Confidential was accused of sending out an email to its members masquerading as an apology from How-Do. The email headlined 'How-Do Apologises to The Confidentials' was sent to Manchester Confidential's database of email subscribers on Wednesday. It purported to be an apology from the publisher of How-Do over its recent coverage of Manchester Confidential's parent company, Cpub Ltd, being wound-up in the High Court. On Thursday, How-Do denied making any such apology.

Sales at the UK's leading scuba magazine were in decline on all fronts -- subscriptions, newsstand and advertising. "With the advent of mobile & tablet devices we quickly developed a strategy for launching our own App and during that process realised we had reached a crossroads," writes Simon Simmons, operations director, who spells out the strategy behind the move from UK-centric print to an international free digital-only magazine.

During the first quarter of 2012, 22% of companies reported an upward revision to their marketing budgets with 21% reporting a reduction, finds the IPA Bellwether Report.. Although traditional media advertising budgets were cut by 2.7%, internet ad-spend increased by 7.8%. The rise in marketing budgets for Q1 of 2012 marks the third consecutive quarter that budgets have increased and has resulted in the first rise in annual spend for four years.

Mail Online is expected to turn a profit for the first time this summer, and is predicted to bring in GBP100 million a year in revenue within five years, the site's publisher has told investors. Speaking at a Daily Mail and General Trust investor day in London yesterday, Martin Clarke said the website was "very close to breaking even" and said Mail Online no longer considered newspaper websites to be key rivals - but bigger online-only players such as AOL-Huffington Post and MSN.

Daily Mail & General Trust expects its newspaper arm to double that figure over the next few years. Revenues from MailOnline, the world's most-visited newspaper website, surged 69% in the last six months, while Daintith said the group is also benefiting from its stronger positions in online property and jobs advertising. The newspaper arm, A&N Media, which includes regional titles as well as the flagship Daily Mail and consumer websites, has an annual turnover of about GBP1.1 billion, so digital could soon represent nearly one fifth of sales.

The Slovak startup has raised the money from 3TS, one of the leading private equity fund in Central and Eastern Europe. Launched in May 2011, enables online publications to offer their readers premium content on a subscription basis. In July 2011 it raised EUR300,000. In the two test markets, Slovakia and Slovenia, readers pay monthly subscription of EUR3.90 (Slovakia) and EUR4.89 Euros (Slovenia), which enables access to the premium content of all participating online media, a total of 60 websites and 20 publishers. The publishers receive a share of the revenue based on the traffic generated, while Piano Media keeps …

The Curzon Smart TV app will give viewers video on demand independent films as it's released in cinemas via Samsung Smart TVs, PCs, tablets and smartphones. New releases can be streamed for $9, recent releases for $6 and older titles in the library for $3 per film. The app will also grant access to behind the scenes footage and interviews with the film makers. The service currently has a catalogue of 250 films with more being added over time.

Patrick Heery, who has been editor of BBC Newswire since June 2010, will take over from Gary Duffy, who returns to So Paulo as editor of BBC Brasil at the end of May. Duffy was UK editor from 2000 to 2007 and again from 2010 until now. He was a correspondent in Brazil from 2007 to 2010.

A survey of 1,899 people by myvouchercodes.co.uk finds that Twitter, Facebook and other social media sites are used by 59% of online daters in a trend referred to as network dating. Seventy-two percent used both online dating sites and social media platforms while 19% used social media sites alone. Just 9% said they solely used dating sites. Of those, 59% said they preferred social media platforms with 51% believing them to be safer and a third saying it enabled them to meet people through mutual friends.

Across the new CBSi Games group, more than 3 billion minutes of video are served each month to 18-34 year old men. Jim Lanzone, president of CBS Interactive, said: "The eSports scene is one of the hottest trends in video, and is rapidly attracting the core 18-34 male demographic in greater numbers than any other medium or category.