Rutube, Russia’s state-backed video platform and the Kremlin’s preferred alternative to YouTube, is undergoing mass layoffs as viewership craters and its parent company, Gazprom-Media, struggles to justify the platform’s ballooning costs. According to Frank Media, the platform’s staff were informed of “significant” cuts this week as part of a merger with Premier, an online cinema service, and Yappy, a TikTok-style vertical video app.