Искали в наперстках - и здравых умах;
Гонялись с надеждой и вилкой;
Грозили пакетами ценных бумаг;
И мылом маня, и ухмылкой.
CHAOS AND HATE
WHAT RUSSIAN SOCIAL NETWORK VK SAYS ABOUT UKRAINIAN ELECTION
On March 27th, 2019, Internews Ukraine and UkraineWorld presented key findings of the research 'Chaos and Hate: What Russian Social Network VKontakte Says About Ukrainian Election'. Using neural networks and artificial intelligence approaches, data research analysts studied 1 mln profiles of the Ukrainian segment of VK and almost 10 mln posts to understand: what is going on here ahead of the Ukrainian elections.
10 KEY CONCLUSIONS
1. VKONTAKTE IS LOSING ITS AUDIENCE, BUT BECOMING INCREASINGLY PRO-RUSSIAN
This can be seen as a direct consequence of the Ukrainian sanctions enacted on certain Russian internet products, including VKontakte, in 2017.
However, pro-Russian rhetoric is now much more widely represented in VK posts than in 2017. Today, Vkontakte is a breeding ground for the “Russian world” messages and narratives to a greater extent than a few years ago.
2. KEY UKRAINIAN VKONTAKTE USERS ARE IN DONBASS AND… KYIV
The greatest total number of active users in the Ukrainian segment of Vkontakte are located in the Donetsk oblast, followed by Dnipropetrovsk oblast. Kyiv city comes third. Luhansk oblast is fourth, followed by Kharkiv oblast and Odesa oblast.
The greatest number of active VK users who wrote about the election are located in Donetsk oblast (29.7%), followed by Dnipropetrovsk oblast (10.7%), Luhansk oblast (9.9%) and Kyiv
3. ANTI-GOVERNMENT AND PRO-RUSSIAN SOURCES FLOURISH ON VKONTAKTE
4. NEGATIVE MESSAGES DOMINATE
5. ONLY ZELENSKYI ENJOYS AT LEAST SOME (BUT NOT SUBSTANTIAL) POSITIVE REMARKS
6. POROSHENKO IS THE KEY TARGET OF HATE SPEECH
7. EVEN CANDIDATES WITH PRO-RUSSIAN RHETORIC GET MOSTLY NEGATIVE MESSAGES
8. HATE SPEECH IS FLOURISHING
9. ANTISEMITISM IS FLOURISHING TOO
10. UKRAINE IS PRESENTED AS A FAKE COUNTRY