Is TV a move in the right direction for the Mirror? (Mirror Group to move into TV market)

News of the Mirror Group's decision to throw itself into the television arena carries slightly disconcerting echoes of another era. Before the late but unlamented Cap'n Bob went for that last big swim three years ago, the Mirror was the UK flagship of--supposedly--a global multimedia empire.

Since then the newspaper group has fallen into new hands and has been run by a management team with rather more pressing things on its collective mind than diversification and global strategy. And, love him or hate him, the group's chief executive, David Montgomery, has brought the company back from the brink and has slowly but surely started to nullify the awful legacy of the Maxwell era.

The debt position has improved, some of the missing pension money has been recouped and costs have been cut, not least through a move to Canary Wharf--which also helps to distance the new regime from the …