RTVi Russian Television International

RTVI is a socio-political multi-platform media. In addition to editorial centers in New York and Moscow, there are correspondent points in Berlin and Tel Aviv and a network of journalists around the world. In addition to traditional television, this is now - a site, social networks and instant messengers - something without which you cannot imagine modern media.

History

2022: Launch of Decentraland Metaverse Representative Office

On June 1, 2022, RTVI announced that it had created its own representative office in. metauniverse The international media holding has already bought the land in - Decentraland one of the major platforms virtual reality operating on. blockchain Ethereum 

{{quote 'author
= told Olga Piven, CEO of RTVI Media Group.|"Scaling presence in digital has become RTVI's priority. Now the audience has the opportunity to receive information at all possible sites. Technology penetrates into life so much that this process is inevitable. If until the last moment RTVI expanded its presence in the world, in digital, now our vector is directed, among other things, to

metaverse.

Large media at the beginning of June 2022 are not fully represented in meta, but only implement individual NFT projects, so we see great potential here.

Decentraland, where we bought land and will create content, is already attracting global brands and investors, "-}}

According to Olga, it is planned to invest up to $100 thousand in the project in 2022. 

RTVI's digital representation will provide users with access not only to the channel's current programs, but also to exclusive materials published only in the metaverse. Decentraland allows you to implement game mechanics, as well as monetize NFT objects created by the owners of the "land."

The press service explained that the RTVI representative office will appear on the general map of the "continent" Decentraland in the form of a square section of 16 by 16 meters.

2019: RTVI expands international market presence and changes content strategy

• The monthly audience is 16.3 million people in more than fifty countries around the world.

RTVI's development strategy includes expanding its presence in the USA, Israel, Germany and other traditional markets, with a high concentration of Russian-speaking audiences, and creating a fundamentally new infotainment.

The expansion of the channel's presence involves both the creation of local content, with the predominance of infotainment over the news agenda, and access to new markets with a high concentration of the Russian-speaking population, the expansion of current broadcasting in the USA, Germany, Israel, as well as post-Soviet countries.

Ruslan Sokolov, owner of RTVI: "First of all, it is necessary to note the results that the channel's team has shown over the past 2 years. We were able to stop the trend of falling audience, expand the presence among the Russian-speaking audience, increasing it from 6.5 to more than 10 million people, create a multi-platform media resource, demonstrating a breakthrough growth in the number of visitors to the site by 40 times. The American market has always been traditional for the channel, so the logical step will be to expand its presence in the United States. It is also planned to increase correspondent posts in Israel, Germany and other key countries. "

The strategy will be based on both local, educational and entertainment content and updating existing projects. The author's program "Editorial Office" by Alexei Pivovarov, "Dilettant" with presenter Vitaly Dymarsky and "New" with presenter Ilya Oskolkov-Tsentsiper has already aired. Preparing for the release of the third season of the program "Russian Norms!" with Elizabeth Osetinskaya. Mikhail Labkovsky will return to the air, the first author's program of the blogger from the USA Tatyana Rhodes "Rodos" will be released, where Max Pokrovsky, Daria Ekamasova and many others become heroes.

To implement the development strategy, the channel increases its presence in the traditional and one of the key American media markets and redistributes financial and personnel resources between its offices.

2012: Ruslan Sokolov acquires RTVi

In March 2012, the former general director of the Zvezda channel Ruslan Sokolov acquired RTVi for $10 million.

1997: Satellite broadcast begins

The NTV division was created by the media structures of Vladimir Gusinsky to relay the licensed version of the flagship channel of the media group - the NTV channel in the version for a foreign Russian-speaking audience.

Here's how the RTVi website says it as of March 2012: "On January 1, 1997, the RTVi channel began broadcasting via the Express 2 satellite. With the help of individual satellite antennas, RTV International programs were seen by viewers in the Middle East and Europe. Israel's largest cable operators have begun delivering the RTVi signal to their subscribers. "

Of course, in 1997 no RTVi existed, and the program began to be relayed by the international version of the NTV channel. But RTVi still does not like to remember that they were once NTV, and the story of the gap between the current RTVi and NTV went down in the history of new Russian media as a scandalous^[1].

In 2001, the Russian state unexpectedly recalled that Gusinsky's media empire, Media Bridge, owed state Gazprom large sums of money to the company, and that the Bonum satellite, which NTV was so proud of, was also launched with public funds. Representing the Russian state in the "dispute of economic entities," Gazprom, to the defense of the violated financial honor of which the Russian courts stood up, as a result of proceedings that included Gusinsky's short detention, eventually took control of almost everything that belonged to the media empire of Vladimir Gusinsky in. Russia

Among other things, the NTV channel and the national satellite operator NTV Plus came under the control of Gazprom. NTV journalists led by Yevgeny Kiselev, who left the channel, broadcast for some time from the TNT channel, while it had not yet completely come under the control of Gazprom. Later, journalists moved to the TV-6 Moscow channel, owned by Boris Berezovsky, but soon another "business entity" Lukoil remembered the debts of the now "TV-6 Moscow." Even later, there was a story with the TVS TV channel, organized on the "sixth button," where the team of the former NTV moved from TV-6 Moscow, but broadcasting did not work there, which was to be expected. Prevented "economic disagreements" of "economic entities."

All the time of the above-described television perturbations in Russia and later NTV-International, renamed Russian Television International, continued to belong to the old owners - Vladimir Gusinsky and his partners.

After the split of the Russian broadcaster, NTV had to re-create its direct satellite broadcasting network for foreign audiences, and the network became known as "NTV Mir." And RTVi first relayed the programs of TNT, then "TV-6 Moscow," and then began to broadcast TVS programs - in general, the projects of the journalistic team of the former NTV. With their termination, Russian Television International organized its own news service. TV news on Russian Television International began to be called "Now" by analogy with the news releases of the TVS channel that stopped working.

It should be noted that Russian Television International no longer resembled NTV in scale. The news was chamber, and the reporting network was small. Despite this, Evgeny Kiselev, Andrei Norkin, Vladimir Kara-Murza, Vladimir Shenderovich, and the former host of the Vesti program Yuri Rostov, who emigrated to the United States 20 years ago, worked for RTVi at different times. The channel has studios in New York, Tel Aviv and Moscow. In the 2000s, a large branch called Echo Tv, headed by Andrei Norkin, functioned in Russia. Under the label of this branch, their own analytical programs were released in the spirit of the old solid NTV.

Nevertheless, general political and news programs in Russian Television International did not receive any response in Russia, despite the fact that censorship was rampant on domestic Russian television in the 2000s and the need for high-quality information broadcasting was very high. The fact that the uncensored information broadcasting channel in Russia is in demand is evidenced by the success of the Dozhd TV channel, which has been launched for several years.

The main reason for the unrealization of the potential of RTVi as a popular uncensored information channel in Russia was the desire of Vladimir Gusinsky. Gusinsky, the main owner of the canal, preferred, having gone to emigrate after a short period of time, not to interfere in Russian politics anymore. At the same time, Gusinsky continued his media business in Russia. His companies continued to produce TV shows for Russian television, and Teleklub and Detsky Mir TV channels are still offered in the NTV Plus package.

In turn, the RTVi signal was strictly encoded and was not intended for the audience in Russia. At the same time, the satellite from which RTVi operates - Eutelsat Hot Bird 13A/13B/13C 13.0 g. E - is quite watchable and popular in Russia. It seems that if at one time RTVi did not encode at least part of its programs and addressed them to the audience in Russia, its fame and success would be completely different, orders of magnitude higher.

In this regard, we recall the events of 2001, when journalists of the besieged NTV gathered rallies in Ostankino in their support. If then there was not an abstract call for the protection of freedom of speech, but a very specific one - to buy satellite dishes and aim them at the NTV satellite free channel - RTVi, which will be broadcast from abroad, then the history of Russian television, and the history of Russian satellite TV in particular, would have developed somewhat differently. At a minimum, Russian television would be freer and more dynamic. The experience of a number of not quite democratic countries, where TV channels broadcasting from abroad are not inferior in influence and success to national television, confirm such an assumption.

Notes