Yesterday’s post sparked a major discussion in journalistic circles, and I’m glad it did — the discussion matters.
That said, I didn’t express myself very clearly, and so the main thing being discussed is: “Navalny doesn’t want to give us interviews; he only wants to speak on his own channel.” There’s really no point in even discussing that, because it simply isn’t true.
Yes, our channel reaches a larger audience than many media outlets, but I’m not celebrating the channel’s success here so much as worrying about how small the audience reach of independent media is. Navalny.live is something put together in a makeshift way in one of the ACF’s (Anti-Corruption Foundation’s) rooms by people who don’t know a damn thing about this. We have exactly one format: a talking head. The whole thing costs next to nothing. And it frustrates me that professionals with incomparably greater experience and far more resources aren’t making the effort to create something better — and, most importantly, something with even broader reach.
I give interviews to the media in enormous numbers. I can guarantee that there is no one in Russia right now who gives more. We opened 44 campaign offices. I personally opened 34 of them, which means I held 34 public meetings where I answered any questions people had. I also gave 30 press conferences for regional media outlets (though any federal journalist could attend), and at least 60 one-on-one interviews to regional media.
We have a special project featuring photos of what we do, taken by someone independent of us.
So I try to be as open to the press as possible, and I’ll keep doing that to the extent that it still allows me to do substantive work as well, rather than just hand out interviews.
To continue the point of that post, here’s what I want to say. I genuinely believe this is a very good time for a journalist and for journalism — specifically in Russia. Yes, censorship is crushing everything. But it also creates millions of people who desperately need truthful information. That sharply increases the demand for journalists who know how to work and aren’t lazy. A huge number of things become interesting simply because they’re forbidden and can’t be written about. Write about them, and you’ll become famous. You’ll gain a large audience and win journalism awards. Sure, you may also come under pressure, but everything in life has its price.
Of course, if you’re an editor-in-chief or a publisher, if you have to find money just to keep an outlet alive, then you’re living in hell. I’m hugging you and crying with you. I honestly don’t understand how you survive. Those of you who somehow manage to remain independent and stay afloat — they should be putting up monuments to you. You’re heroes.
But if you’re just a journalist, then your life is amazing and full of adventure. You get paid for doing deeply interesting work that millions of people need. And millions will read you, if you don’t get lazy and constantly whine.
That’s the key point. I insist that it is laziness, lack of initiative, and idleness that are burying Russian journalism faster than Putin is.
Here’s an example that personally got to me.
There was the trial with Usmanov. A high-profile story. Clicks. Traffic. Everyone wrote about it a million times. But within that dispute there were many different angles, all of them very interesting. I can understand why journalists didn’t dig into the taxes — numbers, time-consuming, complicated, hard. What I understand less is why no one thoroughly unpacked the estate deal worth 5 billion rubles (about $85 million at the time). You’d only need to interview a few people to expose everyone involved almost immediately.
And I really don’t understand why no one took up the issue of censorship at Kommersant (a major Russian newspaper). It’s also a story about journalists themselves.
The court ruled that Usmanov was not involved in censorship. But there was Kovalsky’s dismissal. There was an open letter from journalists.
And at the trial itself, strange things happened: appearing as witnesses for Usmanov were A. Kolesnikov (“chief journalist” of *Kommersant*), executive editor Yakovlev, and the publication’s CEO Zhelonkin — but they were not questioned.
What did they want to say? What does Kovalsky think about all this? And what about the signatories of that letter? They’re in your contacts. They’re your friends. They’re easy to interview. Do they agree with the court’s ruling? Would they sign the letter again? Why are they silent? What do they think of Usmanov? Are they denying censorship because they’re being paid? What do other well-known journalists think of the court’s decision?
Why is Usmanov’s representative saying, “He didn’t fire him”? That’s easy to verify — there he is, standing in the hallway. Go up and ask him.
To write an incredibly interesting feature on this subject, all you need is: a) the desire, and b) a phone. And you wouldn’t even need to call secretive officials — just your chatty fellow journalists.
It costs 0 rubles. No business trips required.
And the result would be a great piece. It would raise important questions. It would make people think. Ethics, morality, whim, metaphysical undertones, scandalous quotes — everyone loves that stuff.
So where is that piece? My apologies if I somehow missed it, but as far as I can tell, it doesn’t exist. The only thing I saw was Smirnov writing about it on Telegram.
No one got the tens of thousands — maybe even hundreds of thousands — of clicks. No one got the fame. No award.
There’s nothing at all. All they do on Facebook is pick Navalny apart — he’s gotten too full of himself and doesn’t want to give us an interview where we can, for the hundred-millionth time, ask the all-important question: “How do you explain the fact that you still haven’t been killed?”
To sum up: those who work and want to do good journalism are perfectly capable of doing it. And the main reason there is so little good journalism is cowardice and laziness — with laziness outweighing cowardice a hundredfold.
P.S. Sorry if I sound preachy, but just as voters have every right to lecture politicians, readers and viewers have every right to lecture the media.