Comment on Telegram partners with xAI to bring Grok to over a billion users
weirdcarrotmonster@sh.itjust.works 4 weeks agoTelegram is not banned in Russia in the same way YouTube isn’t. They fight it by attempting to decrease service quality, prompting users to switch platforms. In last few months connectivity without VPN degraded noticeably. It just happens that since it’s official ban (2018-2020) telegram evolved to be pretty resilient to blocking, and it’s easier to declare “yeah we signed a deal with Durov he works with us now, unbanned” than look like fools while blocking 1% of all IPv4 addresses (im not kidding) with no result.
rottingleaf@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
Not true. There was a period it wasn’t possible to use Telegram without VPNs. That’s in the past.
What shows their alignment best is that Russian state propaganda feels right at home in TG, while counterpropaganda channels from time to time get banned without explanation.
YouTube just plainly doesn’t work in Russia, its pages load, videos don’t.
The reason they say stuff about “degrading caching servers” and whatever other bullshit they say is to reduce visibility of their actions from the general population. It’s smart, not stupid. I thought it’s dumb that they always lie this way, until I realized that most of said lie sticks subconsciously, and the saved expenses at controlling the population add up. It’s like saving every dime being virtuous in the Protestant approach to life.
They could ban it completely.
They did look like fools, but the “no result” part is just not true, the result was achieved. Telegram didn’t evolve, it works the same as before, a typical client-server application.