Honda flew the nest at the end of last season which has prompted ITV to seek out a new sponsor ahead of the F1 season starting next Sunday.

Initial reports indicated that a figure of around £5million was anticipated to be required to claim the rights however the rumours are that Sony’s new contract will only see ITV claim £3million - still a pretty penny.   No doubt ITV were hoping the Lewis-factor would have loosened the pursestrings in boardooms around the globe, however it was not to be.

So why would a company want to associate themselves with F1?

Excuse me for a minute, I just need to work my way through a problem - writing things down is meant to help order them in your mind apparently and find the best solution.

The problem is that we currently have a 27″ LCD Samsung flatscreen telly which is fine for use in the bedroom or as a second TV in another room but not much cop as the main telly in the lounge.  Therefore we’d like a new one for when we move into the new house (that we’ve had for 7 months and are yet to move into…).

What should an advert do?

To me, it should inform the viewer about the product and inspire or encourage them to go out and buy it.  So many ads these days do neither, yet companies are obviously willing to spend thousands of pounds on their advertising budget on these nonsense ads and I don’t understand how they can justify it.

Ads on TV at the moment are broken down into 3 categories - for me at least.  First there are those which do inform me about the product, but are simply wrong for some other reason - mainly because they are plainly just ridiculous.

Trawling the internet for new gadgets (a typically male thing to do on a wet Saturday!), I found this site detaling a batch of new phones which Sony Ericsson have unveiled. The bad news is that they aren’t due for release until nearer Christmas!

I’ve always been a fan of Nokia phones, they are simple to use and relatively fashionable but last year I switched to a Sony Ericsson K800i and I’m glad that I did. The menu system and controls are every bit as easy to use and understand as any of the Nokias I’ve had in the past, and it’s packed with good features.