They reveal that artistes who were nominated and had sold virtually nothing have seen a huge increase in sales ratio whereas those already selling have only increased slightly.

Am I alone in finding this not at all strange news?

If someone sold 10 CDs and now has sold 1000, that's a massive percentage rise but a drop in the ocean. Whereas 2 million rising to 2.2 million is only a slight rise.

Either I'm going mad or the media is.

I think whoever put that story together took filling a story out to new seemingly unobtainable heights!

Only in August! My favourite August story this year was the classic "The Yeti does exist" (The mail 2 weeks back.)

I don`t understand the Mercury prize and was stunned when some friends of mine got nominated for it a few years back.