Sile's In Love At First Sight

For those curious as to what TV presenter Sile Seoige's review of the Kylie gig in Dublin tonight was, wonder no further:

Yes Sile, we think you might regret it too.

Royseven 'You Say, We Say' Review

Nearly five years after their first album, 'The Art Of Insincerity', was released, Royseven have finally got around to following it up. Sadly, despite the wait, 'You Say, We Say' doesn't match up.

Accompanying single 'We Should Be Lovers' is perfect radio fodder, and has been duly hammered. It's a pleasant track, with Paul Walsh's voice and suitably dramatic backing from his band-mates making up for slightly clichéd lyrics. Along with this, 'Channel 103 On My T.V.' and 'You Can't Hide That' are definite highlights, drawing the most on their Muse influences. Sadly, there's not much else going on here. The title track reveals a lack of real ideas, building itself around a chorus that just doesn't work.

'No Romance', while hugely enjoyable, does have an air of being a mash-up of Irish rock hits in the last five years. 'Dance' is built perfectly for a summer soundtrack, as is 'Killer'. It's just a shame the energy doesn't hold up all the way through. For the most part, the album trundles along, without much enthusiasm or passion.

Oddly, the album was fully completed nearly a year ago, with the first single, 'Killer', released all the way back in October. It feels like they could have used that time to inject a bit more heart into their songs. The production is immaculate, but there's not much under that shiny surface.

Viral Marketing: The Highs And Lows Of 2011's General Election

All of the major parties attempted to use viral marketing to sway voters, from party leader's recording videos, to Fine Gael releasing a flash game and Fine Gael e-Valentines.

Added to this, several of the individual candidates created personal videos, with some being more creative than others. So, did this give them a boost?

1) Mannix Flynn 

Running as a "New Independent" in Dublin South East, Mannix revived the "Dub Rap" from the 80's during this interview, which promptly spread across the net. Despite being on of the most viewed videos of the campaign, it did little for Flynn, who was eliminated on the second count.

2) Dylan Haskins

Also running in Dublin South East, Dylan Haskins placed a lot of importance on internet campaigning, with a active blog, and Facebook and Twitter accounts. His video urged people to get behind him and support his campaign, but it failed to achieve this, as Haskins was eliminated from the election after the forth count.

3) Michael Dolan 

A country song, called Dolan For The Dail attempted to support Michael J Dolan's campaign to be elected for Fianna Fáil. The song attempts to promote Dolan as a new option, but it didn't work. He fell early in the race, being cut after the forth count.


4) Michael Conaghan 

Not technically a video, but still one of the more unusual attempts at promoting a candidate. Created for Michael Conaghan, running in Dublin South Central, the song is a remake of Horse Outside by the Rubberbandits, called Rest Outside. Not long after the song hit the web, the Rubberbandits slammed the effort, and insisted that they in no way supported the candidate, or were asked permission for the use of the song.

Despite the controversy, Michael Conaghan was still easily elected, picking up over 10% of the first preferences.

5) John Dillon

Also taking the form of a country flavoured song, Independent John Dillion recieved support in the form of "Dillon's Gonna Win". Despite the optimistic name of the song, Dillon didn't win, coming in fifth in the three seater constituency. 

6) Martin Heydon 

Possibly the most bizarre of all the videos to surface during the campaign was for Martin Heydon. Running for Fine Gael, in Kildare South. An overtly apocalyptic assessment of Ireland's state, it takes huge swipes at Fianna Fáil's record, and references Superman, Johnny Cash and the Terminator.  

While it's impossible to tell if the video helped Martin Heydon's campaign, it certainly didn't hinder him. Heydon topped the poll and was elected on the first count, taking a third of the votes.

Equality In Ireland Leaps Forward

With all the commotion and controversy surrounding the election, it may have gone unnoticed that, in the space of one day, Ireland made a huge leap forward for gay rights.

On Friday, for the first time ever, the Irish people elected an openly gay person to the Dáil. In fact, they elected two, both members of the Labour party. More importantly, the two individuals ran, not as "gay candidates", but as candidates who just so happened to be gay.

On the same day, with a lot less commotion than the election, the first public civil union occurred in Dublin. While not the first to take place (two couples had already married in private), they were the first to allow a newspaper to cover the event (The Daily Mail, no less).  Considering it was just 18 years ago that homosexuality was decriminalised in Ireland, it is clear, as a society, we've moved so far forward. 

The Election Race Runs On And On

With forty of the forty-three constituencies completed, the final three, Galway West, Laois/Offaly and Wicklow have begun recounts. While both of the Galway and Laois/Offaly recounts are believed to be fairly straightforward, it appears the Wicklow one is likely to run on and on.

Before the voting had even closed, it became apparent that there would be difficulties with the election in Wicklow. Reports began to emerge that the ballot, which can be seen here, was "overly-complex" . Due to the huge number of independents running, two columns were required, with fourteen of the party picture boxes empty, and one candidate being photoless. This has lead to claims that people were "confused" as to which boxes to enter votes into.

Add to this, there are in total 24 candidates, 11 of which received fewer than 1000 votes, which has meant that the elimination and redistribution of votes has been a long and fruitless process. As of the thirteenth count, no candidate had been eliminated, and a recount has been called, due to Dick Roche being only three votes behind his FF colleague, Pat Fitzgerald. According to local reports, the Sinn Fein candidate has also called in legal advice, ahead of what they believe will be a close call for their candidate in the battle for the last seat.  As it stands, it could be a while before this constituency knows exactly who it's representatives will be.

The Other End Of The Spectrum

With the news of the total wipe out of the Green Party as well as Fianna Fáil, the majority of the headlines were of course dominated by the major candidates. However, spare some thoughts for the smaller candidates who also suffered heavy defeats. Four candidates across the country, all running as independents, received less than thirty first preference votes:

Sean Forkin (Mayo)

Benny Cooney (Dublin Central)

John Dominic Keigher (Dublin SE)

Peadar Ó'Ceallaigh (Dublin SE)

29

25

27

18

Now, in order to be placed on the ballot one must complete the necessary forms, including obtaining the backing of thirty signatures. So, in this case, these candidates failed to even receive the votes of all the people who nominated them. After weeks of campaigning, one can only imagine that this must be utterly galling.

The Mood Of The Nation

The votes are still being counted and recounted to decide the seat winners, but each constituency has now declared their first count. On the above right is the first preference majority winners in this election, in stark contrast of that in 2007.


Images taken from the RTÉ website.

Taxing The Internet

In the run up to the general election next week, two separate parties have come out with similar "computer tax" policies. First off, the Green's proposed an usage based internet tax, to replace the tv licence fee that they would scrap. Their logic behind the tax is that it would fund journalism. "Good journalism, whether on the television, radio, in print or online costs money."

Fine Gael emerged the next day with a similar replacement to the licence fee, a public broadcasting tax that would “apply to all households and applicable businesses, regardless of the device they use to access content”. Although the finer details of the idea have yet to be decided, as it stands, the tax could apply to iPods, e-readers, Android phones, as well as computers and televisions. Obviously enough, it penalises people and companies who've made efforts to become carbon neutral by switching from paper usage to electronic.

Asides from that, specifically with the Green party policy, people will be double charged. They already pay their internet service provider for the data usage, and this proposal will add further cost on top of that, despite the state not providing the service. In this regards, the tv licence fee made sense in that at least the state was providing a direct service for the fee.

If you consider the importance placed on Ireland being a "knowledge economy", it seems a move backwards to create further costs to technology driven businesses. One can opt out of having a television, and therefore a television licence. Industry, on the other hand, cannot choose to forego the use of internet services, and thus could not avoid such charges.

Obviously, both parties are only mooting these as possibilities at the moment. Hopefully consideration will be put into the widespread effects of such a move happening.

Times Are Hard All Over

As the Dail was dissolved, people throughout the land rejoiced at the fact the the Fianna Fail government that had staggered on too long had finally been put out of it's misery. And with good reason. The country is in serious financial trouble, and times are as hard as they've been here in a very long time.

Amazingly though, all of the people yelling loudly about how Fianna Fail had destroyed this country seemed to have missed any other news stories that day.

Over in Egypt, the country is in chaos. After rigged elections, and corruption that has actually brought the country to it's knees, people are having to take to the streets to force change. Their lives have been ruined to a degree that most Irish people will thankfully never know. People have lost their lives. To be honest, right now, our woes don't even compare.

Yes, things are tough here at the moment, it is a difficult period, but people really need to gain some perspective.

Is Ireland About To Embrace Leader Debates, American Style?

As the start of the General Election 2011 approaches, it seems more likely than ever that there will be a leader's debate during the campaign.

Fresh from his election as leader of the Fianna Fáil party, Micheál Martin has declared his interest in partaking in such a debate with the leaders of both Fine Gael and the Labour party. During Martin's first press conference as leader, he said that the "traditional module of election debates is seriously flawed and must change".

"Specifically, I have asked them to agree to hold two

debates between us three, one at the start of the

campaign and one at the end.

In addition there would be a series of one-on-one debates

between us and a separate debate in the Irish language."

As expected, the smaller parties that would be excluded from such a debate are unhappy with such a scenario. Sinn Fein TD Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin criticised the idea, saying: 'Once again we have a Fianna Fáil leader engaged in the politics of exclusion and only willing to debate with parties from the consensus for cuts.'

Mr. Martin's call comes days after it was revealed that Sky News have approached the leaders of the five main parties to televise a leaders debate, chaired by Adam Boulton. RTE, TV3 and TG4 are also said to be interested in holding such a debate, although they are said to still be considering their respective formats.

It is not yet known whether all parties involved would take up such an offer. However, both Enda Kenny and Eamon Gilmore have called for such debate to take place, so as it stands, it appears that the likelihood is that Ireland shall follow the UK's lead, and have the party leaders fight for the hearts and minds of the public through a televised forum.