News International is experiencing the unpleasant taste of its own medicine this week, as the scandal engulfing the business throws up new revelations on a seemingly daily basis.

It remains to be seen whether sacrificing the News of the World is going to prove adequate, or whether the gangrene is spreading to other limbs. But one thing was evident in the last ever edition of the Sunday red top: News International has remained characteristically wily and has used the NoTW's demise for potential future gain.

We already know that the print run of the 'thank you and goodbye' final edition was doubled to some 5m, and that the newspaper sold out in many areas. On page 10 of the paper we find a somewhat unusual reader offer for a FREE souvenir edition - basically another copy of the final edition together with a facsimile of the first edition published back in October 1843. Love the original masthead, by the way.

I wonder how many people will take this up? On the face of it it's potentially quite an expensive exercise in terms of print and postage, although the costs will be as nothing set against what the phone hacking fallout has already cost the company

More importantly, it provides the potential to gather a veritable goldmine of reader data that will come in very handy indeed when (surely when, not if) NI's replacement Sunday title is launched.