Actually, we’ve been here before! Some of Dublin’s great buildings were built in the late 18th Century. And then the country went bust...

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So much has changed since the fall of the Berlin Wall. It underlines how much we have to learn from our European neighbours...

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It has sometimes occurred to your correspondent, after one too many cups of tea, that Sun Studios was a hell door or a portal to another dimension, and its proprieter Sam Phillips a necromancer summoning dark spirits upon the earth through the wizardry of slap-back echo. Never have so many dark and electrifying sounds emanated from one postal address, namely 706 Union Avenue, Memphis, Tennessee.

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Certain gay commentators have expressed surprise at the wave of support for same sex marriage. But, says our columnist, gay relationships are of equal value to heterosexual partnerships

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Simon Napier-Bell is one of the most successful managers in UK pop history. In preparation for his appearance in Mindfield at Electric Picnic, he talks to Olaf Tyaransen.

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As creator of Bebo, Michael Birch surfed the social networking zeitgiest long before anyone had heard of Facebook. Much sought after as a web guru, his pronouncements on the future of music on the net are sure to have the big players sitting up and paying attention.

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Genevieve Hulme-Beaman, star of the award-winning play Little Gem, tells us about meerkats, acting out risque scenes on stage and, em, nervous farting.Roe

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Ireland is banjaxed but who's going to fix it? If you reckon you could do a better job of running the country than the current government, here is Hot Press' handy, seven-step guide to building your very own political party.

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Gays and lesbians are finally on the way to be being regarded as equals under Irish law. But could it be that the gay community has issues with the 'bis' and transexuals who are both part of gay culture - but are treated as outsiders?

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In their analysis of Ireland's Olympic performance, the commentariat have taken a characteristically gloomy outlook.

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A glorious Olympic opening ceremony suggests a world at peace. But burning villages in Georgia and South Ossetia reminds us that human conflict is never far away.

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The most yawnful month of the year is upon us, but thankfully politics and sport are keeping the flame alight: the games have already begun.

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An off-shore excursion to a nature sanctuary proves surprisingly haunting, evoking the spirit of The Wicker Man and Lord of the Flies.

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Bertie Ahern lied in public about his finances - but is still looked on with fondness by the public. What does this say about our attitudes towards wrongdoing?

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Is Erica Jong a free speech martyr in the making or just another paranoid android?

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By naming his book after The Third Man – a novel famous for its magnificently slithery protaganist – Peter Mandelson demonstrates an acute grasp of his unpleasant role in the rise to power of Britain's New Labour

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In the same year that the findings of the Saville Inquiry into Bloody Sunday were finally published, how ironic that the powers-that-be in the North should try to clamp down on the public’s right to protest.

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People from Eastern Europe begging on Irish streets are an increasingly common sight. What motivates them to travel across an entire continent to sit shivering outside a suburban Spar? And what happens to the families they bring with them?

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The future lies in the production of cheap energy. But has the bust robbed us of the chance to become the Saudi Arabia of wind and sea energies?

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The oil spill in the Gulf has uncomfortable echoes of the banking crisis

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It’s June — but with the Gulf Coast covered in oil and the Irish health service in meltdown, the summer silly season seems a long way off.

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Homophobes often claim gayness is a disease. But might there be real physiological differences between queer and straight?

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In an ironic twist, anti-gay marriage campaigners are now trying to cast themselves as on the receiving end of a "liberal" crusade.

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As the controversy over the documentary about poet Cathal Ó Searcaigh, Fairytale Of Kathmandu, heads for the courts we have to ask: can there really be any winner in this grisly saga?

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The recently passed Civil Partnership Bill has many shortcomings, but at least it signifies a meaningful distinction between church and state.

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