Guido is ecstatic - the PM's spokesman told lobby journalists he "didn't recognise" the claims it made about Brown's behaviour, which is Westminster-speak for saying they're wrong.

I was teasing one of the authors this morning by telling her she was now the story, but she didn't rise to the bait.

Whatever you make of the Bloomberg feature, we should all be grateful to the writers for introducing us to the concept of the news sandwich. Supposedly, when Brown's PR people are telling him what the papers have been saying, they downplay the negative coverage by first telling him about a positive story, then describing the negative one before swiftly moving on to another positive item.

It's like something out of The Thick of It, which, by the way, I heartily recommend.

                   

It's hard to believe, but the Government is trying to feed us information and we're turning them down.

The Office of Public Sector Information is busy making all sorts of facts and figures available for people to access using an application process interface (API) which allows them to get information from a Government database and re-present the facts on their own website, in their own way.

For example, you could let someone enter their postcode in a box on a website and present them with their local school results, crime figures, roadworks etc.

I'm not sure what's currently available, but the Government is actually asking people what they want and trying to give it to them. It's had plenty of responses, but how many of them have come from newspapers?

The average journalist doesn't have the technical skills to make use of this data (it takes some programming to grab the right info and present it well). But major newspaper companies should have people who can do this.

There are many other sources of information too. TheyWorkForYou.com allows people to access its database (it might charge a commercial business for this) and if local councils aren't doing it, we should ask them to.

For an example of what I'm talking about, take a look at US website everyblock.com.

Here's a small sample of information everyblock.com offers about the Midtown South neighbourhood in New York.

Someone one day will do something similar in the UK. I think it's an obvious one for local newspapers. We should be adding a service similar to what EveryBlock provides to our websites.

                   

As a rule, most newspaper websites replicate the print product in the way that they present content to readers.

The top stories or features are picked out by the website editor and given the greatest prominence, with the remainder placed on the page according to their category.

For example, the Times website has the biggest stories of the moment at the top, followed by "more news" (the best general news stories), then business news, then sport, then comment, etc.

This echoes the print format, in which the top story or splash goes on the front, with other stories presented in an order chosen by the editor, often divided into categories. Of course, print products have to do this.

But many successful websites outside newspapers take a different approach, customising their pages for readers and presenting them with content they are likely to be interested in.

For example, YouTube offers me videos based, as far as I can tell, on what I am subscribed to and what I have watched in the past.

Here is part of the Amazon.co.uk page is it appears to me:

It seems to me that newspapers could learn from this approach. Using cookies or, even better, by persuading people to register on our sites, we could use the stories they have looked at before, those they have rated highly and those they have commented on or e-mailed to friends to take a guess at what kind of stuff they are interested in.

If it's sport, then give them the sports stories at the top of the page rather than at the bottom, for example.

And when readers do register, we could also simply let them tell us what they want through a simple interface, in the same way that Yahoo lets people personalise their splash page, for example. I wouldn't depend entirely on this though, as what people say they are interested in may not be exactly the same as what they actually spend their time looking at.

I imagine we'd still want to push the top stories of the day in a prominent position (or maybe not?). But there's no reason newspaper websites should be static, and if we don't take the initiative in giving readers what they want then someone else will. Indeed, they already are.

                   

Should the Government intervene to help local newspapers survive the recession?

This was the suggestion put forward in a House of Commons debate earlier this week.

Two things struck me about the debate. First, as we've reported in the Birmingham Post and Mail, Cabinet Office Minister Ian Pearson hinted that some kind of help for the industry may be announced in a Government policy paper due out on Monday January 26.

Mr Pearson, who also happens to be a local MP representing Dudley South, told a backbencher: "The final issue that I want to mention is financial support. My hon. Friend raised this issue, as did other hon. Members, and it is a complex one, given the requirement that freedom of editorial control must not be threatened by state intervention.

"I want to reassure him that such support is being considered within the Digital Britain initiative."

Digital Britain is a green paper - an early policy document - which will be (according to a government press release) "an action plan to secure the UK's place at the forefront of innovation, investment and quality in the digital and communications industries."

Those of you with interests in blogging, the internet and the future of media big and small might find it interesting, it seems to me.

The second thing that struck me was the pessimism MPs taking part in the debate all seemed to have about the future of local papers.

Solihull MP Lorely Burt, a Lib Dem, suggested the BBC should step in and set up some kind of "joint venture website" with local journalists.

She said: "It would keep local journalism alive and kicking, it would be attractive to advertisers and more interesting, varied and local, and it would create a synergy beneficial to both."

The problem with this idea is that local papers already have their own local websites, of varying quality, and believe they have an important role in helping them stay afloat.

Sharing their advertising revenue with the BBC would hardly help. Having said that, the BBC has clearly invested in the technology and expertise to create high quality websites, so perhaps this could help smaller publishers.

I'm not sure, however, whether Ms Burt was worried about helping media businesses at all - or if she simply wants to help local journalists continue to perform what she believes is an important role.

                   

Read more...

This is because the Standard has gone one better than offering free copies. It actually bribes potential readers to take the paper away.

In some branches of WH Smith (and elsewhere, for all I know) you get £1 off a magazine if you also buy the Standard for 50p, effectively giving you a free copy of the paper and 50p off the magazine.

Now, I always get a copy of the Standard while I am at the office in Westminster. It's as much a national paper as a local London paper, and even though most of the stories I write are focused on the West Midlands, it makes sense for me to know what the national papers are saying.

Having skimmed through it at work, I might take it on the Tube with me to Waterloo, where I catch the train home. And sometimes I'll stop in Waterloo's WH Smith to pick up something to read for the train journey.

I know I can save money on magazines by grabbing a second copy of the newspaper here, but I don't. I'm not a great environmentalist, but I can still see how wasteful this is, even if I stand to save 50p.

But there are assistants roaming the shop (employed I suspect by the Standard rather than WH Smith) who look out for people buying magazines, and thrust a copy of the paper into your hands before you reach the till. They do this even if they can see that you already have a copy of the Standard under your arm - and even if you point this out to them, and explain that you don't need two newspapers.

Weak-willed as I am, I'm afraid that in these circumstances I just accept the paper and the 50p saving. It saves me money, and presumably boosts the Standard's circulation, but it can't do much for the environment.