Open to debate

At this week's launch of Hero, the new higher education web service, its chairman Tim O'Shea demonstrated the skills that made him a professor of information and communication technologies.

Requesting questions at the press conference, he told journalists that his Irish background suited him to debate. "Go into a pub in England, and someone is talking while everyone else nods. Go into a pub in Ireland, one person is talking and everyone else is shaking their head," he said. Result: not a single question from the floor.