Media: Headliner - Indie's ad sales team inherits the Barnes trainspotter gene.

Detail is The Independent's new commercial director's middle name.

There must be an obsessional gene in the Barnes make-up. Simon Barnes, the recently appointed commercial director at The Independent, has a whole room in his London home devoted to vinyl and CDs and has transferred 6,000 songs to his iPod.

His brother Andy, the sales director at Channel 4, has a whole room in his house devoted to a shrine to his beloved Arsenal.

Of his love of music, Simon Barnes says: 'I'm obsessed with finding the little nuggets, trying to search out the really rare things.'

This trait is also apparent in his work, according to former colleagues.

'He has a massive capacity for anal detail,' one says. But they also say that he matches this with less trainspotterish tendencies.

Charlie Varley, the managing partner at Walker Media who worked at the digital content company Oxigen with Barnes, says: 'He's a complete media junkie, a big networker and the ultimate pressure salesman.'