Russia has its own internet, and this film looks inside it. While the rest of the world uses Google, Facebook and YouTube, many Russians use Yandex, VKontakte and other home-grown services, in a digital world that is both innovative and closely watched. The video, from the Vox series, shows how that parallel internet grew up, and how it differs from the one most viewers know.
The report visits the companies behind those services, hearing how they built search engines, social networks and maps for a Russian audience, and how they have had to work with a state that wants to control what people see. It also shows the surveillance, the filtering and the pressure on journalists and bloggers, in a system where innovation and censorship live side by side.
For understanding socialism’s history, the Russian internet matters because it shows a post-Soviet state trying to keep control in a new age. The Soviet Union once controlled the press, radio and television; modern Russia tries to do the same online, while also wanting the benefits of a modern technology industry. The film helps viewers see that tension, and why the internet, which was supposed to set information free, can also be a tool of power.