First up: Tim Waterstone, the company's founder (and would-be owner if he could ever get it right) talked to the Sunday Herald about why the campaigns to save Ottakar's from takeover actually had the opposite effect. "In a sense the protests did misfire, in that when the green light came from the Competition Commission, so much time had passed that HMV were able to come in at a much lower price and take the company, by then in a very weakened position. That was bad luck for Ottakar's shareholders." Yeah, no kidding.

Meanwhile, HMV- the parent company of both Waterstone's and Ottakar's - has named a new chief executive, Simon Fox. The Telegraph reports that Fox, who quit as chief operating officer of Kesa Electricals last week, will succeed Alan Giles who steps down as HMV's chief executive at the company's annual general meeting on September 28.