National information policies and Russian-speaking social media as a driver of Kazakhstan — Russia integration

Introduction

Many countries traditionally consider regional integration as a solution allowing to withstand growing globalization and build a foundation for economic cooperation. Meanwhile, other no less relevant non-economic interests allow countries to play a more prominent role in international politics [Kembayev 2016]. Those include sociological, ideological, and information factors [Lagutina 2015]. As a rule, regional unions have broader space for action, than associations of geographically distant states, although some scholars suggest distinguishing integration from regionalization [Söderbaum 2007]. A. Bagayeva defines regionalization as a process of ‘neighbor states with strong internal relations and focus on regional agenda’ drawing politically and economically closer to one another. Eastern Europe of today is an unfavorable case of failure to integrate regionally, suggesting that the opposite processes of separation and alienation take over where integration fails. According to A. Bagaeva [Bagayeva 2015], however, balanced relations are a key enabler of regional integration, with the latter sustained at three levels — the social level (including people and different social groups), the institutional level (the state, parties, and organizations), and the ideological level, where mass media as an institution is paramount [Bagayeva 2015].

Today the Internet is a dominant information network providing network integration based on linguistic identity, which makes it highly responsive to any integration processes [Kuznetsov 2018]. The incoming information flows from neighboring countries shape perceptions of border states citizens, providing an insight into their social problems and political sentiments. For example, in North America and Europe, the prevalence of English language with its extensive media market and the Internet space has formulated the idea of ‘a collective West’ among their citizens who share common culture and worldviews. Post-Soviet countries are unique for the extensive use of Russian language, which in turn shapes the image of the ‘Russian world’ the West. Over the past three decades, however, post-Soviet countries have undergone a dramatic transformation in their perception and use of Russian language and culture. Today, the way post-Soviet states perceive one another is a hardest challenge and a test for the apparent success of regional integration.

The discussion at Our Neighbors: A View from Russia roundtable considered the most important factors that shape Russia’s perceptions of post-Soviet republics, with the participants predominantly referring to ‘the augmented importance of instant information sharing amid globalization and the Internet. Mass media in general and new political communication formats in particular shape neighboring countries’ profile via official public media, as well as via a plethora of informal Internet communication networks beyond public authority control’ [Shutov 2017]. This factor acts bilaterally, as the Internet, with its public availability in post-Soviet republics, allows their nationals to access information about Russia without constraints. In this respect, social networks have an essential role to play.

At the same time, some papers highlight the differences in national legal regulation of mass media activities among EAEU countries. ‘Amid rising geopolitical conflicts and intensified information wars’ information security laws require harmonization, rather than unification [Vikhrova, Gorlova 2022]. Vikhrova et al. suggest harmonizing legal regulations and concepts in order to consolidate common information policies enshrined in the EAEU law. A case in point is legislative regulation of social networks in Russia and Belarus. On July 10, 2023 the Law on Online Platforms and Online Advertising was adopted in Kazakhstan following a great deal of discussions at the draft stage before entering into force on September 9, 2023. The pioneering law provides definitions to numerous terms regarding social media. Those include such concepts as account, public community, instant messaging serviceand others¹.

Among other provisions, the Law considers the language of communication for online platforms. The Law obliges platform owners to ensure availability of platform data in Kazakh language, access to automatic translation of platform content into Kazakh, and Kazakh content moderation. Meanwhile, content in Russian language is extensively present on Kazakhstan websites and social networks. Accidentally, the Law does not impose specific requirements to moderate content in other languages.

Today in post-Soviet countries and globally, public institutions, agencies, politicians, and civic leaders are extensively exploring social networks. As a rule, the language of personal blogs in Russia often depends on the region, while in Kazakhstan, leaders of various levels maintain bilingual social accounts both in Kazakh and Russian languages.

On August 3, 2023 Tadviser​.com corporate informatization portal issued the Social networks (Russian Federation market)review informing that in 2023 Russia launched its first training program for public officials on using social networks in their work. The course on How to maintain official pages of government bodies in social networks was included in the skills improvement program.

Earlier in 2022 Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin approved of two social networks for senior officials to host their personal accounts — “Odnoklassniki” and VK. Before adopting a relevant law, President Vladimir Putin spoke about mandatory use of social networks by all government agencies. At the same time, Russia imposed a ban on a few foreign social networks with the released traffic capacities shared mainly by the still available Telegram and VK.

Although officially not prescribed by law, Kazakhstan has an informal recommendation obliging officials to maintain their profiles in social networks. Generally, regional akims and administrations of rural districts have Facebook* and Instagram* accounts². In his interview Kasym-Jomart Tokayev, President of Kazakhstan, mentioned that he responds to messages in social networks in person and sometimes may use WhatsApp* to delegate tasks. President’s page has over 349,000 subscribers in X (ex-Twitter) and 2.6 million in Instagram*.

Ample evidence suggests that in the EAEU and the CIS, integration processes largely depend on prevalence of Russian language adopted as the EAEU working language under the EAEU Treaty, rather than national legislation of individual countries³. Russian is also the working language of the CIS. Today social networks in Belarus and Kazakhstan are estimated to show high prevalence of Russian language.

Literature review

For centuries Russian language and culture were broadly spread in Central Asia. In numerous reports and speeches, politicians, political scientists, and scholars have referred to language as an important soft power. These days, however, Russian is said to have somewhat weakened in its position. Transition to Latin-based alphabet and constitutionally prohibited official communication in Russian in some post-Soviet republics is scarcely the only reason, the CABAR (Central Asian Bureau for Analytical Reporting) agency analysts report. China and Western countries are actively expanding their presence in the region. Turkish, Arabic, and Chinese language schools are becoming more popular in Kazakhstan. ‘Unless Russia revises its humanitarian cooperation strategy with Central Asian countries, education in Russian language is going to lose ground amid such competitive environment, thus weakening dramatically Russia’s presence in the region’ [Bekmurzaev 2019]. The report points out that Kazakhstan is the only country in Central Asia to share its border with Russia and therefore characterized by a lot stronger influence of Russian language and culture. By 2025, Kazakhstan is going to become the third country in Central Asia to transition to a Latin-based alphabet. The current profile of Russian language is not homogeneous across Central Asia. Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan are the only countries in Central Asia to use Russian in official communication on an equal footing with national language. Although constitutionally recognized as a language of interethnic communication, Russian is less common in Tajikistan, whereas in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, it is no longer used officially. Generally, experts identify two different country groups in the region. ‘Group 1 is Kazakhstan showing an increase of Russian-speaking population, despite the 40 % decrease in the population of Russian origin and a targeted public support of Kazakh language; Group 2 are other post-Soviet republics where the position of Russian language has become critically weak’ [Evdokimov, Davydova, Savkin 2020].

In 2022 the Pushkin State Russian Language Institute published a remarkable study comparing the status of Russian globally and in the CIS in particular. The study celebrates the 30^th anniversary of the Commonwealth of Independent States and analyzes the GCI (Global Competitiveness Index) and the SI (Sustainability Index) in post-Soviet countries. The paper concludes that Russian is strongly competitive by its GCI. Although outperformed by English, Chinese, Spanish, and French in the number of speakers, Russian is still ‘keeping a high profile as a language of research papers, international organizations, and Internet websites’ [Arefyev et al. 2022].

The SI was calculated based on different indicators, such as the relative share of children in the post-Soviet countries who study at school in Russian, the relative share of Russian language teachers, etc. ‘Over the last 30 years, the number of university students taught in Russian in the post-Soviet republics has decreased 2.1 times down to 692,300 in the 2019/2020 academic year, corresponding to only 18.4 % of the total university student population in these countries,’ the researchers conclude. For example, by now the higher education institutions of Kazakhstan have lost some 100,000 of Russian-speaking students.

This paper is a pioneering attempt to study the use of Russian language within the framework of Russian language SI in post-Soviet countries. The Republic of Belarus (81 %) and the Republic of Kazakhstan (62 %) share the leading position in this respect for obvious reasons — both countries have large cohorts of Russian-speaking population.

Meanwhile, an expert study on the needs of the media community in Kazakhstan, commissioned by the Internews organization (suspended its activity in Russia in 2007) in 2019, highlighted that the deficit of Russian-speaking employees is a problem for Kazakh journalism. In addition, the experts point out absence of deficit or rather an oversupply of Kazakh-speaking journalists. Expert opinions also emphasize the shortcomings in how public orders are distributed between mass media companies, including the fact that the chance to secure a public order depends on the number of subscribers. Considering that the number of Russian-speaking subscribers shows a downward trend, which is especially evident in the south of the country, ‘the language environment is undergoing transformation,’ an expert survey respondent suggests. ‘It is impossible for us to compete with publications in Kazakh — the ones supported by the government, I mean. Then, either they shut us down, or fund us without these mockery contests. Once, I was on a business trip to a neighborhood, where young people were on no good terms with Russian. I would feel the same if someone addressed me in English. I would understand one word out of ten. Definitely, I wouldn’t subscribe to an English periodical’⁴.

All the above is true for the south of the country, where Kazakh dominates in mass media. The north is totally the opposite. For example, the Kostanay News and the Nasha Gazeta (lit. Our Newspaper) are the top printed regional periodicals by number of copies and subscriptions (hard copy and web page) in the Kostanay region. Both newspapers are published in Russian. Thus, any judgement regarding the status of Russian in Kazakhstan should base on a differentiated approach. Today Kazakhstan has 5,189 registered mass media platforms. Those include 1,852 media in Kazakh and Russian, 853 in Russian, 693 in Kazakh, and 1,512 in three or more languages⁵.

Bilingual mass media is another trait of media market in Kazakhstan. For on-line media, bilingualism with a 50:50 split ratio is mandatory by law, while hard copy periodicals choose between mono- or bilingualism on their own. However, their choice impacts the amount of funding from the state. In Kazakhstan, the practice of delegating state orders to mass media has long been a controversy, ultimately splitting journalists and the audience between the two opposite views. On the one hand, there is awareness that without state funding, mass media can go bankrupt; on the other hand, state-funded media companies may stop caring about being competitive and will produce content to order only. Back in 2018, experts pointed out that in Kazakhstan public mass media funding exceeded advertising revenues⁶.

Some ten years ago Tamara Zhuravel et al. reported that some regions in Kazakhstan are characterized by the prevalence of Russian in mass media. The authors called this phenomenon inert hegemony, pointing out that prevalence of Russian in terms of quantity of media content was due to tradition, rather than a coherent strategy to mainstream the CIS common language [Zhuravel et al. 2014]. Investigators suggested that in the future, ‘there is going to be a dire need for vernacular Russian to ensure its survival in the country, including the mass media space’.

Mass media pages in social networks are an absolutely different story, as they are not subjected to the requirement to observe a specific language split ratio. VK, “Odnoklassniki”, Telegram, Facebook* and Instagram* are the most popular social networks among mass media in Kazakhstan. Usually, mass media posts in social networks are published in the language of the event itself. The popularity of these social networks among mass media entities correlates with how popular these social networks are among common users. In Russian Federation, national social networks are traditional tool of communication among representatives of various nationalities. ‘For migrants living in Russia, communication in social networks is a most important source of information and emotional support,’ Tregubova and Nee suggest. The authors note that migrants from five post-Soviet countries living and working in Russia (Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan) are the most frequent users of Russian social networks [Tregubova, Nee 2020]. Moreover, VK and “Odnoklassniki” social media are generally popular with the audience in these countries and are used in daily communication. ‘As search query statistics shows, social networks are among the most regular requests, with “Odnoklassniki” and VK taking top positions. Both Russian social networks are ultimately popular throughout Central Asia, mostly because of being the pioneers in market to provide content in readerfriendly Russian language’⁷.

Meanwhile, sociological study of mass media consumption demands and literacy in Central Asia performed by Internews (which suspended activities in Russia in 2007) in 2021 shows that in Kazakhstan social media (45.7 %) and websites (42.8 %) are the main source of information, while traditional sources like television (30.4 %), newspapers (6.5 %), and radio (3.9 %) are blatantly poor. ‘The survey has demonstrated that individuals prefer receiving information in Russian on a regular basis while watching television, listening to the radio, or reading newspapers and magazines’, the study reports⁸. Social networks are the top source of information in Russian: 57.2 % of respondents write and read in Russian only; 20.2 % of respondents use both languages on an equal footing; 7.8 % of respondents use Kazakh only. This evidence is supported by the analysis of the use of Russian by Central Asian students studying in Russian universities: ‘Discussions regarding communicative technologies used among foreign students mention social networks first and foremost as a pivotal source of information’ [Savchuk et al. 2020: 32].

Concurrently, Kazakhstani scholars highlight the emergence of parity in KazakhRussian and Russian-Kazakh bilingualism among the nation’s youth, who represent the active majority of users on social media platforms and popular websites. This phenomenon is particularly evident in user-generated comments. According to a study conducted by Kazakhstani researchers, there is a growing frequency of foreign lexical units — borrowed via the Russian language—within Kazakh internet discourse. ‘The borrowings under investigation are actively employed in contemporary Kazakh online discourse and span all spheres of life, including medicine, sports, economics, and others’ [Zhanpeissova et al. 2023].

A similar situation is observed in Uzbekistan, where both the assimilation of lexemes and expressions through calquing and the formation of Uzbek constructions under the influence of external expressions — at the phrasal and sentential levels — occur. ‘Under the influence of the Russian language, lexemes assimilated through calquing or borrowed concepts expressed in Uzbek words are frequently encountered in the Uzbek language’ [Popov 2022].

Grebenyuk argues that one of the key functions of social media is the partial compensation for the lack of social interaction in the host country. ‘Therefore, many such solidarity-based groups are organized along regional lines, and in Russia, they are often associated with specific major cities (for example, communities of Kazakhs in Moscow, Uzbeks in Saint Petersburg, etc.)’ [Grebenyuk, Subbotin 2021].

On the integration of the Russian and Belarusian languages within mass media discourse, Belarusian scholar M. I. Konyushkevich writes: ‘The coexistence and interaction of Russian and Belarusian in the Belarusian media space is inevitable; moreover, the influence of one language on the other is bidirectional but not symmetrical’ [Konyushkevich 2017].

Methods

To study the prevalence of Russian language in social media of Kazakhstan, the case of VK was considered as a most popular social platform. This network is among the top five most popular social media in Kazakhstan according to Ekonomist​.kz ranking. The ranking 2020 looked as follows with social media arranged from the most to the least demanded: VK, Instagram*, Facebook*, “Odnoklassniki”, and Telegram⁹.

One Million True Stories (OMTS) is the largest VK community in Kazakhstan (vk​.com/​o​m​t​s​_kz) having 1,345,564 subscribers — a lot more than official blogs of such Kazakhstan news agencies as Nur​.kz (605,283 subscribers), Almaty Today (256,327), and egov​.kz state services (258,529). Nur​.kz and Almaty Today are mostly Russian; egov​.kz is bilingual. Parsing was used to determine the geography of subscribers and to provide evidence that the majority of OMTS members come from Kazakhstan.

Though a largest social media community, OMTS appeared in January 2013 and is rather mature comparing to a typical social media community. Its members are active, with posts published daily. Members actively comment on the news or exchange opinions, and moderation is efficient.

Another objective of the OMTS community study was to look at how extensively Russian is used in communication by calculating and comparing the number of posts and comments in Kazakh and Russian. It was curious to analyze whether the language of follow-up comments was associated with the language of the initial post.

A diagram was drafted showing the residence geography of OMTS subscribers throughout Kazakhstan to find out how popular the community is by every region, e. g. whether it is more popular in northern or southern regions of the country, etc.

The study also considers how popular the websites of Kazakhstan mass media (e. g. the Kostanay News, the Petropavlovsk News) are among Russian residents of Kazakhstan– Russia border regions. In addition, Parsing was used to analyze how often border region residents visit the Nash Chelyabinsk community page. Liveinternet and Similarweb allowed to track the statistics and geography of views for dedicated Kazakhstan websites. The findings provided an insight into the extend of Russian language prevalence in Kazakhstan and its use as a main language of social media communication in the web.

Findings

The countries of Central Asia explored international and Russian social media while pursuing to establish national social networks domestically. For example, over many years Kazakhstan regularly announced the launch of various Internet resources for domestic communication among the country nationals. For example, the video hosting platform kiwi​.kz (not to confuse with a similar payment provider) existed for a few years, the blog platform yvision​.kz became relatively popular, and there are a few idly existing forums, perceived by the majority of Kazakhstan users as a relic of the 2000s.

However, Kazakhstan has failed to produce its national social network so far. It might be a matter of the near future, if more effort is invested in the Kazakhstan video hosting platform aitube​.kz, that emerged in response to youtube​.com as is clear by its name. Today the platform attracts 4.5 million users per month, which is quite a lot for a country like Kazakhstan with a population of about 20 million people. Aitube​.kz is noteworthy for communication research in Kazakhstan, as it has a lot in common with a social network, like youtube​.com. Every new video of a popular series (the platform mostly hosts locally produced series) generates over a thousand comments within a few days. Comments in Kazakh and Russian are an equal split. Registration via Google, Apple or vk​.com account is necessary to leave a comment on aitube. kz. After logging-in users shall accept the terms of the user agreement. No authentication by first and last name, e‑mail, etc. is required. Such simplified registration is a great advantage of websites in Kazakhstan, where anonymous comments are usually banned.

Despite all the above, Russian vk​.com has no rivals in Central Asian countries. Shavkat Sabirov, Head of the Internet Association of Kazakhstan, believes that VK, “Odnoklassniki”, and Instagram* are the most popular social networks in Kazakhstan. He is convinced that the popularity of Facebook* is rather exaggerated and is limited to the cities of Astana and Almaty¹⁰.

Russian is the mainstream language of One Million True Stories, the largest community (1.3 million followers). The social media parsing available at vk​.barkov​.net/​s​t​a​t​g​r​o​ups. aspx was applied to scrutinize the community by subscriber geolocation. 454,281 (54.3 %) subscribers were from Kazakhstan; 31,671 (3.79 %) from Russia; 4,404 (0.53 %) from Kyrgyzstan; 20,497 (2.45 %) from the USA; and 6,712 (0.8 %) from South Korea. Thus, almost half of community members are indeed residents of Kazakhstan. The content of the OMTS community is entertaining, without any explicit political discussions, and includes mostly daily life stories rendered by the community members. Prices on advertising posts (5,000 Tenge (10 USD) per post) suggest, that the community was initiated to gain revenue. Nevertheless, as the largest VK community group in Kazakhstan, OMTS demonstrates that Russian is still widely used by Kazakhstan users of the Russian social network.

The community, located at vk​.com/​o​m​t​s​_kz, publishes posts mostly in Russian. Users write comments in Russian and Kazakh. Some posts are bilingual, with subscribers express their opinions in both languages. Few scattered remarks in English and Turkish do not exceed 0.1 % of the total text.

In November 2023, 114 posts were published in the community — 109 posts in Russian and 5 posts in Kazakh. Each post generated 12,400 views on average. To express their activity, visitors use likes (~ 250 likes per post), reposts (maximum 6 per post), and comments (~ 50–60 per news post).

Table 1 shows that the language of comments direct correlates with the language of the initial news post. News posts in Russian are mainly commented in Russian as well, while Kazakh comments prevail for initial news posts in Kazakh. At the same time, users sometimes respond in Kazakh to a Russian news post and vice versa. No explicit criticism was noticed regarding the use of either language.

Table 1. Statistics for the first 20 Russian posts published in November 2023 in One Million True Stories, the largest VK community in Kazakhstan. Compiled by the author based on vk​.com/​o​m​t​s​_kz

Comments on the wall of the One Million True Stories community are written primarily in Russian and Kazakh. At the same time, participants in the dialogue may respond to each other in different languages — for example, one comment may be in Russian, the next in Kazakh. The examples provided below, in the original language, confirm the widespread practice of bilingualism within the Kazakhstani online community. Here is how community members discuss a certain everyday story (the original Kazakh and Russian languages are preserved): «Дана, сен­де сон­дай подру­га ізде, ыржа­лақтап күл­мей. — 100 % она сама гряз­ну­ля и дома унее навер­но бар­дак. — Aida, маа­ал. — Куаныш, мал деме! Мал рен­жіп қала­ды. — Куаныш, ты про себя? Конечно, ты мал». In this dialogue, not only do the responses alternate between languages, but Russian and Kazakh lexicon are also combined within the speech of a single user.

Such bilingual practices are also found in online communities of other countries. In the One Million Kyrgyz Stories group, similar dialogues can be observed (the original Kyrgyz and Russian languages are preserved): «Всё, всё, Омке. Сенин бит­тя сөзүң биз үчүн кят­та май­рам го. Считай, что я уже заки­нул в пред­лож­ку пост про боли в пле­чах. — Пока я пустой, будут идеи — поде­люсь обязательно».

Social networks, in this case VK, clearly reflect from a medialinguistic perspective the habitual behavior of users who are equally proficient in both Russian and the official language of their country. Even in cases where a user is not fluent, for example, in spoken Kazakh, they still comprehend it well enough and respond in whichever language is more convenient for them.

The diagram at Figure 1 showing ten cities demonstrates with the largest number of community subscribers demonstrates that the latter directly correlates with the city population. Although it does not reveal any correlation between the number of subscribers and the country region (south, north, west, or east), the diagram suggests there is a trend for Russian to prevail in the ten cities under consideration.

Fig. 1. Cities of Kazakhstan with the largest share of One Million True Stories subscribers. Retrieved from vk​.barkov​.net

Fig. 2. Statistics for Kazakhstan nationals among subscribers of the Nash Chelyabinsk community by November 2023. Retrieved from vk​.barkov​.net

The success of the One Million True Stories community, established in 2013, led to the emergence of numerous other big communities with similar names. Examples include One Million Malaysian True Stories (a community of Kazakhstani students studying at universities in Malaysia), One Million Kyrgyz Stories, One Million Chinese Stories, One Million KAZGUU Stories, One Million Taraz True Stories, among others. The predominant languages used within these communities are Russian and Kazakh.

Both Kazakh and Russian Internet users find Russian social networks attractive. Thus, 658,000 subscribers of Nash Chelyabinsk (Fig. 2), a largest VK community, includes 741 (little more than 0.1 %) users from the nearby Kazakh city of Kostanay. Meanwhile, 113,000 subscribers of the Kostanay News community include 1,489 from Chelyabinsk (1.3 %).

Mass media of Kazakhstan, in particular those with cross-border coverage, are followed by citizens of other countries, first and foremost Russia. According to Similarweb. com, 3.75 % of Kostanay News readers are Russians; readers from Russia constitute up to 6.47 % Petropavlovsk News readers. Figure 3 shows the distribution of pkzsk​.info webpage visitors by cities of Russia, September through November 2023 (data provided by Liveinternet​.ru).

VK, a Russian social network, has been traditionally popular with Kazakhstan nationals. VK communities among Kazakhstan population amount to over 17,000 (dated November 2023), including 187 with over 10,000 subscribers. Hardly any new social platform launched in Russia or Kazakhstan would ever gain such popularity in Kazakhstan in the near future.

Another popular social network in Kazakhstan (included in the register of social networks by Roskomnadzor in October 2021) is Telegram. Legally, the company is registered in United Arab Emirates, however, the development of Telegram began three years prior to Pavel Durov’s departure from VK, which is why many users consider the messenger to be of Russian origin. According to Durov, Telegram has 12.5 million users in Kazakhstan¹¹.

At the same time, Azimzhanov and Myssayeva, citing the Kazakhstani marketing agency Wunder Digital, provide different data: “Based on the 2023 data, TikTok, Instagram*, and WhatsApp* emerged as the most popular platforms in Kazakhstan. In contrast, Uzbekistan’s digital ecosystem is dominated by YouTube, Telegram, and Instagram*” [Azimzhanov, Myssayeva 2025].

The extent of Russian and other language usage is reported by the company Brand Analytics, which analyzed data from five social platforms — VK, “Odnoklassniki”, YouTube, Facebook* and Instagram* — in August 2024. According to the data presented by Brand Analytics (Fig. 4), the prevalence of the Russian language on VK and “Odnoklassniki” among Kazakhstani users exceeds 70 percent.

On March 14, 2022 Russian IT-developers Alexander Zobov and Kirill Filimonov launched Rossgram, a Russian social network similar to Instagram*, considering that the latter is blocked in Russia. The introductory post on the Rossgram VK page explicitly admitted that the platform is in fact an equivalent of the banned foreign app. In early 2023, public registration was still unavailable on Rossgram website. However, preliminary early registration was available, followed by notification on availability of social network access. The app visual design with its three-row grid design, stories on top, identical likes and subscriptions explicitly suggest that Rossgram is an equivalent of Instagram*. At the moment, the VK account of newly emerged social network has a little more than 100,000 subscribers, which is not much. The composition of its audience includes 82 % of Russian users. The VK users from Kazakhstan and Belarus who follow Rossgram are less than 1 % (Fig. 5).

A possible explanation is that Rossgram positions itself as a patriotic social network in contrast to its banned original cognate. This contradicts with the traditional principle of global coverage as a common advantage of all social media. For example, the VK social network launched in 2006 is available in 86 languages to users all over the world. Official data reports the VK webpage is visited monthly by 100 million people. Those include quite a lot of non-Russians who appreciate VK’s approach to authorship. Thus, in 2010 VK was top second on illegal music distributor ranking by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). The availability of illegal digital content apparently explains why the social network is so popular among English-speaking visitors, e. g. a community where users can share soft copies of books with others. This community has some 45,000 members. The composition of subscribers shows that the vast majority are from the USA, Canada, Philippines, etc. (i. e. non-Russians).

International coverage is a hallmark of global non-Russian social networks as well. Before Russia’s ban of Meta** products, the Facebook* audience in Europe amounted to was 307 million users. This number dropped down to 303 million after Russia banned Facebook*. Facebook* owners admitted that the lost 4 million subscribers were Russian users, as a matter of fact, the rbc​.ru website claims. The company assumed that this may affect the advertising profitability in Europe.

Discussion

Whether or not Russian will be used by social media communities in post-Soviet countries depends on what regulatory framework governing social media activity each country is going to adopt in the future.

Although the society of today cannot be imagined without the Internet and social media, hardly any post-Soviet country has elaborated clear legislation regarding social media and user activity. Consequently, ‘common users follow their own double standard that laws are to be observed, but there is no need to do so in social media’ [Volkova 2022: 28]. Indeed, Russia and Belarus have specific national legislation regarding libel, advertising, pornography and extremist content, etc. However, as Volkova points out, the existing rules and regulations provide for some specific aspects of social media functionality, while a comprehensive and integral legislative framework governing the entire scope of social media activities is still missing in Russia and Belarus.

Kazakhstan is facing similar legislative challenges regarding liability for particular Internet offenses. The legislation enforced in 2018 by the Ministry of Information and Public Development of the Republic of Kazakhstan was an effort to regulate social media communication by prohibiting anonymous comments on websites. Commonly known as the commenting ban, this legislation allows to leave comments on Kazakhstan websites following a mandatory authorization via a digital signature or text message. Most Internet websites in Kazakhstan observe the new requirement to the letter. Some websites use third-party plug-ins for visitors to comment the posts via a registered social media account (VK, Mail​.ru, “Odnoklassniki”, etc.). As for publications in social media, regulation other than commenting moderation is absent so far. Thus, Kazakhstan has no specific legislation regarding communication within social media communities.

In 2021 Uzbekistan amended the Law on Personal Data by adopting Article 27–1 that provides for mandatory storage of personal data of Uzbek citizens on national internal servers. Following enforcement of the amendment, Uzkomnazorat (a cognate of Russian Roskomnadzor supervision authority) immediately demanded Mail​.ru, Twitter and some other networks to comply with the new regulation. Although particular restrictions of social media activities have never been considered officially, users noted difficulties in accessing some websites¹². Earlier in 2013 Kazakhstan enacted a similar regulation informally known as Data Localization Law. Same regulations were enforced in other postSoviet countries. Experts suppose that the regulation is indeed feasible for banks, public service centers, etc., but ultimately problematic to implement for social media and websites. For example, despite bearing the country’s domain, many websites in Kazakhstan use foreign hosting platforms with the website database stored in a foreign data center as well. According to whois​.domaintools​.com, a largest news platform Nur​.kz is relies on American Cloudflare servers. Apparently, the site owner made such decision considering the high reliability of the servers in terms of protection from DDoS attacks epidemic. The two other popular republican newspapers The Vremya and The Karavan keep their servers in data centers located in Kazakhstan.

Sometimes functionality constraints that web platforms have to face in individual countries are do not stem from server and database storage location. In spring 2022, Russia declared Meta company an extremist organization and imposed a ban on its international social media. Nevertheless, few Russians continue using these social media via a Virtual Private Network (VPN). In May 2022, referring to a survey by the LLC CB Razvitie Bank, the TASS agency reported that 25 % of Russians use VPNs to access blocked social networks¹³. In fact, VPNs and anonymizer sites have been banned in Russia since 2017. It is only in 2021 that Roskomnadzor supervision authority began to block traffic originating from such services¹⁴. Global practice, including China, shows that despite the efforts of regulators to eradicate illegal communication channels, VPNs are impossible to block completely, since developers continuously invent illegal ways to circumvent these blocks or disguise VPN traffic as regular traffic.

From what initially was a tool for simple communication, today social networks have transformed into platforms to exchange and distribute all kind of data, including in violation of international copyright law. At the same time, social networks are an asset as key enablers of communication, which can be impeded only by natural language barriers. Once a common language is spoken, unlimited integration develops successfully off the scratch. Notably, the integration processes sweeping all over the globe today are dramatically overlooked by such legislative restrictions, as the ban on anonymous commenting in Kazakhstan or blocked foreign social media in Russia. The Internet-related legislative regulation considers issues of information security, advertising, or banned media products, leaving aside the demands of certain social cohorts, such as migrant workers from Central Asia. Considering the broad use of Russian in communication, lawmakers might consider sufficient the few Russian-spoken social networks, such as VK, “Odnoklassniki”, Mail​.ru, etc. On the other hand, these networks also pose a challenge for regulatory supervision, unless asking ourselves whether such supervision is practical in fact and, if so, how strict it should be. When Internet regulation is developed, legislators should first and foremost consider the integration processes involving users from post-Soviet republics, who have tight bonds with Russian language and culture. Here, unconstrained and free information exchange is a collateral.

It is worth reiterating that social integration via communication channels is largely spontaneous. This does not imply, however, that in case of potential information chaos regulators shall not interfere to rectify the process and channel it along the right pathway. At this stage what could promote social integration of users, residing in post-Soviet republics? Decision-making at the CIS level can offer best practice in this respect, e. g. declaring 2023 the Year of Russian Language as a Language of Interethnic Communication within the CIS¹⁵. In late 2020 the CIS Heads of State Council signed the relevant document. This initiative has great untapped potential. However, the eventual success depends on specific actions to sustain international integration. Following the proposal by Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, President of the Republic of Kazakhstan, in 2022 the draft Treaty on the Establishment of the International Organization for the Russian Language was unanimously approved, which is another step forward, promoting Russian as a language of the CIS Summit¹⁶.

Conclusion

Initially, social media were developed as a tool for on-line communication and networking. Classmates, the first social network developed in the US, was launched in 1995 and was mostly a collection of schoolbooks. By early 2000s social networks were perceived as an emerging business technology, offering both basic communication services and commercial profit to the developers. Prior to the launch of VK and “Odnoklassniki” in 2006, Russians used chat rooms available with Mail​.ru, Yandex, or Rambler email platforms. In fact, these chat rooms were a prototype of future social media.

Once the popularity of Russian social media skyrocketed in 2007, it became obvious that the ability to communicate in Russian and not technology was decisive for their use. With their Russian interface, Russian-speaking audience, and original cultural identity (instead of adopting existing global solutions), VK and “Odnoklassniki” websites were able to oust out their foreign competitors, i. e. Facebook*, although by that time social media were not a widely established practice. Overall, by the time national cognates of Western social networks appeared, most Russians were new little about social networks and hardly attempted to use them. The reason behind such failure to attract Russian audience before 2006 is simple: global social media did not support Russian language consequently, offering a very narrow scope for communication with fellow nationals.

It is the initially national identity of Russian social networks that allowed VK and “Odnoklassniki” to gain high profile and expand into the post-Soviet countries stepwise, thus evolving into a supranational media, though maintaining the strong imprint of Russian language and culture as its hallmark. In the mid-2000s, social networks extended their both cultural and political influence, which was the apparent motivation for Facebook* to develop the interface in Russian language as well in June 2008. This move ran almost hand-in-hand with the growth in the number of Russian social media users. By June 2008, the VK audience reached 15 million people. The same year Facebook* claimed to sue Russians for plagiarism¹⁷.

All post-Soviet countries have been attempting to establish national social media platforms for some fifteen years. For several times Kazakhstan declared to launch national social media such as ILike, Loca, etc. However, the initiative halted at the stage of smartphone app design. Uzbekistan also tried to set up davra​.uz national social network, but in 2023 the network webpage was no longer in operation. Telegram, VK and “Odnoklassniki” still keep the top positions in the CIS countries. Such popularity is explained by a set of reasons, including the prevalence of Russian language in the CIS. No less significant for the post-Soviet society is the well-established tradition to use Russian social networks. Telegram and VK have already nurtured a generation of users. The option to start a community in any language, including English, is no less importance. With its interface designed entirely in English, the Share Books Epub And More community has over 60,000 English-speaking subscribers, the overwhelming majority coming from remotely located non-CIS countries. Meanwhile, Facebook* hosts hundreds of Russian-speaking communities as well.

Over the past twenty years the functionality of social networks has undergone tremendous changes. The original national identity characterized by overwhelmingly monolingual communication in national languages has acquired a supranational identity where language is a tool of integration, rather than separation. Against this background, the 2022–2023 political events and Russia’s ban imposed on Meta** social media products did not incur any dramatic disruptions in communication among users in post-Soviet countries. These events had a greater impact on patriotic Russians, whereas Russians of a more cosmopolitan mindset were still able to access Instagram* or Facebook* via a VPN. Nothing changed in social media accessibility for Russian-speaking users living in the CIS. Moreover, it is false to claim the use of particular websites can reflect the user’s political or civic views or attitudes to international current affairs.

The integrative potential of social media is impregnated in their supranational status. Russian public policy regarding information and communication generates a lot of excitement among users living in neighboring countries, in particular in Kazakhstan and Belarus. The VK community of the Rossiya 1 broadcasting company counts some 1.2 million members. Rather approximate calculations by large cities suggest that at least 0.1 % are from Kazakhstan. This does not suggest, however, that all of them support Russia’s political pathway. It more likely that these users are attracted by Russian culture, language, and mass media products of Russian origin.

It is logical to assume, that the scope of social media coverage indicates the geography of language distribution, rather than common cultural boundaries. Similar to such languages as English, Spanish, or German, Russian is widely spoken in other countries for a set of historical reasons. As a language of interethnic communication within the former USSR, Russian language naturally acquired similar functionality in social media of whatever jurisdiction. A VK user from Kazakhstan or Uzbekistan may not necessarily belong to ethnic Russians or may even fail to speak Russian fluently. Social media have been playing a huge role in the adaptation of numerous migrants from Central Asia. ‘Social media are becoming a critically important virtual environment where users can benefit from various kinds of support, from practical information to empathy. This facilitates faster and more efficient adaptation and integration,’ Russian investigators claim [Nosova 2015: 91].

Despite existing demand, the CIS republics have so far failed to develop their own national social networks. Enthusiasm alone is insufficient to develop a strong and impactful Internet platform. Generous investment is required. Next, millions of users prefer wellknown websites and are reluctant to trust the new ones, which in turn causes a lot of inertia in user behavior. Ultimately, a national social network would confront integration as a natural phenomenon enshrined in national history and global culture. A national copy of VK or Telegram would hardly make any sense, whereas the majority of users would be averse to banning Russian bilingual communication in favor of other national languages, as this would halt natural integration processes.

Our research demonstrates there is no reliable evidence of any major attempts to oust the widely spoken Russian language from social media communication. The alarmist forecasts about social media being replaced by other technologies, such as smart Internet, business networking, decentralized social networks, etc., remain highly controversial and are in stark contrast with promising statistics on extensive use and untapped integrative potential of traditional social media platforms.