cable news channels. In August 2015, RT's average weekly viewing figure had fallen to around 450,000 (0.8 percent of the total UK audience), 100,000 fewer than in June 2012 and less than half that of Al Jazeera English. In March 2016, the monthly viewing was figure 0.04%. Latin America is the second most significant area of influence for internet RT (rt.com). In 2013, RT ascended to the ranks of the 100 most watched websites in seven Latin American countries. A Pew Research survey of the most popular news videos on YouTube in 2011–12 found RT to be the top source with 8.5 percent of posts, 68 percent of which consisted of first-person video accounts of dramatic worldwide events, likely acquired by the network rather than created by it. In 2013, RT became the first television news channel to reach 1 billion views on YouTube. In 2014, its main (English) channel was reported have 1.4 million subscribers. Followers In 2013, RT became "the first news network to surpass 1 billion views on YouTube". As of shortly after the invasion of Ukraine and blocking of RT by tech companies, RT's "main Facebook channel has more than 7 million followers" (some of which are located in Europe where the channel is blocked). RT's YouTube account had "roughly 4.65 million followers in English and 5.94 million in Spanish". Impact RT has some effect on viewers' political opinions, according to a 2021 study in the journal Security Studies. Viewers exposed to RT became more likely "to support the withdrawal of the United States "from its role as a cooperative global leader" than those who did not watch RT by 10–20%. "This effect is robust across measures, obtains across party lines, and persists even when we disclose that RT is financed by the Russian government." However, exposure to RT had no measurable "effect on Americans' views of domestic politics or the Russian government." According to author Peter Pomerantsev, a large audience rating is not RT's principal goal. Their campaigns are "for financial, political and media influence.” RT (and Sputnik) "create the fodder" used by "thousands of fake news propagators" and provide an outlet for material hacked from targets it wishes to harm in the service of Russian (government) interests. RT also serves to make friends with people "useful" to the Russian state, such as Michael Flynn (retired United States Army lieutenant general and dismissed director of