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A national messenger app called MAX is currently being prepared for launch in Russia.

It’s being developed by VK. MAX is being presented as the main, central messenger, intended to funnel all Russians into one platform for complete control over domestic traffic. In short, a replacement for Telegram. It will be connected to government services and modeled after China’s WeChat.

I’m already predicting a complete failure. After all, the Chinese dictatorship differs from the Russian one in having actual professionals, as well as much larger investments in building apps for their digital gulag. Plus, corruption in China isn’t as bad. In the end, the entire budget for MAX will get embezzled, the result will be a laggy messenger, it’ll eventually be removed from the App Store due to sanctions, and that will be the end of it