Hopes of economic recovery underpinned gains by the directories group Yell, whose share price strengthened yesterday despite a lacklustre day on the markets.

Rupert Murdoch and his henchmen have repeatedly bad-mouthed Google as a “tech tapeworm” and a “parasite”, guilty of “false gospel” and, according to the media mogul himself this week, “theft”. That war of attrition is starting to have an effect.

Google has bowed to pressure from newspaper publishers and agreed to let them limit the number of free news pages users can read per day.

Since free trade replaced mercantilism, liberals have understood that capitalism can do good even if that is not its first objective.

One of the country's largest newspaper firms started limiting access to online content for several of its titles today in a groundbreaking trial.

Johnston Press, the regional newspaper group, is to begin charging for the online content of some of its local titles, in the latest sign that the industry has shifted heavily in favour of making the internet pay.

Johnston Press, which owns the Yorkshire Post and The Scotsman, yesterday backed the "greater stability" in its advertising revenues, as the declines slowed over the past 10 weeks.

The notion that The Guardian would close The Observer, or turn it into a weekly magazine, always seemed unlikely. I don't say there weren't one or two members of the Scott Trust (which owns both titles) who did not seriously consider the idea. Some senior Guardian executives have undoubtedly had it in for their sister paper for years.

A £40m print deal will make Northern Ireland one of the biggest producers of daily newspapers in Europe.

Johnston Press, the beleaguered regional publishing group, cheered investors yesterday despite plunging profits after it successfully secured a £485m debt deal with its banks.

Roger Parry, a 40-1 shot with Paddy Power to land the chief executive's job at broadcaster ITV, has said that he does not want the role.