What's the Catalyst of the Protests?

The protests were framed by most people as protests against rigged elections. I think that the catalyst was sort of the blatant spectacle of the transfer of power from the Meets Rimeo de Vazefur, if you remember such a character back to Vladimir Putin. It's not like Russia had had real elections for more than a dozen years. Elections had become an empty ritual, but somehowI think that the exposing how empty that ritual was was insulting to people.