Are you interested in one week's work placement in The Irish Times? Transition Year students can learn first-hand about the workings of this newspaper if their submission is published in Media Scope's weekly Over to You column. Just send us a 200-word piece on a media-related topic.
Ross Kelly, St Macartan's College, Monaghan
Nowadays what people consider is good music is decided by what the music industry wants them to think is good. Music termed under "pop" is exactly that, popular, but more often than not the song is awful. Songs like these have been made out to be the "in thing" and so, like sheep, people follow the lead of the music industry and end up tormenting thousands of radio listeners for the next two months.
A slick promotion campaign seems to be able to get people to buy anything. No matter whether the person singing the song is completely tone deaf or if the band is the worst ever to have walked this earth.
Only one thing seems to count: looks. Some of the people selling hundreds of thousands of records can barely sing three notes but their looks seem to sell their records, probably due to the free poster that accompanies the single!
Maybe if the music industry tried doing the same for people who can sing and good musicians, they could make far more money.
Bebhinn Shine, Loreto Abbey, Dalkey, Co Dublin
SPORT is no longer sport, it's business - a craftily conceived, inspired business designed to get the most money possible out of unsuspecting players and fans. All sport, from the Ryder Cup to the Premier League to the seven-and-under kick-around in the local park on a Saturday morning, has been infiltrated by a demon, one that every club wants in order to be credible, yet despises because of the cost it inflicts on every fan around the world: sponsorship. Virtually every team needs a sponsor, regardless of size or calibre. Your eight-year-old's soccer team will doubtless have a sponsor, who pays for the team's kit and equipment in return for the free advertising space that is your child's chest. This all seems very well, but what of the other side of sponsorship? If this son or daughter supports a famous soccer team and wishes to show loyalty to and love for, say, Manchester United by buying and wearing a replica jersey, he or she is instantly an advertisement for Sharp. And if he is misfortunate enough to have had Newcastle or Liverpool inflicted on him, he is an ad for alcohol. Would you be happy for your child to pay £40 to sport a (very fashionable) set of advertising boards and perhaps a bell to ring out the joys of Newcastle Brown Ale?
Write to media scope by posting your comments to Newspaper in the Classroom, The Irish Times, 11-16 D'Olier Street, Dublin 2 , or faxing them to (01) 679 2789. Be sure to include your name, address and school, plus phone numbers for home and school. Or you can use the Internet and e-mail us at mediapage@irishtimes.ie
media scope is a weekly media studies page for use in schools. Group rates and a special worksheet service (see `faxback', right) are available: FREEPHONE 1800-798884. media scope is edited by Harry Browne.
