1. Collective Yandex in the past, present and future - Firstly,
apparently this week the head and founder of Yandex, Arkady Volozh,finally realized that Yandex was being taken away from him. The Kremlin,of course, is taking away the most advanced Russian IT company from itsowners. That is, Volozh still had a hope that Yandex would be boughtfrom him - but, apparently, now this hope has been dispelled. That's whyVolozh suddenly announced this week that he is against Russia's invasionof Ukraine and has always been against it, but "there were reasons"forcing him to remain silent. In principle, it is, of course, good thatsuch a prominent person as Volozh spoke out unambiguously against thewar. On the other hand, he did this only after the authoritarian Russianregime did not give him money.Volozh in the past, back in the Soviet Union, was an engineer,researcher, a person from the academic community, like the other founderof Yandex, Ilya Segalovich, already deceased. But, as we see, decades ofbeing in the role of a capitalist lead to a reassessment of values.Money becomes more important than anything. You need to remember this,especially when you are debating with some ultra-liberal fans of AynRand. By the way, another interesting fact about Volozh: although heseems to have been living in Israel since 2014, he still has a privatemansion in the center of Amsterdam, on the banks of the canal. True,local anarcho-punks have been squatting the mansion for half a yearalready and are holding anti-war events there, including. We think it'svery honest and fair. We hope that Volozh, as an opponent of the war, isnow certainly not offended.Meanwhile, this pushback of Yandex by the state does not take place in avacuum, it is, of course, part of the trend. The other day, for example,it turned out that even the faithful support of the regime - the VKholding, which includes Vkontakte, Odnoklassniki, Mail.ru and otherirradiation towers - turned out to be legally registered in the BritishVirgin Islands. To reduce taxes, most likely. This, of course, isridiculous, but now the shareholders and the board of directors of VKhave approved the re-registration of the company's legal entity and itstransfer to a special administrative region on Oktyabrsky Island in theKaliningrad Region. This, in general, is also such an offshore harbor,but only its own, old, dear. Apparently, this is more comfortable forthe Russian authorities.But the most important thing is that all these processes, so to speak,the nationalization of IT companies also have consequences. Manydevelopers, team leads, and so on are already starting to look aroundwith the question "where to run." This is especially pronounced inYandex, which has always been characterized by freedom of morals, but inVK, too, not everyone likes the final transformation into a statecorporation under a personalist dictatorship. So, where will all thesedevelopers go? Many, of course, will dump in the international Bigtechfor big salaries.But many will also be interested in doing IT support for liberationinitiatives, including anarchist ones, in the free time. The onlyquestion is whether the anti-authoritarian movement can attract thesepeople. We think this is important: it is absolutely necessary toimprove the quality of libertarian Internet projects (even "Trends"),and for this, technically literate people are also needed. In order tobuild anarchist structures that influence the future, it is important topromote open and free alternatives to commercial services and softwareproducts. In this sense, the open source movement is a natural ally ofthe anti-authoritarians (unlike the big software and hardware companiesthat prioritize profits).And finally, you will have to think about money too - people who quitthe conditional Yandex may do something on a volunteer basis, but stillthey will also need some kind of salary. This is one of the items ofexpenditure that will be used by the funds raised by us during theAutonomous Action crowdfunding. So if you want to improve libertarianweb resources - support us!2. War and statesMeanwhile, in Ukraine, the Russian occupiers and their deputies arebreaking through more and more new levels of the bottom. The other day,collaborator Alexander Dudka in the Kherson region annealed with napalm.In his video statement, he addressed all those residents of the occupiedterritories who have not yet received a Russian passport, and threatenedthat soon they would not even be given medicines, well, in general, like"get out of the territories that we occupied, now Russia is here."Anarchists do not attach much importance to the so-called "stateborders", but there is still some kind of directly special impudencehere. It is especially ironic, of course, to hear this from the"denazifiers" type. It seems that before the highest state officials ofthe Russian Federation were not so frank. However, judging by the video,this Dudka, apparently, is sitting on some substances - "what a soberman has in his mind, then a drunkard has on his tongue." In principle,if you think about it, who wouldn't sit on substances in Dudka's place?The fate of the Gauleiters is usually unenviable, he understands this.So, the Russian governors threaten people with the wrong citizenship,the aggressor Russian army fires rockets at the rescuers, and thesecrimes, of course, will eventually be investigated one way or anotherand the criminals will get their own.But there are also questions to the Ukrainian state. The detonation ofdrones in Moscow has become commonplace, shelling of Bryansk villageshas also become commonplace. So, it is not very clear what is the pointfor Ukraine to disintegrate chicken coops in Russian villages or turnPyaterochka in Shebekino into rotting ruins? The desire to take revengeis understandable, but there is exactly zero military sense in this -all the more so when the Ukrainian counteroffensive in Zaporozhye andthe Kherson region is clearly bogged down and firepower would be moreuseful there. The Russians, whose apartment was robbed by Grads, willobviously not become friends of Ukraine from these attacks - even ifthey also do not gain confidence in the Russian authorities.In general, it seems that in this case, attacks on civilianinfrastructure are such a purely political move by Zelensky to show somesuccess on the eve of the presidential election campaign in Ukraine. Thesame is with the mass dismissal of military commissars, which isunlikely to eradicate corruption in the Ukrainian army conscription system.It is important that we say all this not because we do not support theUkrainians in their truly heroic struggle against Kremlin imperialism.We support. But, unfortunately, it is clear that state institutions andoligarchic clans can rather interfere with this struggle. The Russianpolitical regime may be more degenerate than many others. But any stateprimarily protects the interests of the ruling classes, not the people.Remember this.By the way, Putin, unlike the Ukrainian authorities, is well aware thatit is necessary to use "soft power" and not just missiles. The Kremlin,as you know, finances the ultra-right all over Europe, and this helps ita lot, at least a little, but to shift the public discourse towards"maybe everything is not so simple, maybe Russia attacked correctly." Itis clear that Ukraine has few opportunities to finance someone, it doesnot have such oil revenues, but still, at least some propaganda ofalternatives to Putin's gang could be carried out, and not just shellingborder villages. Well, on the other hand, this opens the field for ouranarchist propaganda.By the way, this is important in the long term, for decades. It is notyet clear whether Putin is going to eventually start a very big waragainst NATO - most likely, he himself has not yet decided. But he isalready actively conducting militaristic brainwashing of schoolchildren.So the pseudo-scientist Medinsky gave birth to a new school historytextbook, where he explains in detail why, so to speak, "the Russianboot is holy." It seems that while the vast majority of high schoolstudents treat this propaganda with irony or even contempt. But if thiscontinues for years and years, the brainwashing will bear fruit. Andthen it will take a very long time to treat these militarized generations.So we must oppose the official propaganda of fascism in schools anduniversities with lively, informal, perhaps even subcultural propagandaof anti-militarism, anti-fascism and self-organization. Every sticker,every graffiti, every uncensored post on social networks is a grenadefor a tank of Kremlin fascism. Download anti-war stickers from our site!3. Anarchism behind the hillBy the way, the number of potential anarchist stickers in Russia has nowsignificantly decreased, which is not a secret. Many had to flee afterthe start of the war, after mobilization or as a result of repression.And this process will continue, since the Russian authorities areobjectively interested in "washing out" of the country all those who areagainst the regime and are active.This led to the weakening of the anarchist movement in the RussianFederation (and we have already talked about this in previous episodesof "Trends"), but, on the other hand, it provides opportunities for theconstruction of anarchist structures in exile. Moreover, Russian"enemies of the state" have a long tradition of organizing abroad,dating back to the 19th century, if not the 17th. We need points ofconcentration of anti-authoritarians. It's good that such points appeareven outside the capitals - for example, on August 12 in Batumi,Georgia, an evening was held in memory of our deceased comrade DimaPetrov, "Ecologist".Quite a few anarchists from the post-Soviet space attended theinternational congress of the anti-authoritarian movement in Switzerlandin July. Participants of AD were also there, expect a report from thisevent in the near future.And remember that not all visa-free countries are safe for politicalrefugees from Russia. For example, trying to hide in Kyrgyzstan isreally dangerous: the Kyrgyz authorities will easily hand you over tothe FSB, as they already did with Alexei Rozhkov and can do with otherleftist and libertarian activists - Alena Krylova and Lev Skoryakin - atleast.Don't expect it to always be easy - again, all states instinctively feelthe danger posed by an anti-authoritarian movement. We - out of spite,we - across, as Yegor Letov sang.4. PoliticiansAnd finally, our traditional rubric of solidarity with comrades behindbars. In Belarus, anarcho-partisan Dmitry Dubovsky was transferred froma colony to a prison regime "for violating the rules of the order."Write to Dima and other Belarusian comrades! By the way, on the cover ofthis episode of "trends" there is an artistic processing of the famousphotograph of all four anarcho-partisans with the equally famous slogan"For your freedom and ours". Such T-shirts can be ordered fromDissidentby (a non-profit initiative to support political prisoners inBelarus) and thus help those who are in captivity.In Russia, meanwhile, the "Tyumen case" continues, where sixanti-fascists are being pulled under some analogue of the "Networkcase." And, of course, with the same torture. Just the other day, theTyumen court, as expected, rejected the lawyers' demand to conduct aninvestigation into the fact that the guys were tortured with electriccurrent and other joys of the Russian so-called "law enforcementagencies." Let's be honest - the prospects for the guys are gloomy. Thecops made sure that one of them, Kirill Brik, refused a lawyer and,like, "confessed." In the future, this will allow the court to easilyhand down sentences of conviction to all of them with long terms forallegedly "participation in a terrorist organization."Of course, the surest and most reliable way to avoid this and save Yuri,Roman, Danil, Deniz, Nikita and Kirill is to bring the collapse of thecannibalistic Putin regime closer (after this collapse, the guys willnot sit behind bars for a day). But even now you can still help thedefendants in the "Tyumen case" - transfer at least a small amount to asupport group or write a letter to the guys. By the way, a festival ofsolidarity with them has been taking place since August 15th.You can arrange a concert or a film screening, but letters aredefinitely the most important link between a prisoner and the outsideworld. Become that link! And the walls will surely fall.Well, that's all for today! We remind you that in "Trends of Order andChaos" the participants of Autonomous Action and other authors giveanarchist assessments of current events. Listen to us on YouTube,SoundCloud and other platforms, visit our website avtonom.org, subscribeto our weekly e-mail newsletter!Episode 118 prepared by Manihttps://avtonom.org/news/struktury-svobody-trendy-poryadka-i-haosa-epizod-118_________________________________________A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C EBy, For, and About AnarchistsSend news reports to A-infos-en mailing listA-infos-en@ainfos.ca
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