St. Petersburg State University demanded that the student publication “Lupa and Pupa” remove any mention of the university

St. Petersburg State University (SPbSU) demanded that any mention of the university be removed from the description and heading of the student publication Lupa i Pupa. Previously, the university administration put forward similar requirements to the Studen magazine. The authors wrote about the incident on VKontakte and the telegram channel .

The editors of Lupa and Pupa received letters from Arsen Kardanov, head of the department for the use and protection of intellectual property at St Petersburg University, which were sent to their personal and corporate emails.

The requirement to remove the mention of the university from the header and description of the public was explained by the fact that this could mislead readers — they could allegedly think that the journal Lupa i Pupa writes on behalf of St Petersburg University.

“If we don’t do this, they promise to write a statement to the police against us not only for using the name of the university, but also for ‘distributing deliberately false information’,” the authors of the channel say.

They stressed that they never claimed to be writing on behalf of the university. “However, we are students of this almshouse, and it seems to us that we have every right to call ourselves students and graduates of St. Petersburg State University,” the creators of the publication added.

According to Lupa i Pupa, the letters received from the university administration are an attempt to get rid of the student media. The authors indicated that they were not going to stop the activity of the channel and would try to make the situation widely publicized.

As a result, the mention of St Petersburg University was removed from the description of the publication’s public page on VKontakte and the telegram channel . Now the authors call themselves "the most relevant and classy media of the university, which is fighting student media."

On April 30, the Studen publication also reported that the editors were required to remove any mention of St. Petersburg State University from the name and description of the community. The authors complied with this requirement, adding that they will continue to "cover student life and current events."

Petersburg media wrote about this story ( 1 , 2 , 3 ). On the same day, appeared in the electronic reception of St Petersburg University. an official comment by Deputy Rector for Legal Affairs Yuri Penov

According to him, after checking, university staff identified communities that “spread false information about the life and activities” of the university and use “the name and means of individualization of St Petersburg University” in their names and descriptions. This, as Penov writes, "may mislead universitarians, as well as third parties."

• The authors of Studnya and Lupa i Pupa wrote about the anti-war actions of students and the administration’s fight against them, distributed the text of the resolution of the initiative group of students of Russian universities against the war in Ukraine, and also talked about expulsions of students for participating in protest actions. At the moment, to the “Jelly” more than three 3 thousand people have subscribed to the “Lupy and Navel” page. public on VKontakte, and more than 12 thousand users