The rumour spread quickly after the Telegraph posted this piece early Wednesday afternoon. Deliberate mischief or an honest mistake?

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First came this: “The publisher of the Guardian and Observer newspapers is said to be close to axing the print editions of the newspapers, despite the hopes of its editor-in-chief Alan Rusbridger to keep them running for a few more years.” [ The Telegraph ]

Then came this: “When a story is published that is so obviously wholly inaccurate it is hard to know quite how to describe it. A mistake? A falsehood? A flyer? The truth is, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, is that The Guardian isn’t about to do any such thing,” wrote Roy Greenslade.

The reports came just a day after news that the Evening Standard, a newspaper distributed free in London, has registered its first profit in ages.

* Full disclosure: I do not care either way about the Guardian rumours as I have not been able to justify buying print newspapers for years.