ifregion.ru was the website of the Nizhny Novgorod news agency "IF-Region" (IF-регион), a news feed covering the political, economic, and social life of Nizhny Novgorod and Nizhny Novgorod Oblast. The editorial office was located in Nizhny Novgorod at 15 Bolshaya Pokrovskaya Street, office 1-2, and the home page listed the phone numbers (8312) 33-20-40 (editorial office) and (8312) 39-74-24 (finance and commercial service, also the fax)[1]. The copyright notice in the footer read "© IF-region, 2001-2011," and in the snapshots of the following year, "2001-2012"[1][2]. Substantive snapshots of the home page preserved in the web archive span November 2011 through July 2012.

What the home page looked like

At the top was a header reading "News Agency 'IF-region'" with the current date; next to it were "email" and "password" fields and a "Registration and subscription" link — access to the feed required an account[1]. The horizontal menu at the end of 2011 consisted of the sections "Home page," "Politics," "Economy," "Industry," "Finance," "Society," "Culture"[1]; by summer 2012 the "Industry" section had disappeared from the menu[3].

Below were the blocks "Exclusive" (interviews), "Analytics," and, from 2012, "Our commentary," as well as "Photo chronicle" and export buttons "RSS 2.0" and "Atom 1.0"[1][3]. The home page featured one expanded story of the day, with a "News feed" below it and a "week · month" toggle. Each item began with the prefix "IF-REGION-" and carried a line of place and time: "Nizhny Novgorod," the date, hours and minutes[2]. The item ended with a "Full text of the article" link, which in the June 2012 snapshot read "Permanent link to this article"[3].

A distinctive feature was a warning for visitors with old browsers: as the home page informed them, their web browser "was released a very long time ago and is obsolete," with advice to install Mozilla Firefox[1]. In the footer, the agency stipulated that the information "is intended for private use only" and could not be reproduced without written permission[1]. Below the copyright notice ran a line of paid links unrelated to the site's subject matter: wholesale Italian shoes, real estate in Montenegro, Swiss watches, cottage designs[1][4].

What the agency covered

The backbone of the feed was regional politics. In November 2011 this meant the campaign ahead of the State Duma elections: Alexander Bochkaryov's removal from A Just Russia's federal party list, the drawing of lots for airtime among the parties, and the confirmation of Kozhevnikov as prosecutor of Nizhny Novgorod Oblast[1]. In January 2012 the feed followed pre-election pickets, the "For Fair Elections" march on February 4, and the March 4 municipal elections in fifteen districts of the oblast[2]. In summer 2012: the refusal of more than three hundred Nizhny Novgorod city administration employees to disclose their income, the conflict around Dzerzhinsk head Sopin, and the founding of a regional branch of the Civic Platform party led by Maxim Matkin[3][4].

The economic section rested on the region's major enterprises: the closure of Sibur-Neftekhim's chlorine production at Kaprolaktam, the Vyksa Steel Works and OMK (United Metallurgical Company), and a bankruptcy suit against the football club Volga in the arbitration court[4]. Pieces in the "Analytics" and "Our commentary" blocks ran under headlines built on wordplay: "A City Without B.," "La guerre for the post of 'mayor,'" "Amending the Charter to Amend the Charter," "gub-ER-nator"[1][3][4]. "Exclusive" published interviews — with State Duma deputy Alexander Khinshtein, with Artyom Kavinov, with Vladislav Yegorov[1][2][3]. "Photo chronicle" covered street politics: the report "Every month, on the 31st… Strategy-31 rally in Nizhny Novgorod" stayed on the home page from autumn 2011 until early 2012, then was replaced by "Picket against Dzerzhinsk City Duma deputies"[1][3].

Size of the archive and place in the Nizhny Novgorod internet

The depth of the feed can be judged from the page navigation at the bottom of the home page. In the November 2, 2011 snapshot the last archive page was 1065; on January 19, 2012 it was 1067; on June 26, 2012 it was 1075; on July 19, 2012 it was 1076[1][2][3][4].

In the nn.ru directory the site was listed as "Information Agency IF-Region," and its own description promised "prompt, complete, and objective coverage of political, business, financial-economic, and social events in Nizhny Novgorod Oblast in real time." In our sample of the Counter.nn.ru rating, ifregion.ru is recorded with a score of 769.07 — for more on how this data works, see the Archival study of the Nizhny Novgorod internet from the counter.nn.ru rating. The agency does not appear in the published voting results of the Nizhny Novgorod Internet Day for 2004, although that year's competition table does include another regional agency, "Kremlin"[5]. For the Nizhny Novgorod Internet, IF-Region was neither a portal nor a forum but a professional news wire — a genre that leaves scant traces in the web archive: the home page carried headlines and short leads, while the texts themselves lay behind the "Full text of the article" link[2].

How it closed

The last snapshot of the home page with a live feed is dated July 19, 2012: the top story was about the founding of a regional branch of Civic Platform, with the feed running through July 18[4]. There are no later substantive snapshots of the home page in our sample. As of the census of defunct Nizhny Novgorod sites, the domain ifregion.ru is not registered.

Sources

  1. web.archive.org — Home page, 2011 (archive)
  2. web.archive.org — Home page, January 2012 (archive)
  3. web.archive.org — Home page, June 2012 (archive)
  4. web.archive.org — Home page, July 2012 (archive)
  5. web.archive.org — Voting results of Nizhny Novgorod Internet Day, 2004 (archive)