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In September 2023, Russia Today launched its online platform in Portuguese, as "RT Brazil".
On Aug 9, 2024 the broadcast and other equipment from the RT studio in Washington DC would be auctioned off. <ref>https://rasmus.com/auctions/PDFH8RH4lUDFATQlWiEv {{Bare URL inline|date=August 2024}}</ref>
==Organization==
===Ratings/impact===
;Audience ratings
The RT website (as of March 2022), maintains that "since June 2012", RT has "consistently and significantly outperforms other foreign channels including Euronews and Fox News. RT's quarterly audience in the UK is 2.5 million viewers".<ref name="RT-ratings">{{cite web |title=RT. About Us. Distribution |url=https://www.rt.com/about-us/distribution/ |website=RT |access-date=14 March 2022 |archive-date=7 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230607134305/https://www.rt.com/about-us/distribution/ |url-status=live }}</ref> However, according to ''[[The Daily Beast|]]''The Daily Beast'']], citing leaked documents from "Vasily Gatov, a former RIA Novosti employee" (as of 2015) RT “hugely exaggerates its viewership,”;<ref name="Niemanlab-2022"/> and its most-watched segments were on apolitical subjects.<ref>{{cite news|title=Putin's Propaganda TV Lies About Its Popularity|url=http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/09/17/putin-s-propaganda-tv-lies-about-ratings.html|website=The Daily Beast|date=17 September 2015|access-date=6 August 2016|last1=Zavadski|first1=Katie|archive-date=20 September 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150920002756/http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/09/17/putin-s-propaganda-tv-lies-about-ratings.html|url-status=live}}</ref> Between 2013 and 2015, over 80% of RT's viewership was for videos of accidents, crime, disasters, and natural phenomena, such as the 2013 [[Chelyabinsk meteor]] event, with less than 1% of viewership for political videos.<ref name=Zavaski17Sept/> In late 2015, all of the 20 most-watched videos on its main channel, totaling 300 million views, were described as "disaster/novelty". Of the top 100, only a small number could be categorized as political, with only one covering Ukraine.<ref name=BBC915/> The most popular video of Russian president Putin shows him singing "[[Blueberry Hill (song)|Blueberry Hill]]" at a 2010 St. Petersburg charity event.<ref name="Zavaski17Sept"/> In 2017, ''[[The Washington Post]]'' analysed RT's popularity and concluded that "it's not very good at its job" as "Moscow's propaganda arm" due to its relative unpopularity.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/01/12/if-russia-today-is-moscows-propaganda-arm-its-not-very-good-at-its-job/|title=If Russia Today is Moscow's propaganda arm, it's not very good at its job|newspaper=The Washington Post|access-date=13 April 2017|archive-date=12 January 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170112205116/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/01/12/if-russia-today-is-moscows-propaganda-arm-its-not-very-good-at-its-job/|url-status=live}}</ref> RT has disputed both ''The Daily Beast'' and ''The Washington Post'' assessments, saying their analyses used outdated viewership data.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.rt.com/op-edge/315778-exposing-daily-beast-propaganda/|title=Exposing Daily Beast propaganda: 10 RT political virals the YouTube MSM can only dream of|website=RT International|language=en-EN|access-date=13 April 2017|archive-date=14 April 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170414162029/https://www.rt.com/op-edge/315778-exposing-daily-beast-propaganda/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.rt.com/op-edge/373527-fact-checking-washington-post-rt-report/|title=Fact check for dummies: Teaching Washington Post & Co how to do journalism one last time|website=RT International|language=en-EN|access-date=13 April 2017|archive-date=14 April 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170414080820/https://www.rt.com/op-edge/373527-fact-checking-washington-post-rt-report/|url-status=live}}</ref>
A study by Professor Robert Orttung at George Washington University stated that RT uses human interest stories without ideological content to attract viewers to its channels. Between January and May 2015, the Russian-language channel had the most viewers, with approximately double the number of the main channel, despite only having around one-third the number of subscribers.<ref name="Orttung">{{cite book |last1=Orttung |first1=Robert |last2=Nelson |first2=Elizabeth |last3=Livshen |first3=Anthony |section=Measuring RT's impact on YouTube |title=Information Warfare |journal=Russian Analytical Digest |date=8 December 2015 |volume=177 |issue=8 |url=http://www.css.ethz.ch/content/dam/ethz/special-interest/gess/cis/center-for-securities-studies/pdfs/RussianAnalyticalDigest177.pdf |access-date=21 March 2021 |publisher=[[Research Centre for East European Studies]] |location=[[University of Bremen]] |via=[[ETH Zurich]] |archive-date=9 April 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230409122210/https://css.ethz.ch/content/dam/ethz/special-interest/gess/cis/center-for-securities-studies/pdfs/RussianAnalyticalDigest177.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref>
According to Steven Erlanger, RT provides "hard news and top-notch graphics" and a "mix with interviews from all sorts of people: well known and obscure, left and right. if there is any unifying character to RT, it is a deep skepticism of Western and American narratives of the world and a fundamental defensiveness about Russia and Mr. Putin."<ref name="Erlanger-NYT-8-3-17"/>
RT formerly hosted the leaders of populist European parties such as UKIP's leader Nigel Farage and Marie Le Pen, leader of the French Populist National Rally Party.[https://ecfr.eu/article/commentary_putins_friends_in_europe7153/ Putin’s friends in Europe] Far-Left leader George Galloway also formerly hosted his own TV news programme on RT named "Sputnik: Orbiting the World with George Galloway"[https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/kremlin-state-television-station-has-its-british-bank-accounts-closed-82pkcz0ll Kremlin television station has its British bank accounts closed]
=== Propaganda and related issues ===
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