Alisher Usmanov is the fifth Russian businessman on the Forbes list with a fortune of $15.2 billion. He made a significant part of his fortune from investments in technology companies - Megafon, Mail.ru Group and Facebook. But his VKontakte profile was created on May 18, the day the video message to Alexei Navalny was published, and his YouTube profile the day before. Usmanov himself confirms in the video that, unlike the opposition politician, he “does not use the Internet, but develops it.”

Few novice bloggers have managed to “blow up the clearing” like this. By Sunday evening, Usmanov’s video had received 4.5 million views on social networks alone – 3.2 million on VKontakte and 1.3 million on YouTube. It seemed like everyone was discussing the video: presenters on major TV channels and taxi drivers in the capital’s traffic jams. Naturally, much of this popularity is due to the fact that Usmanov responds to Navalny with his huge base of fans and haters. On the other hand, if until now, let’s say, the colorful conversational style of a rather closed oligarch could only be appreciated by partners, acquaintances and rare journalists, now - millions of users. PR specialists will debate for a long time whether it was a mistake to make the video literally on the knee and obviously without a pre-written speech.

Usmanov probably hoped that most users would support him when they heard the “truth” about Navalny’s investigation (about how the oligarch allegedly gave a bribe to Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev). Judging by most of the comments under the video, it didn’t work out, I wasn’t convinced. But he achieved something else: he was really heard, the video was not just watched, a huge number of memes, photoshopped photos and stickers were made from it. After the release of Navalny’s investigation, the oligarch gave several interviews to the media, including Vedomosti and Bloomberg, where he examined the accusations in detail. But, probably, he was dissatisfied - business journalists were more interested in talking about investments, and not about the fact that the oligarch was not actually convicted of rape, as Navalny talks about it. But for Usmanov this is a fad, his friends say. And most likely this is one of the reasons why, on the day of the trial, the oligarch did not give another interview to the media, but posted a video where he said everything he considered necessary.

Navalny addressed his investigation to ordinary users, Usmanov enters the same arena and demonstrates to politics and users that he is ready to counter openly, and not hide behind administrative resources and lawyers. Whatever the real reason for this public duel, we, dear users, will only benefit from this show. Let's stock up on popcorn.

Why Alisher Usmanov became a video blogger