Paper Monitor
11:01 UK time, Friday, 19 December 2008
A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.
What global financial crisis? The Financial Times has not just one gravity-defying, glossy supplement, but two.
Last Friday How to Spend It, chock full of ads for diamond-encrusted timepieces, fell out of the pink-paged paper. Today it is Wealth, chock full of ads for understated platinum timepieces and bespoke banking services.
The former is concerned with fun things to do with one's still-sizable wedge, perhaps in a long lunch break. Its motoring review might involve taking a grunting, gleaming Harley Davidson out for a spin (very wide boy banker).
The latter is given over to interviews with very, very rich people indeed, such as Bill Gates. It test-drives a private jet so one can ferry eight friends across the Atlantic or to shop in Paris. "[T]here is plenty of space in the baggage compartment for trunks full of gold ingots (mind the weight, though)..."
Yes, one must always be careful not to exceed the baggage limit when packing one's gold.
And the centrefold is a reader survey, with 37 tightly-typed questions such as:
33. Into which of the following bands does your total annual household income (before taxes) from all sources fall?
- Less than £30,000
- £30,000 - £49,000
- etc...
- £1,000,000 - £4,999,999
- £5,000,000+
Paper Monitor would prefer not to answer this question.
Once the survey is complete, Wealth readers are invited to snip it out, perform a complicated origami operation so the pages form their own envelope, and then pop it into the post. No stamp required - it's second class pre-paid.
Meanwhile, in the cheap seats, the Daily Mirror speculates that the next Timelord may be a woman. As for the Christmas special, "Secrecy surrounds the storyline, but the Mirror can reveal the episode will see the Doctor facing some of his deadliest foes, the Cybermen."
Paper Monitor can inclusively reveal this is no surprise at all. The tin-can aliens pop up in the ±«Óãtv's ads for its festive offerings, ads that have been running since early December.
The 
