In
the Guardian Roy Greenslade in the wake of Asda's threats to magazines that it stocks take a look at the power of the supermarkets
The supermarket group Asda had demanded that magazine publishers should give the company free advertising and editorial space or face not being sold in its 300 British stores.
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The group backed down later in the week but according to Roy his
research among publishers, all of whom asked to speak off the record, suggests that this episode is far from over. It has put the spotlight on the increasingly fraught relationship between them and some (not all) supermarkets.
In the Independent
Guy Adams looks at the American market and how it could ignore a great news story
against this backdrop of falling circulation and a failing industry, the decision of every mainstream paper in America to ignore the juiciest political story of the month (and possibly the year): the discovery by National Enquirer hacks of John Edwards, in the corridors of a Beverly Hills hotel, where his alleged mistress and alleged love child were also staying, at half past two on the morning of Tuesday, 22 July.
and to him
one of the reasons America's newspapers are dying is their perceived pomposity. Readers say they are too timid to rock the boat; right-wingers complain (with some justification) that they conspire to suppress damaging stories about Democrats. The general public thinks they have simply become boring.
Whilst in the same paper,
Jamie Merrill examines how the lobbyist are setting the news agenda and particular one,the Taxpayers alliance
Paul Lashmar, an investigative reporter and lecturer in journalism at University College Falmouth, sees a direct relation between the rise of the TPA and the pressures on news organisations. "Journalists are often now so overstretched that a lot of work that used to be carried out in the newsroom is carried out by groups like the TPA. You don't see extensive research anymore whereas it used to be commonplace in Sunday papers to have exercises where, for example, you would ring around every MP for their opinions as the TPA has done numerous times.
In the Guardian
Peter Wilby takes a look at the political correspondent in the wake of the Labour leadership speculation
But to ask whether there were really any "plots" was perhaps to miss the point. Politics trades on gossip and intrigue, and ministers, and most backbenchers, are reluctant to move against a prime minister without the safety of numbers. Media reports therefore play a similar role to graffiti in a totalitarian society where public dissent is forbidden. They express a mood that may lead MPs to something more substantial.
And finally in the same paper
Janine Gibson take a look at the other big media story of the week,the departure of Peter Barron to Google
Most likely - and I haven't asked him because otherwise how could I pontificate? - Barron saw a generation of controller ships open up around him, and either didn't fancy it or wasn't next in line. It's often the BBC way to keep execs hanging till they get fed up and leave.
