7 ms·

EU to Ban RT and Sputnik

41 points by Markoff 5y ago

badRNG 5y ago
Well, RT seems to be down here (states)
- pinewurst 5y ago
  There's been a DoS attack going on for some time.
- yrgulation 5y ago
  Excellent - I use moscowtimes.ru for news from within russia. Not sure how reliable it is, but i've read an article which if google translate works fine, it would appear there is dissent among their forces. Also the russian ministry of defense has openly spoke, in russia, about russian losses: more than 3200 dead. That's half the losses Russian had in 8 years of the Second Chechen War. Looks like Ukraine is winning and thus Putin is resorting to nuclear fearmongering.
  - robbedpeter 5y ago
    Ukraine is losing 1 for every 20 Russians killed so far. Putin's strategical prowess is surprisingly terrible.
    - yrgulation 5y ago
      As i said before. The russian army is nukes and propaganda. Look at how well its propaganda works even here on hm - some defend these weapons of war, rt and sputnik, as freedom of speech. However i do dead non government owned russian papers using google translate for intel, and the news are slowly trickling in. I tuned in to radio sputnik once and there were americans speaking some very disturbing anti american crap. It was the most weird comedy i listened to until i realised they are dead serious. Propaganda is a weapon.
    - CodeGlitch 5y ago
      This is what I don't get about the Russian invasion. Russia is a technologically advanced country (look at their space programme), they've had all this time to develop drones, missiles, satellites, etc - yet they send in tanks and troops like it's WW2. They've spent years developing assassination techniques, and have used them in the past to remove opposition leaders, and yet they have resorted to a ground invasion to remove the Ukraine government. None of it makes sense, unless Putin is trying to get the West to start a hot war?
enz 5y ago
I got: > 403 - Forbidden . That’s an error. Client does not have access rights to the content so server is rejecting to give proper response. That’s all we know. (France, no VPN) edit: it works when connected from a datacenter (from France)
- barbacoa 5y ago
  Same here in USA. They appear to be under a DOS attack.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- vladvasiliu 5y ago
  Works for me, on a residential connection.
  - enz 5y ago
    Now it works. Looks like they had some kind of DDoS protection (à la Cloudflare) and their heuristics estimated that my IP was a threat.
oceanplexian 5y ago
Looks like this is real : https://www.politico.eu/article/ursula-von-der-leyen-announces-rt-sputnik-ban/ https://www.politico.eu/article/ursula-von-der-leyen-announc...
- reaperducer 5y ago
  The fact that you thought it was a good idea to find a second source for an article from RT about RT says a lot about RT.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
sfjailbird 5y ago
That is crossing a line. In free societies we should be able to hear different sides.
- tablespoon 5y ago
  > That is crossing a line. In free societies we shoild be able to hear different sides. RT and Sputnik aren't "sides" in a democratic debate. They are propaganda outlets participating in bad faith with a goal to undermine those societies that have those debates.
  - throw3434053 5y ago
    You are in for a rude awakening my friend.
  - screye 5y ago
    When all outlets are propaganda outlets, the only way to ensure information from both sides is to let them all scream. I, like most HNers support Ukraine's bid for survival in this war. But, the sheer magnitude and spread of pro-Ukraine and anti-Russia propaganda would even embarrass the director of Rocky 4.
    - guiriduro 5y ago
      Yep, I remember a war that was clearly decided in advance but maintained a pretence of negotiability, on a bed of lies and manufactured fear of WMDs, supported in general by a compliant media with plenty of military embeds, glee over "shock and awe" and dropping of a lot more ordinance, and an almost complete absence of reporting of the victims of it. That war was Iraq. Nothing forgives Putin for what he's doing, or the laughable propaganda it rests on and Russian media promulgation of the same, but let's not pretend our media aren't also dancing to a political tune, filtering, ignoring, misrepresenting. And precisely because we claim to live in a free society we should hold our media to higher standards of independence, verifiability and circumspection.
      - deleted 5y ago
hericium 5y ago
Minimization of DDoS against Russian government and its media by censorship carried out against Europeans. Commies everywhere.
a0-prw 5y ago
I regularly read RT and occasionally Sputnik. I also read the opposing views held by Western media like Economist, FT, Independent, etc. RT are always careful to acknowledge opposing viewpoints. For example, in all articles on the war, so far, they say "Moscow claims ..." and "Kiev claims ..." Censorship happens when the authorities are afraid of the viewpoints of their opponents. So the EU is afraid of allowing Russian perspectives to be learned about by EU citizens. Its becoming plainer by the day that we don't live in a democracy.
- bob66 5y ago
- coenhyde 5y ago
  This isn't about censorship. It's about an economic embargo.
  - gutitout 5y ago
    Sadly, you’re wrong. It’s about censorship. If they wanted economic embargo they would pull the plug or Nord Stream.
    - coenhyde 5y ago
      Ideally they would pull the plug on Nord Stream, but people would freeze. That's a hard ask. They're going as far as they can without hurting themselves too much. Cutting Russian banks off from SWIFT was a tough call.
- beeboop 5y ago
  During all this mess, RT has always pushed the view that Putin was liberating regions of Ukraine that had lawfully and democratically seceded from Ukraine and welcomed Russian troops. I don't call that very neutral
  - thinkingemote 5y ago
ComradePhil 5y ago
Shielding your peasants from foreign propaganda is one of the best thing you can do in modern politics; pioneered of course by the Great Firewall, without which China would have seen a lot more political instability.
hurflmurfl 5y ago
I'll risk posting a reply on this thread, without having a big point to prove but more with the goal of getting an answer to a question, which some readers may find interesting and others may find sacrilegious. I'm living in Russia at present, and the dilemma I face is related to sources of news and information about the ongoing "conflict"/war/invasion. I could read Russian news, of course, but anyone and their grandmother knows that you get a nice good blob of biased propaganda on those. I could read European / US news, where the take is quite lopsided as well. What I actually read is HN, I read some opinions and discussions, looking for ones that are actually interesting and discuss fundamental questions rather than resort to simplifications, logical fallacies, "common sense" (quotes because it tends to be rather private and subjective, but not so common) and then try not to get too much unverified information into my head. I do not support the war effort, and I sympathize greatly with the many people affected in one way or another by the situation. Having said all this, is there a good source of [as unbiased as possible] information on the reasons behind the current situation and the sequence of events leading to it? Both sides just sing their tune, vilify the other side and generally try to appeal to subjective morals or feelings or just build a strawman and go from there. Now that's, of course, par for the course, we're talking about media. I, however, would like to know BOTH sides of the conflict deeper before trying to form an opinion that I can count as my own. Thus, my first question: where do I find some sort of a compilation of arguments from both sides, where everything is not reduced ad absurdum and the opinion is left for the reader to form? Naturally, I also have a related second question: where would one find a stream of information that's related to the ongoing events (not the history) and portrays the situation from multiple points of view? As a habit, I try not to hold strong opinions that I don't understand completely, and I most commonly choose not to hold any opinion at all, as I do not find the time investment to sift through all the sources reasonable. Do you have any suggestions, fellow HNers? Or do you just zen out of this and file it away as "life happens, as usual"?
- astkaasa 5y ago
  I think it's an advantage that you can read both English and Russian sources. And it's such a lazy idea to pursue some [unbiased] [good] source. Be an adult and try understand the world by yourself. And because it's such a difficult and tiring process, sometimes it would be better just return to your normal life and all these things (social network / news / forum discussions) are not that relevant to your life actually. They do not deserve your attention. They are just something like gaming. I'm facing the same situation that I can read both English and Chinese sources. So I'm writing these words to myself at the same time.

41 points by Markoff 5y ago

badRNG 5y ago

Well, RT seems to be down here (states)

pinewurst 5y ago
There's been a DoS attack going on for some time.
yrgulation 5y ago
Excellent - I use moscowtimes.ru for news from within russia. Not sure how reliable it is, but i've read an article which if google translate works fine, it would appear there is dissent among their forces. Also the russian ministry of defense has openly spoke, in russia, about russian losses: more than 3200 dead. That's half the losses Russian had in 8 years of the Second Chechen War. Looks like Ukraine is winning and thus Putin is resorting to nuclear fearmongering.
- robbedpeter 5y ago
  Ukraine is losing 1 for every 20 Russians killed so far. Putin's strategical prowess is surprisingly terrible.
  - yrgulation 5y ago
    As i said before. The russian army is nukes and propaganda. Look at how well its propaganda works even here on hm - some defend these weapons of war, rt and sputnik, as freedom of speech. However i do dead non government owned russian papers using google translate for intel, and the news are slowly trickling in. I tuned in to radio sputnik once and there were americans speaking some very disturbing anti american crap. It was the most weird comedy i listened to until i realised they are dead serious. Propaganda is a weapon.
  - CodeGlitch 5y ago
    This is what I don't get about the Russian invasion. Russia is a technologically advanced country (look at their space programme), they've had all this time to develop drones, missiles, satellites, etc - yet they send in tanks and troops like it's WW2. They've spent years developing assassination techniques, and have used them in the past to remove opposition leaders, and yet they have resorted to a ground invasion to remove the Ukraine government. None of it makes sense, unless Putin is trying to get the West to start a hot war?

enz 5y ago

I got: > 403 - Forbidden . That’s an error. Client does not have access rights to the content so server is rejecting to give proper response. That’s all we know. (France, no VPN) edit: it works when connected from a datacenter (from France)

barbacoa 5y ago
Same here in USA. They appear to be under a DOS attack.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
vladvasiliu 5y ago
Works for me, on a residential connection.
- enz 5y ago
  Now it works. Looks like they had some kind of DDoS protection (à la Cloudflare) and their heuristics estimated that my IP was a threat.

oceanplexian 5y ago

Looks like this is real : https://www.politico.eu/article/ursula-von-der-leyen-announces-rt-sputnik-ban/ https://www.politico.eu/article/ursula-von-der-leyen-announc...

reaperducer 5y ago
The fact that you thought it was a good idea to find a second source for an article from RT about RT says a lot about RT.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

sfjailbird 5y ago

That is crossing a line. In free societies we should be able to hear different sides.

tablespoon 5y ago
> That is crossing a line. In free societies we shoild be able to hear different sides. RT and Sputnik aren't "sides" in a democratic debate. They are propaganda outlets participating in bad faith with a goal to undermine those societies that have those debates.
- throw3434053 5y ago
  You are in for a rude awakening my friend.
- screye 5y ago
  When all outlets are propaganda outlets, the only way to ensure information from both sides is to let them all scream. I, like most HNers support Ukraine's bid for survival in this war. But, the sheer magnitude and spread of pro-Ukraine and anti-Russia propaganda would even embarrass the director of Rocky 4.
  - guiriduro 5y ago
    Yep, I remember a war that was clearly decided in advance but maintained a pretence of negotiability, on a bed of lies and manufactured fear of WMDs, supported in general by a compliant media with plenty of military embeds, glee over "shock and awe" and dropping of a lot more ordinance, and an almost complete absence of reporting of the victims of it. That war was Iraq. Nothing forgives Putin for what he's doing, or the laughable propaganda it rests on and Russian media promulgation of the same, but let's not pretend our media aren't also dancing to a political tune, filtering, ignoring, misrepresenting. And precisely because we claim to live in a free society we should hold our media to higher standards of independence, verifiability and circumspection.
    - deleted 5y ago

hericium 5y ago

Minimization of DDoS against Russian government and its media by censorship carried out against Europeans. Commies everywhere.

a0-prw 5y ago

I regularly read RT and occasionally Sputnik. I also read the opposing views held by Western media like Economist, FT, Independent, etc. RT are always careful to acknowledge opposing viewpoints. For example, in all articles on the war, so far, they say "Moscow claims ..." and "Kiev claims ..." Censorship happens when the authorities are afraid of the viewpoints of their opponents. So the EU is afraid of allowing Russian perspectives to be learned about by EU citizens. Its becoming plainer by the day that we don't live in a democracy.

bob66 5y ago
coenhyde 5y ago
This isn't about censorship. It's about an economic embargo.
- gutitout 5y ago
  Sadly, you’re wrong. It’s about censorship. If they wanted economic embargo they would pull the plug or Nord Stream.
  - coenhyde 5y ago
    Ideally they would pull the plug on Nord Stream, but people would freeze. That's a hard ask. They're going as far as they can without hurting themselves too much. Cutting Russian banks off from SWIFT was a tough call.
beeboop 5y ago
During all this mess, RT has always pushed the view that Putin was liberating regions of Ukraine that had lawfully and democratically seceded from Ukraine and welcomed Russian troops. I don't call that very neutral
- thinkingemote 5y ago

ComradePhil 5y ago

Shielding your peasants from foreign propaganda is one of the best thing you can do in modern politics; pioneered of course by the Great Firewall, without which China would have seen a lot more political instability.

hurflmurfl 5y ago

I'll risk posting a reply on this thread, without having a big point to prove but more with the goal of getting an answer to a question, which some readers may find interesting and others may find sacrilegious. I'm living in Russia at present, and the dilemma I face is related to sources of news and information about the ongoing "conflict"/war/invasion. I could read Russian news, of course, but anyone and their grandmother knows that you get a nice good blob of biased propaganda on those. I could read European / US news, where the take is quite lopsided as well. What I actually read is HN, I read some opinions and discussions, looking for ones that are actually interesting and discuss fundamental questions rather than resort to simplifications, logical fallacies, "common sense" (quotes because it tends to be rather private and subjective, but not so common) and then try not to get too much unverified information into my head. I do not support the war effort, and I sympathize greatly with the many people affected in one way or another by the situation. Having said all this, is there a good source of [as unbiased as possible] information on the reasons behind the current situation and the sequence of events leading to it? Both sides just sing their tune, vilify the other side and generally try to appeal to subjective morals or feelings or just build a strawman and go from there. Now that's, of course, par for the course, we're talking about media. I, however, would like to know BOTH sides of the conflict deeper before trying to form an opinion that I can count as my own. Thus, my first question: where do I find some sort of a compilation of arguments from both sides, where everything is not reduced ad absurdum and the opinion is left for the reader to form? Naturally, I also have a related second question: where would one find a stream of information that's related to the ongoing events (not the history) and portrays the situation from multiple points of view? As a habit, I try not to hold strong opinions that I don't understand completely, and I most commonly choose not to hold any opinion at all, as I do not find the time investment to sift through all the sources reasonable. Do you have any suggestions, fellow HNers? Or do you just zen out of this and file it away as "life happens, as usual"?

astkaasa 5y ago
I think it's an advantage that you can read both English and Russian sources. And it's such a lazy idea to pursue some [unbiased] [good] source. Be an adult and try understand the world by yourself. And because it's such a difficult and tiring process, sometimes it would be better just return to your normal life and all these things (social network / news / forum discussions) are not that relevant to your life actually. They do not deserve your attention. They are just something like gaming. I'm facing the same situation that I can read both English and Chinese sources. So I'm writing these words to myself at the same time.