mjoneill
It tends to depend on the company...and what the writers are building, and of course, what the product is. Some products do not lend themselves well to a freelance approach, as the domain and product specific knowledge is quite high. Other products have very specific regulatory compliance obligations that also do not lend themselves readily to freelancing (unless you are talking about long term contractors with 2+ year commitments, etc....
They have local chapters in many geographies. Their annual conference is usually well attended and covers topics related to technical writing from Help Authoring to Content Strategy to Content Marketing to Agile.
It's been a long time since I immersed myself in this world, so apologies if my memory is less than perfect.
On the other end, much of documentation has moved into the Wiki space. For a long time, Confluence was making some serious inroads there.
Most professional tooling these days also emphasizes content reuse, and sometimes (if you are lucky) separating content from presentation.
Opinions come from experience: I spent many years in tech writing at both fortune 50's and startups, but have since moved on to other disciplines I enjoy more.
Marketer here. Yes, they work very well...unless you're pumping out a crappy newsletter that nobody wants, doesn't provide value, etc.
Not all products are the same, and not all sales funnels are identical... but generally you want lower commitment asks that can help you build your audience of potential customers far out in advance of them being in a position to buy. In a B2B world, investing in high-value content that helps people do their jobs better regardless of whether or not they own YOUR software is a great way to build your audience so that your product is front and center when it is time to buy/consider.
For some products, the opportunity to replace an entrenched solution with your own may only come up once a decade. For others, it might be an annual or monthly ask. Content Marketing is the only thing worth a damn that builds trust and relationship so that you can better convert these opportunities when the time is right.
This move by Russia is intentionally timed because countries themselves struggle to act with a unified voice, much less transnational alliances.