Thanks to all the conscientious citizens who have taken part and continue to take part. To the unconscientious (or simply lazy), let me remind you that their indifference is encouraging the Russian government to go ahead with plans to confiscate a year’s worth of pension savings from 25 million people between the ages of 18 and 46. Here you can calculate exactly how much will be stolen from you. Still, it’s worth noting that there are many conscientious people. 16,899 people have sent an appeal to their State Duma deputy. That works out to roughly 37 appeals per deputy. Naturally, deputies from Moscow will receive the most appeals, but the regions have also joined in quite actively: 82 regions have already taken part in the campaign.
For example, the top 30 looks like this:
and here’s the bottom of the list
You could say: “The Jewish Autonomous Oblast is protesting 300% more actively than Karachay-Cherkessia.” We are continuing our work to personalize the responsibility of each deputy:
Today, a paper appeal was delivered to each of the 450 State Duma deputies. Later, we will publish a public table where next to each deputy’s name there will be a link to their response to the appeal (or the ominous note “did not respond to the appeal”), as well as information on how they voted for the “law on pension robbery.” Each of the 25 million people whose annual pension savings are being stolen will be able to go there and see a personalized list of thieves. In addition, we sent official appeals to every faction leader in the State Duma (including United Russia), and their responses will be published. Several people wrote to me saying, “Stop boasting and scaring deputies with the claim that 25 million people will hear about the campaign. Only readers of your LiveJournal and a small number of media outlets that covered the campaign will hear about it—that’s 3 million people at most.” A fair point, and we’ve taken it into account. We want to use the tools that proved effective during the election campaign. For example, paid online advertising. Almost all of our 25 million victims have internet access. That’s excellent. Here it is:
We at ACF (the Anti-Corruption Foundation) chipped in ourselves for now and raised 100,000 rubles (about US$1,100), which we simply used to buy Google search ads.
(That’s just how Google phrases it as “100,000 rubles per day”; in reality, for now, that is the budget for the entire campaign.)
We invite you to take part as well. We figured that if our cheerful calculator shows that the government and the State Duma are going to confiscate tens of thousands of rubles from you, then there’s a good chance that, in order to protect that money and put pressure on deputies (or maybe just out of spite), you might also throw in 500 rubles (about US$5.50) to a special Yandex wallet, which we will use to pay for the campaign’s online advertising. All funds received in this wallet will be used solely and exclusively for Google Ads, Yandex Direct, and advertising on Facebook and VK. The advantage of this advertising is that it is completely transparent, and it is easy for us to report how much was spent on what, which keywords were purchased, and so on. By the way, if you are a specialist in contextual advertising, we would be very glad for your volunteer help in making this advertising more effective. It will be an interesting experiment. And of course, don’t forget that your personal participation is better than any advertising. Posting this link on your social networks is a very powerful (and free) way to spread the word. Give a sharp poke to those who want to confiscate your pension savings: Write to your deputy. Chip in the cost of two cups of coffee to pay for the campaign’s online advertising: