"We see the future very much in terms of multimedia" said the man from the Japanese hi-tech company, his fingers forming a pair of aerial inverted commas around the last word as it left his lips. The perfect timing of the gesture left me in no doubt this was an oft-used device designed to cover his unease (or was it plain embarrassment?) at the use of this latest technological buzz-word. Perhaps he just considered the British Music Fair an inappropriate event to reveal such lofty intentions.

Though there is nothing new in the idea of combining various forms of aural and visual (or indeed, tactile) media to produce a more involving sensory experience, the word multimedia is still a recent addition to everyday parlance. Yet already we are wary of its use and distrustful of its users. As a subject for speculation it has become the stock-in-trade of the techno-prophets of the colour supplements and the glossy US science mags. Fascinating to read (particularly if the in-flight movie doesn't appeal) and useful to disgorge at parties when your association with technology is revealed and an instant 'where it's all leading' prognosis is demanded.

But ultimately it's of no more value than the speculation that surrounded the introduction of home computers in the early '80s. The multimedia propagated by MT is, I like to believe, of a rather more practical kind, aimed squarely at those with an everyday involvement with technology and rooted firmly in our origins as a magazine for musicians. You might, I suppose, call it applied multimedia. It certainly needs no inverted commas around it - either real or imaginary.