Der Spiegel has an article today profiling two important players in the Russian blogosphere – Rustem Adagamov (Drugoi) and Robert Schlegel of the Nashi, and how they are squaring off in the struggle over web censorship.  It seems hard to imagine that Russia would go as far as, say, Thailand, as it would quickly become quite unprofitable for the likes of Mamut and Milner if the Russian internet offered nothing beyond Kremlin pronouncements.  Nevertheless, it’s still amazing that this conversation is even happening at the same time as the “grand modernization narrative” and aims to emulate Silicon Valley.

“Russia’s bloggers are simply the most serious,” says Brad Fitzpatrick, the American founder of LiveJournal, an online service that allows people to set up their own blogs. And there’s no doubt that bloggers in Russia are more influential than they are anywhere else.