´óÏó´«Ã½

I'm the ´óÏó´«Ã½'s media correspondent and this is my brief selection of what's going on.

Tobacco firms have denied claims in a that they are using websites such as YouTube to get around a ban on advertising cigarettes. a study in New Zealand found a number of pro-tobacco videos "consistent with indirect marketing activity by tobacco companies or their proxies". The ´óÏó´«Ã½'s Jonathan Fildes reports several tobacco firms signed up to a voluntary agreement to restrict direct advertising on websites in 2002.

Richard Desmond, the new owner of Channel 5, is in talks with Endemol to buy the rights to Big Brother, . But it says no announcement is imminent. This week's final drew 4m viewers, well up on last year's.

Wolf Mankowitz, who wrote the screenplay for a James Bond film, was himself suspected of being a spy, according to new papers released at the National Archives in Kew. The ´óÏó´«Ã½ and [subscription required].

The ´óÏó´«Ã½'s newspaper review looks at speculation in the papers over the mystery of the murder of MI6 employee Gareth Williams, whose body was found at his flat in London.

Links in full

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• Jonathan Fildes | ´óÏó´«Ã½ | Tobacco firms' use of YouTube probed
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• Kayte Rath | ´óÏó´«Ã½ | MI5 suspected Bond screenwriter was communist agent
• ´óÏó´«Ã½ | Newspaper review

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