Life.ru
Life (stylized as L!FE, formerly LifeNews) is a Russian pro-government news website owned by and published by . Its office is based in Moscow. History. As of February 2014, it had a potential audience of 30 million subscribers. The channel's editor-in-chief is Anatoly Suleymanov. In September 2014 Ukraine's National Council of Television banned 15 Kremlin-run channels, including Life News, for what they claimed was war propaganda. In 2015 News Media cut around 15 to 17 percent of the employees of Lifenews. Life has been shut down on August 18, 2017. Previously it has been  published that the TV channel is about to reduce staff. Internet publication Life.ru. In 2009 the internet publication of LifeNews.ru was launched. At the same time the projects LifeSports and LifeShowbiz of the news media holding company were launched, which were both closed in 2016. Life.ru News Media, which controlled the domain of Life.ru, had the following owners: 75% of shares was owned by a closed fund "Media+", which was associated with the "National Media Group" (NMG), businessman Yuri Kovalchuk, who is close to Russian President Vladimir Putin. 25% was controlled by General Director . In 2018 Gabrelyanov announced his retirement  from life.ru; according to Meduza and project publications because of a tense relationship with First Deputy Presidential Administration Alexei Gromov and the NMG management. In 2016 LifeNews.ru was renamed as life.ru and was planned as Russian equivalent of Buzzfeed. The new project merged the former Lifenews and Super websites. On September 17, 2018, Suleymanov and Life.ru editor-in-chief Alexander Potapov left the project, with Nikita Magutin (Mash) and Raul Smyr (LifeCorr) leaving at the same time. Aram Gabrelyanov returned to News Media as General Director, with Arseniy Hovhannisyan becoming the new Chief Editor of Life.ru, who previously held a  similar position at Izvestia. TV-channel Life. The TV channel was officially launched in September 2013. The broadcasting licensee for the television channel was Media Content LLC, whose beneficiaries were Aram Gabrelyanov and the oil merchant "Surgutex". On July 1, 2014 LifeNews TV channel broadcast digitally in the Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol as a part of the third (regional) multiplex. According to the open statistics of LiveInternet, the daily audience of the LifeNews online informational publication in 2013 was 200-250 thousand viewers. On September 24, 2013 the LifeNews mobile application was launched. On December 17, 2014 LifeNews Editor -in-Chief Anatoly Suleymanov confirmed large-scale redundancies by January 1, 2015 due to the restructuring by the News Media holding company. Ilya Melekhin was appointed editor-in-chief on 15 May 2016. He was replaced by Svetlana Levintas on April 14, 2017. On August 18, 2017, the channel Life TV stopped broadcasting and announced its closure. According to the strategy of The holding company News Media, extended streaming on the Internet and social networks was to replace TV broadcasting. Radio Life Sound. On July 1, 2013 Aram Gabrelyanov, the owner of Life, became the General Director of the radio  station "Russian News Service" (RNS), which had been set up in 2001. On July 4, 2016, as part of the reorganization of the Life brand, RSN was renamed as Life Sound. On August 14, 2017 the radio station stopped broadcasting. On August 14, 2017 the radio station stopped broadcasting. Ownership. Life is owned by general director Aram Gabrelyanov. The Gabrelyanovs operate in different sectors of Russian life from showbusiness to the security services. According to an article in The Moscow Times an influence on their recent success has been loyalty to the Kremlin. "The father, Aram Gabrelyanov, refers to President  Vladimir Putin as the "father of the nation". One of Putin's oldest friends spent $80 million to become a key shareholder in the Gabrelyanovs' holding company, News Media, providing it with a flood of cash for investment.' Criticism. LifeNews is notable for a servile attitude toward the Kremlin and a proximity to the Russian security services. While broadcasting news about events during the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine, LifeNews was derided for falsely claiming to have found the business card of Dmytro Yarosh at the site of a battle in the Donbass. Ukrainians quickly created an internet  meme called the "Yarosh business card" and called the reporting "propaganda worse than that of Nazi Germany" When the number on the card was called, it reached an unaffiliated elderly woman, casting further doubts on the claims of LifeNews. In September 2014, the National Television Council of Ukraine banned 15 channels operated by the Kremlin for alleged war propaganda, including Life News. In September 2014, YouTube blocked the LifeNews video channel due to third-party complaints about copyright infringements. In the wake of the Charlie Hebdo shooting in January 2015, it aired a piece from one of its regular contributors  and 'expert political analysts' that said the terrorist attack had been carried out by the US against France in order to further an anti-Russian agenda. These claims were treated as little more than conspiracy theories meant to build pro-Putin support in American media According to the Security Service of Ukraine, it is a paramilitary organization. Andrew Levus, SBU, called members of the LifeNews channel 'specific special operations combat units of information.'