Internet Helps Russia Change

December 10th, 2011. I hope that day will be marked in the newest history of Russia to be an awakening from the lethargy that Putin’s regime has put the country in. For the first time in this century in Russia people massively went to the streets to protest against the last election falsification. Hundreds thousands of people across the whole country! Look at the photo below to understand the size of the meeting in Moscow (source, click to enlarge):

People went not to support particular party or leader, they just feel abused by the government and its leading party The United Russia, which they call: “the party of Crooks and Thieves.” That nickname was given by a famous Russian blogger Alexey Navalny, who was put to jail just after few days after the elections of December 4th 2011, when first protests started. He is known for disclosing on the Internet the facts of theft and corruption in Russian government and the United Russia party, he also involved many supporters while investigating those cases and making them public. When Alexey is back after his 2 weeks of detention, he will be very welcome to lead that new opposition force, as it seems to be the very right moment. Looking at his face, I hope Russia will have a good chance, although many people in Russia are still to meet Alexey.

The meeting resolution was to redo the elections, investigate all the falsification facts, and free all the political prisoners detained after the first wave of protests. Putin and Medvedev have two weeks to address the claim. The next meeting is planned on December 24th.

From the technology standpoint, Internet has played an important role of the only mass media in Russia where people could get true facts about Putin’s regime, communicate with leaders and bloggers of opposition. TV in Russia has been totally manipulated. The most important resource is Livejournal.com which is enormously popular among mid and upper class intellectuals. Twitter has proven to be invaluable as the instant messaging system which was heavily used during the last meeting. Also on the Facebook Russians organize events and share thoughts, yet there is a local alternative of Facebook: vKontakte.ru.

Look at the amazing photos published on the Internet. Russian state-owned media would never show them.

http://oleg-kozyrev.livejournal.com/3875971.html

http://drugoi.livejournal.com/3665579.html#cutid1

http://pano.1drey.com/various/protest6.html

Internet has been helping Russia change. The opposition should act now to catch the moment.

Related posts:

1. Vague Perspective of Revolution in Russia
2. Time Person of the Year — The Protester
3. Russian Presidential Election through Web Eye
4. How to deal with suspended account in Twitter