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Screw them. They maintain the news.yandex which on purpose ignored the war and presented the government view on the situation. (and for last few years they neve

Screw them. They maintain the news.yandex which on purpose ignored the war and presented the government view on the situation. (and for last few years they never showed any kind of news associated with dissidents like Navalny, or other unpleasant for government topics). So yandex deserves what they get, they are complicit. Obviously there are a lot of good people working in the company, but they'll find new jobs, as they are at least not dead or displaced, like a million refugees from Ukraine.

rjzzleep 5y ago
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
molodec 5y ago
Not complying with the government can put them to prison for 15 years. https://news.yahoo.com/russia-blocks-twitter-and-facebook-as-war-in-ukraine-rages-on-204206358.html https://news.yahoo.com/russia-blocks-twitter-and-facebook-as... The country is largely silent on the war because the people are just scared. There is no free speech in Russia.
- molodec 5y ago
  Same in Belorussia. https://twitter.com/AlinaLeonovaSF/status/1499459505071038468 https://twitter.com/AlinaLeonovaSF/status/149945950507103846...
  - paganel 5y ago
    Moldova just announced that if you openly support the war/the Russian invasion in neighbouring Ukraine you risk prison, so it can also go the other way. I sort of understand why Moldova is doing it (small country a throne's stone away from Odessa and the Russian troops), the idea is that all sides are giving up democracy and the rule of law as fast as they can (the West a little slower, but it's following the same path).
- llIIllIIllIIl 5y ago
  So they are choosing bankruptcy over jail. What an honorable way. Let them do it with glory.
  - tenpies 5y ago
    I hope you're honourably on your way to Ukraine then. If you're willing to condemn them and their families to 15 years of prison for "honour", it's the least you could do. My point is that it's extremely easy to condemn people online, but 99% of Westerners have never even had a contrarian position, let alone a contrarian position against an authoritarian government. Canadians had a hint of it during the Trucker Protest if they donated and had their banking cancelled, but that's been about as close as the West has been to this sort of regime.
    - Talanes 5y ago
      >let alone a contrarian position against an authoritarian government. I think this is the meat of it. Plenty of westerners have some level of contrarian positions, but we don't face real resistance for it and thus fall into the trap of thinking it's easy for everyone else.
- paxys 5y ago
  That law was signed yesterday. Yandex has been operating for 25 years. Let's not pretend that they are the victim here. The Russian oligarchy has been fully complicit and even instrumental in getting the country to the state it is in today. Yandex itself has been an arm of Putin's government for many years (https://www.ft.com/content/dce2e23c-15c5-11ea-8d73-6303645ac406 https://www.ft.com/content/dce2e23c-15c5-11ea-8d73-6303645ac...).
  - trhway 5y ago
    Yandex was back then giving FSB info on people donating to opposition.
  - molodec 5y ago
    You are right it didn't start yesterday. Over the years Putin slowly but surely took control over all main media and news sources and the country let him with little to no resistance, but today it is too late. The remaining liberal channels were shut down this week. https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russian-prosecutors-demand-restricted-access-radio-station-tv-2022-03-01/ https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russian-prosecutors-dem...
- rectang 5y ago
  The point of sanctions is to make people like these Yandex employees discontented. Before they could shrug their shoulders, going along with it because there was little choice, and live their lives in stability and comfort, sheltered from the atrocities perpetrated by their government. But now they are harmed through economic retaliation. Ideally it drives down Russian support for the war and Putin's popularity, which right now are disgustingly high. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't, it's drastic and heavily coercive, and it's arguably collateral damage. But it's not like these Russian programmers are having their apartments shelled. This is war through other means, and war is hell.
  - vertis 5y ago
    If some of the other threads are anything to go by, Russian tech people are looking to leave Russia.
    - rad_gruchalski 5y ago
      And so the old people of Russia have what they wanted - USSR 2.0.
- orbital-decay 5y ago
  Long before the censorship, when they got plenty of leverage to meaningfully resist it, Yandex was one of the first companies supporting the "Safe Internet League", along with Vimpelcom and others. They were the first to run to Kremlin in an attempt to strike a deal to guarantee themselves a place under the sun in a brave new world, long before the first censorship laws were even discussed. Yandex picked the sides long ago, and now they are paying for being on the wrong side of the history. They aren't just complicit in censorship somehow, they are the censors themselves.
sandworm101 5y ago
And all thoee buckets of cash they are bragging about mean nothing. No rational person would be sending money into Russia right now, let alone converting dollars into rubles. The money outside of Russia today will stay outside. The money still inside Russia will diminish in value, that is until it is siezed. Yandex's days as a going concern may be numbered. Thats what happens when a business is caught out straddling both sides of a new sanctions regime. Maybe they can buy a soccer team.
lowkey 5y ago
Do you have equal contempt for the New York Times which knowingly sold us a War in Iraq by constantly repeating a lie about WMD, resulting in 500,000 dead Iraqis? There are no 'good guys' in this war. - Putin is a brutal dictator. - America is pushing an amazing amount of propaganda in this war while simultaneously sending arms and funds to back a Saudi bombing campaign in Yemen targeting civilians. - Ukraine has enlisted openly white supremacist neo-nazi's in their national guard to fight Russia in the east. - Facebook even unbanned the Ukranian Azov Brigade [0] this week as long as they are fighting the Russians [1] This is a war with no heroes and no winners, even though we have been taught to hate the 'others' to the point of targeting everyday Russian citizens, even those who oppose Putin's actions. The truth is the first casualty in times of war. Propaganda works on all of us. The best thing we can do is realize that fact. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azov_Battalion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azov_Battalion [1] https://theintercept.com/2022/02/24/ukraine-facebook-azov-battalion-russia/ https://theintercept.com/2022/02/24/ukraine-facebook-azov-ba...
- ibero 5y ago
  > this is a war with no heroes pretty sure i seen some heroes.
  - lowkey 5y ago
    How sure are you that at least some of that wasn't manufactured propaganda? You do realize that propaganda works for both sides and it can be hard to identify in the fog of war. All I am saying is that it pays to be skeptical in these troubling times.
    - ibero 5y ago
      i saw a man running into a crumbling building that was mortared to hell to get their neighbors children out.
      - lowkey 5y ago
        That is fantastic and that man is most certainly a hero, no argument. That said, my question was about how certain you were that at least some of the heroic acts you read or watched, were not some form of propaganda? Call me cynical but as soon as the conflict started I started investigating claims from both sides and I learned that a significant amount of what we heard early in this invasion turned out to be false propaganda. Examples: - Figher Ghost Ace turns out to be a myth https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022/03/02/ukraines-fighter-ace-ghost-of-kyiv-may-be-myth-its-lethal-war-morale.html https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022/03/02/ukraines-figh... - Israel TV Channel shows Star Wars Tie Fighter crash landed in Ukraine https://www.nytimespost.com/israeli-tv-channel-runs-live-footage-from-ukraine-showing-crash-landed-tie-fighter-from-star-wars/ https://www.nytimespost.com/israeli-tv-channel-runs-live-foo... - According to Reuters/MSNBC/US Officials - There is no evidence Russia attacked nuclear reactors in Ukraine. https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-usa-nuclear-energy-idUKW1N2U401C https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-usa-nuclear-e...
aasasd 5y ago
Please explain how Yandex News is supposed to transmit anti-government news, when there's been a ‘news aggregators’ law for years, which specifically forbids them to do that.
- Klaster_1 5y ago
  An understandable argument. They could always have closed the News service in protest to the law, that ain't punishable.
- codedokode 5y ago
  No, I think that you are wrong. That law that you mention requires only to publish news from officially registered media. At that moment there were officially registered not-pro-Putin media that could be used as a source (for example, covering anti-government protests, trial on Navalny and so on), but Yandex preferred to tune the algorithm so that it chooses news from pro-Putin media for the homepage that is seen by millions of people. Yandex chose to become a propaganda outlet. Some of the news that they re-publish from propaganda media are very low quality and, I think, even violate Yandex's own rules. If you understand Russian, read this headline for example: [1]. For those, who don't understand Russian, the headline contains the word "shit" while describing (with rejoice) how Lyubov Sobol was denied to take part in Moscow State Duma elections. There was no law requiring Yandex to accept such publications for their news aggregator, but they accepted it. [1] https://newssearch.yandex.ru/news/search?text=%D0%B1%D0%BB%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%B4%D0%B8%D0%BD%D0%BA%D0%B0+%D0%B2+%D1%88%D0%BE%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%B4%D0%B5+%D1%81%D0%BE%D0%B1%D0%BE%D0%BB%D1%8C+%D0%BD%D0%B0%D0%B2%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BD%D1%83%D0%BB%D0%B0 https://newssearch.yandex.ru/news/search?text=%D0%B1%D0%BB%D...
  - aasasd 5y ago
    Hmm, I looked into the law, and you seem to be right. Not sure now why the law was treated as the end of ‘independent’ Yandex News back then—though of course it was obvious that the gov wanted to control it and did everything it could think of, to that end. Personally I stopped paying attention to YN after that. Rukipedia even has a section on incidents suggesting both manual fiddling with the YN output and the government's stuffing of it: https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Яндекс.Новости#Критика https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Яндекс.Новости#Критика As for the example you cite: if it was found just in the ‘news search’, then it's possibly not from a source ‘certified’ for appearing in the main news feed—from what I've read, it seems that the search includes many more sources than the feed, and is possibly not regulated by that law.
paganel 5y ago
They still presented search results in their general search engine that were banned by Google (some of them because of stupid EU laws, some others because of stupid copyright laws), that was nice.

rjzzleep 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

molodec 5y ago

Not complying with the government can put them to prison for 15 years. https://news.yahoo.com/russia-blocks-twitter-and-facebook-as-war-in-ukraine-rages-on-204206358.html https://news.yahoo.com/russia-blocks-twitter-and-facebook-as... The country is largely silent on the war because the people are just scared. There is no free speech in Russia.

molodec 5y ago
Same in Belorussia. https://twitter.com/AlinaLeonovaSF/status/1499459505071038468 https://twitter.com/AlinaLeonovaSF/status/149945950507103846...
- paganel 5y ago
  Moldova just announced that if you openly support the war/the Russian invasion in neighbouring Ukraine you risk prison, so it can also go the other way. I sort of understand why Moldova is doing it (small country a throne's stone away from Odessa and the Russian troops), the idea is that all sides are giving up democracy and the rule of law as fast as they can (the West a little slower, but it's following the same path).
llIIllIIllIIl 5y ago
So they are choosing bankruptcy over jail. What an honorable way. Let them do it with glory.
- tenpies 5y ago
  I hope you're honourably on your way to Ukraine then. If you're willing to condemn them and their families to 15 years of prison for "honour", it's the least you could do. My point is that it's extremely easy to condemn people online, but 99% of Westerners have never even had a contrarian position, let alone a contrarian position against an authoritarian government. Canadians had a hint of it during the Trucker Protest if they donated and had their banking cancelled, but that's been about as close as the West has been to this sort of regime.
  - Talanes 5y ago
    >let alone a contrarian position against an authoritarian government. I think this is the meat of it. Plenty of westerners have some level of contrarian positions, but we don't face real resistance for it and thus fall into the trap of thinking it's easy for everyone else.
paxys 5y ago
That law was signed yesterday. Yandex has been operating for 25 years. Let's not pretend that they are the victim here. The Russian oligarchy has been fully complicit and even instrumental in getting the country to the state it is in today. Yandex itself has been an arm of Putin's government for many years (https://www.ft.com/content/dce2e23c-15c5-11ea-8d73-6303645ac406 https://www.ft.com/content/dce2e23c-15c5-11ea-8d73-6303645ac...).
- trhway 5y ago
  Yandex was back then giving FSB info on people donating to opposition.
- molodec 5y ago
  You are right it didn't start yesterday. Over the years Putin slowly but surely took control over all main media and news sources and the country let him with little to no resistance, but today it is too late. The remaining liberal channels were shut down this week. https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russian-prosecutors-demand-restricted-access-radio-station-tv-2022-03-01/ https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russian-prosecutors-dem...
rectang 5y ago
The point of sanctions is to make people like these Yandex employees discontented. Before they could shrug their shoulders, going along with it because there was little choice, and live their lives in stability and comfort, sheltered from the atrocities perpetrated by their government. But now they are harmed through economic retaliation. Ideally it drives down Russian support for the war and Putin's popularity, which right now are disgustingly high. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't, it's drastic and heavily coercive, and it's arguably collateral damage. But it's not like these Russian programmers are having their apartments shelled. This is war through other means, and war is hell.
- vertis 5y ago
  If some of the other threads are anything to go by, Russian tech people are looking to leave Russia.
  - rad_gruchalski 5y ago
    And so the old people of Russia have what they wanted - USSR 2.0.
orbital-decay 5y ago
Long before the censorship, when they got plenty of leverage to meaningfully resist it, Yandex was one of the first companies supporting the "Safe Internet League", along with Vimpelcom and others. They were the first to run to Kremlin in an attempt to strike a deal to guarantee themselves a place under the sun in a brave new world, long before the first censorship laws were even discussed. Yandex picked the sides long ago, and now they are paying for being on the wrong side of the history. They aren't just complicit in censorship somehow, they are the censors themselves.

sandworm101 5y ago

And all thoee buckets of cash they are bragging about mean nothing. No rational person would be sending money into Russia right now, let alone converting dollars into rubles. The money outside of Russia today will stay outside. The money still inside Russia will diminish in value, that is until it is siezed. Yandex's days as a going concern may be numbered. Thats what happens when a business is caught out straddling both sides of a new sanctions regime. Maybe they can buy a soccer team.

lowkey 5y ago

Do you have equal contempt for the New York Times which knowingly sold us a War in Iraq by constantly repeating a lie about WMD, resulting in 500,000 dead Iraqis? There are no 'good guys' in this war. - Putin is a brutal dictator. - America is pushing an amazing amount of propaganda in this war while simultaneously sending arms and funds to back a Saudi bombing campaign in Yemen targeting civilians. - Ukraine has enlisted openly white supremacist neo-nazi's in their national guard to fight Russia in the east. - Facebook even unbanned the Ukranian Azov Brigade [0] this week as long as they are fighting the Russians [1] This is a war with no heroes and no winners, even though we have been taught to hate the 'others' to the point of targeting everyday Russian citizens, even those who oppose Putin's actions. The truth is the first casualty in times of war. Propaganda works on all of us. The best thing we can do is realize that fact. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azov_Battalion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azov_Battalion [1] https://theintercept.com/2022/02/24/ukraine-facebook-azov-battalion-russia/ https://theintercept.com/2022/02/24/ukraine-facebook-azov-ba...

ibero 5y ago
> this is a war with no heroes pretty sure i seen some heroes.
- lowkey 5y ago
  How sure are you that at least some of that wasn't manufactured propaganda? You do realize that propaganda works for both sides and it can be hard to identify in the fog of war. All I am saying is that it pays to be skeptical in these troubling times.
  - ibero 5y ago
    i saw a man running into a crumbling building that was mortared to hell to get their neighbors children out.
    - lowkey 5y ago
      That is fantastic and that man is most certainly a hero, no argument. That said, my question was about how certain you were that at least some of the heroic acts you read or watched, were not some form of propaganda? Call me cynical but as soon as the conflict started I started investigating claims from both sides and I learned that a significant amount of what we heard early in this invasion turned out to be false propaganda. Examples: - Figher Ghost Ace turns out to be a myth https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022/03/02/ukraines-fighter-ace-ghost-of-kyiv-may-be-myth-its-lethal-war-morale.html https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022/03/02/ukraines-figh... - Israel TV Channel shows Star Wars Tie Fighter crash landed in Ukraine https://www.nytimespost.com/israeli-tv-channel-runs-live-footage-from-ukraine-showing-crash-landed-tie-fighter-from-star-wars/ https://www.nytimespost.com/israeli-tv-channel-runs-live-foo... - According to Reuters/MSNBC/US Officials - There is no evidence Russia attacked nuclear reactors in Ukraine. https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-usa-nuclear-energy-idUKW1N2U401C https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-usa-nuclear-e...

aasasd 5y ago

Please explain how Yandex News is supposed to transmit anti-government news, when there's been a ‘news aggregators’ law for years, which specifically forbids them to do that.

Klaster_1 5y ago
An understandable argument. They could always have closed the News service in protest to the law, that ain't punishable.
codedokode 5y ago
No, I think that you are wrong. That law that you mention requires only to publish news from officially registered media. At that moment there were officially registered not-pro-Putin media that could be used as a source (for example, covering anti-government protests, trial on Navalny and so on), but Yandex preferred to tune the algorithm so that it chooses news from pro-Putin media for the homepage that is seen by millions of people. Yandex chose to become a propaganda outlet. Some of the news that they re-publish from propaganda media are very low quality and, I think, even violate Yandex's own rules. If you understand Russian, read this headline for example: [1]. For those, who don't understand Russian, the headline contains the word "shit" while describing (with rejoice) how Lyubov Sobol was denied to take part in Moscow State Duma elections. There was no law requiring Yandex to accept such publications for their news aggregator, but they accepted it. [1] https://newssearch.yandex.ru/news/search?text=%D0%B1%D0%BB%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%B4%D0%B8%D0%BD%D0%BA%D0%B0+%D0%B2+%D1%88%D0%BE%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%B4%D0%B5+%D1%81%D0%BE%D0%B1%D0%BE%D0%BB%D1%8C+%D0%BD%D0%B0%D0%B2%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BD%D1%83%D0%BB%D0%B0 https://newssearch.yandex.ru/news/search?text=%D0%B1%D0%BB%D...
- aasasd 5y ago
  Hmm, I looked into the law, and you seem to be right. Not sure now why the law was treated as the end of ‘independent’ Yandex News back then—though of course it was obvious that the gov wanted to control it and did everything it could think of, to that end. Personally I stopped paying attention to YN after that. Rukipedia even has a section on incidents suggesting both manual fiddling with the YN output and the government's stuffing of it: https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Яндекс.Новости#Критика https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Яндекс.Новости#Критика As for the example you cite: if it was found just in the ‘news search’, then it's possibly not from a source ‘certified’ for appearing in the main news feed—from what I've read, it seems that the search includes many more sources than the feed, and is possibly not regulated by that law.

paganel 5y ago

They still presented search results in their general search engine that were banned by Google (some of them because of stupid EU laws, some others because of stupid copyright laws), that was nice.