Its administration and sales support are all supplied by the Mirror Group, owners of 46 per cent of Newspaper Publishing, the Independent's parent. The price-war-battered, Murdoch-bashed newspaper industry is far from being on its back, but the pressures are brutal and the prospects for many titles bleak. No wonder, then, that so many publishers have been enticed by the prospect of cost-saving through sharing printing facilities, administrative staff and advertising departments. To say that World Service staff regard their managers as emperors without clothes would be to grossly overdress them.This is all very easy for me to say After all, I'm leaving.

I'm going to Seattle, where Microsoft and NBC News have launched a new network, MSNBC, on television and the Internet. As one of my Bush House colleagues said, "You've managed a transfer pass from the Titanic to the Space Shuttle. Good on ya, mate."Things may not be that dire for World Service, but that's the state of play in the morale department. And indeed, MSNBC, like the Space Shuttle, could explode on take-off.