Well, obviously, it's not. But things aren't looking too rosy, either. Smash Hits has gone, TOTP is about to go, cd:uk was spirited away in the middle of the night (though rumours speak of its return), and we live in a world where Level 42! Level 42! Level 42! can get into the Album Top 20 with a greatest hits collection.

And things aren't going to get better. ITV have somehow managed to stop it from becoming a big news story, but the announcement that they're beginning to wind up CITV as a programme-making venture should be ringing alarm bells in every record company across the land (it also makes me incredibly angry, but I'll spare you the Robin Carmody-esque rant). They've already axed the traditional Saturday morning children's show in favour of Andrew "Spit In His Meal" Worrall Thompson.

What does this mean? The traditional avenues for a pop act are disappearing rapidly. Even for the bigger acts, things are going to be hard. When Justin Timberlake heads over here next month, where is he going to promote his new single on national television? The zombie remains of PopWorld? The children's TV circuit used to be an essential way of getting a new band in the public eye. No longer. Some might point to the Internet as being a natural progression of this type of advertising. It plays a part, but Sandi Thom wouldn't have got anywhere near the charts if she didn't have her PR company getting her splashed all across the national media before the single's re-release.

It just seems very depressing. I want a band like Lucky Soul to scrape into the Top 40 and get a five-minute slot on national television. I want their to be an arena where people like Rachel Stevens can survive. But it looks as if those days are firmly behind us. No more shall we have the likes of New Kids On The Block and the Happy Mondays on the same show. And I think we're all poorer for that.