A Russian news outlet has raised $250K in cryptocurrency after sanctions crippled its finances. The company had not previously accepted crypto donations and is now considered the first non-profit organization to use blockchain as a fundraising tool. What are your thoughts on this?
In order to continue publishing independent news in the face of Russian government propaganda and censorship, a Russian independent news organization has received more than $250,000 in bitcoin contributions from supporters.
Since March, Meduza, a Latvian-based Russian-language news site that claims to cover “actual Russia today,” has started accepting contributions in the form of USD, euros, and cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Binance (BNB), Tether (USDT), Monero (XMR), and zcash (ZEC).
The news organization has collected about US$250,000 in bitcoin contributions from 146,000 individual transactions since announcing their fundraising appeal. 3.75 BTC ($116,954) and 49.9 ETH ($117,767) accounted for almost 93 percent of the entire gift amount.
Folks, Meduza has redesigned its crowdfunding after being disconnected from our supporters in Russia. We now turn to you—our global audience—to replace those 30k donators. Help us keep Russians & the world informed about the monstrous war against Ukraine. https://t.co/y83ieV9LuT
— Meduza (@meduza en) in English 14 March 2022
Meduza’s financial problems began in April 2021, when the Russian Justice Ministry designated it and several other independent media outlets as “foreign agents,” requiring the company to include a large font warning in each of its Russian-language articles informing readers of its “foreign agent” status. The same caution must be included in all commercials, resulting in the loss of practically all of the company’s sponsors. On their contribution FAQ, it stated:
“As you can expect, few businesses will pay to market their goods if the information is labeled as “produced by foreign agents.”
Being labeled a foreign agent did not stop Russian readers from giving to the charity, as the firm quickly put up a way for donors to make regulatory payments via their banks utilizing Stripe’s payment processor.
However, in March, Meduza was targeted by Russian government censorship as well as the effect of Western sanctions. Russian authorities disabled its website for “disseminating material in violation of the law,” and a restriction on the SWIFT network for Russian banks on February 26 cut off its sole source of funding from Russian supporters.
SWIFT is a worldwide financial communications network that allows financial organizations to send and receive money internationally.
Meduza said on their contribution page that due to budgetary constraints, they were unable to accept payments from its Russian fans.
Since February 25, the news organization and its writers have been posting daily updates on Russia’s war against Ukraine, including photographs and tales of Ukrainian people affected by the conflict, as well as other key events not covered by Russian media.
“Millions of Russians now depend on our news,” Meduza noted, stressing that its journalists had been forced to flee the country.
“Transferring money from Russia to Europe has been difficult since the commencement of this conflict. 30,000 donors were gone. We are currently receiving no funds from Russia.”
The gifts, according to Ivan Kolpakov, Meduza’s editor-in-chief, would allow the company’s 25 journalists who have since left the country to live in Riga, Latvia, where the company’s offices are based.
The invasion of Ukraine demonstrates the necessity for crypto regulation.
The Russian sanctions have had unintended consequences for Meduza and its journalists. Russian citizens, students studying abroad, foreign students in Russia, and even whole countries’ civilian populations have all been badly harmed by Russian-facing sanctions, according to media sources.
