General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Does anyone think the Russians are all over social media but not on Democratic Underground? [View all]Decoy of Fenris
(1,954 posts)There's an older website that used to be run by an old-school DUer, now since departed this life. He had one of those global stat-tracker website tooltips, you know, the ones from the late 90s and early 2000s, which show where everyone on your website is visiting from. He's been dead for years, the website inactive except for the forums, where a few old-timers still shoot the shit. By and large, that website's largest volume of visits (numbering in the thousands as opposed to single-digits from elsewhere in the world) were from the Russian Federation, one of the southwestern Oblasts bordering the Ukraine. Thousands of visits daily to a largely-defunct dem website, used only as a messaging forum between a few Dem fans.
I won't say that there's Russian interference on D.U. for certain, lacking any evidence to prove the claim, but I sure as shit wouldn't write it off as "Can't happen, won't happen." Far smaller and less influential sites than this have been monitored or swayed by some group within Russian borders, and to say D.U. is beneath Russian notice is painfully naive.