Interfax: Prime Minister Medvedev is best known blogger of Russia – poll

(Interfax – July 19, 2013) Seventy percent of Russians have heard the “blogger” word but 29 percent do not know what it means, the Russian Public Opinion Study Center (VTsIOM) said in the presentation of a poll conducted in 42 regions on July 6-7.

A third of the respondents (33 percent) could name some of the Russian bloggers. Twenty percent mentioned Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and 8 percent said it was President Vladimir Putin, “probably, meaning the official page of the chief of state in the social network,” the sociologists said.

Other bloggers mentioned by the respondents were television personality Ksenia Sobchak (2 percent), opposition activist Alexei Navalny (2 percent), businessman Mikhail Prokhorov (2 percent) and Liberal Democratic Party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky (2 percent).

In the opinion of Russians, bloggers want to share their ideas and information they have (43 percent), to attract attention (35 percent), and to communicate with other people (27 percent). Eighteen percent said blogging was a trend; 17 percent argued it was a way to pass time and use one’s creativity, and 14 percent supposed blogging was a way to earn a living.