Background. The necessity to introduce digital technologies in education and in the professional training of journalism students in particular has been widely discussed in the theory and practice of education over the past 20 years. From the point of view of both future research and training, it becomes very important to study the development of journalists’ professional competencies and professional identity in the online environment. Objective. To study the experience of distance learning by students in the faculty of journalism at Lomonosov Moscow State University during the period of restrictive measures in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic (Spring 2020). Design. A two-stage empirical project studied the opinions of students about distance learning, to identify its effectiveness for the formation of professional competencies and identity. In the first stage, a qualitative (investigative) study was conducted on a small sample using semi-formalized tools. In the second stage, a formal survey was conducted on a representative sample (N = 576). Results. We found that in order to achieve the social, educational, and cognitive presence necessary for effective online education, an important condition is the communication environment and stable communication among all participants: students, professors, and academic departments. However, the communicative environment of the traditional training process is not transferred to the online environment in its original form. With Internet technologies, it is difficult to provide a strong teaching presence, which is a catalyst for the development of social and cognitive presence and a key component of traditional professional training. In the online learning mode, students are overloaded with self-study and written assignments, and mastering the necessary professional knowledge, competencies, and skills becomes their own responsibility. Not all components of the traditional educational process (types and forms of classes, educational materials, etc.), remain effective when transferred to the online environment. Conclusion. The formation of professional competencies, as well as the social, cognitive, and behavioral components that determine the further development of professional identity, is difficult in distance education. Online learning cannot be regarded as a full-fledged alternative to the traditional higher professional education of journalists.

The paper approaches digital divide as a complex multi-dimensional and multi-level problem, not being limited to the Internet access only. We argue that regardless of some universal trends previously identified by scholars, every country retains its national specifics in ICT access, skills and benefits people can get from using ICTs. In this vein, we theorize Russian model of the digital divide, approaching it through three main angles: state regulation of digitalization processes in Russia on federal and regional levels; different modes of the digital technology use in a cross-regional comparative perspective; and specific mechanisms for the analysis and further overcoming digital divide in Russia. For the latter point, we propose a ‘digital passport’ of the Russian regions that allows for better understanding of the digitalization progress in particular regions of the country and for more efficient policy-making on site. Lastly, we test a ‘digital passport’ model on eight federal subjects of Russia to show its applicability of the study of the digital divide in different regional contexts.

In the context of Russia's digital transformation, the systemic digitalization of the dialogue between the public and the authorities is gaining particular relevance. The dialogue involves dealing with various problems of digital inequality, which include not only access to information and individual user skills but also ensuring simple process of getting the required amount of information about the local authorities’ activity. The role of the authorities here is providing the “digital information openness”, i.e. reporting to the local community about their work, receiving feedback from the residents and involving them in the informational dialogue. Authorities’ digital information openness will help to make them approachable for people and achieve “two-way” communication with the public. This will keep the government bodies well informed about the real socio-political situation in the region and guarantee the public’s involvement in the process of making decisions on development of the region and municipalities. The article analyzes web resources of government agencies and social network accounts of highest officials in eight RF constituent territories with various levels of economic development. The analysis shows that one of the key factors of supporting the dialogue between authorities and the public and developing digital information openness is federal and local legislative regulation.

At a time when representation in the digital and information environment becomes one of the most important factors in the development of the territories, as well as a full-fledged tool for achieving geopolitical and economic goals, the work on the formation of foreign policy images of the regions in foreign media space takes on special importance. In this article, based on the analysis of theoretical and methodological aspects of its use, the author distinguished between the concepts of "image" as a chaotically forming set of audience perceptions and "image" as a purposefully structured work on the formation of specific ideas about the territory. Taking into account that the measures stipulated by the Strategy for the Development of Eurasian Economic Integration until 2025 aimed at providing broad audience access to information about the Union are focused only on the population of the participating countries, and there is no purposeful work to form the image of the EAEU in foreign media, the author analyzed the image of the Eurasian Economic Union created in the leading American Internet media. The results of the frequency content analysis of the materials of the USA leading online news media, conducted within the study, as well as the emotional tone of these publications, demonstrate that the Eurasian Economic Union is in dire need of focused effort to create and consolidate a sustainable foreign policy image in the media space of the West. Already in 2017, the negative image of the integration association associated with Russia's aggression, actively formed by the leading US news media in 2014–2016, has lost relevance as uninteresting to the American audience and was deleted from the agenda.