“Just Show up and Put Stuff on the Air…”

Bruce Gellerman has huge NPR (US Public radio) experience and his investment in the Internews radio projects is very big. Bruce worked in Armenia as an advisor for two weeks in the end of September, doing a “radio trip” around Armenia to understand the needs of radio stations. Bruce visited “Ardzagank”, “Impulse” (Yerevan), “Shant” (Gyumri) and “Interkap” (Vanadzor), writing a reviewing report on each of them afterwards.

Despite the problems revealed at the stations, Bruce states that, in general, people working at radio stations do everything to make the best radio production possible. As he mentioned after his trips, “Radio is very simple. People should just show up and put stuff on the air.

I always compare radio to chess. You can learn the chess movements in ten minutes. And you spend the rest of your life learning how to play the game. Now my impression is that you’re doing it. You’re doing radio. I mean, look at the Internews “Aniv”! It’s terrific! It’s not perfect. But it’s very good journalism. That should be the model.”