Presenter and part-time rapper Nick Cannon, aka Mr Mariah Carey, has been encouraged by doctors to relinquish his role as morning host of US radio show ‘Rollin With Nick Cannon’. Mr Carey says he thought it best to quit after blood clots were found in his lungs, with reports also stating that an enlarged ventricle was discovered in his heart.

Cannon tweeted this last Friday: “A bitter sweet morning. I have to stop my radio show. Doctors’ orders. The doctors said if I don’t slow down and stop working so hard, then it’s a wrap!”

He also issued this on-air statement during his final show: “I have been asked to put my health first and cut back on some of my professional commitments in order to allow my body to get the rest that it needs to keep up with the demands of a multi-tasking schedule. Even Superman has to sleep”.

Cannon was hospitalised last month with mild kidney failure, having fallen ill whilst over the Christmas period. He subsequently underwent an operation in LA, and was released to recuperate at home. It’s thought he may also be forced to quit his other high-profile post as compere of ‘America’s Got Talent’, though the 31 year old insists he’ll continue to present CBS syndicate ‘Cannon’s Countdown’ each weekend.

Oh, The Sun On Sunday, who knew? Yes, people, News International may have spent months officially denying that a Sunday edition of its infamous red top was in the pipeline, to carry on where disgraced sister title News Of The World left off when it was blown up last July, but we all knew it was very much on the agenda, didn’t we?

And while News International bosses presumably thought last August – a logical time to launch a Sunday Sun as the new football season always results in a sales spike for the weekend tabloids – was slightly too soon to go live with the new title, given the political sensitivities around the events that led to the closure of the NOTW, seemingly seven months is sufficient for us all to forgive and forget. Oh well, at least it means the new Sun On Sunday will be able to cover Charlotte Church’s phone hacking lawsuit when it reaches court in the next few weeks.

News International, of course, registered a handful of relevant internet domains for the Sun On Sunday within 48 hours of announcing the News Of The World would close when the phone hacking scandal went nuclear last summer (it can’t use the name Sunday Sun because there already is a newspaper using that name the North East of England). And while for some time News International insisted no actual plans for a Sunday edition of The Sun were being actively considered, rumours that said plans were now very much underway escalated in recent weeks.

Then Rupert Murdoch told his staff on Friday that a Sun On Sunday launch was imminent, and that was translated into “we launch next weekend” late last night, with The Sun splashing the news it would now have a Sunday edition as its front page story today, rather amusingly billed as “another Sun exclusive”.

There’s an interesting back story to all this, in that the prospect of News International launching a Sunday edition of The Sun was on the agenda a long time before the phone hacking scandal caused the NOTW to close.

With print edition sales plummeting, ad revenues wobbling, and websites generating traffic but not serious income, all newspaper groups are looking for major savings at the moment, and ending the luxury of having separate editorial teams for daily and Sunday editions of the same title is a logical way to go, even if a Sunday newspaper arguably has a different feel and role to a daily, which is possible mainly because it is produced by a team working on a seven day rather than 24 hour production cycle.

As a result, all newspaper owners have been slowly integrating elements of the teams who produce their respective daily and Sunday editions. Doing so, though, is plagued with internal politics, and is all the more tricky for those papers whose Sunday titles have a totally different brand name (so The Sun/News Of The World and The Guardian/The Observer). Former News International chief Rebekah Brooks – axed for her role overseeing the phone hackers during her time editing NOTW – had been busy grappling with how to merge her company’s two tabloids before the Hackgate scandal exploded, taking the Sunday paper and her CEO job with it.

Although closing the News Of The World in the way News International did last July was both expensive and embarrassing, and arguably didn’t diffuse the hacking scandal in the way the newspaper company clearly hoped it would, there is a big up side. It has enabled the creation of a seven-day-a-week tabloid, allowing News International to try to claw back a share of the Sunday newspaper market, but without the cost of operating two stand-alone titles – and without going through the time consuming and costly process of merging the two paper’s teams in an organic way.

Ironically, Murdoch presented the launch of a Sunday edition of The Sun as a positive to the paper’s staff on Friday, a vote of confidence to boost morale after a number of arrests of key Sun journalists over allegations they paid police officers for stories; arrests enabled by the assistance of a new standards unit at NI, which has a brief to help uncover and expose past dodgy activities at the newspaper firm in a bid to repair the reputation of News Corp’s UK division.

It’s a clever move – assuming any Sun journalists buy it – because by all rights Murdoch should be apologising to his staff for forcing them to produce an extra edition every week, without the full resources and budget that were previously made available to the NOTW. But instead the launch of the Sun On Sunday has been spun as something journalists there should be celebrating, because it shows the news mogul’s “unwavering support” for the title.

Quite what form the Sun On Sunday will take remains to be seen, though Murdoch himself is expected to stay in London this week to oversee its launch, and Fabulous magazine – the former NOTW supplement that has been included with the Saturday Sun since that paper’s demise – is expected to return to the Sunday slot.

If the Sun On Sunday can woo those former News Of The World readers who didn’t immediately switch to a rival title (which is the majority of them, the Mirror and Daily Star Sunday did see a post-NOTW circulation uplift, but many of the 2.7 million people who bought the former Sunday were unaccounted for), it will be good news for those in consumer and entertainment PR whose clients, while never too keen to be on the receiving end of NOTW hate, recognised the influence the tabloid had on a large audience, making it a useful tool when it was being positive about your products or people.

Jazz Mag FM, Jizz FM, Fucky Sensation, Darling They Seem To Be Playing Porn On This Jazz Radio Station – all the clever puns were circulating yesterday after it emerged digital jazz station Jazz FM played five minutes of pornography on top of its pre-recorded ‘Funky Sensation’ show on Saturday night.

What was apparently the soundtrack of an adult movie, and not some rather inappropriate studio activities (for 7.15pm, certainly), aired in the background as music played on the jazz station on Saturday evening, but high enough in the mix for everyone listening to notice, with many taking to Twitter to air bemusement, amusement or disgust.

Jazz FM quickly issued an apology, saying in a statement: “Unfortunately we had an unauthorised access to the live feed this evening which resulted in a highly regrettable incident. Please accept our profound and sincere apologies for any offence that may have been caused”.

Meanwhile ‘Funky Sensation’ host Mike Vitti was quoted by Radio Today as saying: “There was unauthorised activity and behaviour in the studio which we take very seriously and we will be taking the appropriate disciplinary action against the individual concerned. In addition I will apologise to the Jazz FM audience at the beginning of next week’s programme”.

Needless to say, the Radiofail website can be relied upon to show us what quality jazz-based radio with added porn sounds like.

The latest set of ABC circulation figures for the music press make for gloomy reading, though anyone in the traditional music media who goes looking at these stats expecting good news is asking for trouble.

With the exception of freesheet The Stool Pigeon, pretty much everyone saw their circulations fall year on year in the latter half of 2011, some significantly, and even those magazines aimed at an older demographic whose decline has been generally less severe over the last decade.

At IPC Media, Uncut suffered the second biggest circulation decline of them all in terms of percentages, down 14.2% year on year to 62,305 copies sold each month. Sister title NME’s decline was only slightly less, 14% year on year to 27,650.

Rivals Bauer Media’s music mags didn’t fair much better though. Although Mojo saw a very slight rise in sales in the second half of 2011 versus the first half, and is now the biggest paid-for music title, year on year circulation was down 7.5% to 87,555. Q fell 3.6% to 77,522, and Kerrang – which, to be fair, is losing sales less slowly than most of its competitors (remember, at one point NME and Kerrang were more or less neck and neck) – saw a 2.1% decline to 42,077 copies.

Future Publishing enjoyed, if one can enjoy such things, the biggest percentage decline with its Metal Hammer mag, which dropped 15.7% in 2011 to a circulation of 35,259, while Future’s other music mag, Classic Rock, experienced a 7.9% decline, down to 62,354.

In the pop market, Top Of The Pops magazine, now published by Immediate Media under licence from the BBC, saw a 10% dip taking its circulation down to 84,782 – though that’s not so bad given it had to face off a brand new competitor in 2011, with Egmont Magazines’ We Love Pop getting an ABC of 58,321 after its launch last July.

The free titles did better, The Fly slipped only 0.4%, and retained its title as the biggest music magazine in terms of circulation, with 100,574 copies distributed each month, while urban freebie RWD, while slipping 2.1%, is still second biggest with an ABC of 96,240. Newish quarterly title DIY Magazine, from the This Is Fake DIY team, had a 3.5% dip with a circulation of 36,801, while The Stool Pigeon enjoyed the only circulation increase, up from 51,750 to 53,676 from the start to the end of the year. Music distributor Proper Music’s magazine Properganda had its first annual ABC figure in the latest set of stats, with a circulation of 46,542.

And that’s your lot. Of course some of those titles whose print circulations continue to nosedive are doing well online, in terms of readership at least, the NME in particular. So much so, in some cases you start to wonder whether the main editor of those titles shouldn’t be focusing on the website first and print spin-off second, rather than the other way round.

Following those recent reports that Channel 5 would move into the world of programme production for the first time with, amongst other things, a Jedward project, the Daily Star has now confirmed that the hyperactive pop twosome will front a six part series called ‘Jedward’s Weird Wild World’.

Which figures. I mean, it’s a weird world we’re living in where Jedward continue to have such undeniable success. The programme will be one of those ‘funny videos off the internet’ shows, which sounds suitably cheap for the low-cost telly network.

So, how about a bit of digital copyright law where the music industry is a customer rather than a seller? The UK’s Copyright Tribunal yesterday considered the licences that are required by press cuttings and PR agencies or departments that aggregate, curate and circulate links to articles from newspapers and magazines to corporate clients. That such a licence is required was actually confirmed in the UK appeals court last year, and reaffirmed when the Supreme Court refused to consider a further appeal against said licences last November, though this week’s interim ruling from the copyright courts provided some clarity on how all this will work.

But first, some background. This affects any cuttings or PR agency, or in-house PR unit, that provides commercial media monitoring and reporting services, ie they provide cuttings of or links to any coverage about a company, its operations or its competitors (or, in the case of record labels, usually coverage of its artists). Traditionally this service would involve making physical photocopies of coverage, and such copies required a licence from the copyright owner, ie the newspaper or magazine publisher. And this was usually administered by one central body, the Newspaper Licensing Agency, which is sort of the PRS of the newspaper world (though News International and the FT operate their own systems).

Increasingly these days, though, cuttings and PR companies provide clients with lists of headlines and links rather than physical cuttings, and some in the sector argued that, as physical copies were no longer being made, no licence should be required. Which probably makes sense at first sight. But the NLA disagreed, successfully arguing in court that a copyright also exists in a headline or any URL primarily made up of an article’s headline, so even if no physical copy is made, a licence is still required – albeit a special online licence. And as the Supreme Court has refused to hear an appeal on this matter, the Court Of Appeal’s ruling in the NLA’s favour stands.

That said, one additional issue in this debate will be argued before the Supreme Court – something which revolves around a technicality of how web browsing works – ie when you access a website your browser makes a temporary copy of the content you see. Under EU law that temporary copy is exempt from any copyright licence requirement, though it isn’t clear whether that applies in a commercial context, especially where an article is accessed via a commercially supplied link. That particular point is still to be argued in the UK’s highest court.

This week’s hearing at the Copyright Tribunal was less to do with whether link licences are required, and more to do with what rates it’s reasonable for the NLA to charge, and what form those charges should take. On this issue the PRCA, a trade body for PR agencies, and digital cuttings company Meltwater, who have both opposed the links licence throughout, claimed a victory, saying that, in an interim decision, the Tribunal backed seven of the nine changes they requested be made to the new licence, in particular on fees and how they are charged. Meltwater reckons those changes could save the PR and media monitoring industries £100 million over the next three years.

PRCA boss Francis Ingham told CMU: “Both Meltwater and the PRCA have invested huge resources ensuring the PR industry and other internet users are not subject to unreasonable costs. The savings we have achieved for the industry highlight how important it was that we stood up to this scheme when others just accepted it. This is a huge win for Meltwater, the PRCA and its members. We have won the battle. We must now continue to fight to protect the broader principles of the internet. The mandate the NLA has been given is against the ethos of the internet and sets UK copyright law in a head on collision course with every day internet users. We share their concern and will now step up our campaign to make UK copyright law fit for a digital age”.

That latter viewpoint – about the wider implications the existence of a links licence could have on more general internet usage – is contentious. Many in the tech community share Ingham’s concerns, with some suggesting anyone sharing links to newspaper and magazine websites, or even just accessing such content, as part of their professional work, could be subject to licence fees, if the legal principles behind the NLA’s licence are interpreted in a wide way. Some have even suggested it could limit the freedom of any search engine, media, blogger or even simple web user, to share links to newspaper content.

The NLA disputes these claims strongly, though, and it is true that such doom and gloom is based, in the main, on the ‘thin end of the wedge’ logic that is often employed when objecting to unpopular new – or newly confirmed – copyright rules.

The NLA argues that it is only interested in licensing commercial media monitoring services, ie companies who directly profit from distributing article extracts compiled to the brief of a specific client, and not just anyone passing on links to newspaper and magazine content. It adds that its members – the newspaper and magazine publishers – have no interest in limiting the non-commercial, non-fee-based distribution of links to their respective content, given that drives a lot of the traffic their online services enjoy. Opponents, though, would presumably argue that, while this may be the case for now, they worry about how increasingly desperate media owners might further exploit this copyright in the future.

Either way, the NLA said it welcomed this week’s Copyright Tribunal interim ruling on the links licence, despite the PRCA and Meltwater getting their concessions (which, the NLA argues, are not as dramatic as its opponents suggest). The agency’s MD, David Pugh, told reporters: “We welcome today’s decision which follows two court cases confirming the legality of licensing. We are pleased that the Copyright Tribunal has upheld the principle and structure of our online licensing scheme, and confirmed that Meltwater is subject to the same requirements as media monitoring organisations. The judgment provides a measured, equitable regime that will ensure stability for both publishers and end-users alike: our customers will benefit from a transparent licensing structure and newspapers can be sure of a fair reward for their content”.

Music news and reviews website Gigwise has a new editor, in the former of Michael Baggs, who previously worked for Top Of The Pops magazine, Popjustice and Channel 4′s short lived music website. Most recently he has been managing online content to support next week’s BRIT Awards.

Confirming his appointment, Bagg told reporters: “I’m thrilled to be joining Gigwise as Editor and to be working on one of the UK’s most established and respected music websites. I look forward to helping steering the site to the forefront of online music content in the UK, developing the excellent written and video content that the site already produces and embracing social networking to reach a new generation of Gigwise readers”.

The site’s publisher Andrew Day added: “We had a lot of very high calibre applicants for this position. Michael impressed us greatly with his vast array of experience in online content management, superb journalism and possessed all the key traits essential for the Gigwise Editor position”.

Ah, Sky is having another go at the talent show format. Remember ‘Must Be The Music’? No? Really? Come on Sharleen, surely you remember it? No, oh well, it was a thing. As will be ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’, though this is set to be a lame copy of ‘Britain’s Got Talent’ rather than a lacklustre imitation of ‘X-Factor’, so that’s something to look forward to. Girls Aloud singer Sarah Harding and radio DJ Chris Moyles have been booked to judge.

The main difference between this and ‘BGT’ is that the studio audience will get a vote. While Harding, Moyles, cricketer Andrew ‘Freddie’ Flintoff and ‘Pineapple Studios’ dance personality Louie Spence will all provide what’s sure to be quality critique of the wannabe acts that appear on the show, the studio audiences will then be able to vote on keypads for their preferred performers, with the less favoured ones condemned to expulsion from the stage via a trap door, bungee rope or on-stage explosion. The overall winner will receive a £25,000 prize, which should surely cover any potential loss of personal dignity incurred. Well, nearly.

Says Amanda Byron, who will take time out from sneering at ‘Total Wipeout’ contestants to present this terrible new show: “We’re hoping to find some serious talent along the way, but contestants be warned! One bum note or bad joke and your hopes and dreams of success will be literally swept away from you, with a dramatic departure from the show”.

And if that doesn’t sound like a frighteningly ‘real’ realisation of ‘Black Mirror’ episode ‘Fifteen Million Merits’, I don’t know what does.

Oh, Charlotte Church, what a superstar. Of all the celebrities that have been pursuing civil actions against News International over allegations journalists or investigators working for the now defunct News Of The World illegally hacked into their voicemails, only Church’s case looks likely to go to court any time soon, after a barrage of out of court settlements were confirmed this week.

With the criminal investigation into phone hacking moving along at the speed of a number 73 bus on the Euston Road in rush hour, and the government’s Leveson Inquiry on the issue so widely defined it’s likely to achieve nothing, many have been hoping one of the civil actions in relation to the scandal would actually get a full court hearing.

But with News International handing there lawyers a multi-million pound pot of cash to buy off the litigious phone hacked celebrities and members of the public one by one (before the newspaper firm had even got round to admitting phone hacking was rife at its former Sunday tabloid), it seemed increasingly likely that the circumstances around the hacking scandal would never be exposed in the civil courts.

Even those c’lebs who insisted they were suing on a point of principle eventually took News International’s dirty cash. Perhaps believing that the criminal justice and political systems now had the scandal covered, since the whole thing blew up big time last July, and maybe nervous about the private lives they were trying so hard to protect being aired in court, not the mention the legal bills that would be run up in the short term, perhaps it’s understandable that even the more angry celebrities would take the easy way out.

But while a string of outstanding celebrity lawsuits were settled this week, legal reps for Charlotte Church and her parents have so far stood fast, and while that might be hardline negotiating tactics for a bigger pay out, you get the sense the Church family just want to see News International in court.

It’s unclear whether the damages any court hearing will deliver will exceed the sums of money the newspaper firm is paying out voluntarily – as some of those settlements have been in the hundreds of thousands, probably not – but a court hearing will likely further tarnish the reputation of News International and, more importantly, it’s parent company News Corp, the Murdoch family which control it, and all the news organisations within that empire.

Certainly News International’s lawyers, having no out of court settlement with the Church family, tried every argument they could this week to have a court hearing delayed, but judge Geoffrey Vos was having none of it, telling the defendants “we’re ready for trial”. Preliminary hearings should begin later this month.

Church is one of the surprisingly few music types to have been pulled into the phone hacking scandal, and to give evidence to the government’s Leveson Inquiry into press ethics, launched after the long simmering hacking story finally blew up last July, resulting in the dramatic closure of the tabloid at the heart of the scandal.

Church’s motivation to hit back at the tabloid press that first hailed her as a child star, and then relished in dishing the dirt on the Church family as her fame grew, is particularly admirable, her key concerns being a string of stories about her parents’ private lives that had a devastating effect on her mother’s mental health. The singer reckons no less than 33 such stories in the News Of The World were based on illegal newsgathering.

News International now has mere weeks to persuade the Church family to settle before the court proceedings begin. Assuming it does go to court, a story which has only involved the music community on the peripheries so far, will become very much a pop courts affair.

Church isn’t the only phone hacked celebrity still negotiating with News International. A handful of the first batch of phone hacking lawsuits are also yet to be settled, but technical issues mean they aren’t ready for court. Meanwhile a whole load of new lawsuits – 50 in recent weeks, including one from James Blunt – have been filed, as the Metropolitan Police slowly alert other individuals seemingly hacked by the News Of The World. Several hundred more people could as yet file legal proceedings.

The majority of those cases will likely be settled out of court, though the conclusion of the Church case – should it be heard in court – would become highly relevant. While high profile litigants are rumoured to have received pay offs of hundreds of thousands from News International – and it’s likely that’s the sort of sum being offered to Church – the majority of lawsuits are being settled for tens of thousands. But if Church was to get six figures from the courts, that could set a precedent that would potentially multiply the cost of settlements for NI by ten.

As we wait to see if the Church case is the one that finally brings this whole scandal to court, the Leveson Inquiry rumbles on with its all-star list of celebrities, editors and journalists giving evidence. CMU Business Editor Chris Cooke recently gave his take on the Inquiry so far on PR website esPResso at this URL.

Bauer Media has announced that Andrew Harrison is the new editor of Q Magazine, he replacing incumbent Paul Rees, who is leaving Bauer altogether “to pursue new challenges and opportunities”.

Harrison briefly edited Q in 2000, and was involved with the title, along with Smash Hits and Mixmag, in his role as Editorial Director at the music mags’ then publisher EMAP Performance from 2000-2002. He is also the former editor of Select, and has written over the years for the likes of Rolling Stone, The Observer, GQ and The Guardian, where he coined the phrase “landfill indie”. Which is nice. He joins Q from The Word.

Announcing his appointment, Q’s Publishing Director Rimi Atwal said: “Andrew’s proven track record in magazine craft, coupled with his instinctive understanding of Q’s eclectic audience and his long-standing passion for music, makes him the ideal choice as editor at an exciting stage of product development”.

Harrison added: “I’m thrilled to be taking on the editorship of the world’s greatest music magazine, and I’m looking forward to building on its unrivalled heritage of quality and character. Q is the gold standard of music journalism, and I’ll be working hard with the team to burnish that reputation in the months to come”.

Rees departure took many by surprise, he having been with the Bauer (previously EMAP) since 1991, working his way through the ranks at Kerrang! before becoming Q editor in 2002. Though that he is being replaced by an external appointment suggests Rees’ exit has been anticipated for sometime internally.

News International has announced a new partnership with Global Radio which will see the Sun and Times publisher get exposure for its newspapers on various shows across Global’s stations.

The Times and Sunday Times will be promoted on Classic FM’s breakfast show and London talk station LBC, while The Sun will sponsor Heart’s Club Classics show and the recently revamped Capital breakfast show, which will now include a Sun-enabled Phone Hack Quiz – guess the mystery celebrity from their hacked voicemail messages – it’ll be classic radio listening.

Confirming the new partnerships with News International, Global’s MD Of Commercial Mike Gordon said these words in his best DJ voice: “News International has some of the most recognised newspaper titles in the UK and beyond, so naturally we’re thrilled to announce this partnership. This is the first time that Global Radio and News International have joined forces on such a scale to reinforce their respective positions as the largest commercial radio group and the leading newspaper publisher in the UK”.

UTV’s radio division has announced it is expanding its Signal Radio brand across the Midlands by renaming other stations in its portfolio based in Wolverhampton, Kidderminster and Telford.

Signal Radio is one of the original commercial radio stations, based in Stoke On Trent and broadcasting to North Staffordshire and South Cheshire. It became part of UTV Radio in 2005. The brand previously expanded North into the Manchester area via a Stockport-based offshoot service, although that outlet was rebranded and then subsequently sold off to another company.

The latest announcement means that Signal will now branch out South, with the brand replacing existing local stations The Wolf, The Wyre and The Severn, the latter two taken over by UTV just last week. All three of the new Signal stations will carry the same programming, though it’s not clear how many shows will be produced locally, and how much will be syndicated from the Stoke service.

Commenting on the Signal expansion, UTV’s Director Of Local Radio, Calum Macaulay, told CMU: “I’m delighted to be growing UTV’s local network with the launch of Signal 107 across Wolverhampton, Shropshire and North Worcestershire. We’re already working on our plans for [the] March [relaunch] and look forward to launching the new station, with a potential [audience] of over 900,000, to offer a direct alternative to Beacon Radio”.

Beacon is owned by rivals Orion Media and, as previously reported, is also about to be rebranded to become part of the Free Radio network, which will also broadcast across much of the Midlands.

Anyway, that’s enough local radio news, let’s all sit back and enjoy the best radio jingle ever, the Signal Radio anthem of 1987.

So the rather scary Paul Dacre, the man who couldn’t look less like he edited the Daily Mail if he tried, was back in front of Brian Leveson and his gang yesterday as the always entertaining if probably ultimately pointless Leveson Inquiry into press ethics rumbles on.

In amongst his staunch defence of his paper – the second most read in the UK remember, and with the most read website of any newspaper in the world – Dacre was asked about that infamous column he published about Stephen Gately’s untimely demise, thrown together by one of the Mail’s top outrageous-opinions-for-hire columnists, the fat fingered pie reviewer Jan Moir.

As you may recall, in a column published shortly after Gately’s death and just before his funeral, Moir decreed that the gay singer’s sudden passing was almost certainly as a result of his homosexuality, ‘being gay’ famously causing the deaths of thousands of boyband singers every year. The piece caused outrage, 25,000 complaints to the PCC and an online campaign against the paper’s online advertisers.

Dacre conceded that the piece was badly timed, and should probably have been sub-edited so to be slightly more sensitive, adding that he probably would have requested such tweaks, but that he had left the office early the day before that particular edition was published and so hadn’t seen the column.

But, he added, the unprecedented level of outrage the piece generated was simply symbolic of the way Twitter and Facebook had provided a new forum through which the paper’s detractors could rally together, and, he noted, the Press Complaints Commission ultimately ruled the column did not breach its Editors’ Code. Moreover, Moir’s right to an opinion was sacrosanct, however much outrage it caused.

Dacre: “My view is that perhaps the timing was a little regrettable, [and] I think the column could have benefited from a little judicious sub-editing. But I would die in a ditch to defend a columnist’s right to have her views. There isn’t a homophobic bone in Jan Moir’s body”.

Of course Dacre is basically right, columnists should be allowed to speak their minds, even if some find their writing offensive – after all, calling Moir a “fat fingered pie reviewer” is a bit offensive. Though personally it’s not Moir’s opinions that offend me, it’s that her pieces are frequently ill-informed, and almost always terribly written, and yet Dacre and his readers seemingly lap her work up.

Plus suggesting that Gately’s sexuality was relevant to his death when all the evidence available at the time said otherwise is less of an opinion and more of a slur.

So, Finger-gate seems unlikely to cause as much outrage as Nipple-gate, which is no fun at all. Come on America, how are we supposed to feel all superior if you don’t get insanely moralistic about harmless pop routines from time to time, and then hand out mega-fines to the broadcasters of said pop shows? I mean, we’ve started doing our own moralising over here of late, every time Rihanna appears on ‘X-Factor’, so you need to raise your game.

And think about it. Janet’s wardrobe malfunction at Super Bowl 2004 was just pop’s first family’s most famous daughter saying “look America, I’ve got a breast, that’s nice isn’t it?”, whereas MIA was clearly trying to say “fuck you America, you war-mongering bible-bashing retards, watch your back, us Brits are coming to take back our colonies”. You could clearly see it in her face.

Anyway, Super Bowl owner the NFL distanced itself from MIA’s raised finger during her guest spot in Madonna’s half time show, a spokesman telling reporters yesterday: “The obscene gesture in the performance was completely inappropriate, very disappointing and we apologise to our fans”.

Meanwhile NBC, which broadcast the Super Bowl this year, was keen to stress that – unlike in 2004, when broadcaster CBS handed the production of the half time sing song to then sister company MTV – it wasn’t involved in booking Madonna and her guests. Its only crime was to not blur out MIA’s offending finger moment fast enough.

NBC’s Christopher McCloskey: “The NFL hired the talent and produced the halftime show. [But] our system was late to obscure the inappropriate gesture and we apologise to our viewers”.

According to TMZ, if NBC is fined by US media regulator the FCC over MIA’s finger (as CBS was over Nipple-gate) it will pass the fine onto the NFL which will, in turn, pass it on to MIA’s people, for breaching a ‘do not offend America’ clause in her contract.

MIA, for her part, is seemingly very sorry, and blames nerves for flipping the bird during America’s biggest TV event. A source told The Sun: “She wasn’t thinking. She was caught in the moment and she’s incredibly sorry”.

I can sympathise, nerves have caused me to involuntarily and inappropriately raise my middle finger at people on numerous occasions. It’s ruined many a job interview and got me banned from competing in the long jump at a national level. Oh, those Olympics. They’re like a dagger to my heart.

Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl has signed on as Executive Producer of a new sitcom for US TV station FX, written by comedian Dana Gould. The show will follow a band on the verge of both making it big and breaking up, who are forced into therapy to stay together. With hilarious results, no doubt. It sounds a lot like Metallica’s ‘Some Kind Of Monster’ documentary. Let’s watch a classic scene from that right now:

Global Radio bosses may have gotten tired of Johnny Vaughan, but listeners to the firm’s Capital FM station seemingly did not. As previously reported, Vaughan departed the London station somewhat suddenly late last year, and although his departure was officially amicable, it was clearly initiated by management rather than the presenter himself. This despite latest RAJAR radio listening figures revealing he had 2.25 million listeners in the final quarter of 2011, up 14.9% year on year. Perhaps even Global Radio bosses don’t believe the slightly made up RAJAR figures any more.

Though I bet Team Global are nevertheless touting the fact Capital regained the title of London’s biggest commercial station from rival Magic once again in the latest set of RAJAR stats. Capital is only slightly ahead of Magic though, and the two stations are close enough for any difference to be accounted for by a margin of error, given the relatively small sample group of listeners on which these figures are based.

The third biggest London station depends on which set of figures you use, on weekly reach Capital’s sister station Heart is in third place, but on audience share Magic’s sister station Kiss is ahead. Elsewhere in London, Xfm, Smooth and BBC London all saw their listening figures slip quarter on quarter.

At the national stations, Radio 2 remains the UK’s most popular station by some distance, followed by Radio 1 and Radio 4. The same is true of the respective network’s breakfast shows, though Radio 4′s ‘Today’ programme is getting close to matching Radio 1′s flagging Chris Moyles breakfast show. But all three BBC networks are performing OK overall, especially when compared to the Beeb’s news and sport station 5Live, which lost nearly a million listeners year on year. Ouch. Bosses there insist last year’s figures were abnormally high because of some particularly big sport events.

Both the commercial analogue national stations, Absolute and Classic FM, saw slight drops in listening figures quarter on quarter, though the former was up over 16% year on year. Meanwhile Global Radio’s quasi-national stations – the Capital network and Heart network – were slightly up and down respectively.

In digital land, 6music continues to enjoy the renaissance ironically initiated by the subsequently dropped plans by BBC bosses to axe it in 2010. The digital music station, close to its tenth birthday, now has nearly 1.5 million listeners. Other BBC stations Radio 4 Extra (formerly Radio 7) and 1Xtra also scored record audiences.

Universal Music yesterday announced a new partnership with Dutch company the Talpa Media Group in relation to yet another talent TV show format to be called ‘The Winner Is’. Talpa is also the company behind talent franchise The Voice’, which is due to come to British screens in March via the BBC, and Universal is the record label partner on that programme too.

The press release describes the new show as follows: “Exceptionally talented singers are given the unique opportunity to earn money each week by using their vocal talent. But first they must beat their opponents in a series of die-hard vocal duels”. Singers of all ages and types, including professional artists looking for a televised comeback, will be welcome to take part, and there’ll be big cash to be won, with a million dollars up for grabs on the final edition.

Yeah, sounds shit doesn’t? It’ll probably be huge. Universal will then get to work with these “exceptionally talented singers”. Says Universal top man Lucian Grainge: “UMG is about breaking and nurturing new artists and their music. Our partnership with John and his team has provided the right combination of innovation, platform and talent to do just that in dynamic new way”.

R&B starlet Rihanna is to co-produce and feature in a new television programme aiming to discover fresh fashion design talent.

Aspiring young creatives will compete to make outfits for famous guest figures, the competition’s ultimate honour being the chance to design a stage outfit for Rihanna to wear during her headlining set at this year’s Wireless Festival.

The untitled show will be broadcast on Sky Living over ten weeks, with solo Girls Aloud star Nicola Roberts confirmed to present.

Says Rihanna of the venture: “I am excited to follow in the journey of our contestants and see how their individuality influences their efforts during the course of the show”.

So, anything goes. Although no ‘Fuck You’-emblazoned brothel creepers please, we’re British.

N-Dubz singer Tulisa Contostavlos did not breach OfCom rules when she waved her arm at the camera during an edition of last year’s ‘X-Factor’, on which she was a judge, the TV watchdog has ruled.

As previously reported, OfCom announced in November that it would investigate whether Contostavlo’s trademark greeting at the beginning of the show – flashing a tattoo on her arm bearing her nickname, ‘The Female Boss’ – constituted advertising for her perfume of the same name.

OfCom ruled that the salute did not constitute undue prominence for the product, because the perfume is officially known as ‘TFB by Tulisa’. However, it did find that an exchange between Tulisa and the presenters of ‘X-Factor’ spin-off show ‘The Xtra Factor’, Caroline Flask and Olly Murs, was in breach of product plugging rules.

On 26 Oct, while interviewing Contostavlos, Flack said: “Your perfume, ‘The Female Boss’, came out this week, and I’ve been wearing it all day by the way”. To which Murs responded: “I wondered why you were smelling so nice”.

They then linked to a video clip of various celebrities copying Contostavlos’ arm wave. This, OfCom decided, did count as giving the perfume undue prominence, as, despite the fact that Flack in theory referred to it by the wrong name, Murs then endorsed it, adding further that the perfume wasn’t the only thing that had been “catching on” before showing the video clip.

Independent digital radio station Planet Rock has announced that its MD, Jonathan Arendt, is leaving the company to set up a new digital firm with G Media co-founder Ricki Lee. The new company, called 7West, will offer digital products to the radio sector. Meanwhile, at Planet Rock, the station’s owner and Chairman, Malcolm Bluemel, will resume in the role of CEO.

Confirming his departure, Arendt told CMU: “The last eighteen months have been brilliant, working with truly talented people and great rock music – what could have been better?  Malcolm has big plans for the station and I know it will go from strength to strength”.

Bluemel added: “Jonathan will be missed at Planet Rock. He has driven audience and revenue to record levels and overseen a complete re-image of the station. I wish him well and look forward to working with 7West in the future”.