Communication Technology and New Media Commons^™

All Dressed Up With Nowhere To Call: Fashion Victims In The New Look Telecom Industry, Maria Lohan

Irish Communication Review

The Telecom industry In Ireland is currently in training to tone itself up in preparation for both convergence and competition In the new look telecommunications Industry. Only those companies who have completed extenslve tummy tucks on staffing and removed the weight of subsidized charging may enter this new telecommunications club. Not only this, but you must of course have the right personality to attract partners with dowries of infrastructure. An important characteristic is a willingness to invest In anything electronic - but property will do too. And what should the fashion conscious Telecom player be sporting this season? Well POTS …

Hypertext Theory And Narrative, Eoin Kilfeather

Irish Communication Review

The title of this essay may at first glance seem strange. The linkage of a computer based technology with a theory of narrative might seem incongruous; however, hypertext and what George Landow has called the 'convergence of critical theory and technology' has stimulated interest in new theories and problematics of the text and of narrative. Interest in studying the textual implications of hypertext systems has grown almost as rapidly as these systems themselves. It is not an overstatement to say that of all the technological developments of the twentieth century, the emergence of hypertext and the internet has been the …

New Technologies And Changing Work Practices In The Media Industry: The Case Of Lreland, Ellen Hazelkorn

Irish Communication Review

The broadcasting environment in Ireland is the most competitive in Europe. RTE's revenue is strictly limited. The licence fee has not increased since 1986. Advertising revenue is controlled by law. The preservation of a comprehensive and effective radio and television service can only be sustained by the most efficient and cost effective approach to the production of programmes of quality.

Problems Of Broadcast Funding: Crimeline And Sponsorship, Amanda Dunne

Irish Communication Review

In recent years, the dominant trend in broadcast regulation in Europe has been to place the consumer not the citizen at the centre of policy. While technological change has also provoked phenomenal changes in broadcasting and its marketplace, the irrefutable tension between the interests of the citizen and those of the consumer, between 'quality' programming and 'mass' audiences, and between the 'public service' ethos and the interests of commercial broadcasting is more directly a function of policy (Dahlgren, 1995).

Fianna Fail And The Origins Of The Irish Press, Catherine Curran

Irish Communication Review

In order to win political support for its programme of economic self-sufficiency in the 1930s, Fianna Fail appealed to a number of constituencies: Irish manufacturers, the smaller farmers, and the urban working class. The success of this appeal depended on a number of factors, one of the principal being that an effective means of communication should be established. The Irish Press was founded in response to an immediate and pressing need for a mass circulation daily to assist in Fianna Fail's struggle for hegemony against the ideas of the ruling party, Cumann na nGaedheal. Manning (l972:42) remarks that the significance …

Audience Identification And Raidio Na Gaeltachta, Niamh Hourigan

Irish Communication Review

Issues of audience identification have always been crucial for radio and television stations broadcasting tn lesser used languages. The imminent arrival of Teilifis na Gaeilge and increased interest in the radio station itself have re-opened the debate concerning Raidio na Gaeltachta and its target audience. This paper argues that approaches to audience identification for Raidio na Gaeltachta have been characterized by a lack of clarity and a failure to recognize the diversity within the Irish-speaking community. The expansive and ill-defined nature of their target audience has not been addressed in a structured manner. Consequently the station's position Is becoming increasingly …

Book Reviews Volume 5

Irish Communication Review

Book Reviews

D. Butler, The Trouble With Reporting Northern Ireland Aldershot, Reviewed by Catherine Curran.

K. Tester, Media Culture and Morality, Reviewed by Eoin Devereux

B. Gunter, J. Sancho-Aidridge and P. Winston, Television - The Public's View, Reviewed by Amanda Dunne.

R. Winsbury and S. Fazal (eds.) Vision and Hindsight: The first 25 Years of the International Institute of Communications, Reviewed by Desmond Fisher.

R. Silverstone, Television and Everyday Life, Reviewed by Richard Fitzsimons.

J. Tambling, A Night in at the Opera London, Reviewed by lan Fox.

S. Moores, Interpreting Audiences, An Ethnography of Media Consumption Livingstone and P. Lunt …

After The Green Paper: What Next For Broadcasting In Ireland? : Discussion, Ellen Hazelkorn

Irish Communication Review

On 27 April 1995, the long-awaited Green Paper on Broadcasting, drafted by the Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, Michael D. Higgins. and entitled Active or Passive? Broadcasting in the future tense was published. Its publication carne one week after the publication of the Interim Report of the Competition Authority on the newspaper industry In Ireland. and preceded the publication of an examination of the skills requirements of lhe independent film and television production sector In Ireland. entitled, Training Needs to 2000 (June 1995). It is remarkable that within a very short space of time, three very substantial studies …

Freedom Of Access To Information On The Environment - The Reality In Ireland, Geraldine O'Brien

Irish Communication Review

A chink of light appeared on the horizon in 1990 with the lrish Government's laudable comments on the adoption of the EC Directive 90/313 on Freedom of Access to Information on the Environment. This commendable approach was contained in the Government's Programme for Action during its EC Presidency and appeared to herald new beginnings. The Directive would come Into force on 1 January 1993.

Saving Us From Ourselves: Contraception, Censorship And The 'Evil Literature' Controversy Of 1926, John Horgan

Irish Communication Review

In the history of Irish public policy on communications, the ban on the publication of information about contraception merits a special place. It existed for half a century. and the circumstances of its elaboration and implementation offer a special insight into the sensitivity of Irish governments on matters of sexual morality, as well as into public and media attitudes to the controversies involved.

Some Thoughts On Freedom Of Information And The Civil Service, Sean Dooney

Irish Communication Review

All new civil servants receive from the personnel unit of their department a number of circulars dealing with various aspects of their conditions of employment. One of these circulars. the receipt of which they are obliged to acknowledge, deals with official secrecy. The Circular draws attention to the obllgations of civil servants in relation to secrecy in the transaction of official business, which obligations are provided for in Section 4 of the Official Secrets Act 1963. That section, as readers are no doubt aware, provides that they shall not communicate any official information to any other person unless they are …

Scots Gaelic And Welsh Language Broadcasting In The Cultural Contexts: A Comparative Analysis, Fachna O'Drisceoil

Irish Communication Review

This paper will be a presentation and comparative analysis of the experiences of Welsh and Scots Gaelic broadcasting. The intention is to draw conclusions regarding broadcasting strategies in those languages and to identify the implications of those conclusions for Irish language broadcasting strategy. It was decided that a brief discussion of a wider range of lesser used languages would be superficial in nature, and of little real benefit to understanding the Irish situation. Instead, a more detailed presentation will be given of the Welsh and Scots Gaelic cases on the basis that their cultural and historical experience has most similarity …

On Gendered Knowledge In Communication: Women In The Film Industry, Michele Martin

Irish Communication Review

Studies in communication have shown that, in the fllm industry. women as directors obtain less financial support than men. They find themselves in a peculiar situation: the discrimination they suffer obliges them to innovate. and hence they often find themselves at the 'avant garde' of cinematographic production. This is specifically true in the area of documentary film-making. To use Carle's words, In film 'the revolution passes through women'.

Feature Writing In Women's Magazines: A Limited Ideological Challenge, Susan Liddy

Irish Communication Review

Since the emergence of the International women's movement in the early 1970s. women's magazines have increasingly popularized feminist Ideas. The fragmented format of the genre ensures that a debate on feminist issues can surface in features side by side such old reliables as beauty tips, recipes or advice on how to attract and keep a man. In 1991, over one third of feature writing in Woman's Way and three quarters in U, reflected items from the Irish feminist agenda. Issues like the wage gap, the absence of state funded childcare, the need for equal status legislation , rape and domestic …

New Media Technologies In Europe: The Politics Of Satellite, Hdtv And Dab, Hans J. Kleinsteuber

Irish Communication Review

It has been lhe tradition in Europe to develop media technologies at national level with close cooperation between the state and the private sector, and frequently with competition between different states and their industrial Infrastructures. The creation of new technologies mostly occurred within lhe electric, and later the electronics industry and included studio equipment, transmitters and receivers; it also included those industries supplying equipment to areas such as telecommunications. optics and the aerospace indus try. The state has always provided some of the central players. for example, Post Office administrations (Telecoms), research ministries, the military sector and in particular, the …

Thatcher, The Iba And Death On The Rock, Tony Fleck

Irish Communication Review

Since its beginnings in the 1920s. broadcasting in these islands has always been considered by the vartous governments of the day. whatever their political complexion. to be too important to be left solely to the broadcasters. Successive administrations have attempted to regulate and control what is heard or seen over the airWaves by a series of acts of the British Parliament or Dail E!reann. These acts have been drafted so as to give designated ministers the power to decide on the composition and membership of the Authorities. Boards of Governors or Commissions established by law - and to dismiss them …

Book Reviews: Volume 4

Irish Communication Review

J. Fiske Power plays, power works, reviewed by David E. Butler

M. Skovmand and K. Schroder {eds.) Media cultures: reappraising transnational media, reviewed by Richard Fitzsimons

B. Gunter and T. Viney Seeing is believing: religion and television in the 1990's, reviewed by Tony Fleck

A. Millwood Hargrave {ed.), Broadcasting Standards Council: Violence in factual television, reviewed by Muiris MacConghail

J. A. Walker Arts TV - A history of arts television in Britain, reviewed by Brian O'Neill

J. N. Didie Aid for cinematographic and audio-visual production in Europe, reviewed by John G. Phelan

N. Miller and …

The French Have Got A Great Culture, I'Ve Been To Versailles' (Ted Turner): Towards A 500 Channel World, Raymond Snoddy

Irish Communication Review

Ladies and Gentlemen, good evening and thank you very much indeed for the honour and pleasure of being Invited to give the second Annual Rathmines Media Lecture. First of all I owe you a necessary word of explanation for the strange title of this talk , 'The French have got a great culture - I've been to Versailles': Towards a 500 Channel World. It sums up rather well some of the themes I want to touch on tonight. I heard these words about French culture spoken during a supposedly serious interview last month. I was on a 24-hour visit to …

Making The Headlines: Africa In The News, Mary Van Lieshout

Irish Communication Review

Familiar images of emaciated, dying children from Sudan and Somalia once again found the front pages of our national dailies and the headlines on the RTE Six-One News. Perhaps the authors of such footage and photographers of these pictures justify capturing children in this way because they feel that showing the awful truth about those lives will do more good than harm, convinced that invading the privacy of a dying individual and his or her family is in some way 'worth it'. If that logic is correct why do these photographs bear such close resemblance to those of the mid-l980s …

Devils And Angels: The Rise Of Irish Telethon Television, Eoin Devereux

Irish Communication Review

In this article I wish to examine the issue of how the media portray the lrlsh poor with particular reference to the emergence of fund-raising or telethon television. This study Is part of a larger project which examines how the Irish national public service broadcasting organization, Radio Teiefis Elreann (RTE), portrays poverty and the poor through an examination of fund-raising television, factual television (news, current affairs and documentaries) and fictional accounts of poverty (television drama) over a twelve month period. My project represents a significant departure from the existing debate about poverty and the media in an Irish context in …