19b

Recording 19b

Teacher: Would you like to be famous?

Student: I think a lot of people want to be famous nowadays and that’s why reality TV is so popular. But I wouldn’t like to be famous at al.

Being famous nowadays simply means that you’re in the tabloids a lot and you’re followed by the paparazzi everywhere you go. I’d find that very intrusive. Famous people have no privacy at all in any part of their life.

Their life also seems to be very silly superficial because they spent all of that time going to parties and trying to look glamorous. It all seems very artificial to me − they just don’t seem to be part of the real world at all.

Teacher: Hmm. Do you think famous people have a positive or negative influence on young people?

Student: I think they should have a positive influence on young people, but many of them don’t. Some personalities are good role models and use their celebrity status to encourage people to think about important issues, but we often see photos of famous people behaving badly.

Teacher: Nowadays we have access to the news 24 hours a day. What effect does this have?

Student: I think it can affect us in both positive and negative ways. On the one hand, it’s very convenient to be able to catch up with what’s happening in the world at any time of the day or night, no matter where you are.

But on the other hand, this kind of news can give you a distorted view of what’s happening, because even minor news stories are given more importance than they perhaps should have.