Stories from RuNet Echo from April, 2010

Russia: More Commentary on Sex Video Scandal

  29 April 2010

A Good Treaty comments – here and here – on the sex video scandals involving members of the Russian opposition, notes an increase in blog traffic (“nothing brings visitors to a website like the promise of nudity”), and responds to Julia Ioffe‘s Foreign Policy piece on the scandal.

Russia, Poland: The Truth About Katyn

  23 April 2010

Steve Bandera of Kyiv Scoop writes about Andrzej Wajda’s 2007 film Katyń, which has been shown twice in Russia in the past few weeks (reactions from the Russian blogosphere are here) – and comments that the truth about the massacre is “only coming out now in the former Soviet Union...

Russia: “The Sirens of Russia”

  23 April 2010

A Good Treaty posts a YouTube video of a Moscow driver's encounter with a high-ranking official's BMW and explains why “the special road status of the elite is a sore point with the Russian public.” (A few more related links in Russian are here.)

Russia: Medvedev Twitter Accounts

  22 April 2010

Profy writes about the soon-to-be-launched official Twitter account of the Russian president – and the recently suspended fake one: “The thing is that this Twitter account misbehaved on the day of last week’s terrorist bombings in Moscow: a comment was published that looked very much like the first official comment...

Russia: Authorities Inspect Major Social Network

  21 April 2010

Russia authorities started inspection of the country's major social network Vkontakte.ru, rbcdaily.ru reported. The authorities claim the social network became popular with neo-Nazi, xenophobic and extremist groups. But the inspection can also be an attempt to extract users’ private data.

Russia: Internet Development in Regions

  21 April 2010

Yandex.ru published report [RUS, .pdf] on Internet development in Russian regions. Report concludes that the drastic increase in Internet penetration during 2009 was in Russian regions. The average speed of the Internet there is 1,100 kbs. The most active bloggers are in the Far East.

Russia: The ‘Little Blue Buckets’ Protest

  19 April 2010

The Little Blue Buckets mock protest, initiated (RUS) by LJ user cook, took place in Moscow Sunday, as drivers fitted their cars with blue plastic buckets (siniye vedyorki) to protest the impunity of state officials who routinely use blue flashing lights (migalki) on their vehicles to violate traffic rules and...

Russia: Volcanic Eruption Provokes Cooperation and Jokes

  18 April 2010

Two days passed since Mother Nature showed its power to mankind letting the Icelandic volcano with unpronounceable name “Eyjafjallajökull” fill the European aerospace with ashes. As the ash cloud went east, more and more airports were closing, which led to European-wide transport collapse. Russian bloggers – also affected by the...

Russia: New Book About Livejournal Announced

  14 April 2010

Russian magazine “Ogonyok” published an interview with Andrey Podshibyakin, a former executive editor of Livejournal. Podshibyakin tells about his new book “Po-zhivomu: 1999-2009. Livejournal in Russia.” The book covers a decade in the history of this popular blogging platform in Russia.

Russia: Facebook to Open Office

  12 April 2010

Russian daily Vedomosti reports [RUS] that Facebook is going to open its office in Moscow and develop cooperation with local cellular companies. So far, most Russians have been using local social networking platforms (e.g., Vkontakte, Odnoklassniki, Moy Mir). The article's translation is published [ENG] in The Moscow Times.

Russia: Reactions to the Polish Tragedy

  11 April 2010

April 10, 2010, the day that should have started a new era in the Russian-Polish relations, brought tragic news instead. Airplane with the highest Polish establishment on board crashed in the Smolensk forest. The reaction of the Russian blogosphere was divided as usual when it comes to the Russian-Polish relations.

Kyrgyzstan: Social Media Create and Fight Information Overload

  10 April 2010

The coverage of recent bloody events in Kyrgyzstan by online and traditional media caused information overload that made it very difficult to create a consistent picture. That is why bloggers who focused on monitoring the information, checking its credibility and creating consistent picture of events, played an important role in an adequate coverage of the protests.

Kyrgyzstan: The “Archived” Revolution

On April 6th, Kyrgyzstan was hit by mass protests which eventually led to the overthrow of the government as well as many deaths. While the internet did not play a major role in mobilizing the protests, it has been used to document what happened in detail.

Russia: Expat Bloggers List

Ru_travel community tries to make a list of expat bloggers who live in the most distant parts of the world. Russophone bloggers found in New Zealand, Singapore, Australia, Malaysia and even Antarctica.

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