Internet Gains Trust Among Russians As Source Of Information – Study

(RIA Novosti –  March 26, 2013) A research conducted by RIA Novosti Research Centre has shown that the trust of Russians towards the internet is growing, whereas TV is losing its popularity as a source of information, RIA Novosti news agency reported on 26 March.

In December 2012, media experts and heads of Russian leading media houses took part in the research aimed at studying the Russian news sector development tendencies.

“After analysing the information (received) from the research companies, we can state there is a continuing growth in users’ interest to internet as a source of news information both in the world and among Russian internet audience,” the study says.

According to the research materials, the increase of the world audience in the News/Information sector equalled to five per cent in 2012. The monthly audience volume of Russian leading news websites reached 21.9m people in October 2012, which is 61 per cent of the entire internet audience. As compared to October 2011, the increase equalled to 13.2 per cent, which is a little higher than the increase of internet audience in general (13 per cent).

“Apart from the growth of internet as a source of information, it has become possible to track the rise of trust to this news source in 2012. According to FOM (Public Opinion Foundation) statistics, in 2012 only 4 per cent of the population regarded websites a source of information that they trust most, and in 2012 that percentage has gone up to 11 per cent already,” the document says.

Amid the growth of trust to internet media, there is a reverse tendency regarding the television as a source of information. “In 2012, according to FOM, only 57 per cent of those polled called TV a source they trust most. For comparison, the share of such respondents equalled to 71 per cent in 2010. Those tendencies are most obvious among the internet audience,” the study says.

A later RIA Novosti report quoted the head of RIA Novosti Research Centre, Yelena Slinko, as saying that Russian regions will soon become “the main arena of rivalry”. She noted that the increase of audience in the regions prevails over the figures shown in Moscow and St Petersburg.

Slinko said there is a greater demand for regional news than those broadcast from the centre, and local news websites have more viewers than federal ones. “It is city websites that most often become a source of information for Russians,” she added.