Runet, it provided sources of independent information about crisis events. For instance, during the Putsch events of August 1991, UseNet newsgroups were used by members of the Relcom and Demos networks to share information about what had happened in Moscow (Soldatov & Borogan, 2015). Runet started to play a role as an alternative source of information at the time of several major terror attacks in the first half of the 2000s, when state-controlled TV channels were increasingly criticised for censoring essential information about crisis situations (Lipman, 2006). These included the hostage taking during the Nord-Ost musical in Moscow in 2002 and in a school in Beslan in 2004 (Peterson, 2005, p. 79). Independent online media were the central source of information at these times. That said, information was also circulating via Runet, mostly in the Livejournal blogosphere, a popular platform in the mid-2000s. One of the reasons for the blogs’ increasing role was that a number of well-known journalists used Livejournal for personal blogging in addition to reporting to their media organisations. In some cases, first-hand information was also published by eyewitnesses and relatives of the hostages. The role of Runet at the time of the terror attacks was not limited to Russia. Israeli Russian-speaking users of Livejournal created a dedicated online community, “Pereklichka_il” (roll call), to check the safety of bloggers following terror attacks in Israeli cities.1 This community can be considered as an early prototype of Facebook’s safety check application. User-generated content came to play a particularly significant role when an incident took place in a highly populated environment, for instance, a fire in a tall building in the Setunsky neighbourhood of Moscow in November 2005, when eyewitnesses from the surrounding buildings shared photos online in real time. Information generated by the users of Runet, including bloggers and members of local forums, often offered first-hand information about emergency situations almost in real time in a number of incidents and terror attacks, particularly when the event took place in an urban area or in proximity to a substantial number of Internet users who were able to document and share information about the incident using their personal computers and mobile phones. This included the crash of a Boeing in Perm in 2008, a terror attack on the “Nevsky Express” train in November 2009 (Asmolov, 2009a) and a fire in the “Khromaya Lochad” club in Perm (Asmolov, 2009b). Groups dedicated to these incidents were created on social networks such as Vkontakte and these were used for sharing information about what had happened. User-generated online content about the incidents also started to be actively used by traditional media. Another practice that emerged in the context of the coverage of major incidents and terror attacks was the memorisation of the personal pages of the victims. For instance, a number of the passengers and flight attendants who tragically died in the aforementioned 2008 Boeing crash had personal webpages on the popular social

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network Vkontakte. Following the tragedy, dozens of users left comments with condolences on the personal profiles. These profiles were also used as a source of information by traditional media. With the growing popularity of Twitter in Russia, substantial coverage of incidents started to circulate with hashtags. Hashtags enable the emergence of a common denominator for a feed of information around specific events. Moreover, while some hashtags referred directly to an event (e.g. #Domoded24 in the case of a terror attack on Domodedovo airport or #Metro29 in that of the terror attack on the Russian underground), other hashtags referred to specific aspects or forms of activity related to the event, for instance, those that helped people in the area of the incident to find alternative free transport. Twitter also contributed to the rapid proliferation of information through its simple reposting feature. Social media gradually became a legitimate source of information for traditional media. It also challenged the state’s framing of and narrative around the scale of the incident and the efficiency of the response. That said, multiple sources of information online also contributed to an information overload, a lack of clear and consistent pictures of the events, and they also increased the threat of the proliferation of unverified information and rumours. In response to this challenge, users of Runet introduced a new bottom-up practice that allowed verified information from social media and traditional media to be gathered in the same place. This is the practice of the development of ad hoc websites that appear in the first hours after an event to aggregate—in one and the same place—information from a variety of sources. One of the first websites of this type Vlfire.org was set up in response to a fire that had occurred in an office building in Vladivostok in 2006. The website was also used to hold the local authorities accountable following the incident. In some cases, an ad hoc project would be named after the hashtags given to the event on Twitter. For instance, a few hours after the terror attack on the Moscow underground on March 29, 2010, the webpage metro29.ru was set up to aggregate information about the tragedy. A similar type of ad hoc website was developed during the 2011 terrorist attack on Domodedovo airport. The platform Domoded24. com “served as a source for essential information, such as names of casualties and wounded as well as lists of volunteer drivers” (Machleder & Asmolov, 2011). The role of these ad hoc websites and social media platforms went beyond providing an alternative source of information and contradicting the official media frames. It constituted the position of users in regard to crisis not only as information sources but also a resource that can be mobilised to show mutual aid and assist those affected by the crisis. The full spectrum of Runet’s functions in crisis situations can be explored through addressing emergencies which have a broader geographical scope and which continue over a longer period of time. This requires focusing on and examining responses to natural disasters.

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Natural Disasters and Crowdsourcing

In summer 2010 wildfires broke out in different locations in Western Russia. More than 60 people died, and the unofficial number of casualties was higher. Hundreds of buildings burned down. Moscow was covered by smog and millions of people in the Russian capital struggled to have access to fresh air. The wildfires in Russia took place a few months after a tragic earthquake in Haiti, an incident that had triggered a wave of innovation around crisis mapping and digital innovation. Some of the technologies that had been used in response to the Haiti earthquake could be also seen used in response to Russia’s wildfires. First, the Russian Internet was actively used to map disaster and collect volunteerbased geographic information (VGI) about the emergency (the notion of VGI was introduced by Goodchild (2007)). This included the active participation of GIS experts, open data activists and members of the OpenStreetMap community. Some fire-mapping activities were supported by environmental organisations such as Greenpeace and the satellite monitoring company Scanex. A map of fires was developed by Yandex (http://pozhar.yandex.ru). The “Kosmosnimki” company, which is linked to Scanex, developed the platform “Fires” (http://fires. kosmosnimki.ru which later became fires.ru) for the global mapping of wildfires. More generally, the data about fires came from various sources including usergenerated information on social media (including Facebook, Livejournal, YouTube, etc.) as well as from satellite imagery. Internet-based fire mapping sought to offer real-time information about the spread of fires in different locations in Russia. These crisis mapping efforts were particularly important due to some Russian Internet users’ mistrust of official information about the scale of the fires. While the traditional media reported that the emergency services had the wildfires under control, digitally mediated efforts to independently map the fires provided an alternative picture of the scale of the disaster. In that sense, crisis mapping went beyond the instrumental mapping of disaster, and it can be considered a source of alternative framing of the disaster (Entman, 1993), one that challenges the authorities’ control over the construction of the information picture around wildfires. The role of user-generated information in the case of Russian fires, however, was not limited to creating a database of open data about disaster and crisis mapping. The role of user-driven crisis mapping was also not limited to alternative framing and exposing the real scale of the disaster. As highlighted by Morozova and Miroshnechenko (2011), the role of online networked communities went beyond information exchange and it “initiated citizen participation in real life events” (p. 148). The information that was collected by users included the humanitarian needs of the wildfire victims as well as requests for the immediate mobilisation of volunteers to fight the fires. A particularly significant role was played by the blogging platform Livejournal. One of the first reports about the wildfires was provided by Mikhail Shlyapnikov, a blogger who lived near a village that was almost destroyed by the fire. This report was distributed promptly through social networks and it mobilised

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other bloggers to take part in the collection of various goods to help victims. A dedicated Livejournal-based community, Pozar_Ru (http://community.livejournal. com/pozar_ru/), was launched to offer a common channel of communication and a coordination of response to the wildfires. Some bloggers, including journalist Igor Chersky, went to the areas affected by the fires to gather first-hand information about real needs. The help that was provided by Internet users included not only food and clothing but also professional firefighting equipment that had been purchased by the users. Runet started to play a vital role in the mobilisation of resources that are needed to respond to a disaster and in the engagement of volunteers, as a part of the emergency response. Russian users nevertheless faced a major challenge. A constant flow of information about fires and needs requires an efficient platform for crisis mapping, one that can aggregate information about fires, information about needs and information about available resources offered by Internet users. In addition, there is a need for an advanced mechanism to coordinate resource allocation, as well as to organise volunteering activities. One response to these challenges was provided by those who relied on the crowdsourcing platform Ushahidi, which had been used a few months earlier in response to an earthquake in Haiti. The crowdsourcing platform “Help Map” (Russian-fires.ru) offered to connect those who needed help with those who could offer assistance, relying on a permanent aggregation of data about fires, needs and resources. In addition to online platforms, “Help Map” offered an offline volunteer-based coordination centre for fire response. The platform also supported synergy between users and different NGOs including the official charity organisation of the Russian Church. Data from the “Help Map” was also integrated within the map of fires that had been developed by Yandex, which constitutes an example of cross-platform collaboration between a major Internet company and an independent citizen-driven online initiative. The capacity of digital platforms to support alternative top-down systems of emergency response coordination relies not only on the generation of usergenerated data but also of user-generated metadata. “Help Map” and other crowdsourcing platforms, as well as Twitter, allow users to generate new categories and tags, which support the development of an alternative system of crisis classification. The development of a structure of categories that is driven by users can be addressed as the folksonomy of emergency situations (Asmolov, 2015a). The development of “Help Map” highlighted the fact that Russian Internet users had taken a step forward, moving from a variety of initiatives and a general willingness to volunteer to a user-coordinated emergency response operation. According to Morozova and Miroshnechenko (2011), “The ‘Help Map’ project is an example of an ‘ad hoc’ electronic resource developed by a networked community in emergency situations” (p. 148). In just a few days “Help Map” was visited by more than 100,000 users and attracted the attention of the mass media. According to Meier (2015), “Help Map” was also one of the biggest Ushahidi deployments worldwide at that time. Later, it received a Runet Award, a national award sponsored by the Russian Ministry of Communication, as the best Internet project of the year in

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the “State and Society” category, and several other prizes. The project was also one of the first significant crowdsourcing initiatives in the history of Runet. Scholars highlight that “citizen-driven ad hoc electronic resources are a type of project that emerges when the state’s structures are not capable of reacting to new issues that are thrown up by emergency situations” (Morozova & Miroshnechenko, 2011, p. 148). According to Yanitzky (2010, online), the role of social media in response to the wildfires in 2010 highlights that “the network systems not only performed faster and more flexibly in the mobilisation of resources, and in a way that is not available for mobilisation through ‘vertical structures’ of political and social action, but they also provided more reliable information, which also included early warnings about critical situations that were developing on the ground”. Yanitzky also suggests that the way social media were used in response to wildfires bears a resemblance to Kropotkin’s concept of mutual aid, which highlights that cooperation is not possible without trust. The role of Runet in response to wildfires can be conceptualised through a number of contemporary concepts from social and political science. For instance, the role of Runet users in response to wildfires can be addressed as a manifestation of various segments of networking power (Castells, 2011), the mobilisation of the “fifth estate” (Dutton, 2009) and the emergence of networks of trust that support digitally mediated mutual aid (Benkler, 2011). The role of Runet in the facilitation of emergency response in a sociopolitical context can be also explored using the concept of limited statehood (Livingston & Walter-Drop, 2014; Risse, 2011). The latter would suggest that the users’ self-organisation that relies on digital platforms can be seen in situations where citizens believe that the state is not capable of providing an adequate emergency response: In an environment of low trust in government and other institutions, interpersonal communication networks become tools for coping with crises when public mechanisms for effective communication fail. Ordinary Russians develop their own unique strategies of communication and pragmatic competence to survive and maintain control over their environment. (Samoilenko, 2016, p. 406).

In that light, the practices that were developed by Runet users in response to wildfires can be seen as an alternative user-driven mode of governance for an emergency situation (Asmolov, 2014). Traditional institutions including the Ministry of Emergency Response started to develop their own online presence in January 2008, when the ministry launched an Internet portal that dealt with emergency situations (Morozova & Miroshnechenko, 2011, p, 149). One of the major purposes of the state’s online presence is to broadcast alerts about hazards and potential emergencies. That said, it seems that the state predominantly approaches Internet users as a passive audience that needs to be informed, rather than as a potential partner for collaboration. Morozova and Miroshnechenko (2011) highlight that they were not able to find any reference to the value of the resources of the networked community in any official or informal documents produced by Russian emergency response institutions. According to these writers “Ignoring the constructive potential [of networked communities] is a

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consequence of the rejection of Internet users as ‘Aliens’ due to their non-conformism and criticism of the authorities” (pp. 149–150). This notion of considering Internet users as “aliens” gave rise to several different types of state-driven online policy. For instance, in the case of wildfires some pro-government youth movements allegedly used digital technologies to create a semblance of participation in the emergency response through the dissemination of staged photos showing the putting out of fires (Asmolov, 2010). Another way traditional state institutions addressed the role of digital platforms in emergency situations was by developing a tool for the management of volunteers. The website Dobrovoletz.rf (Volunteer.Rf) was developed by RosSoyuzSpas, an organisation of emergency-related volunteers that was associated with the Ministry of Emergency Situations (MCHS). Unlike “Help Map” and various pages on social media that offered a horizontal and transparent model for the coordination of emergency response by users, Dobrovoletz.rf proposed a model based on a registry of volunteers that is managed hierarchically in a non-transparent way by RosSoyuzSpas administrators. The Dobrovoletz.rf platform highlighted the tension between the role of ICTs in the engagement of people in emergency response and controlling the resources of people in situations of crisis. The model of a platform that is driven by an intent to control the resources of Internet users, rather than to use these resources, has been conceptualised as “vertical crowdsourcing” (Asmolov, 2015b). Another major tension can be seen around the state’s approach to the role of ICTs in an emergency with regard to user-generated data. Apparently, there is a conflict between seeing data as something that contributes to awareness of a situation and enables a support response and seeing data as a source of criticism which challenges the state’s monopoly over the information picture of a disaster. The latter transforms the state’s perspective on the role of social media from a resource that contributes to emergency response to a resource that can be considered a reputational threat and that may have a negative impact on the institutional apparatus. Innovative forms of citizen use of digital platforms as well as tension arising between volunteers reliant on digital platforms and traditional institutional structures again emerged 2 years after the wildfires, this time in reaction to floods in the Krymsk area (2012). In 2013, in response to floods in Russia’s Far East, a group of volunteers tried another model of digitally mediated response due to the remoteness of the disaster from central Russia. The ad hoc platform Amur13 was used by a small group of volunteers for crowdfunding. The financial assistance that came from a broad group of Russian Internet users allowed goods to be purchased and sent to the few volunteers active in the disaster area and distributed to support the affected local community and local responders. The role of platforms for emergency response, however, has now gone beyond specific emergency situations. Digital platforms have contributed to the development of networks of citizen resilience that allows people to be mobilised around emergency situations on an everyday basis. For instance, “Liza Alert”, a digital search and rescue online group and platform, allows the immediate mobilisation of volunteers once there is a report that someone has gone missing (Asmolov, 2011). “Liza

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Alert” volunteers, as well as members of a few additional search and rescue projects that use digital platforms for the mobilisation of volunteers and the coordination of searches (e.g. the Extremum group that is based in the Saint Petersburg area), illustrate how ICTs can help to save the lives of specific people in everyday life. One may suggest that emergency-related digital online projects also inspire digital innovation in the sphere of urban and political activism, when crowdsourcing platforms start to be used for the mapping of urban problems and to facilitate citizen activism to resolve them. For instance, according to Russian political activist Alexey Navalny, the model of “Help Map” was used for his first crowdsourcing project, which mapped potholes on roads (Navalny, 2010). This example suggests how innovation comes to be diffused, moving from crisis-related activism to other spheres of digitally mediated citizen participation. Emergency response continues to be an area of constant digital innovation. That includes the development of algorithms and AI applications to deal with the increasing size of big data sets around emergency situations. The response to the hurricane that took place in Moscow in 2017 highlights that the development of efficient and targeted alerting systems remains a challenge. While big Russian Internet companies such as Yandex had developed new innovative forms of mapping that allowed hurricanes and rainfall to be followed in real time, the state’s SMS-based alerting system was accused of being late and providing information that was neither instrumental nor helpful to people in the affected areas. To sum up, the case of Runet demonstrates how in emergency situations digital innovation has not only contributed to people’s increased situational awareness but also challenged the state-sponsored framing of the emergency. Furthermore, digital mapping has provided actionable data that supports the mobilisation of users’ resources and the coordination of user-driven response. This analysis illustrates the role of Runet in increasing transparency around emergency situations, in supporting efforts to hold state institutions accountable in order to improve their emergency response and in facilitating the self-organisation of Internet users to respond to the emergency. It also highlights the tension between institutions’ top-down efforts to control the information picture of a disaster and the volunteers and users’ bottom-up efforts to provide an independent picture of the situation and allow the horizontal mobilisation of the resources of the users by the users around goals that are defined by the users.

4.3

Internal and External Conflicts: Participation and Political Innovation

The third set of crisis situations under discussion is that of conflicts. The role of Runet in conflicts provokes the asking of several questions, including how digital platforms mediate the relationship between their users and the conflicts, how relations between institutional actors and users are manifested in a conflict situation and

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what the major forms of digital innovation are that are driven by conflict situations. Conflict can be divided into two main types of situations. The first type is that of internal political conflict, which includes conflict within a state such as citizendriven protest against the authorities. The second type is that of external conflict, which includes cases of international conflict between state actors. Numerous scholars have explored the role of Runet in empowering the Russian political opposition (Greene, 2014; Oates, 2013). On the one hand, Runet can be considered as an alternative source of information which “offer[s] alternative frames for discussing news and politics” and “constitutes an independent alternative to broadcast and print media” (Alexanyan, Barash, Etling, & Faris, 2012). On the other hand, Runet is used a platform for the mobilisation and self-organisation of people in situations of political protest. The protests following the parliamentary elections in winter 2011–2012 provide an illustration of the role of Runet in a context of political crisis. The protests were supported by the development of various digital projects including platforms that support new forms of data collection about electoral fraud (e.g. The Map of Electoral Violations by NGO Golos), independent tools for counting the number of participants in protests (e.g. “The White Counter” tool), tools for the simplification of symbolic production and the sharing of protest-related content, tools for the mobilisation and engagement of people for electoral monitoring and participation in demonstrations, and tools that allow new forms of decentralised connective action (Bennett & Segerberg, 2012) as in the case of the White Circle protest. In the latter case, a dedicated platform (Feb26.ru) supported the self-organisation of people enabling them to create a live chain around the centre of Moscow. Situations of internal crisis can be considered moments of accelerated digital political innovation, when both sides of a conflict seek to develop technological solutions to increase their capacity to collect data and mobilise people as well as to neutralise the innovations that have been introduced by the opposite side (Asmolov, 2013). From this perspective, every new political crisis presents a new cycle of digital innovation on both sides of the conflict. Digital innovation can also be viewed as something that can potentially change the balance of power between opposing sides of the conflict, though every shift of balance towards one side is answered by the other side with efforts to restore the balance. For instance, the increasing role of Vkontakte social networking groups in the facilitation of a diversity of forms of participation in protest activity was addressed by increasing pressure on the founder of the network, Pavel Durov, who in turn publicly refused to collaborate with the authorities. What started as a request from the Russian security agencies for the disclosure of data from the private communications of Vkontakte users ended with Vkontakte changing hands and Durov leaving Russia. The other type of conflict is that which goes beyond the borders of the state. The Internet is often considered as a space for information warfare between various state actors, in which digital platforms can be used both for propaganda and for infrastructural cyberattacks against a rival state and its citizens. That said, while focusing on international conflict as an additional type of crisis in order to examine the role of Runet, it is particularly fruitful to approach this type of conflict from the point of

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view of Internet users. This approach involves exploring how digital platforms distinguish between everyday life and conflict through users’ immersion in the conflict and by offering users a set of roles in relation to the conflict. The conflict between Russia and Ukraine presents a distinctive case, since while it involves conflict between two independent sovereign states, many citizens of both countries share the same Russian-speaking Internet space and use the same digital platforms including social networking websites that were developed in Russia. The opportunity for immediate direct communication between users from both sides of the conflict potentially contributes to the scale of its psychological tension and online hostility. Social networks integrated general information about the conflict with interpersonal interaction between users, which contributed to immersion within the conflict even if the users were remote from the location of conflict. The latter can potentially lead to the destruction of existent social ties, e.g. large-scale “unfriending” practices when people decide to cut their ties on social networking platforms due to the political positions of their friends (Asmolov, 2018). The destruction of social ties supported by the proliferation of trolling practices as well as a flow of disinformation contributes to the scale of online aggression. That type of communication not only follows the conflict but also constitutes the conflict by changing the social structure of the societies that have been involved in that conflict. As with situations of internal crisis, international conflicts give rise to various conflict mapping tools and platforms that provide information about the conflict from both sides. Moreover, dedicated platforms and crowdsourcing practices are used to verify information and challenge the credibility of the sources that are linked to the rival side in the conflict. The collection of data relies not only on crowdsourcing but also on the analysis of satellite imagery, as in the case of the reports that are developed by the Conflict Intelligence Team, a Russian online group of conflict investigators. The latter can be considered as practices of Open Source Intelligence analysis that have been adopted by various actors to investigate conflicts. Data collection, together with its proliferation and verification, can be considered as a form of user engagement in conflict-related activities. As well as in cases of natural disaster and internal political crisis situations, international crisis situations are also followed by digital innovation that enable various forms of user participation in the conflict, which can be conceptualised as “participatory warfare”. This includes participation in information warfare when users from both sides are permitted to create content and disseminate content that represents the position of one of the sides. Some hacktivist projects allow the simplification of participation in hacking activities for common users, when, for instance, users are able to contribute their computer resources to a botnet. Conflict mapping projects allow their users to collect and share intelligence from the conflict zone as well as take part in data verification and data analysis that is also related to the conflict. Crowdfunding initiatives allow their users to sponsor military activities, including taking part in purchasing military equipment. Finally, some platforms are used for recruiting volunteers for offline participation in the conflict. To sum up, digital innovation simplifies users’ participation in conflict through offering a range of possible forms of activity in relation to warfare. As well as

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immersive practices, the participatory practices can also be considered as something that constitutes the conflict through increasing the scope of social participation in the conflict and making this conflict part of everyday reality even in areas that are remote from the conflict. From this perspective, Runet has contributed to the socialisation of conflict (Schattschneider, 1975), which has increased the scope for participation in conflict on both sides. In the case of both internal and international conflicts we can see that Runet has played a role not only in the construction of different images of a given crisis but also in the mobilisation of users’ resources in relation to such crises.

5 Conclusion This chapter proposes that the Russian Internet has two different, though interrelated, faces. The first face is that of Runet in everyday life. The second face is Runet in situations of crisis. To explore the “crisis side” of Runet, this chapter has addressed a variety of crisis situations including terror attacks, natural disasters, political protests and international conflicts. Despite the diversity of these situations, examination of the role of Runet in crisis situations allows us to identify a number of common features of the Russian Internet space and the crisis-related practices of Russian Internet users. Runet’s users generate crisis-related data that contributes to shaping a general picture of crisis and situational awareness. That data increases the transparency around crisis situations in cases when the state’s control over information flow seeks to diminish the scale of the emergency. The role of Runet in increasing transparency around a crisis also contributes to citizens’ capacity to hold the authorities accountable regarding their management of the emergency response. In crisis situations Runet reveals new faces in the digital crowd and new functions of digital sourcing. The role of user-generated data in exposing the scale of a crisis and in providing information about specific needs allows users to go beyond passive spectatorship. The examination of natural disasters highlights that user-generated data can be considered as actionable data that support actions by individual users as well as by NGOs. Runet offers a range of participatory tools that mediate action and facilitate the self-organisation of individual users in a crisis situation. From that perspective, one can argue that Runet appears to play an important role in shaping the relations between users and crisis situations while offering diverse forms of potential action in relation to a given crisis. In that sense, the role of Runet in constructing the picture of a crisis and the mobilisation of users’ resources to address that crisis are interrelated. That is consistent with that double role of technological mediation as a mediation of meanings (Silverstone, 2002) around specific situations and a mediation of activities (Kaptelinin, 2014) in regard to the constructed situation. The case of Runet also illustrates how different types of crisis situation serve as moments for innovation (Sellnow & Seeger, 2013). This includes not only technological but also socialpolitical innovation that, as suggested by Solnit (2010), offers a window of opportunity towards a new type of society. At the same time, while many

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features concerning the role of digital technology in the crisis situations discussed here can be found in other countries, a number of aspects can be considered distinctive of Runet. A central aspect is related to the structure of power relations between state and citizens and the specific role of crisis situations in Russian history and Russian political culture over the last few hundred years. This chapter illustrates that the role of Runet in crisis situations is on the one hand a display of citizens’ mistrust towards authorities and citizens’ interest in developing an independent capacity to address crises. On the other hand, exploring the role of Runet in crisis situations illustrates the state’s interest in controlling the digital crowd, specifically the generation of content which threatens state control over the representation of a crisis, as well as the state’s concern with the digitally mediated independent self-organisation of Internet users. From this perspective, Runet demonstrates that every type of crisis, including natural disasters, political protest and international conflict, can be seen to generate tension between user-driven horizontal mobilisation (e.g. the case of the “White Circle” platform and the “Help Map”) and state-driven vertical mobilisation (e.g. the case of Dobrovoletz.rf and initiatives for user engagement in information warfare) around the crisis. The core of this tension is control over how the resources of the digital crowd are used in a crisis situation, which includes symbolic resources for the construction of crisis and a diversity of other resources that can be applied as part of users’ engagement around а crisis. In that context, the chapter demonstrates the vital role of Runet in both framing the crisis and shaping the structure of the participation of users in crisis situations. The exploration of power relations cannot be separated, however, from the sociocultural context which focus on the examination of Runet’s role for normative and social transformation. This chapter proposes that in the case of crisis situations, Runet can be associated with the emergence of a crisis-related social system, which relies on a different type of normative structure and offers new types of roles to Internet users. This includes the continuous efforts of its users to collect actionable information about the real scale of the crisis and the horizontal coordination of mutual aid which relies on the mobilisation of the resources of the digital crowd. Runet plays a vital role in mediating the transition from everyday life to crisis, which is followed by change in the structure of social systems and the role of users. At the same time, projects like “Liza Alert” use digital platforms in order to continuously support the construction of crisis awareness as a part of everyday life and sustain crisis-related normative modes of behaviour beyond large-scale crisis situations. Finally, it may be argued that various types of emergencies seem to be a central driver in the development of Runet. This chapter has demonstrated how crisis situations can be considered as moments of accelerated innovation, when users develop new digital platforms and new digital practices including platforms for crisis mapping and tools for the facilitation of collective action. For instance, crowdsourcing practices that were introduced during the response to wildfires in 2010 were actively adapted later in various fields including the struggle against corruption and urban activism. At the same time, situations of crisis, including political protest, international conflict and natural disaster, can also be considered to be moments for the accelerated development of new forms of control. Therefore,

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such tendencies as the sovereignisation and securitisation of Runet may also have their roots in specific crisis situations that force institutional structures to address new political challenges. To conclude, this chapter has shown that Runet indeed follows the vision of the “mobilising wheel” that was put forward by Arkady Gaidar. It takes part in defining a given crisis and supporting the mobilisation of people around that crisis, while the act of mobilisation actually defines the situation as a crisis. It also constitutes the nature of the organisation of people around crisis situations. At the same time, the questions that were focal in Gaidar’s “wheel” remain so for Runet as well: What are the rules that regulate how the “wheel” can be used, who is connected to the “wheel”, who has the right to turn the wheel so as to mobilise the network and, finally, is just any user able to create and use his or her own “digital wheel”?

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Gender Activism in the Russian Segment of the Internet Elena Pronkina

1 Introduction The Internet provides rich empirical material for understanding what is happening in modern Russian society. It contains many representations of gender stereotypes in Russia and provides a lot of interesting information about public opinion on gender issues. At the same time, the Internet is an area of activism within which gender roles can be redefined and gender stereotypes can be reconsidered. Today media attention is focused on gendered flashmobs like the #Metoo campaign. Such flashmobs cause public discussions on gender inequality and power relations. As such, they become an important part of the socio-political discourse. There were similar Internet movements in Russia which caused a certain resonance in the media space. These cases provide an opportunity to reflect upon the forms of activism within social media and the clash of different understandings of gender stereotypes. In addition, it is important to consider the gendered nature of the technologies themselves, which can be considered as gender non-neutral. In this case Internet technologies may influence the process of establishing gender meanings.

2 Gender Studies of the Internet: Main Perspectives Today gender studies is a whole field of knowledge, focused on the female and male identity, sexual identity, gender policy, representation of gender and sexuality in popular culture. Educational institutions train specialists in the field of gender studies. Young researchers defend doctoral dissertations devoted to a variety of

E. Pronkina (*) National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russian Federation e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_13

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gender issues. Researchers engaged in the study of gender issues often turn to the traditions of different disciplines and methodological approaches, making it possible to consider gender studies as an interdisciplinary field of knowledge. Often, the interests of such researchers are on the fringe of different disciplines including history, sociology, media studies and so on. Gender studies of the Internet is a result of such intercrossing. In the early gender studies of the Internet, digital technologies were positioned as “a passive fixed, and somewhat insubstantial space or context” (Arvidsson & Foka, 2015). The material turn in gender studies, accordingly, contributed to the revision of the Internet as a distinct realm (Hekman, 2010). Within this approach, the Internet contributes to the reproduction or transformation of oppressive systems and towards supporting or redefining the gender order. This perspective corresponds to a common trend in Internet studies to not advocate the online-offline opposition. The results of recent studies by media anthropologists show the need to consider online practices in relation to offline practices in different cultural communities because different cultures can create different Internet practices (Miller, Costa, &Nicolescu, 2016). Thus, the Internet is not a homogeneous space that provides equal opportunities and that poses the same problems for all users. It is different. That is why it is important to study the sociocultural specifics of Internet use. Additionally, gender studies of the Internet also contributes to the debate on pessimistic versus optimistic views on digital technologies. An optimistic position allows us to see new opportunities for free self-identification on the Internet and redefining gender stereotypes. A pessimistic view on the Internet tends to identify practices of oppression and representations of inequality. Gender studies of the Internet considers different issues including gender differences of Internet use, gender representation on the Internet as well as special gendered digital practices. For example, researchers who study the differences in use of Internet technologies try to make conclusions on whether or not there is a gender gap (Bimber, 2000; Ono & Zavodny, 2003). Some researchers examine gender presence in certain online communities, whilst division in gender participation has also become a subject of study (Vasilescu, Capiluppi, & Serebrenik, 2012). Others demonstrate how websites create special gender representation systems, suggesting that there is a choice between male and female identity. Such systems become new “sex-gender system” as the Internet gives the opportunity to deconstruct the “male-female” dichotomy (Laukkanen, 2007, p. 81). The results of some studies show that gender differences are important in the context of the production and perception of representations on the Internet. For example, the results of focus groups in Australia demonstrated that adults’ perception of boys and girls’ online self-representations can be different in relation to the sex of their children (Albury, 2015). Online self-representations of young women often become an object of censure and blame. At the same time boys can be free to appear naked in pictures and social networking profiles without being read as sexual by either peers or adults (Albury, 2015). However, Internet technologies “offer means of expressing, re-articulating and re-inscribing gender identities” (Karl, 2007, p. 55). In this context these technologies can be considered as part of sexual politics. In fact, Internet

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technologies are diverse and create both the potential for changing existing practices, as well as reinforcing them. Nowadays activist groups consider the Internet as a space not only as having an emancipatory potential but also as means that contributes to the spread of violence and surveillance (Feminist reflections on Internet policies, 2017). Niels van Doorn and Liesbet van Zoonen confirm that many gender studies of the Internet can be divided into two basic groups: gender-essentialist and technologicaldeterminist (van Doorn & van Zoonen, 2010). As a rule, studies of online gender differences reinforce “male-female” dichotomy due to appealing to the generalised types of the gendered communicative behaviour (van Doorn & van Zoonen, 2010, p. 262). However, some researchers consider Internet technologies as having potential to experiment with creating a gender identity (Turkle, 1995, p. 180). The approaches oriented on a determining effect of gender or technology tend to ignore social contexts on interaction and common social structures (van Doorn & van Zoonen, 2010, p. 264). In the framework of other approaches, there is focus on gender roles forming by social structure and the Internet technologies in particular. The Internet technologies become the subject of interest as the platform for solidarity and activism. Researchers study how activists use the Internet to contribute to social changes, mobilise and produce special knowledge (Newsom & Lengal, 2012). Another important topic in the framework of this approach is the women’s role in the production and consumption of Internet pornography (Smith, 2007). Generally, Internet technologies are positioned as gender-neutral instrument that can be used by or against women in the process of power relations establishing (van Doorn & van Zoonen, 2010, p. 268). However, nowadays the gender-neutral nature of technology is being questioned as is mentioned above. Niels van Doorn and Liesbet van Zoonen suppose to think about relations of gender and the Internet in different situations and spaces (van Doorn & van Zoonen, 2010). This perspective helps to examine the relations between technological and non-technological aspects of social experience. In 2017 the Association for Progressive Communications published a mapping research of gaps in gender and digital technologies studies. The authors of this paper point basic topics of activists and researches interest since 2006. Amongst these topics are different issues related to the meaningful access, digital literacy, disability, technology and labour, gender-based violence, sexuality and free speech, datafication and online participation (Mapping Gaps in Research in Gender and Information Society, 2017). According to their findings, the main research gaps are the absence of comprehensive understanding of digital gender divide taking into account local contexts, few critical studies of oppressive and empowering effects of new technologies and lack of structural and feminist analysis of economy and labour on the Internet (Mapping Gaps in Research in Gender and Information Society, 2017). In Russia, gender studies are not so widespread as they are abroad. Practically there are few educational programs and departments that make it easier for the young researcher to include in this discourse. Most often, students study gender issues within the framework of other disciplines such as sociology, culturology, history and philology. However, this practice cannot allow students to receive systematic

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education in this field. Some researchers note that such scientific interest often is not welcomed in Russia because of probable stigmatisation (Borozdina, Kondakov, & Shtorn, 2017, p. 8). Generally, it is related to the current socio-political situation in Russia, which does not contribute to the full institutionalisation of this field of knowledge. Nevertheless, even in this situation, Russian researchers are engaged in studying a wide range of issues related to gender. They defend dissertations and publish the thematic collections of scientific articles. Special courses on gender issues appear on the base of different departments and research centres involved in gender studies are formed. Amongst relevant institutions are “Gender Studies” programme opened at European University at Saint Petersburg which had contributed to publishing of special anthologies and highly qualified articles, Laboratory for Gender Studies in the Institute of Social and Economic Studies of Population (The Russian Academy of Sciences), Moscow Center for Gender Studies, Ivanovo Center for Gender Studies and Tver Center for Gender Studies. It is some common point that history of gender studies in Russia began in 1990 when the first laboratory using the term “gender” as part of the official name was created (Khotkina, 2002). Subsequently, interest in gender studies in Russia grew. New research centres were opened, and researchers created author’s training courses. In the 2000s significant changes took place in Russian society. In particular, it is referred to the turning to the rhetoric of traditional values including the importance of essentialistically defined gender roles and heteronormativity (Titarenko & Zdravomyslova, 2017). These changes contributed to the deterioration of the conditions for gender studies conducting. However, this turn did not destroy the interest in gender studies albeit it slowed the institutionalisation of this academic field. Nowadays Russian researchers examine gender issues including relations between gender and Internet technologies in Russia. It can be said that gender studies of the Internet contribute to a common tradition of studying the connection between gender and the Internet, but there is a certain lack of research devoted to online flashmobs and discussions on the Russian segment of Internet. However, a small number of scientific papers and public attention to this problem show that there is such an interest in Russia (Dorofeeva, 2018).

3 Gender Activism: Discussion on the Russian Internet Gender issues are of interest not just to representatives of the academic environment. There are discussions on a number of topical gender issues in the Russian media space, including sexist discourses in the media, harassment scandals, online flashmobs, certain laws and legislative initiatives as well as spreading of the feminist language. Social media users are also trying to think about current gender norms and stereotypes reproducing different discourses. The Internet is a space of collision between different positions. A positive view of the Internet suggests that such collision can be productive. In accordance with basic ideas about the public sphere,

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communication makes it possible to change one’s own point of view and build consensus by means of argumentation. Ideally, communication ought to correspond to the criteria of civil discussion and give opportunity for understanding, compromise and problem-solving (Smith & Bressler, 2013). However, the communication is not always effective. The opportunity to represent an alternative position and present a rational explanation for an alternative picture of the world is not necessarily converted into a conversation that corresponds to the principles of rational-critical discussion. Moreover, social media users do not always follow the principle of civil discussion. Some researchers consider that the relatively high level of anonymity contributes to an increase in impolite and uncivil discussion (Rowe, 2014, p. 2). In fact, this reasoning mostly pertains to political discussions, but it can be true for other kinds of sensitive issues including gender issues. Uncivil discussion does not contribute to consensus establishing. Besides, users are often involved in discussions not for the purpose of seeking the truth, but for expressing their own position. Russian feminist Nika Vodvud claims that in most cases people do not change their point of view in online discussions. Therefore, she prefers not to plunge into a dispute with people of opposite views (“Nasha povestka”: feministki ob ugnetenii I internete, 2018). However, avoiding discussion can cement existing disagreement. So the communication tactics can generate both positive and negative effects. Having said that, a division between generally positive and negative effects of social media discussion seems to be oversimplified. It is necessary to take into account the particular technological and cultural aspects of discussion devoted to specific issues. Online flashmobs also provoke significant public discussions on the gender issues and, as a consequence, this represents the current gender order. The most known recent gendered flashmob is the #Metoo movement which was brought into the public eye after the juicy harassment scandals involving film producer Harvey Weinstein. The #Metoo hashtag was popularised by the actress Alyssa Milano. Then other celebrities and ordinary Internet users began to use this hashtag in order to tell about their private stories of sexual violence and harassment. This flashmob has demonstrated the scale of the harassment problem and drawn careful attention to the discourse of the unequal distribution of power in the modern society. The stories published by women allowed people to discuss the veil of silence in society, victim stigmatisation and violence naturalisation. At the same time, some men have also shared their stories demonstrating that the current social situation generates a common culture of violence. The #Metoo movement not only demonstrated the ability of users to solidarise, but it has also become an important indicator of the existing gender order. It has not remained just an online discussion, but led to real events in the offline sphere. This flashmob is related to hashtag activism. Hashtag activism is an act of supporting a cause with the use of hashtags to raise awareness of an issue and provoke public discussions in social media (Tombelson & Wolf, 2017). Taking part in online flashmobs related to certain social issues, social media users seek to pay public attention to these problems and discuss their reasons. Current researches on hashtag activism consider online flashmobs in the context of the participatory culture, slacktivism and visibility of problems beyond public attention. Rosemary

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Clark-Parsons concludes that feminist hashtag activism such as #Metoo movement allows users to “make the personal political by making it visible, bridging the individual with the collective”, and demonstrate “the systematic nature” of the problem (Clark-Parsons, 2019). Whilst there is a position according to which such activism does not contribute to real changes, an alternative point of view on online flashmobs is that they frame the discussed phenomenon in a certain way. Before solving the problem, it is often necessary to make it visible. In Russia the #Metoo movement was covered by the media. The reaction of the audience was ambiguous. Some people supported the idea of flashmob, whilst others accused the participants of the intention of attracting artificial attention to their persons and of triggering bullying. The second point of view was aggravated by the spread of a vilified image of “a feminist”. As Russian gender researcher Olga Voronina concludes, this image was shaped due to beliefs that this movement was belligerently directed against men (2011). The idea of the flashmob was mostly discussed in the context of scandals involving Harvey Weinstein and other celebrities. The real consequences of statements on the Internet provoked public interest. The case of a man endowed with power was perceived as a blow to the injustices of the patriarchal order, on the one side. Others saw this as an abuse of the role of the victim and a representation of radical feminism. However, in both cases, the active role of women was at the centre of these discussions. Earlier Russian users had taken part in similar activity devoted to the problem of sexual harassment and violence. This case is the online flashmob #Янебоюсьсказать (#Iamnotafraidtosay) which was started in the Ukrainian segment of Facebook in 2016 and then spread amongst the Russian Internet audience. A feminist and journalist Anastasia Melnichenko started the flashmob. The concept of this flashmob is similar to the ideas of #Metoo campaign. Users published their private stories to express experiences that had been suppressed. They highlighted the abundance of sexual violence in modern society. Reactions from the Internet audience were also ambiguous. Some users supported the openness and courage of its participants, highlighting the public significance of this movement, whilst others reacted to this idea sceptically denouncing the disclosure of intimate details or defining this flashmob as a feminist project in regard to a fringe concern. It is important to realise that users often explained that their scepticism was due to the public status of statements about intimate details. As such, they essentially dismissed the feminist idea about relationship between the private and political dimensions. Whilst the flashmob shows the social importance of discussing the problem the sexual violence and creates the potential for women to show solidarity and form a community, alternative discursive strategy consists in appealing to the non-public status and the non-public meaning of these statements together with defamation of the platform. According to this strategy, one’s intimate life is not of public interest, whereas the social media platform provokes users to do something provocative in order to attract attention to their personal life. Some users blamed “the patriarchal world”. Other characterised this flashmob as “a trifle” in comparison with “real social problems” and considered the intimate stories shared as fictional and called upon women to take other forms of actions for example “to get married” or

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“appeal to police”. The different positions of users may have led to a non-constructive discussion. The Russian case shows that online discussion on gender issues may depend on the perception of public-private dichotomy and attitudes towards social media technology. As such, an important step towards understanding the effects of online discussions effect is to look at the significance of making one’s personal life public, as well as the potentiality that social media offers individuals. Moreover, the public nature of discussion results in the statements of the flashmob participants being immediately assigned, interpreted and included into different discourses. Recent research devoted to this case has shown that the intimate statements of the flashmob’s participants should be understood in the context of similar statements in different situations, whilst the absence of anonymity probably did not allow those stories that were too harsh to be made public on Facebook (Dorofeeva, 2018). Thus, the attributes of the platform allow the existence of the certain forms of activism and the certain forms of reaction to this activism. Whilst the absence of anonymity is an important condition of such activism, some participants had noticed that they were afraid to disclose more information including the names of the abusers and some details of the incidents: “. . .I am afraid to make these names public” or “. . .I am afraid to say this1”. It highlights the significance of such disclosure. In this context the manifestation of female solidarity becomes more meaningful than silence. At the same time, since full self-disclosure is not the ultimate goal, it is possible to establish certain limitations. In the beginning of 2018, Russian Internet users responded to a horrible incident involving a young female student. A young man killed and raped his ex-girlfriend, who lived with him in the same apartment, and then he committed suicide. Some Internet users hastened to blame the girl for immoral behaviour that had caused the murder, so they believed. In particular, there was talk about the nude photos of the girl on Instagram and the fact that she was living together with the ex-boyfriend. Users discussed the girl’s personal life and her behaviour, commenting on the photos on her Instagram account. Some mass media also highlighted these facts when covering the incident. The reaction to this discussion was flashmob #Этонеповодубить (#Thisisnotanexcusetokill) started in Instagram. The flashmob was launched by a woman from Belarus and women from Russia joined at once. Users posted photos with their body. They wanted to show that demonstration of a body should not provoke violence. The flashmob then spread in Twitter and the private stories about intimidation appeared on Facebook and VKontakte. However, some users have tried to discredit the idea behind this flashmob by deriding women’s desires to draw attention to their bodies and stigmatising them. The participants of the action highlighted the reason for their public self-disclosure: “I’m shouting for myself, for all the girls on the planet”. This discursive strategy of discredit is very similar to the discursive strategy used by opponents of flashmob #Янебоюсьсказать (#Iamnotafraidtosay). In both cases,

1 Based on ethical considerations, the quotations of social media users were anonymised to conceal their identities.

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discrediting was associated with condemning the disclosure of a woman’s private life. The discussion of political issues on the Internet can be non-constructive, but its social value is generally recognised. However, there are a number of gender issues in need of public attention, which is not obvious to some Russian Internet users. Such flashmobs may reinforce opposite gender discourses provoking people to reproduce or change gender stereotypes more actively. This process takes place through the management of the contexts of the individual statements. Supporters of these flashmobs oppose the depreciation and stigmatisation of women’s experience and criticise the culture of violence that underlies the power relations. Opponents appropriate personal experience of women and condemn their statements, including them into the discourse of female modesty and pointing out to women what emotions they can experience and represent and what emotions they cannot experience and show in public space: “Girls should always think about their behaviour”. They represent emotions of women as evil and highlight the absence of prudence. It is interesting that even supporters sometimes considered such self-disclosure as “provocation for abusers”. The British-Australian scholar Sara Ahmed confirms that emotions are related to the securing of social hierarchy (Ahmed, 2014, p. 4). She studies how emotions allow people to make boundaries between the external and internal spheres. That is why representations of emotions show the current gender order and power relations. Ahmed refers to feminist philosophers and highlight that “emotions are associated with women, who are represented as ‘closer’ to nature, ruled by appetite, and less able to transcend the body through thought, will and judgment” (Ahmed, 2014, p. 3). The appropriation of women’s emotions contributes to subordination of the feminine and the body (Ahmed, 2014, p. 3). So in the case of this flashmob, the discursive strategy of the opponents also includes the appropriation and an explanation of activists’ emotions. It is noteworthy that, in this case, Instagram as a technological platform takes the side of the opponents of the flashmob by default. The rules of censorship in Instagram do not allow users to post naked photographs. So the platform controls the corporeality. It is clear that these rules are related to all users, but the most famous cases of deleting photos and blocking accounts were often associated with female bodies (Dickson, 2014; Shenton, 2014). The main idea of such censorship is observance of interests of various audiences. Today according to Instagram rules, images that are forbidden include photos of sexual intercourse, genitals, naked buttocks and female nipples. However, Instagram allows users to publish photos of scars from a mastectomy and women breastfeeding are allowed. Nudity in painting and sculpture is also not the subject of censorship. On the one hand, such detailed rules show that Instagram as a social platform tends to be more friendly and attentive to its users and makes censorship more meaningful. On the other hand, Instagram thus manages the contexts of an individual statement and determines the acceptable levels of nakedness of women within the framework of medical discourse and maternal discourse. Thus Instagram establishes a certain mode of representation, and women are forced to use special tactics to circumvent this censorship (Olszanowski, 2014). These tactics include privatising accounts, abstracting and/or obscuring the body and timed removals of photos (Olszanowski, 2014). Russian

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users of Instagram who had taken part in this flashmob also often used similar tactics. They chose poses that allowed them to hide the nakedness of some parts of the body; covered the nakedness with clothes, which made it possible to hide a very small area of the body; and posted their drawings. The photos that depicted a completely naked body could be removed. Whilst these online flashmobs raise the problem of women’s stigmatisation, such practices can be also interpreted as an instrument of resistance to popular gender stereotypes, such as presenting a woman in the role of a victim. Laura Vitis and Fairleigh Gilmour critique the stereotype of women as passive victims of online public spaces (Vitis & Gilmour, 2017). They confirm that the discourse of victimisation undermines the liberatory potential of the online sphere (Vitis & Gilmour, 2017). Certainly, the success of resisting certain gender stereotypes depends on the activity of users, whilst a victim status does not always allow women to endow their own statements with their needed meaning. However, the Russian case also shows the need for public acceptance of the victim status, since the strategy of the statements’ discrediting can be aimed at the destruction of the victimisation discourse. Rejection of the victim status is likely the final stage in understanding the position of women in offline and online spaces. The problem of gender activism on the Internet advances the discussion on the effectiveness of social communication in the online space. The effect of the online gender activism depends on different factors including cultural attitudes towards gender issues and technological attributes. These cases have shown that the Russian Internet community demonstrates a certain interest in gender issues and local flashmobs. The cases highlighted the clash between different discursive practices and rhetoric and the different interpretations of intimate life, that which is closely related to gender problems. A positive approach to the disclosure of individuals’ intimate life considers this practice as a form of a therapy or a social act aimed at transforming the gender order. A negative approach to this practice is built on the stigmatisation of such disclosure. The cause of stigmatisation can be traditional notions of behavioural norms in the public space or vilified stereotypes about female activism. Furthermore, the technological features of the various Internet platforms are built into this process and dictate certain practices of self-disclosure, as well as the perception of these practices.

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Borozdina, E., Kondakov, A., & Shtorn, E. (2017). Sovremennye issledovanja gendera i seksual’nosti: teoreticheskie razrabotki i jempiricheskie izyskanja [Current research on gender and sexuality: Theoretical development and empirical research]. Journal of Sociology and Social Antropology, 20(5), 7–14. Clark-Parsons, R. (2019). “I SEE YOU, I BELIEVE YOU, I STAND WITH YOU”: #MeToo and the performance of networked feminist visibility. Feminist Media Studies. Dickson, J. (2014). A topless Scout Willis walked around NYC to protest Instagram. The Daily Dot. Retrieved April 19, 2019, from https://www.dailydot.com/irl/scout-willis-topless-instagram/ Dorofeeva, O. E. (2018). Anon plz: Anonimnost’ i normativnost’ v publicaciah o seksual’nom nasilii [Anon pls: anonymity and normativity in sexual abuse posts]. Monitoring of Public Opinion: Economic and Social Changes, 2018(1), 235–252. https://doi.org/10.14515/monitor ing.2018.1.12. Hekman, S. (2010). The material of knowledge: Feminist disclosures. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press. Karl, I. (2007). On-/offline: Gender, sexuality, and the techno-politics of everyday life. In K. O’Riordan & D. J. Phillips (Eds.), Queer online. Media technology and sexuality (pp. 45–67). New York: Peter Lang Publishing. Khotkina, Z. (2002). Ten years of gender studies in Russia. Russian Social Science Review. Retrieved April 19, 2019, from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.2753/RSS1061142843044?journalCode¼mrss20 Laukkanen, M. (2007). Young queers online: The limits and possibilities of non-heterosexual selfrepresentation in online conversation. In K. O’Riordan & D. J. Phillips (Eds.), Queer online. Media technology and sexuality (pp. 81–101). New York: Peter Lang Publishing. Mapping Gaps In Research In Gender And Information Society. (2017). GenderIt.org Feminist reflection on internet policies. Retrieved April 19, 2019, from https://www.genderit.org/edito rial/mapping-gaps-research-gender-and-information-society Miller, D., Costa, E., & Nicolescu, R. (2016). How the world changed social media. London: UCL Press. «Nasha povestka»: feministki ob ugnetenii I internete. (2018). [“Our agenda”: Feminists on suppression on the Internet]. New ethics. Retrieved April 19, 2019, from https://etika.nplus1. ru/persecution/cyberfeminism Newsom, V. A., & Lengal, A. (2012). Arab women, social media, and the Arab Spring: Applying the framework of digital reflexivity to analyze gender and online activism. Journal of International Women’s Studies, 5(13), 31–45. Olszanowski, M. (2014). Feminist self-imaging and Instagram: Tactics of circumventing sensorship. Visual Communication Quarterly, 21, 83–95. Ono, H., & Zavodny, M. (2003). Gender and the Internet. Social Science Quarterly, 84(1), 111–121. Rowe, I. (2014). Civility 2.0: A comparative analysis of incivility in online political discussion. Information, Communication & Society, 18, 121–138. Shenton, J. (2014). Rihanna’s naked photo shoot pictures removed by Instagram after violating guidelines. Mirror. Retrieved April 19, 2019, from https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebritynews/rihanna-naked-lui-magazine-instagram-3477774 Smith, C. (2007). One for the girls! The pleasures and practices of reading women’s porn. Bristol: Intellect. Smith, E. S., & Bressler, A. (2013). Who taught you to talk like that? The university and online political discourse. Journal of Political Science Education, 9(4), 453–473. Titarenko, L., & Zdravomyslova, E. (2017). Gender studies: The novelty at the Russian academic scene. Sociology in Russia. Retrieved April 19, 2019, from https://link.springer.com/chapter/10. 1007/978-3-319-58085-2_7 Tombelson, B., & Wolf, K. (2017). Rethinking the circuit of culture: How participatory culture has transformed cross-cultural communication. Public Relations Review, 43(1), 14–25.

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The Internet: Its Influences on Environmental Communication and Environmental Movements Karl Bruckmeier

Environmental communication, including scientific, political and mass media communication, is an established field of social research (Hansen & Cox, 2015; Mueller, 2010). In recent years more attention has been paid to Internet communication, also in Russia, where mass media communication about environmental problems has been investigated (Poberezhskaya et al., see below). Sociological questions about the Internet and its influence on social relations between people and on social structures within the society are less investigated; they are part of the broader discussions of the emerging “information society” or “network society” (Castells, see below). The social framing of Internet use is analysed in other chapters of this book with regard to economic and political contexts and effects; such analyses help to understand the social consequences of the Internet. The question, how the Internet influences social behaviour and social change, is also relevant for environmental problems and their solutions: is the Internet supporting changes of institutions and individuals towards more environment-friendly practices of action? This question cannot be discussed without another one: What is the role of the environmental movements in the practices of environmental communication and action? Generally, social movements are seen as agents of social change. In Henry’s study (2010b, pp. 756, 777), it is concluded: until the past decade Russian environmentalists achieved more rhetorical change, less institutional change in environmental governance; institutional change happens most likely when environmental and economic aims coincide. Through the Internet more information about the environment is available to everyone than in the past. But how this information is used, how the Internet influences public environmental communication in Russia and the practices of Russian environmental movements—these questions guiding the following analysis—have not been sufficiently answered.

K. Bruckmeier (*) Faculdade de Ciencias Sociais e Humanas, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_14

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The history of the Internet in Russia has been described elsewhere (Johnson, 2014; Golubovskaya et al., 2015, especially for digital literacy in Russia). Quantitative data about numbers of users and forms of use seem to constitute the main information used for assessing the significance of the Internet and its effects. Qualitative social impacts through Internet communication, one of the themes in the sociology of the Internet or digital sociology (Lupton, 2015), are more difficult to identify; they require studying and comparing the effects of the Internet on social, cultural, political and economic systems. Digitalisation is too vague as a concept to study such qualitative social changes. An assessment of the social influences of the Internet requires analyses of social structures and processes at macro- and micro-social levels.

1 Conceptualising Social Change Related to Internet Communication For macro-social structures and processes—social stratification and class structures, demographic structures and processes, division of labour in gendered and other forms, social and economic inequality—the changes are slow, influenced by multiple factors, in complicated causality. Technical innovations become effective in combinations with other changes. The Internet as a complex socio-technical system with several technological components helps to connect more people in mass communication over distance, but it does not quickly change the society at large. When can we say to live in a new “high-tech”-society that can no longer be called industrial society? This is not yet the case until the Internet has reached the largest part of the population in a country or globally; further social transformations in economy and society are necessary to achieve a post-industrial society, and changes regarding the environment are among the urgent ones. Presently delayed industrialisation happens in some big countries (especially the BRICS-countries: Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa), showing the asynchrony of societal change and transformation that stretches over a long time. The double transition in Russia, from a socialist to a capitalist and from an industrial to a post-industrial society, makes the changes more complicated. To analyse the societal transformation requires more than empirical data, it also necessitates theoretical analyses of societal changes, especially about global social and environmental change that influence late modern society. The main macro-social process supported and accelerated through Internet communication is economic globalisation in deregulated markets, including the emergence of a digital economy. With regard to that, the social changes shown in empirical research, the emergence transnational networks of “global cities” as nodes of the global economy, are only the first phase of a longer transition. Influences of the Internet at meso- and micro-social levels, in formal organisations, in social action of specific groups, in professional and everyday life and in individual communication, are easier to observe and to describe. Processes and decisions in formal organisations are directly influenced by the Internet. In the economy, in politics, in education and in science, organisational communication is

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structured, institutionalised, regulated and routinised; with new forms of technical communication, communication is becoming faster, technically more effective, enforcing changes of social routines. In micro-level processes, in the daily routines of the lifeworld, in the private sphere and in individual communication, the Internet is a medium for building new social contacts, but has negative effects through acceleration and individualisation as well: stress, social isolation and alienation. From the statistical data about the quantity and the forms of Internet use, it cannot be seen, whether changing communication practices of Internet users are connected with other and larger social changes. The spreading of new ideologies of the globalising economy and the Internet (Steeger, 2005) can be interpreted as a form of cultural change that may have further influence on social change. The digital ideology promises information for everyone through the Internet, possibilities of global communication, making buying and selling easy, simple and fast. Further discussions of the new ideology and of its manipulative psychological effects can be found in Bradshaw (2004), Carr (2008) and Somers (2017) and in articles in “Atlantic Monthly” for the past decade. The discussions show that Internet communication has wanted and unwanted social effects. Romm Livermore (2012) describes most of the political and social changes through the Internet observed so far as preliminary and early; rather than creating new stable and solid social relations, the Internet is a medium of creating forms of “liquid modernity” (Bauman, 2007) with continuous social change, in exemplary ways analysed in the studies reviewed now.

2 How the Internet Influences Social Structures and Processes An early description with differentiated views of the social impacts of the Internet of DiMaggio, Hargittai, Neumann, and Robinson (2001, p. 307) includes five key domains: inequality or the digital divide, community and social capital, political participation, organisations and other economic institutions and cultural participation and diversity. For each of these domains, the authors diagnose similar trends: the Internet as driver of change is effective in combination with other media and factors; it tends to complement rather than displace other media and forms of behaviour. Utopian claims and dystopic warnings of dramatic changes from early debates have given way to more nuanced descriptions of the adaptation of the Internet to existing media use, showing how it permits innovations and reinforces other forms of change. The Internet is not a “technical fix” to solve all social problems technologically, but a socially shaped communication technology that generates social change and is modified through the social actors who use the technology. Rattle (2010) argues in his international study of value changes that came with economic globalisation that the Internet and its communication technologies are important factors for changing beliefs and values about consumption; such changes

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can result in individual and institutional behaviour changes towards more environment-friendly, sustainable consumption. “Can” is the unclear point in this formulation: effects of the digital communication can be different. Evidently, the Internet is a commercialised medium where consumption processes are favoured. How far it supports environment-friendly consumption and behaviour seems a more open question. Also Rattles’ study shows the ambivalence of the Internet as multipurpose medium with multiple, wanted and unwanted effects. Machleder and Asmolov (2011) discussed social change through the Internet in Russia, not for environmental communication but for the emergence of a new network society. However, their observations match with those in the sphere of environmental communication. From practical examples they have derived several trends of change: – Setting public agendas and framing issues depends on the power of networked individuals. – Networking of institutions and collaboration between traditional and new social media, NGOs and other organisations can empower and strengthen actors. – New platforms multiply the capacity of social media to reach more individuals, creating coalitions between different kinds of actors, NGOs, business organisations and media, independently from the omnipresent government. The authors see the Internet as a medium that improves governance and accountability and has already enabled social change through the networking of individuals and institutions over distance. They expect further change in future, when the Internet has spread throughout the global society. Then social change will be driven through new social networks, mobile media and digitalisation, and media development will foster social transformation. This prognosis seems to be more the vision of Internet specialists, less a critical reflection and deeper analysis of change processes. Yet, the authors are aware that long-term effects of the Internet require further research (Machleder & Asmolov, 2011, p. 8). The study by Earl and Kimport (2011) analyses digitally enabled social change, neglecting indirect social and societal changes through the Internet. Digitally enabled change includes processes in social networks: civil society action; social, political and environmental activism; mobilising and protesting; lobbying; campaigning; and power-based communication. Important forms of online activism as E-mobilisation, E-tactics and E-movements become widespread (Earl & Kimport, 2011, p. 12ff). Such activities, dependent on Internet-based communication, are effective in environmental communication and in political processes more broadly. For economic, political and scientific communication, the Internet and its changing effects are well described (see Parts II and III of this book). Regarding the use of the Internet in science, changes of research practices and the methodological consequences of research and “big data” production are discussed in Russian studies of online research (Shashkina, Deviatko, & Davydov, 2012, 2016). Regarding the impact of the new information and communication technologies on social structures, contrasting results include: a smoothing down of differences in society and increased social and digital divides (Skanavi in Shashkina et al., 2012). In environmental communication, similar observations are made as in other social spheres of

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communication: influence and pressure through lobbying, mobilising and campaigning show that the Internet, its channels and its social media create new possibilities of manipulative discussion. The studies discussed show limited forms of social change through the Internet in two forms: direct change through the use of the communication technology, for example, in the development of new networks (through social media like “Facebook”) and gradual change where Internet communication is a part of complex forms of social change through different drivers and factors that connect with, reinforce or countervail each other, resulting in long-term effects that cannot yet be foreseen. A significant change of social communication and control through the Internet remained rather unnoticed in the public discussion: since several years the number of virtual, non-human communicators and Internet users (programmes, machines, robots) is higher than the use by real persons, and it grows faster than that of direct use by humans. The first report showing this was from the firm “Incapsula” specialised in Internet security: the “Bot Traffic Report” from spring 2012. The larger part of Internet use is now done by machines, not mainly in search engines, but for hacking and criminal purposes. This supports the conclusion that the Internet has become a system of unprecedented social control, manipulation and surveillance, by governmental and private institutions, in legal and in illegal and forms; furthermore, it directs attention to the insufficiently studied use of artificial intelligence in social and Internet-based communication. The following review of environmental communication shows the manipulative forms of Internet communication to simply be another aspect of control and surveillance.

3 Environmental Communication Through the Internet in Russia The Internet can be used to make critical and minority groups publicly heard and politically more influential; for Russian environmental movements, this has been observed since the 1990s (O’Lear, 1997, 1999). Social media and Internet channels as “YouTube” were used to enlarge social participation in discussions and decisions about environmental problems, to mobilise people, to generate new local movements and protests and to build global networks and action over distance. More and more environmental activities of movements and other environmental actors happen through the Internet, in forms of electronic mobilisation and campaigning (Earl & Kimport, 2011), showing that the movements act like political actors. Social networks were characteristic forms of organisation in the new social and environmental movements already before the era of the Internet. Now the question is how the Internet influences the further communication about environmental problems in civil society and in environmental movements: which themes and problems find resonance, when and why?

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Davydova (2014) observed that climate change, one of the most important environmental problems discussed in science and environmental politics, is of little interest for Russians; she found as reasons: the problem is too abstract, too global, and its manifestations are not visible for everyone; also the long denial of climate change by Russian scientists and politicians has supported the low attention given to the issue. Anthropogenic climate change is a topic of scientific and political controversies, but the Russian mass media pay little attention to it (Yagodin, 2017). These observations illustrate deficits of environmental communication in science, politics and the mass media. Other authors show “dis-informing” effects of the Internet in communicating climate change (see below). Regarding scientific environmental communication in Russia—and elsewhere—a consequence of “big data” production in net-based environmental research is that complex global environmental problems can be studied more systematically, although often only through modelling. To make the results of research accessible to decision-makers and to a wider audience, new forms of environmental communication have developed, for example, the review and translation of research in “outreach reports” as that of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In environmental policy, developed international and global arenas of political action, international political programmes and regimes (sustainability policies, biodiversity governance, and climate policy) depend on continuous input of scientific information and are facilitated through the Internet. Difficulties of communication about complex processes, of finding consensus among researchers and among political actors and acceptance among people, seem to increase, not to diminish through Internet communication. Regarding political environmental communication in Russia, the recent publication of Newell and Henry (2017), reviewing environmental activism and policy since the end of the socialist system, highlights further difficulties: a huge gap between formal environmental legislation and implementation of the laws by governmental agencies, the blocking of implementation through bureaucratic forms of policy and decision-making and the repression of environmental movements and activists in recent years through the government [earlier described by Mol (2009) as “deinstitutionalisation of the environment” in Russia]. The new legislation and attempts to control the Internet show that the government sees the Internet and environmental activism as risks for political security. Yet, the role of the government in environmental communication is not simply one of control and censorship, more one of becoming active and attempting to take the leading role in all public discourses and issues. The successes of Russian environmental policy were limited, mainly expansion of protected areas and forest certification (Malets, 2011). The hostile context of Russian environmental movements (Yanitsky, 2000, 2012b), the lacking success of governmental policies, insufficient environmental communication in the public and the media and limited interests of inhabitants for environmental problems result in a blocked environmental communication: contrasting and controversial information from different actors is blocking or delaying political decisions and solution processes.

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Environmental Communication in the Russian Mass Media A study by the Levada Centre (Volkov & Gontsharov, 2014, p. 2ff) shows that the use of mass media has changed significantly in the years from 2009 to 2014, although Internet forms of communication are not yet dominant. Still television is the main mass medium, and Internet issues of newspapers are used to a limited degree. However, with the doubling of newspapers in printed and electronic issues, the two media are gradually merging. In more specific research on environmental communication, Ermolaeva (2014, p. 387f) found from a comparative analysis that the Russian press has half as much and shorter articles about environmental themes than the press in the USA, furthermore, that the sociocultural context in the country frames the way of reporting through dominant cultural values and governmental interests. More profound analyses of media coverage of environmental themes in Russia (Poberezhskaya, 2015, 2016, 2017) show the increasing importance of Internet forms of reporting and communicating (blogging, social media, file-sharing). Blogging about climate change has become an important form of environmental communication (Poberezhskaya, 2017). Manipulative reporting about climate change can be found in different Russian mass media (Poberezhskaya, 2015). Internet communication does not always allow the identification of political and interest groups behind the information spread. In climate change communication, the Internet brought a prolongation of controversies (Poberezhskaya, 2016; Yagodin, 2017). Dispute or controversy about the validity of scientific information is in research a method for critically discussing, assessing and improving scientific results, and to deal with different views and assessments among researchers that look at the problems through different disciplinary and theoretical lenses (Sarewitz, 2004). In the political discourse and in mass media, controversies have other functions, supporting specific interests or showing that there is obviously not enough and contrasting scientific knowledge about climate change, with consequences of selective reporting, denial and scepticism in communicating environmental problems. Regarding quantitative effects of Internet communication, “Facebook” and other social media show that networks with many millions of participants spread across all national boundaries, creating also new forms of environmental communication. Yet, many millions of participants cannot interact with each other simultaneously or continually. The global communication community dissolves, when it comes to decision-making and action, into many small groups and networks of actual individuals who are repeatedly communicating about global and local problems. Moreover, global networking through the Internet shows a transition from hierarchical (bureaucratic) to flexible organisation with horizontal networking, flat hierarchies, situation-specific communication and action in many social spheres, also in environmental communication. Two points can be highlighted in a preliminary answer of the question, how the Internet influences scientific, political and media forms of environmental communication in Russia: (a) Internet communication supports broader discussion, but is not necessarily improving the development of solutions to environmental problems.

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(b) The Internet has become a forum for power struggles between different political and environmental actors through communication of environmental problems with selective information, through controversy, contest and manipulation. To explain these external effects of environmental communication further, the internal forms of communication and discussion, the value orientation and the social practices of environmental movements need to be analysed more in-depth, as shown in the following review of Russian research on environmental movements.

4 Environmental Movements in Russia and Their Use of the Internet The history of environmental movements in the Soviet Union and in Russia is mainly documented in the research of Yanitsky (2000, 2005, 2009, 2011, 2012a, 2012b) and in the study of Russian grassroots activism by Henry (2010a). More broadly, the environmental history of Russia has been studied in exemplary forms by Poliakov (2003) and Rosenholm and Autio-Sarasmo (2005). The environmental movements (Yanitsky writes in the singular form of an environmental movement) emerged in the late Soviet Union and had a complicated development with many ruptures. Yanitsky reconstructed environmental thinking and movements in Russia in similar contrasting concepts and interpretations as used in the West: in variants of the “human exceptionalism paradigm” and the “new ecological paradigm” formulated by Catton and Dunlap in the early US-American environmental sociology of the 1970s. However, he modified and specified the abstract paradigms in a more detailed historical reconstruction of Russian environmentalism, describing adaptations and changes of the environmental movements for seven main groups: conservationists, alternativists, traditionalists, civil initiatives, eco-politicians, eco-patriots and eco-technocrats (Yanitsky, 2005); he identified four trends of adaptive change: from long-term to short-term issues and perspectives, from nationwide to “insular” debates, from value orientation to economic orientation and from humanistic to social-technological orientation (Yanitsky, 2009). These trends can be interpreted as “de-utopisation” of the movements; similar trends have been described earlier for movements in Western European countries (Mol, 2000). Since 1960 the movements developed in several phases which reflect the development in the political system (Yanitsky, 2012a): after a first phase with focus on nature protection followed a wave of active local and nationwide protests in the perestroika period of the socialist system; in post-Soviet Russia the movements experienced a democratic upsurge with unlimited access to media and mass protests, followed by a regionalisation of movements and protests against the marketisation of natural resources during the introduction of the market economy; after 2000 a merger of movements with business and state bureaucracy can be observed, with further regionalisation, but also increasing significance of transnational movements. International movements and their Russian chapters (World Wide Fund for Nature,

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Greenpeace) did not receive much attention in sociological research although they became more influential. Whereas in analyses of social movements in other countries in Eastern Europe (Jacobsson & Saxonberg, 2013, Pleyers & Sava, 2015) civil society is seen as rapidly developing and successful, Yanitsky highlights delays, obstacles, and unsolved problems of civil society development in Russia. He diagnosed a deadlock of social, political and economic development and modernisation in Russia: many “frozen” and “hot” conflicts in the long transition process of Russian society after socialism block the modernisation process (Yanitsky, 2012a). Since his early research, he sees the Russian environmental movements as acting in a hostile context (Yanitsky, 2000, 2012a), symptomatic for the difficulties of developing a civil society in an authoritarian state (described in detail by Chebankova, 2015). Attempts of the government to control the Internet since 2012 (analysed in Pallin, 2017) and the new NGO legislation (registration of NGOs receiving funding from abroad as foreign agents) give examples of the difficulties the movements meet when the government tries to control and influence the development of civil society; Ovsyannikova (2017) describes environmental NGOs as “an endangered species”. Also Newell and Henry (2017) specify the hostility against environmental movements by the government and through legislation and describe the “gulf” between environmental legislation and environmental practice and action. In the scientific studies of Russian environmental movements, the role of the Internet is not addressed in detail. Other sources need to be used, not all of them scientifically and methodologically well developed, often working with observations in everyday life, journalistic sources or information based on personal experience of Internet experts. The Internet and Russian Environmental Movements Social and environmental movements use the Internet to build new networks, to remove local and social limits of communication and to create flexible and efficient forms of communication and interaction without formal organisations, hierarchies or face-to-face-communication. Although some social movements communicate mainly through the Internet, Internet-based communication does not make other forms of environmental action and communication superfluous. Peterson (2005, p. 82) describes how the Internet was perceived and assessed in the Russian environmental movements: as providing new possibilities of communication and improved action; as effective medium of networking, gaining influence; and combatting the obstacles and the resistance against environmental action. International networking, support and funding from the West were ways of maintaining at least limited activities. This has changed in recent years when new legal restrictions for NGOs with international cooperation and funding forced the movements to seek new possibilities of maintaining their activities. In this situation, the development of new forms of Internet-based communication seems again offering new solutions: the Internet can itself generate new forms of communication to react to disturbance or blocking of civil society action. Davydova and Chestina

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(2016) described new forms of the use of the Internet in Russian environmental networks and movements: – Social media (Facebook, Vkontakte.com, Twitter) to consolidate support – Online petitions for consolidating support – Crowdsourcing platforms for improving resources and possibilities of action (e.g. with interactive maps for waste recycling possibilities) – Crowdfunding campaigns (on web platforms as www.planeta.ru and www. boomstarter.ru), especially for civil society initiatives not registered as NGOs – Green mobile apps (e.g. the Green Hunter app providing information for consumers about food products) The authors conclude that the new digital tools are not just replacing other sources and media but provide possibilities for widespread distribution of information and latent support for environmental care among the population, both useful in the hostile context of Russian environmental movements. However, it should be added: in such forms of Internet communication, the dilemmas of solving environmental problems (controversies in environmental research, Internet-based and distorted environmental communication) cannot be dissolved. A preliminary answer to the question, how the Internet influenced the practices of environmental movements and other environmental actors in Russia, requires to take into account the broader contexts of environmental action and its institutional framing. The present situation can be described as a phase of contrasting and incoherent changes where various actors and institutions are struggling to maintain or gain influence in environmental communication and agenda setting in environmental politics, under conditions of numerous hot and unsolved social and environmental conflicts that interact and connect with each other (Yanitsky). Contradictions and conflicts appear between different groups of actors and organisations, but also within them: – Governmental environmental institutions try to maintain control over the environmental discourse in society but are simultaneously forced to deal with increasing protests and local conflicts because of unsolved environmental problems. In the Moscow region, for example, unsolved problems with waste disposal, waste management and recycling show the lacking success of governmental policy and of the public administration which creates new possibilities of public action for environmental movements and citizen initiatives for which Internet-based environmental communication is a necessary infrastructure of communication. Similarly, big wildfires, in Russian forests in 2010, 2016, 2017, showed the ineffectiveness of governmental institutions that then spontaneously created local self-help initiatives which would not have been possible without the Internet (see chapter “Runet in Crisis Situations” by Asmolov, in this book). – Environmental movements as nongovernmental political actors are not necessarily split in their interests to care for the environment, but in the ways to do this they develop different strategies of action and forms of cooperation with other actors. They have successfully occupied certain fields of environmental conflicts, for example, regarding deforestation and enforced environmental certification of

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traded forest products, or local protests about waste disposal as the ones mentioned above. International environmental movements or their Russian national chapters have to struggle with the repressive legislation on “foreign agents” but succeeded in creating public attention and debates, for example, about environmental risks of oil drilling in the Arctic Sea. In these activities the Internet-based environmental communication has become an influential medium for creating alternative public spaces of communication and action. – Economic environmental actors, private companies and international corporations active in Russia, are split in their interests regarding the environment and their economic interests. This enforces them to react to and cooperate with governmental institutions, but also with environmental movements when it comes to concrete changes of everyday consumption and routines such as sorting, recycling and disposal of waste. In recent years appeared a number of independent environmental initiatives and projects managed by non-governmental actors and private firms, such as private forms of recycling of household waste, which are mainly dependent on Internet-based communication. – Cultural environmental actors, for example, the Orthodox Church as a powerful institution, are also split in their environmental interests. The religious values of the Church support changes towards environment-friendly lifestyles and less material consumption, encouraging environment-friendly behaviour; but simultaneously the institution uses its strong influence on the population to support the government and its policies, and its own economic interests are not always environment-friendly. The situation of the actors and their heterogeneous or split interests shows the (limited) possibilities of environmental action under conditions of rapid social and environmental change that create new challenges, require the reformulation and adaptation of interests and create new political and social opportunity structures for environmental action (Yanitsky, 2012a). Taking into account the “fluidity” of the changes, the long and delayed transition processes of the Russian society and economy and the general delay of many development and modernisation processes in Russia, it is not yet possible to conclude from the manifold and contrasting changes of communication practices that a transformation of the Russian society towards an environmentally more sustainable society is on the way. The transformation is stuck in the difficulties of initiating value and behaviour changes and creating institutional changes. There may be more difficulties of that kind in Russia than in other countries, and the changes may be delayed, but the kinds of difficulties are similar in all countries: dealing with vested interests of powerful actors, creating new opportunity structures and transformative action capacity for environmental movements and civil society actors.

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5 Discussion and Conclusions 1. Narratives and storylines in environmental communication. The development of digital activism (“slacktivism” or “clicktivism”) does not yet show the future of environmental movements (Bush, 2014, also referring to Russian movements). Analysing how the environment is expressed and foregrounded in the new digital media shows contrasting and contested messages (Graf, 2016, with case studies from many countries). Such observations confirm a plurality—or a mess—of constructions and narratives that is in more limited forms found in Russia too. The approaches of activists and groups, their forms of communication, their constructions of environmental problems, the influence of local contexts and the varying forms of building of awareness show a patchwork of environmental activism and communication. Not a homogenisation through the Internet is on the way, rather the contrary: further differentiation of interests, forms of action and communication. The Internet gives room to different and contradicting processes: global communication and networking, locally specific action, cultural pluralism and different knowledge practices, for which the “network” is not only a new, non-hierarchical form of organisation but also a metaphor for the diversity of environmental activism. 2. Effects of Internet communication in terms of social change. From the description of differential effects in the studies reviewed, it can be concluded that communication through the Internet is an additional form of structuring social processes that are already structured, regulated and channelled through other social communication media, e.g. through power and authority, money and capital, scientific knowledge, cultural values, legal norms and contracts. Regarding personal and private communication between individuals, a main social consequence of Internet communication can be seen as lifting the barriers between public and private social spheres. Regarding all forms of environmental communication, the “Internetisation” is only one of several simultaneously effective processes and changes, further ones include: the creation of new forms of media-based social life, communication, consumption and work, with new “bonding social capital” (within social groups) and “bridging social capital” (between social groups). Many people living today grew up without the Internet or are digitally illiterate. Digital literacy and the digital divide are not yet sufficiently analysed in sociology. The unequal access to information adds to other forms of inequality, the widening gap between rich and poor social groups in all countries as a consequence of economic globalisation (Badger, 2013). The social change that could be observed rather early after the introduction of the Internet is the dissolving of boundaries between different spheres and forms of social communication and private and public spheres. Social processes seen hitherto as specific and heterogeneous—production, trade, public and private services, education and learning, research and technologies, medical cure, cultural practices, political elections and decisions, governmental action, repression and surveillance—dissolve with the Internet into similar communication processes of using the

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technology and the information communicated with it. This simplification can result in a misreading of more complex processes and changes connected with those. 3. Does the Internet create a new form of global (information) society? This question cannot be answered from research in a single country; two concepts need to be specified: how is globalisation and how is the global society sociologically constructed? In two influential approaches, Sassen’s sociology of globalisation and Castells’s theory of the network society, it is assumed that new, transnational social orders develop in globalisation: through networks of global cities connected through transnational flows of goods, services, information, capital, people, power and culture (Sassen) and through the emergence of a global network society (Castells & Cardoso, 2005). Both analyses have been criticised as selective and incomplete. The critique is summarised by Robinson (2009, p. 19): both authors neglect class analyses of the social groups involved in globalisation, their composition and agency, the contradictions and political configurations, especially the functional and structural differentiations of the nation state. The empirical information about transnational processes and flows is not wrong, but requiring refinement and complementary analyses. Analyses of the globalising information or network society based on observable social communication need to include analyses of the systemic structures of modern society created through functional differentiation, processes of social and economic reproduction. Castells identified various trends that he interprets as indicators of the development of a global network society (Castells & Cardoso, 2005, pp. 6ff, 12ff; Open Mind, 2013, p. 136). He interprets studies from different countries as confirming a general trend towards enlarging social contacts and sociability through the Internet, not the isolation of individuals. Such interpretations seem possible, although the methodological production of information can be criticised as selective. In the past decades several aspects of societal change have been discussed in sociological theories: knowledge, information, risk, networks. Late modern society can be described with these facets only partially and selectively. The transition to a post-industrial society diagnosed since half a century has not yet happened; only industrial production has been relocated from old industrial countries to newly industrialising ones. The network society is not a coming postindustrial society or sustainable society, so far only a new phase of globalisation of the economy. 4. Russia as part of the global digital landscape. In the Russian transition society, many social processes and forms of structural change are delayed in comparison to advanced industrial or late-modern societies. How the global asynchrony of social, cultural, political, economic and technological change is influenced by the Internet is difficult to foresee. It seems unrealistic to expect that the Internet would become the “melting pot” of all cultures and national societies, allowing Russian society to jump from a partially industrialised and economically insufficiently modernised to a post-industrial “high-tech” economy. Rather one can expect forms of fragmented development, as in many other countries and at global

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levels: a territorial and social fragmentation of national societies in globalised cities and hinterlands decoupled from the modernisation and development processes, islands of wealth in areas of poverty and stagnation, with environmentally polluted waste land. 5. The Internet and its technologies are generating new environmental problems. This is rather neglected in the discussion of the social and environmental impacts of the Internet. Obviously, these technologies do not pollute the environment as earlier industrial pollution, although they are not clean technologies. With the production and recycling of computers and connected technologies, such as printers, come significant environmental problems. The personal computer and the Internet did not bring with them a paperless office and communication; as a non-anticipated consequence, the use of paper has, until now, increased. Furthermore, the computer and Internet technology require the use of expensive, rare and toxic materials for which no effective forms of recycling and reuse exist until today. Much electronic waste from Western countries is recycled in China, under catastrophic conditions for the local environment, the health of the workers and the local population. 6. A general conclusion. Social change is influenced by the dynamics and processes generated by the Internet, but the technological and the acceleration processes do not affect all forms of social development and change. Many social change processes are slower and not directly affected by the Internet: changes of social and class structures, demographic structures and societal transition processes, processes of socialisation and others. With regard to macro-social structures and processes, the Internet has social effects in the longer run and in combination with other factors and forms of change. Simple descriptions of individual user practices may support false assumptions about individuality and individual autonomy; changes in larger social systems and structures are insufficiently investigated. Acceleration, action over distance and global communication are not the only changes influencing societal development. Social change happens in countries that differ historically, culturally and economically and in the languages, as developed or less-developed countries with advanced or delayed modernisation. Which differences and inequalities will be levelled through the Internet, which will be enlarged, is not easily foreseen. The historical process of building a new society includes ruptures, crises, turbulences, disasters, linear and non-linear changes, anticipated and non-anticipated changes that show a complicated picture of the transition to sustainability, the aim of environmental communication.

References Badger, E. (2013, February 6). How the internet reinforces inequality in the real world. Citylab. Bauman, Z. (2007). Liquid time. Cambridge: Polity. Bradshaw, T. (2004). Reading at risk: A survey of literary reading in America. National Endowment for the Arts, Research Division, Report no. 46. www.arts.gov. Accessed 29.09.2017.

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Making Ruins Great Again: Documentation and Participation on Instagram Ekaterina Kalinina

1 Documenting Decay on Instagram The destruction of traditional lifeworlds, the desertion of villages and decay of rural areas constitute the negative effects of modernity, which is characterised by scientific and technological progress, industrialisation and urbanisation, market economy and capitalist forms of production (Adam, 2005). Besides the destruction of traditional societies and its materialities, modernisation projects also produce their own ruins, such as overgrown factories, redundant transport depots, communication infrastructures and deserted mining towns. With time, some of these abandoned spaces become conceived as heritage sites by being assigned cultural, economic and symbolic values. This process of assigning value happens within both juridical and public discourses, in which photographers, those who document these sites, and photographs, the documents of destruction and ruination, often play an important role. At the moment, many photographers across the world use social media and photo applications, such as Instagram, to display their work to broader publics. In Russia, some of the most followed accounts that upload photographs of decaying cultural sites are @alexpolyakov of St. Petersburg-based photographer Aleksey Polyakov; @13_pilot of Moscow photographer Aleksander Sukharev; @strelnikov_spb of Andrey Strel’nikov from St. Petersburg; @deadokey of Moscow-based photographer, activist and entrepreneur Vadim Razumov; and @samasyava of Moscowbased photographer Kseniya Savina.

This chapter was written as a part of the research project Uncertain Archives funded by Swedish Research Council. E. Kalinina (*) Jönköping University, Jönköping, Sweden e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3_15

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Apart from comprising individual archives on social media, such decay photographs become an important instrument in the hands of heritage activists. The heritage protection organisations and activists use photographic data as both material needed for creating registers of heritage sites and as witness to the inability of the local and federal governments to solve the issues of ruination, demolition and illegal construction that swayed a large number of historical landmarks across the country. Among these organisations in Russia are @archnadzor, a Moscow group of architects, historians and activists who work in the field of heritage protection; @moskvakotoroynet, a Moscow-based community and agency who, together with Archnadzor, organises lectures, seminars and city tours to educate the public as well as inform about illegal activities at heritage sites; and @khrokhino, a charitable foundation working for the preservation of Krokhino Church in Belozersk and campaigning for the protection and preservation of heritage sites on water. While there is an increasingly widespread use of Instagram by photographers and heritage protection groups documenting public decay, relatively little is understood about this practice. Further still, the use of Instagram as a platform for the practices directed at the protection of heritage is underdeveloped; the research in this area of photography (Newton 2013; Sontag 1973; van Dijck 2008) reveals a lot about the meaning-making process in photography, while the work on Instagram as a platform for political campaigning unveils uses of the platform for activism (Caldeira, Bauwel, & Ridder, 2018). Therefore, this study draws on previous research that emphasises the democratic, mobilising and connecting potential of digital media and theories of civic engagement (Dahlgren, 2009) to investigate the above-mentioned practice of documenting in Instagram. This study takes off from the theories of “latent” forms of political participation, which can be considered “prepolitical” or non-action-based (Bakardjieva, 2009; Norris, 2002), self-actualising, do-it-yourself, unallocated citizenship and subactivism (Bakardjieva, 2009; Bennett, Wells, & Rank, 2009; Hartley, 2010, Ratto and Boller 2014; van Zoonen, Visa and Mihelja, 2010). Against this background, this chapter seeks to analyse the communicative practices of photographers who make images of decaying heritage states public on Instagram, by drawing on a case study of three Instagram accounts, @deadokey, @krokhino, @samasyava, and using qualitative visual content analysis of Instagram imagery to frame, explore and interpret the visual posts made to raise awareness about decaying cultural landmarks. In order to address the above-mentioned aim of this study, first the case studies will be presented. Second, the theoretical underpinnings and previous research on Instagram will be provided in a separate section. The third section of this chapter will focus on the Instagram aesthetics and the reactions of the followers to the photographs of ruins. Moreover, the fourth section will address the questions of participation. This chapter will end with concluding remarks, where the main results of the study will be given.

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2 Instagram Accounts Under Scrutiny This chapter uses a case study approach as a means of generating data to address the following research questions: How are decaying architectural sites represented on Instagram? What does the photo camera focus on? What does the practice of documenting and making images available suggest about the photographers’ engagement in the protection of cultural heritage? How does the public react to the images the photographers post? What does this reveal about the potential of Instagram for participatory practices? The choice of the case study methodology is explained by the possibility of carrying out a focused and holistic investigation into the field (Yin, 2013), that is, exploration of visual and assigned textual data provided in the open Instagram accounts. To study the data, visual content analysis with elements of thematic discourse analysis (Rose, 2014) was chosen as the main methodological tool. This type of methodology is usually used to study the content of the images and the textual captions, as well as look for patterns that might reveal strategies and potential uses of the images for the production of meaning. The data for the analysis was captured during the period September 2018–January 2019 by taking screen grabs of the images and the comments of the users under the posts. By embracing Susan Sontag’s view that “the arbitrariness of photographic evidence indicates that reality is fundamentally unclassifiable” (Sontag, 1973, p. 62), I argue that the moments captured on Instagram reveal the working of the social media and provide information about the multitude of different strategies digital images are used for. As the analysis in this chapter is built on the data acquired from social media, the nicks of the Instagram users whose comments were used in the chapter have been altered in order to ensure anonymity of the users. The nicks of the users whose accounts have been analysed are left without changes. Two interviews with the owners of the chosen accounts @deadokey and @krokhino conducted in 2016 have also been used to illustrate certain arguments. For this study, three Instagram accounts were chosen, in respect to them representing three distinct types of agency. The first one—@deadokey—is an Instagram profile of Vadim Razumov, a professional photographer and blogger who promotes country estates. The Instagram account has some 5000 followers, while the blog http://deadokey.livejournal.com is visited daily by more 1000–3000 people and is listed as one of the 500 best blogs of the Russian blogosphere (Dmitireva, 2015, p. 64). @deadokey is an example of an account of a private person and entrepreneur who is actively exploring legal ways for heritage protection. @deadokey Instagram account is a part of a blog that Razumov launched on live_journal where he rigorously collects photo material from his travels and uploads audio guides that he recorded in collaboration with museum curators (Dmitireva, 2015, p. 71). During recent years, the blogger has organised trips to country estates that have been turned into museums as well as worked as a consultant and partner for those who want to invest in historical estates (Interview with Vadim Razumov, 2016).

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@krokhino is the Instagram account of the charity foundation Krokhino initiated in 2009 by activist Anor Tukaeva. The project does not have many followers—about 600—many of whom are volunteers who, at different times, have been involved in the project. @krokhino is an example of a private initiative that became a collective endeavour. It is not the account of a photographer, like in the previous and following cases, but that of an organisation that collects images made by other people— activists, photographers and volunteers. One of the aims the Krokhino Foundation is to preserve the Church of Nativity of Christ standing in the waters of Volga-Baltic Waterway, close to the town of Belozersk. For the last 10 years, the founder of the organisation, Anor Tukaeva, has tried to attract attention to the alarming state of the church and other similar sites that demand immediate intervention by volunteers, investors and politicians. Until very recently, the Russian authorities including the regional government and Russian Orthodox Church were deaf to her petitions. There are several reasons for that. Located in the middle of a waterway, the church does not exist on paper and therefore cannot be granted ownership. This means that legal restoration activities cannot be initiated. This juridical obstacle made all attempts to start restorative work an illegal activity. Having managed to perform only acute preservation such as the erection of a dam, which protects the walls of the church from the impact of the waves and ice coming from the lake in spring; the construction of an abutment in the northern part of the parvis of the bell tower; restoration of the stone setting in the southern part of the church; and installation of the tell-tales to control the deformations, the volunteers working under the guidance of Tukaeva were forced to witness the slow decay of the church. While fighting wind mills, Tukaeva has launched an information campaign which apart from the creation of Instagram account also included a series of short films with celebrities campaigning for Krokhino and a series of theatre plays about the importance of cultural heritage protection. The Instagram account @samasyava is an example of the photographers documenting Russian urban and provincial decay. The owner of the Instagram account, Moscow-based photographer Kseniya Savina, travels to Russian villages and towns, photographs and then uploads the images on her account. She is one of the photographers interested in forgotten and decaying places, and also one of the most popular ones: her account has more than 50,000 followers and attracts both professionals, the media and average citizens who are drawn to the beauty of her images. Her account was noticed and recommended by Ilya Varlamov, one of the few well-known bloggers who focus on urban issues, as well as a number of media outlets, which write about urbanism.

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3 Multiple Uses of Instagram: Reporting, Activism and Storage The popularity of the image-based application Instagram launched in 2010 can be best explained by the dominance of visual culture in everyday life and communication (Evans & Giroux, 2015). Indeed, the visual is prevalent and engaging (Rose, 2015), which makes Instagram a powerful platform for meaning production. With social media photography becoming now a basis for a strategy for communicating ideas to others, Instagram stands at the very centre of this practice (Budge, 2017). The use of the platform for display corresponds with the distinct change in the meaning of photography that occurred in the digital era. Jose van Dijck has pointed out that if in these times of analogue media photography was mainly used for fulfilling a memory function, to serve as a reminder of the times that have passed, in the digital era communication becomes the key purpose of taking pictures. She writes that people and communities “articulate [ing] their identity as social beings by participating in communal photographic exchanges that mark their identity as interactive producers and consumers of culture” (van Dijck, 2008, pp. 62–63). The communicative function of photography is revealed when the platform is used by activists to promote a certain action (Caldeira et al., 2018). In such instances, the activists take advantage of the participatory aspect of social media (Literat, 2012), on the one hand, and of the civic aspect of journalistic photo reporting (Newton, 2013), on the other. When it comes to the latter, the aim of photo reportage is to expose social problems and errant behaviours that could be damaging for the human beings and societies at large (Newton, 2013). Therefore, photographers narrating about topical issues are relevant to the whole of society so as to fulfil their civic duty—they are engaged in public life and stand on the guard of democratic processes (Dahlgren, 2009, p. 58). Hence, the work of photographers under scrutiny could be seen as a form of civic engagement, where photographers perform some kind of altruistic service that is aimed towards solving specific problems—in this case a decay of cultural landmarks—which also has long-standing political implications as the activity’s end goal is to influence governmental actions in relation to the decaying heritage sites. Meanwhile, it will be argued in this chapter that both communicative and memory functions remain, with photography serving not only as means of participating in interactive and societal activities but also in terms of preserving memory about the sites that might no longer be existent. In this case, it is the role of the Instagram platform as a storage database, where images of the disappearing landmarks are being preserved, that should be scrutinised. Van Dijck writes that social media should be seen as a depository for uploading pictures and not be mistaken for an archive, because they are in nature constantly changing databases that lack “even the most elementary principles of an archive’s ordering and preservation system” (2010, p. 409). Van Dijck has a valid point, as the photos and videos on Instagram can be deleted or altered at any time both by the owner of the account and by the platform’s algorithms, which makes it difficult for

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the user to judge the composition of such archive. Moreover, the logic of these changes and alterations made by various involved agents presents a black box: the individuals can have personal reasons for removing their content that only they can know about, while the removal of the data by Instagram can be an effect of a system glitch or a decision taken by an algorithm in accordance with the platform policies. In spite of this fragility of the content on Instagram, photos and videos are in fact stored on the Instagram server even after deletion for an indefinite term but may not be retrievable by an average user. Instagram demands a valid court order for completing retrieval of previously deleted files. This means that to get a back-up copy is almost impossible in practice for the user, which makes it problematic to use Instagram as an archival space. The user can never be certain about the security and retrievability nor of the ownership of the data stored on the platform.1 Another issue with Instagram as a platform for the archiving of data, and its consequent use, is that one can never be certain about the origin of the images, the assigning of the captions and hashtags. At the same time, the images uploaded on the platform do not always answer to the demand of objectivity as they are often being manipulated and altered through the use of various filters in order to create specific effects such as fauxvintage and light leaks. Despite these shortcomings, Instagram is still being used as a platform for the temporary storage and display of image content. In the absence of other easily available and open databases and storages of the images of cultural landmarks in Russia, these accounts may function as image-based archives, but, as it was already mentioned, with some reservations.

4 Making Ruins Great Again: Beauty and Pain in the Photographs The comments left under the images of @samasyava and @deadokey open up several important topics that will be discussed in this section. One of such topics is the beauty of decay and the creation of aestheticised environments on Instagram with the help of photo filters. When looking at the images posted on @samasyava and @deadokey accounts, one is faced with a collection of attractive images of a very depressing phenomenon: the ruination of architectural gems of the previous epochs: churches, village houses and country estates of nobility. Often located off the usual tourist trails, these sites remain unnoticed by travellers and investors alike. Even people who live nearby 1 In 2017 Instagram integrated a new feature—Archive Posts—which can be used to hide any photos and stories from being seen by anyone and to retrieve any “deleted” from the profile photo in two clicks. Judging by its features, Instagram Archive feature can be best compared to a Recycle Bin—a location where your files are temporarily stored till its emptied. As soon as a photo is deleted from Instagram Archive, the recovery of the content is no longer guaranteed. This feature will not be discussed in this chapter as it falls outside of the scope of the analysed material.

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rarely know about the existence of such sites or of the possibility to visit them. They often get information about such places from these accounts: @anton: Wow! ¼) I live relatively close, in Chertanovo. I have been many times to the area, but I have never been able to enter the premises [of the estate ZnamenskoeSadki] ((. Interesting, is it even possible? @nowandthen: Is it possible to get into the house? I also live close by. . .

Photographs of snow-covered country estates and churches, the bleak interiors of residence of nobility, overgrown stairs, ponds and centuries old parks lock followers’ attention on Instagram, who express their appreciation of what they get to see: @asiya: Such beauty! @amor: Such a beauty! ¼) @cazoar: Very beautiful!

Their astonishment with these picturesque buildings and parks quickly changes to the expression of pity and sadness over the state of these places: @marria: Beautiful, but very sad. . . @paulinka: It is so sad, that such beauty disappears. . .

People feel sad about the fact that churches and villas built in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries lay in ruins today. These feelings of sadness and despair are further intensified by the images presented on Instagram. The followers make remarks about how the photographs on the one hand reflect the emotions that one can feel in relation to what one sees in the images and, on the other hand, how these images evoke these feelings of sadness and despair in the spectators: @elena: Impossible colours! The photo really reflects a specific mood! @gal: You have fantastic photos, you really convey the mood. Pain, and tears of loss and life and death. Mind-blowing. Thank you for your work and for this art

This specific mood is created with the use of the colours and filters that emphasise the bleakness and mistiness of the landscapes and the mystery of churches. Filters such as Clarendon, Gingham, Amaro and Mayfair amplify the attractiveness of the depicted ruins, by crafting eye-pleasing presentations. The ruins, despite their depressing state, become picturesque by representing relentlessly aestheticised environments. Even though the pictures depict the sad facts of ruination, they are devoid of negativity. One of the reasons for such representation could lie in the logics of the platform: the images have to abide to some sort of conformity to become attractive on Instagram. The ruins in the images turned out to be not as depressing; they are sanitised, projecting a certain view of the world, that is, full of refined beauty and good vibes, capturing moments of life and lovingly presented environments (Boy & Uitermark, 2017). This feature of Instagram becomes handy for the crafting of an attractive presentation of derelict cultural landmarks, as all of a sudden they turn into mysterious romantic ruins. Aestheticised images of destroyed churches or villas appeal to the general public attracted by the beauty of decay, which awake affective responses.

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The affective response of the followers is a bittersweet longing—nostalgia for times passed and the impossibility to return to them. This nostalgia makes itself visible in the comments of the users left under the post of the Church of the Transfiguration of Our Saviour in Yaroslavl oblast’: @olga: Blues. . . the whole of Russia in one photo @kosu: Very beautiful church. It would be great to restore it @irisha: It is impossible to imagine [now] that there was a time when the bells rang and parish arrived for service

The followers are longing for something much bigger, i.e. the renaissance of spirituality, the revival of community and feeling of belonging to a country with a rich past. In this process, the photo filters substantially increase viewers’ perceived temporal distances to a given photograph, by adding layers of history and meaning: @valentina: How many holy places disappear. It is very painful and sad. What an energy they transmit. It makes me cry. @litops: Super shooting. . . . Spiritual bankruptcy. . . I would say. . . @tanya: Holy Rus’ @zetastar: What despair. It is impossible to revive.

The composition and perspective in the photographs intensifies this longing. The use of drone photography allows @samasyava to create dramatic perspectives of abandoned village houses and slowly decaying churches. By using bird’s-eye perspective, @samasyava provides a physical distance from the object of viewing and the subject, which allows her to intensify the impression of grandness of architectural sites, on the one hand, and, on the other, to create an emotional connection with the viewer rather than a more literal interaction with the buildings depicted in the scene. The moody landscapes in @samasyava photos thrust the viewer into the wilds of nature and forgotten architectural sites—churches and villages—which stand for the divine and the traditional, providing an opportunity to contemplate both God’s and human presence in the world. Meanwhile, humans are rare guests in the photographs: they only appear as travellers that observe the gigantic churches and pass by abandoned village houses. Human beings are made small and fragile next to the magnificent buildings representing something that is much bigger than a human life. The photographs on @samasyava account echo the symbolism which was characteristic of the romanticism aesthetics of the first half of the nineteenth century, when artists like Caspar David Friedrich elevated the genre of landscapes painting previously considered inferior to other genres into the realm of highly symbolic art. These artists were also the first ones who aestheticised decay and who, through the portrayal of foggy natural landscapes with overgrown ruins, managed to convey the power of the divine and of spiritual significance. The symbolism of the portrayed landscapes with beheaded churches, collapsed and overgrown bell towers and empty village houses with blackened windows reminds the followers about the loss of spirituality in modern Russian society and

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the gradual take over by neoliberal forces clinging to optimisation and the neverending circle of profit-making. The images invite for a discussion about the fate of these ruins and the responsibility of the living before their ancestors to protecting what they have created in the past. Through this discussion, it becomes evident that the photographic accounts also call for action and serve as an important impulse for engagement.

5 I Have Been Here! Documenting Ruins and Coming Together as a Community One of the very first photo reportages about the forgotten country estates done by Razumov is a story about merchants Ryabushinsky’s villa in the Balashikha region. Razumov says that he was shaken by “old overgrown stairs in the park” and could not help but tell other people about it (Dmitireva, 2015, p. 62). Up until today the photographer actively documents historical estates in Moscow region by paying attention to the ones that are under conservation or restoration. He says that he returns to some of them several times to monitor the restorative activities, and if he sees something going in the wrong direction, he can start to alarm the community of heritage activists and the authorities (Dmitireva, 2015, p. 65). Razumov thinks that his work as a photographer and blogger is important in attracting attention to problems in the sphere of heritage protection and thus contributes to the popularisation of cultural heritage in Russia. However, it is not enough—what is needed is a collective effort: There are not so many people who are active in the sphere of popularisation of cultural heritage protection, while the sites that need attention are more than hundred thousands. Citizens must be active not only in the sphere of heritage protection and popularisation of heritage, but the engagement is needed in tourism and sponsorship for everything to work out. (quoted in Dmitireva, 2015, p. 64) Every single person can help to safeguard a historical site. Such help can take the form of doing volunteer work for the regeneration and cleaning up of the territory of a country estate, helping to get the estate included onto the registry, or searching for a sponsor. Contemporary legislation provides lot of room for those who are willing to help to restore an estate. (quoted in Dmitireva, 2015, p. 66)

Meanwhile, Instagram as a platform could be used to spark such engagement through what Razumov calls the popularisation of cultural heritage—a process Anor Tukaeva, activist and founder of Krokhino foundation, defines as making historical sites visible and attractive for a visit, while the volunteer and protection activities of the heritage sites can become fashionable and trendy. She points out that “even though there is a consistent group of volunteers and experts who work on the Krokhino site, the majority of people stay indifferent” (interview with Anor Tukaeva, 2016). It is exactly this indifference that has to be overcome in order to

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change public opinion regarding ruins, which in turn will force politicians to reconsider the politics of cultural heritage protection across the country. To set a new public agenda, one has to make these places visible which can be done through working with various media platforms (Interview with Anor Tukaeva, 2016). In this process Instagram can be very useful due to the platform’s characteristics. As has been illustrated in the previous section, the powerful images of ruins evoke an emotional response in the followers, who experience a nostalgic longing for the loss of spirituality and who feel emotionally connected to the sites presented. On Instagram they start engaging in conversations and learn more about the sites they see in the pictures. To a certain degree, the logic of the platform according to which users have to follow in order to make their profiles more visible and recommendable helps in this endeavour. User comments reveal that @samasyava did not always add captions containing either names or locations of the buildings depicted on the pictures when they were uploaded. One of the reasons behind such practice is the working of the Instagram algorithms: the more users engage with a post, the faster the post and the account lands at the top of recommended accounts and will gain more visibility by appearing among one’s recommendations. Users can choose to give information later on so as to increase engagement with a post, as opposed to decreasing engagement by giving away too much information in the very beginning. The followers keep asking about the location of the buildings they find beautiful, and both the owner of the account and other users answering the questions extend the thread of comments, thereby increasing chances for more visibility of the account on the platform. Step by step the users also engage in the discussions that reveal more information about the sites in question: @gwynjones: Why all churches in Yaroslav Oblast’ are made in one style/colour @mikhail: @gwynjones It happens not only in Yaroslav [Oblast’] @gwynjones: @mikhail: Ok, also in Vologda [Oblast’] on the border with Yaroslav Oblast’ @nat: @gwynjones: It is because these churches are built approximately in the same time period and follow almost the same project plan; in the beginning of the 19th century the entrance to the church was organised through the bell-tower; then there was a frater, a warm part of the building, then there was a summer part of the building of two stories which ended with five domes. @dandy: This church has survived the times when many churches had been destroyed across the whole country. As one old woman I know told me ones, she was in this church while a little girl; there used to be an amazing altar screen. After the war this church was used as a storage place for fertilisers. This is my motherland.

Instagram’s specific modus operandi described above has important implications for heritage protection activities. First, it increases the visibility of the site through the hashtags and comments left under the post. Second, it informs the followers about the sites and allows personal stories and histories narrated by people to occur. Third, it supposedly breaks the spiral of silence by providing evidence about the existence of a group of like-minded people who are interested in cultural heritage and are willing to put time into saving it.

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The following example shows how the users exchange information about their heritage protection activities with each other sparked by the discussion of the image of the church in village Stepanchikovo, Yaroslav Oblast’: @anton: We have taken one of such [churches] for reconstruction. . . @modul: @anton, are you working with restoration? It would be interesting to know more about you. . . I am a working with construction myself. @anton: @mogul yes, we do. In Vologda. At the moment we work on two churches. @konstanta: @anton that is so great that you do it!!!!!!!!!!

People also give tips about the other places to visit; @hocok: “If you have time, I recommend to visit village Narma in Vladimir Oblast’. There is a very beautiful abandoned church there. But it is better to go there in summer”. Meanwhile others, like Anor Tukaeva, actively use the images with the people working on restoration activities to attract new volunteers. Posting images of people having fun while doing clean-ups of garbage at a historical site is a way of setting a good example for others who might want to get involved. Seeing the smiling faces of volunteers, reading witty hashtags under the pictures and the texts with the information about the next volunteer trip, they might start asking themselves: Why not join? Such images also provide answers for those asking who is responsible for the decay and what could be done to stop it. The discussions in the threads reveal whom people hold responsible for the poor state of the architectural sites in Russia: @pav: I recognise our country. And that nobody cares about it @luna: Why doesn’t Russian Orthodox Church restore such [beauty]???? This is the beauty of Russian history!! Authentic Russian Orthodoxy! @idelia: @luna, probably, because the construction of new churches is a more profitable business. @luna: @idela: but it is our heritage :(. @idela: @luna, this interests only us, but those who are up there are only interested in money.

It becomes clear in the threads that by “nobody” the users mean the state and most importantly the Russian Orthodox Church, which redirects all its sources elsewhere—making money by building new churches in the areas where economic profits are more obvious, rather than financing the restoration of churches built in the nineteenth century. Anor Tukaeva, who for the last 10 years has tried to save the Church of Nativity of the Christ in the village of Krokhino from complete destruction, claims that one of the factors behind the non-involvement of the Russian Orthodox Church in the preservation of the ruin is the lack of people in the area who could have attended the church as it is located too far from any large settlement: the village of Krokhino is under water after the area was flooded to build the VolgaBaltic waterway, while Belozersk is too far away and has its own religious sites. At the same time, she points out that the average people who live next door to the ruin care very little about it and are difficult to engage in volunteer activities. Nevertheless, there are several local people who regularly join volunteer groups traveling to the man-made island the church is now standing on. One of these local helpers stressed that even though people might want to support the action, they

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cannot afford it, neither in terms of money nor time-wise because they are some more pressing issues one has to take care of, such as looking for work opportunities or battling cancer. Salaries in the province are low and many people have a hard time making ends meet. To save the church and to think about the value of cultural heritage come last on their list of priorities. One could even say that Instagram might not be the best platform for changing public opinion, since the platform’s public is mainly middle-class young urban dwellers who might be too far from the provincial sites like Krokhino. Nevertheless, the majority of the volunteers working for the Krokhino case have an urban middle class background and could be considered as a group to be more receptive of the idea of cultural heritage protection, owing to their level of education and economic preconditions that make their engagement possible in the first place. They act as trend-setters for other groups of people and the images of the ruins with people working on them play an important role in making heritage protection fashionable and trendy. Their communication under the posts also becomes evidence of their action and engagement and gives signals to other people as well. This documentation of action becomes important for the creation of a community that comes together under the same banner: they might all be of various backgrounds but they are all united by the same goal: safeguarding national heritage. The images of people working and leaving positive comments and hashtags under the photographs set a positive mood as well, showing that this is exactly where community building and bonding happens. Therefore, the images provide hope that not everything is lost and it is possible to stop the decay and turn back the clock.

6 Concluding Discussion The findings suggest that photographers and activists use this application to document the decaying landmarks, and in the process, they come out as civic activists who inform the public about the state of affairs in the field of heritage protection as well as engage them in a discussion about the role of the state, the church and the citizens in this practice. Meanwhile, the choice of Instagram as a platform for documenting, storing and communicating with the broader public to raise awareness about the state of cultural heritage in Russia is not random given the platform’s focus on aesthetics. Aesthetics are important when assigning cultural value to sites and objects which have to be picturesque and disciplined in a very particular manner to be considered as heritage. Visually pleasing ruins have the potential to invoke affective responses, such as nostalgia and function as symbols standing for something larger, such as a collective identity. At the same time, Instagram allows for the certain visibility of the historical sites that have been forgotten. By exhibiting them and by naming them, the photographers return the heritage sites from oblivion. This process of setting historical sites back on

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the map is also conditioned by the working logic of Instagram—on the one side it makes the heritage sites more visible but on the other allows only a specific kind of visibility, which again has to correspond to the aesthetics of Instagram.

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Afterwords Marlene Laruelle

These last years, the Western production of expertise on Russian media has rapidly increased, but with an obvious bias related to the supposed need to counter the so-called Russian propaganda and its use of social media for political purposes. This volume arrives on time to offer a sober study on the different faces of the Internet in Russia, far away from the “usual suspect” topics and looking mostly at its domestic use. It also allows to give the floor to the flourishing Russian school of communication and make it available to English speakers. What is fascinating about the development of the Internet in Russia is the combination of both national and globalised features. We indeed tend to forget the key role played by the Soviet Union in creating a first network of connected people, Usenet, that linked Soviet programmers working at the Kurchatov Institute of Nuclear Energy and the Institute for Advanced Training of the Ministry of Automobile Industry and allowed for first online discussions with their counterparts in the West. Since then—even if the first Soviet Usenet did not survive the competition with the Internet—Runet has maintained many national features. First is with its language of course. Runet expands largely beyond the borders of Russia to encompass a larger Russian-speaking world: the .ru zone ranks fourth in the global rating scale of national domains. Second, it has been regularly shaken by linguistic discussions—and often put up resistance to the dominance of English—on the use of multiple scripts (Cyrillic and Latin) and on grammatical questions. Third, it has also developed its own software, resistant to the ones produced in the Silicon Valley: LiveJournal functioned as a social network for the Russian net intelligentsia as early as 1999–2001, followed by Odnoklassniki, Vkontakte, Yandex, etc. More recently, it is the use of the messenger platform Telegram that became one of the main tools of discussion, both among ruling elites and the opposition. M. Laruelle Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (IERES), Elliott School of International Affairs, The George Washington University, Washington, DC, USA e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 S. Davydov (ed.), Internet in Russia, Societies and Political Orders in Transition, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33016-3

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Another specificity of the Russian Internet relates to its ambivalent role of both promoting diversity of opinions and being used as a tool of control by the regime. For long, Western observers were interpreting Russia as divided between those watching television, supposedly under state ideological influence, and those looking for news on the Internet, more free. This binary, naïve line of divide is based on a mistaken perception of the Internet. While television does not allow, or hardly at all, for alternative opinions to be expressed, the Internet is not the free world it was promised to be: not only are state organs very present online too, but the Internet often acts as an echo chamber of mainstream narratives and can even increase their visibility, for instance, around conspiracy topics. Of course, this does not mean that the Internet is not also acting as a platform for civic activism, but the notion of a direct relationship between being connected and being socially active is mistaken. Moreover, being socially active does not automatically translate into a liberal agenda, contrary to Western pundits’ wishful thinking: Russia, as many other countries, has shown the rise of an illiberal civil society that has been able to take advantage of the Internet too. The rise of online social activism is of course genuine, but should be relativised. The Internet has been particularly successful in crisis situation by unifying all the different actors on the ground to manage emergency responses but also to challenge the state’s monopoly over information and keep the authorities accountable of their mistakes, as this was the case, for instance, during the forest fires or other natural disasters situation. Other forms of activism, such as gender activism, have also been able to take full advantage of social media platforms by organising flashmobs, for instance, and by challenging the boundary between private and public space, for example, by finger pointing gender discrimination or domestic violence. Another real of social activism, discussed too in this volume, is the use social media to document everyday reality, for instance, architectural decay, demolition or illegal construction and therefore campaigning for the protection and preservation of heritage sites. All these uses of social media confirm that they have become powerful platforms for meaningproduction, reporting and activism. In addition to this facet of Runet that facilitates citizens’ empowerment, the authorities have recently been developing a whole spectrum of methods to keep control over the Internet. These are justified by the notions of information safety or information sovereignty, i.e. the protection of Russia’s national strategic interests in a time of high tensions with the West. Not that this argument is a totally empty one— it has some legitimacy—but it is mainly used to restrict Internet freedoms at home. The state still considers it has the right to interfere with freedom of speech if there are some threats at stake, with the agency Roskomnadzor acting as a censor, often with selective and arbitrary implementation, which still allows a lot of room for, yet reduce, the expressing of alternative opinions. If there is an area in which the Russian Internet is still lagging behind compared to Western one, it is in the business sector, such as investors’ activity and venture funding: with exception to the growing sector of e-commerce and IT, many innovative domains such as biotech are still limited and mostly shaped by risk-adverse state orders and state-affiliated funds. It is one sector in which the authorities, at all

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journalism’s world is in itself divided, not only by generation and by political positioning but also by individual perception of (self-)censorship, by ethics and by a set of financial, logistical and technological ability to perform investigative work. From that brief sketch, we see that Russia’s Internet world and culture is everything but a monolith resulting from an authoritarian, top-down political logic. It offers, on the contrary, a mosaic of highly diversified actors, practices, worldviews, mechanisms and spatial clusters, where state authorities, businesses and civil society can interact, compete, cooperate, co-opt and be co-opted: it is therefore a genuinely co-created world. On that aspect, the Russian Internet is far away from the Chinese model of a new digital totalitarianism where AI tools are fully instrumentalised to build a social credit system that ranks and controls individuals and their rights as citizens. Not that the Silicon Valley model does not tend towards quite a similar dream of controlling individual’s mindset and behaviour, but it is shaped mostly for marketing reasons, less than for purely political ones. In this growing binary competition between the US and Chinese models of Internet/social media/AI realm, both Europe and Russia find themselves in the difficult position of risking becoming “digital colonies” of both the USA and China. Paradoxically, Russia benefits from having more room for manoeuvre than Europe to resist: it has its own tradition of national software, a very specific Runet realm, and a government ready to restrict individual freedoms in order to guarantee “digital sovereignty”, something which a democratic Europe cannot afford to do, at the risk of reducing its ability to resist pressures from both the US and Chinese models.

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levels, have been investing in the Internet structuration of urban landscapes, whereby many “smart cities” strategies have taken shape not only in the main metropoles, the “millionaire” ones, but also in many, smaller, provincial towns. This goes with the shift towards e-government, with many public services now available online, and a better (and less corrupt) interaction between state structures and citizens. Some other domains of the big data world remain to be developed, for instance, data related to the medical world, which means the country will have to develop so far missing standards for assessing storage and build new processing data centres—mostly in Siberia. Another aspect not only of the Internet but of the entire Russian media that Western observers tend to not see has been the role of market mechanisms, and especially advertising, in reshaping the media realm. Even under some state control, the Russian media, because they rely largely on advertising, can still find themselves in a competitive environment, which has contributed to the creation of an entire world of advertising and PR agencies, sociological services, media measurement companies, etc. This has been particularly true of television, which has remained the main and most trusted media for the majority of the population, even if the Internet is progressively competing with it among the younger generations. This supremacy of the television is not specific to Russia: Italy, for instance, has remained a televisual culture much more than many other European countries. Television plays a multifaceted role: as everywhere in the world, it shapes the cultural consensus of the nation, mostly with fiction production (movies and series, but also music), as well as spreads a consensual view of world politics and Russia’s place in it that corresponds to the one the authorities promote but it also enjoys popular support, mainly through the talk-show genre, and it makes money by selling advertising. Some limited segments of the population remain skeptical towards the narratives promoted on television and look for alternatives, or at least complementary worldviews, such as can be found on the Internet. But these are limited to some specific niches such as the older generations of liberals and emerging groups of the younger generation such as students attending the main institutes, especially from the two metropolises, Moscow and St Petersburg. Indeed, Russia’s Internet world has a spatial component that is rarely taken into consideration by external observers: Russian regions show very different configurations of online stakeholders, depending not so much on the level of Internet penetration as on the existence of a diversified local life, with business, academia, civil society, authorities, etc., competing to defend their perspective. This spatial component, understandable given Russia’s huge territory and its “archipelago” nature in which the socioeconomic strata are very often defined also by geographical features, impacts the digital literacy level: there have been significant disproportions in the levels of digital literacy in Russia’s regions, with a distinct lead from the North-Western federal district, even if we are now seeing/witnessing an overall reduction of such imbalances across the country. Russia’s public sphere remains indeed fragmented by spatial, socioeconomic and cultural capital strata, contributing to the development of clusters that cannot lead, at least not up until now, to a nationwide public countersphere. The professional