Arseny Alexandrovich Sheltsin (born 2 March 1990) — an activist of MGER, a youth functionary in the field of internet dominance, an innovator, a young Orthodox deputy of the Youth Parliament of the Nizhny Novgorod Region, where he holds the post of chairman of the Commission for Informatization and Innovation Activity.

Contractor for the robotized repair of the image of United Russia", as a result of which the internal reporting on campaigning in the forums (possibly falsified, since the well-known NN.RU blogger Antidot was entered into the "our comments" sections) found its way into the Nizhny Novgorod Internet.

Graduated from school N154. Married to Evgenia Platonova. Religious views: Orthodoxy.

A student of the Nizhny Novgorod branch of the Higher School of Economics, Faculty of Business Informatics, Department of Innovation Management.

The essence of the phenomenon

A simplified analogue of Kristina Potupchik, for which he is subjected to parody by activists of the City forum of NN.RU.

About himself

"I was born in 1990 in The City of Gorky. My father graduated from the Polytech, he is a radio engineer and cyberneticist. My mother graduated from Lobach, the Faculty of Computational Mathematics and Cybernetics, and I followed in their footsteps..

As for the video blog, I would like to look at a number of different problems of young people.."

Work

Technical head of the propaganda service of MGER "RosTalant" (currently shut down).

Co-organiser of the failed campaign to set the world record The Biggest Group Kiss".

Currently OOO "Clubcore": a site with photo reports of youth parties from Nizhny Novgorod entertainment venues.

Aphorisms

A collection of Arseny Sheltsin's own aphorisms from his VKontakte profile; the spelling and the signature under each aphorism are preserved.

  • «The path from 0 to 777 always lies through 666» Arseny Sheltsin
  • «In Russia the problem is not that the deputies are bad, but that people do not want them to become better» Arseny Sheltsin
  • «When laws are discussed, the internet must not be an option but an obligatory necessity» Arseny Sheltsin
  • «Love is like an investment portfolio. There are companies that turn out to be loss-making, but with a good search you will find the one that pays for everything» Arseny Sheltsin
  • «The answer to the great question: "How to defend the honour of the country?" is in the new magazine "Kill the USA"» Arseny Sheltsin
  • «Politicians have long spoken through the mouths of the main Media» Arseny Sheltsin
  • «The most merciless instrument of killing in the world is the foreign policy of the USA» Arseny Sheltsin
  • «A good principle of business: why deceive people when they can deceive themselves» Arseny Sheltsin
  • «Good people are known in trouble, and not good ones too… » Arseny Sheltsin
  • «Leaders set the rules, the rest observe them» Arseny Sheltsin
  • «The most important thing is not what it is, but how it is perceived» Arseny Sheltsin

Thank you for your humanity

http://shelchin.livejournal.com/7698.html

"This case showed that if the leadership of local self-government takes no measures to solve problems on its territory, then one must certainly resist such a negligent attitude to work, even if by complaints addressed to the governor!

Thank you, Valery Shantsev, for your attention, promptness and humanity! In such situations you understand that we are all living people. And the distant authorities are quite alive and human."

Intellectually developed young people noticed problems already in their young years

http://doaa.ru//2011/07/28/mini-mozgovoy-shturm.html

"Many intellectually developed young people already in their young years noticed problems in Russia, and most importantly they had ideas for solving them (real solutions that can be applied).

Let us hold a small discussion, state the problems and propose a solution. It need not be described in detail. The most important thing is the very fact — of a possible solution to a problem that concerns many.

This may concern:

  • The legislation of Russia or the Nizhny Novgorod region
  • Municipal problems of Russia or Nizhny Novgorod
  • The problem may consist in the fact that something does not exist
  • Or consist in the fact that something is absolutely not correctly we function

"

One of my main ideas was the phrase

"Before my candidacy was elected to the Youth Parliament, one of my main ideas was the phrase «When laws are discussed, the Internet must not be an option but an obligatory necessity.»

I hasten to keep my promise.

I am a member of the Commission on Informatisation and Innovation Activity of the Youth Parliament at the ZSNO (= OZS).

An internet platform is now being developed for discussing draft laws of the Nizhny Novgorod Region on the themes of informatisation, information technologies and innovation. Every citizen who wishes will be able to read an existing draft law and submit their amendments, ideas and thoughts. And likewise to discuss the amendments of other participants in the discussion. The edits of the commission members will be published.

And most importantly, to discuss what is not being discussed, those things our politicians have not yet reached, and we, the youth and the modern generation, will gladly suggest them"

Before a serious promotion, a person is quite often shown on television – on the federal channels. That is how it was, for example, with our president. And such rumours are entirely true

http://shelchin.livejournal.com/6724.html

"Bulavinov, Head of the city of Nizhny Novgorod, has lately been appearing quite often in the federal Media.

People already know this pattern. Before a serious promotion, a person is quite often shown on television – on the federal channels. That is how it was, for example, with our president. And such rumours are entirely true, since the current Governor) of the Nizhny Novgorod Region will most likely take Luzhkov's former post.

<..>

An example of successful post-crisis development is the Nizhny Novgorod. In the metropolis many acute social and economic problems are being solved: housing is being built, clinics and hospitals are being modernised, new kindergartens are opening. Moreover, the ancient city manages to achieve this without losing its historical face.

So it is high time to place your bets!"

Before we could look round, the project had been created and launched

http://ifomin.ru/2010/01/сегодня-«лидер-xxi»-беседует-с-руководит/

"A little less than a year ago Ilya Fomin and I began discussing the idea of creating a social network of talents, and before we could look round, the project had been created and launched.

"ROSTALANT" for me is a way to realise myself and to help other young people do the same. All people are talented, without exception. Some believe it, some do not, but that is how it really is. A person simply needs to find certain abilities and skills within himself. On our site a person can not only work out what his talent is, but also improve it in the future.

"ROSTALANT" is an indispensable free Russian tool for promoting your talent"

A whole letter more

« Shcheltsin is a whole letter more than Yeltsin.
benina mama, City forum NN.RU
 »


38 thousand bots for "vote-rigging" in a contest

TOPIC: Shcheltsin to account, or Yedro is buying up bots! IMHOnaut 23 November 2011 at 04:14:05

Here is what I would like to clear up... a little about bots... and about the money spent on them.

On your little site doaa.ru I noticed a little group on VKontakte vkontakte.ru/shelhin vkontakte.ru/shelhin where you are trying to hype yourself up at the expense of its members - more than 38 thousand bots from various countries, including the CIS and not only, 99% of the members are hacked accounts.

You are trying to take part in a little contest from Agat. Only after I caught you at it in your little thread about the venality of our forum's local colour, SUDDENLY the link to the group was changed and the avatar removed, the info wiped. For which I was thanked, though somewhat prematurely...

Yandex remembers everything, even what you have already wiped. hghltd.yandex.net/yandbtm?fm...9bcaaa3a&keyno=

The separately notarised group avatar and several pieces of evidence are a separate delight, Arseny is sort of begging for a tablet. media.nn.ru//data/ufiles/4/41/04/3410457.a_7a14de37.jpg media.nn.ru//data/ufiles/4/41/04/3410458.1.jpg media.nn.ru//data/ufiles/4/41/04/3410459.2.jpg

Then you, Arseny, hastily withdrew from the contest and deleted the link, chickened out? 20.agatnn.ru/users/profile/1486/

Arseny, a question was put to you in your thread and I am duplicating it more publicly. How do you gather 38 195 members with hacked accounts and how much does it cost, how do they express their opinion to you? And why do you need this ?

Perhaps we should hold a contest among them for who is the most genuine; after all, I had to take part in your rating and I even made it to 5th place, so your 38-thousand-strong support gathered all by itself? and it will just as accidentally vote in the elections as it did for the Ipad you wanted to win in the contest vkontakte.ru/topic-5613675_25183278 with the help of bots ? Petty, so very petty...

How is it that you, forming armies of bots and working your extremism with those forces), accuse the abode of free speech nn.ru of venality...?"

Interesting facts

  • Personal interests, according to Vkontakte.ru: "business systems, selling the internet, relevant information, new technologies, new ideas, a new world, old senility, beautiful cars, proud politics, dirty patriotism, beautiful girls".

"The Club of Merry Campaigners" — Kommersant, 21 November 2011

The club of merry campaigners. "Kommersant-Online", 21 November 2011 Bloggers have posted online a United Russia report on propaganda on the internet

Nizhny Novgorod internet users have found online a report on the activity of United Russia campaigners, addressed to local party functionaries. Judging by the report, United Russia is making active use of paid campaigners on social networks and on popular Nizhny Novgorod internet platforms. Posing as ordinary users, they campaign for the party of power, criticise the opposition and engage in "localising negativity" against United Russia. The local branches of Molodaya Gvardiya and United Russia deny any involvement with the document and call its publication a prank by a KVN team. The Nizhny Novgorod inter-university KVN league told Kommersant that it had not been making jokes about United Russia.

Users of the Nizhny Novgorod social network NN.RU found and posted on the forum a report on the blogosphere activity of United Russia campaigners. Judging by the document, several people registered on social networks and forums were paid to spread a negative context against the opposition (for example, a video about a negative assessment of Gennady Zyuganov by Communist Party of the Russian Federation members who disagreed with him, information about businessmen on the party's lists, and so on) and to praise United Russia in internet discussions. As follows from the report, the campaigners' main task was the "localisation of negativity" against the party of power — the document lists various threads on the forums of the towns and districts of the Nizhny Novgorod Region with a count of the total number of messages posted, the number of campaigners' messages among them and a note such as "thread diverted".

Soon after the link to the site with the report was posted on a popular forum, unknown persons redirected it to a video clip in support of Muammar Gaddafi; then in the discussion thread there appeared excerpts of similar reports on the online campaigners of the Communist Party, the LDPR and other parties.

However, users managed to save the first web page with the report, which named functionaries of United Russia and Young Guard as its addressees. «I am 99.9% sure that this is a genuine report by United Russia's paid agitators; their activity on the forum had been obvious long before this incident. What happened was, as they say, an epic fail (an epic failure.— “Kommersant”): their administrators failed to password-protect access to the site with the report. After it was published the link was quickly killed and a circus with redirects began. But the very fact that a team of special agitators imitating ordinary users is working on United Russia's image and on “localizing the negative” shows that United Russia has no support at all among ordinary users and is forced to hire bots»,— said the director of the internet company NN.RU Mikhail Iosilevich.

The party functionaries named in the report as its addressees told “Kommersant” that they had nothing to do with the document. «I saw that link and my surname under it, but I never received such a report in my mail. In principle anything at all can be done on the internet, all the more so since my email address is no secret. This is somebody's practical joke or aggressive PR»,— Sergey Bocharov, a member of the presidium of the political council of the Nizhny Novgorod regional branch of United Russia, told “Kommersant”. Gennady Guryanov, head of the Nizhny Novgorod regional headquarters of Young Guard, drew the attention of “Kommersant” to the fact that reports on internet agitation by all the parties had appeared on the Nizhny Novgorod forum, along with party-humour clips from the programme “Gorod Gorky”. «This is just a gag, apparently staged by the KVN team “Gorod Gorky”. After such powerful PR the number of views of their video clips on the internet has tripled. The lads simply decided to have some fun themselves and to amuse the public, especially since the inter-university league games are coming up soon»,— the “Young Guard member” found his way out.

The editor of the inter-university open KVN league of Nizhny Novgorod Region, Dmitry Zonov, however, told “Kommersant” that the KVN players have nothing to do with the internet report. «The KVN team “Gorod Gorky” (Gorky was the name of Nizhny Novgorod in the Soviet period.— “Kommersant”) ceased to exist in 2008. I have seen the video clips of the programme “Gorod Gorky” online, but who makes them I do not know. It looks very much as though someone on the United Russia side is trying hard»,— Dmitry Zonov added. Curiously, in the latest clip the «internet KVN players» poked fun at the street agitators of the Communist Party and Yabloko who «work for dough» («Do you know that Steve Jobs has died? Who is going to head Yabloko now, Yavlinsky?»), while the contacts page of the site promoting the video releases lists the mobile telephone number of one of the Nizhny Novgorod activists of Young Guard.

Roman Kryazhev

United Russia's sewerage — "MK", 26 November 2011

United Russia's sewerage. Moskovsky Komsomolets No. 25807 of 26 November 2011

Are paid agitation brigades littering the Internet?

To win an election it is no longer enough simply to coerce public-sector employees and count the votes “correctly” — in the age of the Internet you also have to secure informational superiority in the World Wide Web. Thanks to the negligence of United Russia functionaries in Nizhny Novgorod, a report became publicly available describing the work of a special agitation brigade that neutralizes criticism of the party of power on forums, in social networks and in blogs. “MK” has studied this technology...

A detective story has unfolded in the Nizhny Novgorod Internet. On the morning of 16 November a link appeared on the city forum of NN.ru to a report, posted on a special server, about the organization of internet agitation in favour of United Russia. Probably because the agitators constantly monitor popular resources, the page with the report was quickly blocked to outside visitors. The document hung in open access for no more than an hour. Vigilant users, however, managed to make screenshots (copies) of the report. “MK” has the corresponding file at its disposal.

The agitators published eulogies to the Putin—Medvedev party on Odnoklassniki and VKontakte, supported the campaign “Thank you, Putin, for this” on Twitter, posted and commented on campaign clips on YouTube, and published previously prepared demotivator pictures against the opposition. The main work, however, was carried out on the forums of the towns of Nizhny Novgorod Region.

The agitators' activity is called “working over” in the document. The basic technique: channelling the negative into the sewer. The results of the virtual agitation brigades' work are counted by the number of posts they produced, the number of responses and the number of users who took part in the discussion. The fullest information concerns Odnoklassniki — there are 18 agitation accounts in that social network. For each of them a “direct impact” (in people) is calculated. In all, according to the report, 8,868 people were covered in that network. Two clips posted on YouTube were watched, according to the report, by 2,765 people. On Twitter an impact was made on 2,600 users.

What does all this look like in practice? For example, on the Nizhny Novgorod forum, in the thread «A student of the MSU journalism faculty on Medvedev's visit to the faculty», we read a post by a user named in the report (spelling and punctuation preserved): «The girl is peculiar and her intellect is zero! Well why? do it like that well what did she achieve??? After all nothing changes from protests like that, and the actions of such an opposition provoke laughter and indignation...». In the thread «The clip “Our madhouse votes for Putin”» we read: «What actions of the authorities does this video reflect? What here is constructive criticism? This is vulgar and stupid!!!». The agitation lays its emphasis on hopelessness, on the idea that if everything is changed it may turn out even worse.

It is also interesting to look at the internet agitators' list of “enemies”. First place goes unreservedly to the Communist Party. For the communists' leader the Nizhny Novgorod agitators even opened a special group in a social network where they post pictures mocking Zyuganov. In second place is the popular blogger and anti-corruption campaigner Alexey Navalny. He can probably be proud of such attention. Rounding out the top three is A Just Russia.

The information leak came from the site of Arseny Shcheltsin. The young man is 21 years old, he is an activist of «Young Guard of «United Russia» and holds the post of chairman of the Commission for Informatization and Innovation Activity of the Youth Parliament.

— A copy of the report on agitation for United Russia appeared on your site. Tell me, how did the leak happen?

— I cannot tell you exactly, — Shcheltsin began the conversation with the “MK” correspondent laconically.

— You don't know how the leak happened?

— I have absolutely no idea what you are asking about. Ask a more specific question.

— Copies of the pages of your site have been posted on Nizhny Novgorod forums. They contain reporting on agitation for United Russia...

— I understand what you are talking about. I am simply a programmer, I work with programs. Anyone who isn't lazy can make pages like that in special programs.

— Hold on, but these documents on your site were seen not by one person but by several hundred. They saw it all with their own eyes. What has “Photoshop” got to do with it? There is no point in your denying it.

— What you are talking about I do not have. Unfortunately. I have no idea what you are asking about...

At the end of the document the persons to whom it was to be sent are listed. Besides Arseny Shcheltsin, a certain Sergey Gorshkov, Gennady Yevgenyevich Guryanov, Sergey Vladimirovich Bocharov and Olga Vladimirovna Shchetinina are named. The site of the Nizhny Novgorod branch of United Russia states that Bocharov Sergey Vladimirovich is deputy minister of sport and youth policy of the government of Nizhny Novgorod Region. Shchetinina Olga Vladimirovna is a deputy of the Legislative Assembly of Nizhny Novgorod Region and head of the regional executive committee of United Russia. Guryanov Gennady Yevgenyevich is chief of staff of the Nizhny Novgorod branch of Young Guard of United Russia. Sergey Gorshkov is only 18 years old, he is an activist of Young Guard.

It is logical to assume that if there is a special brigade of agitators working to a reporting schedule, then there is also payment for their labour. Many clips and comments carry a link to the site “New Formats”, as like as two peas to other sites of pro-Kremlin innovators. «Every day you post all sorts of information you need and don't need on the walls of your social network accounts. You copy demotivators, funny pictures and video clips there. And you do it for free. This site gives you the chance to receive a pleasant bonus for it. For posting one unit of content you will receive a bonus of 3 roubles». So there it is — scatter a hundred replies around the forums and get three hundred roubles.

See a copy of the report on agitation for United Russia here.

Igor Karmazin

Reflashing the network — Kommersant, 17 January 2013

<...>"It is fairly simple to assess the work of a person who writes an article, but how much to pay people who send dozens of 140-character messages into social networks is a more complicated question",— says one of the political consultants. According to him, the ka-2 site developed by MGER is designed to solve precisely this task. An activist registers on the site, connects his social network accounts to it and receives instructions on which topics are to be promoted today — while his profile displays the exact number of tweets he has sent. This makes it possible to calculate his earnings precisely.

Over recent days the pro-Kremlin activists registered on ka-2.ru have been promoting, for example, the hashtags #ИтогиМаршаПедофилов, #МаршПодлецов, #УдальцовСпалился, #КСОсборищежуликов and #ЗаЖелезняка (Sergey Zheleznyak is deputy speaker of the State Duma from United Russia). Some of them they managed to push into the trends of Russian Twitter. "Kommersant" contacted one of those who promoted these hashtags from the ka-2.ru site. He is an MGER activist, a student from Barnaul, who said that he and his comrades in Young Guard had indeed been recommended to register on this site, with a promise that in the event of active work they could count on 10-15 thousand roubles a month. More details: http://kommersant.ru/doc/2106191

As "Kommersant" has learned, the site ka-2.ru was created by an activist from Nizhny Novgorod, Arseny Shcheltsin (according to the RBC hosting service, it belongs to a concealed person).

Mr Shcheltsin has repeatedly organized various actions of "Young Guard", in the summer of 2011 he took part in the primaries of the "All-Russia People's Front" ahead of the State Duma elections, and in November 2011 he became a figure in the scandal around internet agitation for the party of power. At that time, through the oversight of one of the Nizhny Novgorod functionaries of "United Russia", a report found its way onto the internet describing how specially created agitation brigades tried to promote the brand of the party of power in the social networks "Odnoklassniki", "VKontakte", Twitter, and also on Nizhny Novgorod forums. "Kommersant" contacted Mr Shcheltsin and he confirmed that he is the creator of this resource, explaining that "its purpose is to promote particular content in social networks for a fee".

Afterwards, however, Mr Shcheltsin retracted his words, declaring that he has nothing to do with "Young Guard" and pays no one any money for promoting pro-government hashtags. And on the day after the conversation with "Kommersant", on 27 November 2012, Mr Shcheltsin temporarily blocked the site to anyone wishing to register anew.

<...>

Ilya Barabanov, Kommersant, 17 January 2013,

Official site

Nickname on NN.RU

Blog on LiveJournal

Twitter

Facebook

Skype

  • pixelsu

ICQ

  • 454040

Mobile phone

Address

Phone

  • Phone: 831 41-43-47-0.

Internet resources

  • RussianVote.com — ONLINE ELECTIONS to the State Duma 2011 — internet voting. The site's code states: "Arseniy Shcheltsin & Team" ( saved copy ).

See also