MEDIA PERSPECTIVE: Bargain basement is no place for UK's best media labels.(TK Maxx)

A visit to the bargain-priced designer outlet TK Maxx ('get the look and the labels') will tell you much of what you need to know about a portion of the UK population. It's full of people who don't seem to see the irony in buying designer gear in an environment that appears to me to more closely resemble a bus depot than a clean, fragrant store.

Personally, I prefer a more honest approach to the bargain retail experience.

It was Fosters menswear when I was a child and these days it's Primark for socks and H&M or Uniqlo for everything else.

This might be relevant because two of the UK's most loved 'designer' media brands are facing such bargain-rail treatment. Richard Desmond's eyeing up of the Telegraph Group could well become a full, sweaty two-handed grope now that Conrad Black's proposed sale to the Barclay brothers has been blocked. Observers assume that, if successful in his bid, Desmond would strip out costs, tinker with editorial and generally strip away the title's silk to replace it with muslin.

More surprisingly, it has emerged that Channel 4, a broadcaster with a desirable, if dwindling, audience, has held early talks on merging with the rival broadcaster five.

Surprising because it's easier to see a surface synergy between five and Sky, which five's deputy chief executive, Nick Milligan, is jumping ship to join, and ...