Ordering wholesale and retail

Anonymous Shaltai-Boltai hackers published on the Internet letters from Anton Bushuev, director of media relations and advertising at the Moscow Information Technologies company, affiliated with the Moscow government. The main topic of the posted correspondence is the recent elections to the Moscow City Duma and monitoring the activities of the opposition. In particular, correspondence with the editors of the Russian media was made public: ordering materials of an advertising and political nature, "information service" for the interests of the mayor's office, coordination of custom-made publications and prices for them. The most expensive, according to these data, was rated jeans in the newspaper Izvestia (935 thousand rubles per page), in Nezavisimaya Gazeta (760 thousand) and in Komsomolskaya Pravda (645 thousand). According to the data hackers, orders were also carried out by such publications as Argumenty i Fakty, Novye Izvestiya, the government-run Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Moskovskaya Pravda, Literaturnaya Gazeta, the RBC holding, and a number of others at a price or a smaller name. The New Times turned to top managers of a number of publications mentioned for comments.

Vladimir Sungorkin, CEO of CJSC Komsomolskaya Pravda, editor-in-chief of KP

I have read this summary - it is plausible for all editions. They say it's seditious - why? Yes, editorial offices quite officially take money for paid articles - this is a widespread practice when popular media enter into information service agreements with various departments and corporations. I don't see any horror in it. Each department, whether it be the Moscow mayor's office or the Ministry of Industry, has a PR problem, and they need to inform the public about themselves. They need it, but we, the mass media, don't need it much, because this information will not increase readers - it is not interesting to wide circles of workers. And so we find a compromise with departments and corporations: if you want to talk about your activities, pay for it at advertising rates.

Now there is a public demand for disclosures. Here "Humpty Dumpty" was taken and published - it means that it is beneficial to someone. The mayor's office is also in a competitive political field, and it is beneficial for someone to run into it.

Alexander Potapov, editor of the Izvestia newspaper

All materials that are published on our website and in the newspaper are an editorial product. The editorial office has no business relations with Moscow Information Technologies. The editors do not have an agreement to publish something that comes from the mayor's office. My employees have no relationship with the department, except for workers - for example, we call Liksutov if there was an accident in the subway.

With regard to the published correspondence with our employees, we can give an example with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The department, for example, sends messages: “Please cover the event - a press conference of such and such an official will take place.” And the Ministry of Foreign Affairs throws its invitation on the box, where a bunch of other press releases fall. But can it be called correspondence?

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"Humpty Dumpty" was taken and published - it means that it is beneficial to someone "

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In the documents of "Humpty Dumpty" there was a table that the mayor's office had an advertising contract with "Izvestia". As far as I understand, there is an advertising contract, but it concerns applications that are published as a separate tab in the newspaper. But they have a die "advertising". The authorities need to promote investment projects, and they prepare such proposals within the framework of the contract. This tab is formed by the advertising department - they invite authors, take interviews. The editors have nothing to do with this at all - I don’t even have these people on the staff.

This is not a stuffing against Izvestia, but rather against the mayor's office. Who is the customer of the stuffing, it is difficult to say.

Shod Mulajanov, editor-in-chief of the Moskovskaya Pravda newspaper

I have no idea who needs it and why it was done. Perhaps this is an echo of internal political intrigues. Moskovskaya Pravda treats this very calmly - I don’t see any sensation in this. I don't really understand why there is such a hype around this.

Didn't anyone know that there is no free money in the country? What is special or new here? The independent press that people like to talk about so much is possible in a country where there is independent finance. There is no independent money in our country, and therefore there can be no independent press either.

I have no idea whether the information posted is true - I am absolutely not interested in checking the correspondence of my employees. If, in principle, such an interaction occurs, then I do not see anything new here. Whether this is good or bad is a matter of taste.

Moskovskaya Pravda has never concealed that it works with the Moscow government - until recently, there was a separate line in the city budget where our newspaper was listed. We have a formal agreement with the Department of Media and Advertising on subsidies. If you are offered money, but they say “don’t touch me”, then this does not suit me. If we are talking about posting information about the work of the authorities, then this is absolutely normal, but I can immediately print critical material on another page.

Nikolai Zyatkov, President of CJSC "Arguments and Facts"

As for AiF, everything published by Shaltai-Boltai is, of course, all untrue. We write from the heart, from the heart, from common sense and at the behest and logic of the shareholder. We have articles on a commercial basis, on which contracts have been concluded with the relevant structures or with PR agencies. They are all transparent, go through the accounting department, they pay taxes. Putting a shadow on the wattle fence is wrong.

If they praise Moscow, and there really is something to praise for, then this is already paid PR? We give journalists an editorial task: to write about paid parking lots that people don't like, and they complete the task. Or, accordingly, the task is given to praise if something is done wonderfully by the City Day. And here someone settles scores with someone. This is a blow to the mayor's office - there are channels mentioned, and there are names. Maybe this is a far-reaching action, which will be followed by certain legislative conclusions.

PS Editor's note for The New Times. There is a law: any advertising materials must be marked with a message that this or that text or picture is not a journalistic work - "advertising", "advertising rights", "information sponsorship" - all these words and phrases are used exactly in order to not to mislead readers and not to sell them under the guise of information a "dish" cooked according to the laws of PR, not journalism.