Reunited and it feels so good

The craze for virtual school re-unions has finally come to Ireland in the form of a new website www.schoolfriends.ie.

In Britain, the FriendsReunited website, which was recently threatened with libel action by teachers angered at comments on the site, has become one of the top 20 most-visited websites, according to the Guardian newspaper.

The site, which includes more than 28,000 British (and Irish) schools and colleges, includes a school memory of the day and teacher of the day slot. Past pupils pay an annual fee of £5 sterling to access e-mail addresses of former classmates.

The website claims to have brought about thousands of happy reunions all over the Britain - and even a handful of weddings.

The marketing director of www.schoolfriends.ie, John O'Byrne, says he hopes the website will attract more than 250,000 members in the first six months.

Registration is free. However, there is an annual fee of £6.30 (€8) to become a member and "benefit from this inexpensive and efficient way to keep in touch with school friends".

When EL logged on, www.schoolfriends.ie seemed to be sticking to the basic function of re-uniting people, and did not include a teacher slot. Advertising on the site included schooldisco.ie (the Dublin disco where over-18s don their old school uniforms).

Meanwhile, Ginger Television has developed a show called Reunions in which a group of classmates come back together to reflect on the highs and lows of school life.