Media Use in Putin's Russia

Abstract

During the past 15 years Russia has been transformed from a newspaper-reading country to a mainly television-watching country. Entertainment channels have increased their audience recently and regularly reach almost half of the population in towns and cities. Survey results collected in February 2007 suggest that the Internet is taking the place of newspapers, especially among the educated, high-income elites and youth. Newspapers do not appear to be responding to the needs of the middle-class audience, while magazines and the Internet are becoming more important media. In general, those media that have modelled themselves on their Western counterparts have had more success at keeping and even increasing their audience.