Sir: The media plays a very important role in building society. The media has demonstrated potentially profound effects, both positive and negative, on children’s cognitive, social, and behavioural development. It is widely accepted that media has deep influence on children’s health. We, therefore, need to find ways to optimise the role of the media in our society, taking advantage of its positive attributes and minimising its negative ones. We should take steps like limiting our children’s time of watching TV to fewer than two hours per day and keeping TVs and computers out of children’s bedrooms and in family living areas where we can monitor our children. If TV and the Internet are used wisely, they can be great for learning and development. Television is a better medium than the printed word for conveying certain types of information and it makes learning available to groups of children who do not do well in traditional school situations and even to people who cannot read. We need to understand better how to reverse the negative impact of media and make it more positive. SYED DANIYAL ALI Karachi