How is the situation for other HN readers? How is it for the people in Russia? Can they access the whole internet? Can the majority read English?
I took a look at my web server stats and it turns out 2% of my visitors are from Russia. 30% of them are from Moscow and 10% from Saint Petersburg. I guess these are people who already have an overview of international news about the current situation? Or would it help to put some infos up?
Thanks for the laugh. The whole Reddit is now in "Evil Russkis" mode, you can't voice the reason and common sense for absolutely anything.
HN is just less known, but the same happens here too.
Yes, you wouldn't notice the propaganda, because there would be only one side you hear.
> Can they access the whole internet
Well, Twitter and Facebook are now banned.
> Can the majority read English
No. [0] Translators exists but that doesn't answer if they want to read anything in a foreign language. Do you often read articles in the language you don't understand?
> have an overview of international news about the current situation
They have access to information but that doesn't imply they know, want to know or what they are on the same footing with you even if they know.
> Or would it help to put some infos up?
And what 'infos' you want to put up?
[0] https://www.rbth.com/news/2015/12/03/percentage-of-rusians-w... (2015)
> About a third of Russians (30 percent) speak English to one degree or another: 20 percent can read and translate using a dictionary, 7 percent are familiar with colloquial language, and 3 percent are fluent speakers, according to Romir research holding.
Poorly. It's completely unnecessary for their day-to-day lives.
The majority, like in most of the world, doesn't "read Internet". They have some icons on their smartphones they click to access social media or messengers. Their laptop/desktop browser has a default (sponsored) home page with some search engine which they can use for their news feed (as is the case with Yandex) or to access some online shop or the local version of Yahoo Answers. They can mostly use e-mail with the web-interface, but this skill is surely on the decline, considering how widespread one-time logins with a phone are becoming.
> I guess these are people who already have an overview of international news about the current situation.
There's lots of us here still, even considering the paragraph above.
I live in one of the autocratizing nations with access to most of the internet as of now. I think that was the case in Russia too till just 2-3 years ago.
What I've observed in my society is that mere access to information isn't enough. Ethics and critical thinking, or lack of them in general, influence how that information is consumed.
The delusions, myths and lies of the dictator are not all his own inventions but often emanating from, and willingly co-opted by, many of his generation in his society.
State propaganda merely enforces those myths that the people themselves chose to nurture in their minds without any ethical or logical scrutiny.
All news gets judged through that mental framework. If many people believe "liberals" or "the west" are out to destroy their country, then any news about their war crimes will be dismissed as fake news by such minds even if they have access.
That's why I'm a bit skeptical about the black and white narratives where all the evil is only in the dictator's government and media, while their society is portrayed as innocent.
An ethical person who's lived in a dishonest society for years and experiences it daily is unlikely to trust anything the state says. Which means, if many people are ready to side with a dishonest state, then I think they aren't all that honest and innocent to begin with.
The Internet has the cool effect forgetting my IRL identity. I want to be in the communities and identifying with skills and beliefs rather than my nationality. I've replaced google with ddg and youtube with invidious/piped/newpipe because I am tired of them constantly adjusting to my locale.
Nowadays zoomers like my younger brother with all this like machine translation snake oil doesn't even care about learning English, my English was better at his age. He is perfectly content with Russian-language content and translated webpages. It's sad because there are so much possibilities for learning foreign languages today and he is missing the chance to do it at young age.