I was born in Moscow, lived most of my life in Jerusalem, spent 3 years in Washington DC (where I did MA at GW). But now I live in London and my major role is doctoral student at PhD program in New media, Innovation and Literacy at the London School of Economics media department. The topic of my research is development of online political institutions and ICT based models of governance in crisis situations.
I also worked as a consultant on information technology, new media, and social media projects for The World Bank, American Councils for International Education, and Internews, and was a research assistant at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society. Previously I worked as a journalist for major Russian daily newspapers Kommersant and Novaya Gazeta, and served as news editor and analyst for Israeli TV.
Alexey Sidorenko and I were founders of Help Map, the crowdsourcing platform, which was used to coordinate assistance to victims of wildfires in Russia in 2010 and won a Russian National Internet Award for best project in the “State and Society” category.
My Russian blog (since 2002): http://pustovek.livejournal.com/
You can reach me through Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/asmolov
Latest posts by Gregory Asmolov from July, 2010
Russia: Online Cartoon Character – Mr. Freeman – Deconstructs Reality, Mocks Netizens
Gregory Asmolov writes about Mr. Freeman, a sarcastic, gloomy and enigmatic online cartoon character, who has made millions of young Russians think about the way they live their lives.
Russia: Reginal Court Blocks YouTube for Extremist Content
Komsomolosk-on-Amur [ENG] city court, at the Russian Far East, ordered local Internet provider “Rosnet” to block access to Youtube and four other websites (including web.archive.org), Cnews reported [RUS]. The decision was made due to a request by the city prosecutor's office. YouTube had been blocked because of the nationalist movie...
Russia: Blackout of the Social Network Triggers Twitter Panic
The word “vkontakte“, standing for the name of the Russian social network, found itself among top Twitter trends. It happened after millions of Russian users were not able to access [RUS] the social network because of a failure [RUS] of a local power station. Some bloggers started the online panic...
Russia: Ask a Search Engine About the Weather
“When the heat will pass away?” is this week's most popular search enquiry in the Russian Google. Another most popular search requests include: “How to survive heat wave?”, “How to cool down the room without an air conditioner?” and “Where people swim in the Moscow region?”, RIA Novosti reports [RUS].
Russia: First Cyrillic Word Tops Twitter Trends
Russian heatwave makes history not only in the streets of Moscow but also in the virtual space. The Russian word “дождь” (rain) turned to be the first Cyrillic word in Twitter's worldwide trending topics, RIA Novosti [RUS] reports. It happened after Moscow bloggers witnessed a minor rain, that followed several weeks of unusually...
Russia: New Details About the National Search Engine
Russia is going develop the National Search Engine, Gazeta.ru writes [RUS]. Despite the recent denial [RUS] of such plans by minister Igor Schegolev, journalists published slides of a closed presentation of the project, defined as the “informational window of Russia” to the world. The search engine, that will cost more than...
Russia: Anna Chapman – the Most Popular Facebook User
German Klimenko, CEO of LiveInternet.ru, developed a new rating of Russian Facebook [RUS] users. According to it, the most popular Russian FB-user is Anna Chapman [EN], one of 10 Russian spies arrested in the U.S. and returned to Russia within spies’ exchange deal between Russia and U.S.
Russia Launches Social Network for Governmental Officials
President Medvedev introduced “gosbook.ru“, a social network for governmental officials. According to [RUS] Gazeta.ru, the network was Medvedev's personal idea and costed 1 million roubles (approx. $35.000). The platform is supposed to trigger and facilitate discussions among officials.
Russia: Internet Draft Bill Published Online
Robert Shlegel, a “United Russia” [EN] party member and a political blogger, published [RUS] a new Internet draft bill. According to the draft, that mainly consists of updates for the current law “On Information, Information Technologies and Data Protection,” Russia has a jurisdiction to prosecute anyone suspected in committing online crimes against its...
Russia: Executive Director of Moscow Airport Uses Blog to Blame the Mayor
Michael Vasilenko, executive director of Russia's second largest international airport Sheremetyevo, wrote [RUS] a blog post accusing [ENG] Moscow mayor Yuri Luzhkov in a deliberate transport blockade of the airport. Vasilenko declared that authorities started roadworks [ENG] on purpose in order to block Sheremetyevo and promote city-owned airport Vnukovo.