Russia Launches Ruwiki, A Wikipedia Alternative With A Pro-Putin Stance
Russia has recently introduced Ruwiki, an alternative version of Wikipedia that presents a significantly more favorable view of President Vladimir Putin and his government.
The initiative is spearheaded by Vladimir Medeyko, formerly a prominent Russian-language editor at Wikipedia, who decided to leave the platform after 20 years to establish this Kremlin-aligned rival.
Medeyko emphasized that Ruwiki would maintain a neutral standpoint, prioritize high-quality sources, and adhere to Russia’s strict media and freedom of speech regulations, which are known to be stringent.
The launch of Ruwiki in July comes after a prolonged conflict between the open-source encyclopedia and the Russian authorities.
In June of the previous year, Wikipedia refused to comply with a Russian court’s demand to remove articles related to the invasion of Ukraine. As a consequence, Wikipedia has faced multiple fines from the Russian government.
Ruwiki’s content is essentially a direct copy of the 1.9 million articles from Russian Wikipedia, but it exhibits notable alterations.
A comparison conducted by SurgeZirc SA using Google Translate on July 13 revealed significant differences between Ruwiki and Russian Wikipedia.
For instance, the “criticism” section of Putin’s page, which comprises roughly 2,500 words on Russian Wikipedia, has been condensed to a few paragraphs on Ruwiki. However, certain sympathetic comments from a US academic have been retained.
Furthermore, while Russian Wikipedia contains a page dedicated to the 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Ruwiki has omitted any reference to the conflict, instead using the Kremlin-approved term “special military operation.”
Ruwiki also appears to have removed all mentions of the recent rebellion by the Wagner Group. Russian Wikipedia, on the other hand, features a dedicated article on this event, which involved Wagner forces advancing towards Moscow and coming within 125 miles of the capital before retreating.
Notably, a section discussing the disagreements between Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin and Russia’s Ministry of Defense is listed as pending on Ruwiki.
It is important to mention that Ruwiki is currently in its beta version, restricting editing access to external users.
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The launch of Ruwiki is seen by some as a potential precursor to a Russian ban on Wikipedia, given that the platform is one of the country’s most popular websites, according to Bloomberg’s report.
Additionally, Russia has been developing various laws and technologies to enable greater isolation of its internet from the global web, as reported by Wired.
