Does this mean Blizzard has gone red?

Blizzard has announced the technical Alpha of a Russian-laguage version of World of Warcraft. Technical Alpha means that it is on the "friends and family" level of exclusiveness, and will focus on the technical aspects of the game, such as gameplay and bug fixes. A localization beta, which will likely focus on getting the translations just right, is to follow.

All our Russian-speaking players are invited to participate in this first phase of testing which focuses only on the technical aspects of the game. We would especially appreciate your reports regarding any connection and latency issues you may experience.

The second phase, the Localization Beta, will begin with patch 2.4.3 and will focus on the localization of World of Warcraft.

For more information, please check out the European World of Warcraft main site.