The U.K. media regulator on Tuesday said it sees no benefit in setting absolute media ownership limits, but suggested a framework for reviewing whether any single company has gained too much influence. It suggested that the country go through a review of media plurality, including the BBC and online news operations, "every four or five years" in the absence of any major merger reviews. Industry folks have been divided on whether to include the public broadcaster and web outlets.

Working with Luke Bozier, a former aide to Tony Blair who defected to the Tories in January, Mrs Mensch today unveiled Menshn (pronounced "mention"), a social media service for "talking on topic". The service is initially only available in the United States and aiming attract online discussion about the upcoming presidential election. It is scheduled to open to British members in time for the Olympics. Menshn owes much to Twitter in its design and concept, with members invited to post short messages and links of 180 characters. The main difference is that it restricts discussions to pre-approved topics, with the …

Fairfax Media Ltd., Australia's second-largest newspaper publisher, plans to cut 22% of its workforce, close printing sites and introduce digital subscriptions to halt sliding sales and a stock price slump. The Sydney Morning Herald, bought by Fairfax in 1841, and its Melbourne sister, The Age, will shrink to tabloid size by March 2013, the company said in a statement Monday. Fairfax will start charging the publications' online readers in the first quarter of next year and may end print editions entirely if revenue declines materially, it said.

With BFI, the online movie service will make up to 300 titles available to rent or buy, including movies from such filmmakers, as Alfred Hitchcock, Peter Greenaway, Derek Jarman, Terence Davies and Bill Douglas made between 1950 and 2000. Distrify gives movie content creators and distributors the opportunity to offer films to global audiences through building unique viral film sales platforms.

The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG) has been incredibly protective over any website using its logo as the cost of companies being officially associated with the games is very high. Launching the official Olympic Facebook page today, at a large press event in London, attended by former gold medal winner Boris Becker and representatives from the International Olympic Committee, Facebook revealed that it would carry no advertising around its any of its Games-themed pages.

Some Canadian startups looking to tap into larger markets are bypassing the original Valley and instead heading east across the Atlantic. Hossein Rahnama, founder and chief executive of Flybits based out of Ryerson University's Digital Media Zone in Toronto, said he decided to set up a second office in London because it was similar to the company's home city in many ways. Europe tends to have higher adoption rates of new mobile technologies, which made London an appealing place to launch an expansion of his mobile software platform, he said.

In the second half of 2011, Google received 1,455 requests from the Government to hand over its users' private data and it complied with 64% of those demands. The number of requests made by the American government at the end of last year also grew by 37%, from 4,601 in 2010, to 5,950. However, interestingly, Google did a much better job at fulfilling the wishes of the US government, the country from which the technology company hails, than any other government, complying, at least partially, with 93% of all requests. Google only fulfilled 45% of the German government's requests for …

Circulation for The Economist reached more than 1.6m over the year, comprised of 1.5m in print and 123,000 in digital editions. Circulation-based revenue from The Economist and the group's other publications The World Inand Intelligent Life rose 6% with digital circulation revenue more than doubling. The Economist Group posted a record operating profit of GBP67.3 million for its financial year ending March 31.

IPC Media has announced that it is to launch digital editions for thirty of its brands with 14 to be made available internationally on Apple's Newsstand over the next fortnight and a further 16 to launch by the end of August. It follows a similar announcement from Time Inc that all of its titles will be launched on the platform. Seven IPC brands are currently available on Newsstand; Cycling Weekly, Decanter, Livingetc., Wallpaper*, What Digital Camera, World Soccer and Yachting World.

For GBP10.8 million, Tesco has bought a 97% stake in UK-based WE7 and plans to purchase the remaining shares within the coming weeks. Overall, Tesco intends to increase investment in its online business to around GBP150 million between 2012 and 2013. Last year, the supermarket chain acquired Blinkbox, a subscription-free online movie service available on PC, games consoles, tablets and smart TVs.