PornHub honors pledge to issue premium account to Russian media watchdog
The adult video website PornHub has apparently honored its promise to give a premium account to the Russian media watchdog if the site ban in Russia is overturned.
Last September, PornHub was blocked in Russia by a court order for providing unrestricted access to adult content to minors. The news triggered a peculiar exchange between the video service and Roskomnadzor, the Russian media watchdog charged with enforcing such bans.
PornHub offered the agency a free premium account in exchange for unblocking the site, but that offer was rejected.
The ban apparently sparked increased interest from the adult site’s managers in the Russian market. Despite the ban, PornHub started accounts in popular Russian social media and hired a social media manager (SMM) for Russia.
The effort was apparently worth it, since PornHub went back online in Russia in April, now featuring an age verification mechanism to comply with the Russian law.
On Tuesday, Roskomnadzor spokesman Vadim Ampelonsky, who was addressing a conference of social media professionals in St. Petersburg, joked that PornHub is yet to deliver on its promise of freebies. He said if it did, he would personally make sure that all internet providers in Russia make the site accessible.
Dmitry Kolodin, PornHub’s Russian SMM, replied that Ampelonsky would get a premium account as soon as the company’s HQ in Montreal, Canada “wakes up.” On Wednesday morning he posted an update.
“I had sent promo-codes yesterday evening (10 of them),” he wrote.
Ampelonsky told Lenta.ru news website that he would donate his premium account “as charity to the needy.”
