In short: Google needs to pull itself together and start complying with the requirements of Russian legislation. Simple and straightforward.
Since approximately July 24, problems with uploading videos to YouTube have been observed in Russia, and since August 1, uploading content from Google’s video hosting service in the Russian Federation via home provider networks has stopped altogether. Government officials linked the situation to the total degradation of Google’s network in Russia and the company’s unwillingness to modernize this network given the constantly growing traffic to YouTube, as well as to the act of forcing Google to comply with Russian legislation regarding the exclusion of prohibited video content at least from search results and algorithms, and preferably from servers altogether.
Google has not yet come to its senses, which means that YouTube in Russia will gradually and inevitably “die” and lose its audience. VK Video is already gaining popularity at a frantic pace, and the explanation for this is simple: not everyone is ready to fork out for a paid VPN without speed and connection time restrictions in order to restore access to YouTube, and without these moves, the American video hosting works only through a mobile application and only through a mobile Internet network, which, as you understand, is not always convenient.
And so, today, Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Information Policy Anton Gorelkin explained what must happen for YouTube in Russia to resume work as before. The conditions are, in fact, simple and quite natural. Google is required to officially return to Russia and open its representative office in the country, then pay all fines, start upgrading its equipment and fully comply with the domestic legislation of the Russian Federation. Simply put, content banned in the Russian Federation must be removed from YouTube at the first request of Roskomnadzor, and YouTube has no right to ignore these requirements.
A forced blocking of YouTube in Russia, Gorelkin added, is not being considered. Obviously, Russia hopes that Google will come to its senses and understand that it will not be able to be present on the market and be free from its demands. Hope, of course, dies last, but in the case of Twitter, Russia has not waited for any glimmer of common sense from the company. Just as it has not waited for Meta (an extremist organization banned in Russia). Perhaps things will turn out differently with Google, but we would not count on it.
