As one of America's best-regarded journalists and the holder of a Pulitzer prize, Seymour Hersh is accustomed to being talked about. His latest project, however - a book about the late John F. Kennedy, due out next month - has put him at the centre of a controversy he would wishes would go away.

I FELT I WASN'T GETTING ANYWHERE BECAUSE I WAS A WOMAN. THEN ONE DAY A BBC PRODUCER RANG AND ASKED ME TO HELP PRODUCE A NEW CHILDREN'S SERIES CALLED `DOCTOR WHO'...

Mention the name "Ellen" to the media-wise (that is, the massed ranks of US television-viewers) this week and it means just one thing: Ellen Morgan, the winsomely self-deprecating central character of ABC's weekly comedy show Ellen is "coming out" as a lesbian.

If No cause exists for furious national debate, the American media can be relied upon to invent one.

National media newsdesks spent the early hours of yesterday fielding phone calls from those who had fallen hook, line and sinker for their customary April Fool's Day stories. It was only later that they realised the joke was on them.

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With their perfect pop and synth haircuts, ABC were the Eighties incarnate. Or so they seemed. Glyn Brown talks to older, wiser lead-singer Martin Fry about gold lame suits, poverty and comebacks

Prime ministers and independence leaders have protested loudly. The row has even reached the United Nations. From all over the South Pacific, the cry has gone out: save Radio Australia.

If the American experience is anything to go by, John Major may soon realise that formal televised press conferences are not what they used to be - if they ever were in the first place.

When James Bond casually produces an item from his mind-boggling array of gadgets, the inevitable assumption is that they owe more to the future than the past.

Our panellists screen test six cinema chains to see how the space- age out-of-town multiplex compares with its predecessor

Pearl & Dean has revamped its image. But don't panic. By Meg Carter

There are lies, damn lies and newspaper circulation figures. Massaging the numbers is an established practice in Fleet Street, as prevalent as the bag of promotional tricks used to spike readership on certain days of the week: bingo, cheap videos, fantasy football, coupons and the like. Not that the massaging isn't known about: it is, in fact, seen as acceptable by all publishers. With the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) as ultimate arbiter, advertisers can be reasonably confident that the numbers are reliable, at least as a guideline. They may be inflated, but those in the know understand how the system works, and can discount the figures accordingly - demanding cuts from the rate card, for example, or concessionary deals for multi-day campaigns.

With suspicious alacrity, America's profit-driven commercial television networks have agreed to make an unprecedented gesture to the democratic process:free and uninterrupted airtime for the major presidential candidates in the run-up to the autumn election.