Facebook’s recent outage elicited strong responses around the world, but none more dramatic than that of the Russian government, which summarily noted that the 6-hour blackout “answer[s] the question about whether we need our own social media and internet platforms.” If Russia’s redoubled attempts to build an alternative internet and a range of off-brand social media platforms seems an overreaction to a few hours spent without Instagram, that’s because it is. But the move masks a deeper reality: the Russian government feels increasingly threatened by a young generation shaped by access to state-independent social media.
