Best of 2009: Grey Cardigan

Press Gazette columnist Grey Cardigan names his 'Best Media of 2009'.

Best old media: Although the increasing influence of all those Daily Mail imports is becoming painfully obvious, it still has to be the Daily Telegraph. The downgrading of the Obits is very sad (along with the fact that we're running out of war heroes), but the Letters Page is the best in the business. In comparison, the correspondence in The Times is bland and boring.

Best new media: Does The Thick Of It count? Sheer brilliance. If not, then the amazing variety of YouTube content.

Story of the year: MPs' expenses - the source info might have been bought in, but it was handled brilliantly by the Daily Telegraph and set an agenda that has changed government in this country for ever.

Journalist of the Year: For sheer, lunatic entertainment, it has to be Liz-fucking-Jones. She's painted herself into a corner in a dank, Exmoor hovel; has landed herself with a herd of rescue animals that she can't possibly abandon; and, as someone smarter than me has said, now looks as if she's just flown a hang-glider through a flock of crows.

Prediction for 2010: More of a hope than a prediction: that local newspapers might return to local ownership, with sensible margins, a sensible cost base, sensible management and sensible resources. The game isn't up yet if we can prise the odd failing title out of the hands of the greedy mega-groups.

Tomorrow: Patrick Smith.

Best of, so far: Jean Morgan; Neil Fowler; Chris Wheal; Adrian Monck; Paul Linford; Jo Wadsworth; Steve Dyson; Steve Busfield; Sam Shepherd.