—Rest of 2008 outlook: INM said it expected the poor advertising trend to continue for the rest of year and forecast a full-year, constant currency drop in revenue of 2 percent, 11 percent in Euro terms. It expects group advertising to be down about 2.5 percent, circulation revenue to drop 0.5 percent and operating profit to be flat, all in constant currency terms. INM forecasts its year-end net profits to be down by 15 to 17 percent, excluding exceptionals. The 27 percent YTD online revenue gain is an improvement on the 23.3 percent increase for the first six months of 2008.

—2009 even worse? INM, like everyone else, finds it extremely difficult to predict what’s going to happen next year, but despite that, it is fairly optimistic. While the downturn in advertising is “likely to continue for some time”, the company believes the recent easing of interest rates across its markets and probable further reductions, will help stop the rot and contribute towards some growth by H209. INM says it’s a “reasonable assumption” that the advertising and general economic outlook doesn’t deteriorate further and if that’s the case company revenues for 2009 should only be marginally down on 2008.

—Shared newspaper resources? Curiously, as part of a cost-cutting plan involving more redundancies, INM’s UK newspapers division is in discussions with other UK national publishers about a scheme to “create more efficient editorial work flows, while preserving the unique editorial ethos of The Independent”. Most newspapers have shared printing agreements with one or more publisher – but does this mean sharing content, journalists or both?