At a presentation ceremony Tuesday, Mikhail Fedotov, leader of the creative center and former Russian Ambassador to UNESCO, said that the museum had taken three years to make. Posted on its website (www.tvmuseum.ru) are more than 20,000 textual documents and over a thousand photographs and other graphic material from public and private archives. "All this [material] has made it possible for us to recreate the [main] stages in the development of radio and television broadcasting from it emergence through to 1991," he said.
Fedotov highlighted veteran broadcasters' contribution, explaining that they not only provided all kinds of documents from their personal archives, but also participated in the writing of a series of thematic essays on the history of radio and television broadcasting in Russia.
Speaking of the project's financial sources, Fedotov said that it had been implemented thanks primarily to grants from UNESCO, the Soros Foundation, and Russia's Ministries of Culture and the Media. He expressed hope that these donors would continue to support the museum.
In a RIA interview, UNESCO Moscow Office Director Philippe Queau underlined the importance of the cyber museum, pointing out that it would help us to keep alive our memories about prominent radio & television professionals of the past and to educate younger generations about the history of broadcasting.
The International Academy of Television & Radio has begun collecting exhibits for a regular museum at Moscow's Ostankino broadcasting center. UNESCO's virtual museum should become a mirror image of this real-life counterpart, expected to open in 2006, Fedotov said.
