A Contest for One Million Rubles
Text version
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Hi, this is Navalny, and today is my
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birthday, hey-hey, and let's
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imagine that I've invited all the viewers
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of my channel to a party. And what do people
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do at parties? That's right: contests.
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And most of the time they're pretty awful, but ours
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is going to be a great and useful contest.
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So, what do we love? We love YouTube. What
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don't we love? We don't love television. It's
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deceitful and disgusting. What do we want? We
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want people to turn to
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our wonderful YouTube for news and opinions,
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not disgusting television. But right now there's a lot of
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all kinds of nonsense here—unboxing iPhones,
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opening Kinder Surprise eggs, and almost
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no decent video bloggers who
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talk about politics, especially about the regions, and
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my contest is an attempt to change
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that at least a little. I'm taking 1 million rubles
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(about 1 million rubles total) and dividing it into three parts.
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Third prize: 200,000 rubles. Second prize:
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300,000 rubles. And first prize: 500,000 rubles.
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They will go to the people who
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launch the most successful video blogs
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with a political focus. I'm sure
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that right now this video is being watched by just
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a huge number of people who could
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start a wonderful, talented
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video blog, tell people the truth,
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gain recognition from it, maybe
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even make some money—but they're worried,
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they're shy, and they think they won't
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succeed, that all of this is terribly difficult,
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terribly expensive.
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I've been through all of that myself when
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I launched this channel, when we launched
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our live-streaming channel, Navalny
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Live. But guys, it turned out that everything
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is, first of all, very inexpensive, and can be done
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almost for free; that people will watch you
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if you don't lie, if you speak interestingly,
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and if you spend your time
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making the product good,
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high-quality. So don't be shy.
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Give it a try. In the end, if
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it works out, great. And if it doesn't,
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that's not the end of the world. Now
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I'll answer the questions that have obviously
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already
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come up. You need to create a channel on
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YouTube and start posting videos there
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or doing streams—that part is up to you,
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but no less than twice a week.
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You must record your first video by
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June 12.
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No, I don't care how you feel
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about me. Support me if you want, don't if you
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don't—that's your business. But what
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is fundamentally important is that your channel must
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be critical of the authorities, both
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federal and local. That is the key
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condition: no less than 50% of your channel's time and topics
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must concern local
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problems—corruption, bad roads, well, I don't
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know, everything you don't like about
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your city and your region. But
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that criticism must be well-founded and
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honest. There's no need to make anything up. You
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should really go after the authorities, but
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for good reason, so that anyone can say about you:
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this is an honest person's channel.
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Write a post on your social media
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saying that you're taking part in this contest,
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why you're doing it, post your
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first video, and send us the link to
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the email address that has just appeared somewhere
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on
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the screen. We need real, consistently
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active, high-quality channels, so
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of course we won't be summing things up in
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a week or a month, but in mid-
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September, when we'll all be able to see that
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the participating channels have truly
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taken shape and are capable of producing content
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on a regular basis. When the results are tallied,
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we'll take into account both video views and
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the number of channel subscribers, as well as the quality
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of the content. But in order to avoid
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any artificial boosting, I'll say right away that this will not
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be a purely technical decision—like,
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whoever has more subscribers wins.
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I'll create an honest panel of journalists
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and other video bloggers, and by their
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decision they will award these prizes.
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Yes, I'll raise it online, the way we usually
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do. I don't doubt for a second that
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we'll find 10,000 people who will each chip in 100
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rubles to take part in such an
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interesting
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experiment. Well, basically anyone can participate except, of course,
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already established channels with
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more than 100,000 subscribers. If you
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already have 100,000, then good for you,
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hello to you—but you can't
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take part. Yes, maybe there won't be any
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problems. Though of course I'm afraid that possibility
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always exists, but I still
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hope it won't happen.
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Don't worry about that. Look, the most
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popular newspaper in your city is read by
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maybe 10,000 people. So
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if you really try and
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put in the effort, pretty quickly you
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will get a larger audience. That
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can happen easily, and you'll become more influential
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than the most famous journalist in your
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city. We'll try to help you
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gain traction—we'll share links, mention you
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in places. After all, that's exactly what
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a beginning video blogger needs
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most of all. It's quite possible that you won't
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win these prizes, but taking part in the
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contest will give your channel an excellent start,
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and in a year you'll surpass not just me, but even
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Ivanгай (a popular Russian-speaking YouTuber).
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so that you can buy yourself equipment to
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make your channel even better. But in
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principle, you can also buy yourself some ice cream.
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to the fullest
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I see a question has come up about how
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to wish you a happy birthday, Alexei
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How glad I am that this thought occurred to you
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Thank you very much. Congratulating me
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is very easy: there’s a link in the description to
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funding for my election
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campaign—throw in any amount of
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money there. And subscribe to our channel
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they tell the truth here
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the truth. L