Trend Micro unveil ‘What’s Your Story?’ winners
The winners of Trend Micro’s ‘What’s Your Story?’ video competition have been announced as Ireland marks Safer Internet Day today.
Part of Trend Micro’s free Internet Safety for Kids & Families (ISKF) programme, the competition welcomes entries from both primary and secondary school students in the form of a two-minute video that can be created using live action, stop action, animation, original music and more. Each video must address a specific question, which this year asked: ‘How do you know what’s real or fake online?’.
Entries for the 2023 competition spanned seven categories, including the newly added ‘Individual Irish Category’, which encouraged submissions entirely in Irish. The winners were chosen by a panel of expert judges from independent bodies such as Media Literacy Ireland (MLI), Webwise.ie, Cyber Safe Kids, Smart Futures and Young Irish Film Makers.
Taking home the coveted title and prize of €2,000 as overall winner was Karthik Sreekanth, a transition year student in Rockbrook Park School in Edmondstown. A lover of the art of visual storytelling, in just two short minutes Sreekanth gave viewers a deep dive in the world of digital fraudulence and misinformation to uncover the best ways to spot real from fake.
“As someone who would love to pursue higher level education in media and marketing fields this competition was great, and to go home the winner is just amazing,” said Sreekanth. “I found the topic very engaging, it felt very relatable and a useful subject for everyone. In a world where everyone’s attention spans are getting smaller and smaller, the opportunity to create a short, snappy, straight to the point video was my primary motivation. I would also have to mention the ridiculous prize of €2,000. The pacing of the video was very important to me as two minutes is not a lot of time at all. To pack so much into so little time was the biggest challenge in the entire project. I hope viewers learnt something from my piece and look forward to more of my videos…because there will be more!”
Encouraging viewers to ‘Stop, Think & Check’ to avoid falling victim to online scams was Critics’ Choice Award winner Shane King (16) from Ballinagore, Co. Westmeath, who recieved a €1,000 prize.
“It was an amazing surprise to be selected as a winner in 2021, so to go on to win in the Critic’s Choice category this year is something I’m so proud of!” commented Shane. “It’s such an important subject and I think that people of my age and younger need to be educated on what could go wrong when you’re online. I love that I got to raise awareness of that through this project, while also doing something really creative that my whole family could take part in and enjoy. We plan to spend the prize money on a new camera which will really help in creating top quality videos for future competitions and our own home productions. Anything left over will go towards our next family holiday.”
The successful entrants have been encouraged to give their creations another moment in the spotlight by entering the Media Literacy Ireland Awards. The MLI Awards programme recognises and raises awareness of the great work being done in Ireland to promote media literacy. It has four award categories including the Best Youth-led Media Literacy Intervention category, which is being touted as another excellent platform for the budding filmmakers.
The closing date for entries is 10 February. All information can be found at medialiteracyireland.ie/awards.
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