Studies examining the democratizing potential of new media have tended towards a
somewhat parochial Anglocentrism, which has characterized much of the ensuing
debate and therefore often failed to fully predict the effects in other contexts and
cultures. While new media?s role in circumventing the obviously deficient media
environment of parts of the Arab world attracted global attention post Arab Spring,
and some attempts have been made to examine the impact in other overtly
authoritarian regimes, this article argues that the most revealing dynamic is
elsewhere: in „West-facing? post-Soviet countries which embrace concepts of media
freedom and democracy yet fail to fully implement them. In these media
environments, sometimes described as „semi-free? (Robakidze, 2011), web access is
often very high, partly driven by the failures of the mainstream independent press to
capitalize on the post-Communist environment combined with recent limitations on
the freedom of the press. Two countries on similar political trajectories, Ukraine and
Georgia, are examined in this article. Both experienced so-called „Colour
Revolutions? in the early 2000s, with „media freedom? a fundamental part of
protestors? demands, yet the underpinning cultural context differs considerably, with
a comparative approach to the research revealing some significant areas of
congruence whilst simultaneously stressing the importance of geopolitical context in
the development and effectiveness of online journalism. Through the use of
immersive interviews with journalists in both countries, the article identifies the
emergence of „hub websites? specializing in independent political journalism, around
which an engaged and politically active population is coalescing.