Novartis CEO Daniel Vasella has criticized the way he was quoted on Swiss television's "Tagesschau" last week. At the time, he said that the discussion about bonus payments was "pure populism". In an interview in the NZZ am Sonntag, Vasella said that it was easy to distort statements by deliberately reproducing only certain sections of a conversation. He had not defended the bonus structure of the banks, but merely the logic of performance-oriented salary systems.
"I dislike the hypocrisy and populism of certain circles," Vasella continued. However, he does not understand populism to be the population's reaction to very high wages, but rather when these emotions are exploited against their better judgment, for example for political purposes.
Swiss television does not accept Vasella's criticism. "From our point of view, the interview was reproduced correctly," media spokesman David Affeltranger told the news agency SDA.
In an interview with the NZZ am Sonntag, Vasella also reiterated his earlier statement that the pharmaceutical company Novartis would not change its remuneration system. "If you start making changes just because the political environment changes, our employees would not be able to understand that." Besides, Novartis is not in crisis.

The Swiss communal catering company SV Group has awarded the Media Prize 2008. Selected journalists were honored for comprehensible contributions on the complex issue of "healthy nutrition", the SV Foundation wrote in a press release on Friday.
First prize went to the team of journalists from the WDR science program Quarks & Co for their report "Die Dickmacher und wie wir ihnen entkommen" (The fatteners and how we can escape them). The 2nd prize went to Max Rauner and Jens Uehlecke for the article "The apple dilemma", which deals with the organic status of the popular fruit. It provides clear answers to the question of whether an organic apple is healthier than a conventionally grown one.
As part of the 5th SV Media Prize, the eight-member jury was able to select from a total of 40 entries, the foundation also announced.

Tamedia has expanded its online business in the Internet TV market. The media company is acquiring a stake in Zattoo's business in Switzerland. The former Zattoo Europe is spinning off its activities in Switzerland and Liechtenstein into Zattoo Switzerland.
The collaboration will enable Zattoo to further expand and market the Internet TV service it launched in 2006. This was announced by Zattoo and Tamedia in a press release on Thursday.
As a first step, Tamedia is participating in the financing of Zattoo International with a loan and is supporting the company in the spin-off of Zattoo Switzerland. Once this subsidiary has been established, Tamedia will acquire 24.5 percent of the share capital of the Swiss company as part of a conversion of the loan. The parties have agreed not to disclose further details of the investment.
The Zattoo TV service currently has over 800,000 users in Switzerland. With distribution in Belgium, Denmark, Germany, France, the UK, Norway and Spain, the service is used by over 3 million people worldwide.
Zattoo employs around 40 people at its two offices in Zurich and Ann Arbor in the USA.

The Swiss Television Audience Council has judged the new medical soap "Tag und Nacht" to be innovative and appealing to the audience. However, some shortcomings, such as excessive pacing and shortcomings in the characters and patient stories, need to be rectified.
In view of the innovative concept of the series, the Audience Council believes that it has the potential to counterbalance American doctor series. The series offers contemporary content and authentic dialog in dialect.
In the Council's opinion, the characters are multi-layered and offer interesting constellations and development opportunities. However, not all of them are equally plausible and some are too clichéd or caricatured. In addition, it considers the pacing with many scenes and rapid cuts to take some getting used to.
However, the Audience Council notes that the problems have been recognized. It also recommends that those responsible examine the possibility of moving the program to another slot.
The series was also highly praised by the Tages-Anzeiger's culture section. In the October 23 issue, film editor Florian Keller came to the conclusion that the "cinematic" series, "the pure opposite of a slowly rippling telenovela", was simply in the wrong slot.

In future, the construction company Hilti will use the slogan "We build ideas". The slogan developed by the agency Leone Ming is intended to convey a simple and direct impression of the company's field of activity, writes Leone Ming in a press release.
The phrase "We build ideas" will be integrated into all Hilti marketing and advertising measures in future. The subjects of the new advertising campaign show employees at work.
In connection with the creation of the slogan and the design of the new campaign, the website and various advertising materials were adapted accordingly.
Responsible at Hilti: Tina Hilti. Responsible at Leone Ming: Christine Böhmwalder (AD/design), Leone Ming (CD/concept), Michael Walser (graphics), Kathrin Konzett (project management)

The Public Council ruled on Friday that the last fall session of the Federal Assembly in Bern was reported in a competent, balanced and comprehensible manner. The reporting by Swiss Television and Radio DRS took into account the various political camps in an appropriate and balanced manner.
According to the Audience Council, Swiss Television was able to distinguish itself through a variety of different approaches. SF does not only deal with the debates in the Federal Parliament in the classic news programs. Individual topics are also addressed in other programs such as Arena, Rundschau, DOK, Club, Kulturplatz and Sternstunde Kunst.
There was no shortage of suggestions for improvement. For example, more innovative approaches to the topics could be sought. The Council would also welcome a stronger focus on young or newly elected Council members and stakeholders outside of Parliament.
The Public Council also made this comment to Radio DRS, whose reporting it praised overall. In particular, the expertise of the editors was impressive. The events in Bern were covered almost completely and close to the listeners.
According to the Public Council, the only thing it found disturbing was the occasional use of tabloid expressions in radio reports. For example, there was talk of "electricity barons".

In July/August of this year, Planetactive conducted an online survey on the use of media in Switzerland, with a particular focus on digital media. The agency came to the conclusion that the gap between actual media usage and expenditure on digital marketing is still very wide, even in Switzerland.
The average Swiss Internet user spends more than three hours on the Internet. The use of online media is mainly at the expense of the consumption of print media, but TV and radio will also have to give up time for three quarters of respondents, Planetactive wrote in a press release on Friday.
For Martin Sinning, Managing Director of Planetactive in Zurich, the results of the study show that it is high time for advertisers to invest more of their advertising budgets in digital media. Traditional media are still overrepresented, target groups are becoming increasingly difficult to reach there and the efficiency of the campaign is becoming increasingly difficult to prove.

Manfred Pfiffner was elected as the new Chairman at the SRG Audience Council meeting on Thursday. He succeeds Othmar Kempf, who led the committee for four years.
Manfred Pfiffner has been a member of the Public Council since 2000 and became Vice Chairman three years ago. Franz-Xaver Risi, editor-in-chief and publisher of the trade magazine Schweizer Touristik, is now taking over as Vice President.
In addition to the Presiding Committee, five new members were elected to the Public Council's Executive Committee. From January 2009, President Manfred Pfiffner will join Franz-Xaver Risi, Roberto Colonello, Amira Gafner-Al Jabaji, Susanne Hasler, Arthur Oehler and Simon Zogg on the management committee.

The Maz has held its photojournalism course for the fourth time. 13 graduates received their diplomas at a ceremony at the Maz.
The photographers spent 18 months working on reportage, portrait and documentary photography, discussing and working with star photographers from all over the world, reflecting on legal and ethical issues in photojournalism and learning the latest image editing techniques. They applied the knowledge they had acquired in their traineeship, according to a press release from the Swiss School of Journalism Maz.
The newly selected photographers of the 4th Press Photography degree program (with traineeships) are:
Corinne Aeberhard: 24 heures, Pius Amrein: Neue Luzerner Zeitung, Vinicio Barreno: Tages Anzeiger and Sonntagszeitung, Stefan Bohrer: Blick, Urs Jaudas: St. Galler Tagblatt, Ennio Leanza: Bild-Agentur Keystone, Tobias Meuli: Agenturen Visage und Fotogen, Karina Muench Reyes: SF Schweizer Fernsehen, Florian Nidecker: Migros Magazin, Matthias Wäckerlin: Basler Zeitung, Coralie Wenger: Zürichseezeitung, Daniel Winkler: Bild-Agentur Ex-Press, Ruben Wyttenbach: NZZ am Sonntag.
The award was presented by Nicole Aeby, Head of Photography Studies.

Irene Ackermann will replace Cyrill Treptow as the new Head of Magazines Online as of November 1, 2008. Treptow had been responsible for the online presence of Tamedia magazines on an interim basis since March of this year.
After holding various positions in the advertising industry and studying economics, Irene Ackermann worked at Tamedia from 2001 to 2006, most recently as a project manager in the former Electronic Media division. Two years ago, she moved to Betty Bossi Verlag as Head of E-Business Bossi.

Marco Valà has been advertising manager for the lifestyle supplement Chili of Südostschweiz am Sonntag in the Zurich branch since October. Chili is published every Sunday as a supplement and reports on trends in life, living, food and drink, beauty and travel.
Marco Valà is self-employed and, in addition to Chili, markets other magazines from the
health, fashion and gastronomy.

The Aargauer Zeitung will have a new editor-in-chief from next February. The 33-year-old Christian Dorer will be the new editor-in-chief. Dorer is currently deputy editor-in-chief of Sonntagsblick.
As AZ Medien AG announced on Friday, Dorer will report directly to AZ publisher Peter Wanner. The AZ central editorial office in Baden produces the national pages for the Mittelland Zeitung (MZ) association. As announced in July, Peter Buri, the former editor-in-chief of the MZ's mantle page, will take over the project management for the planned multimedia center in Aarau. The 50-year-old Buri will remain a member of the company management.
Dorer graduated from the Ringier School of Journalism. From 2001, he worked in the business department of Blick and from 2002 to 2005 was the parliamentary correspondent for Blick and Sonntagsblick. In February 2007, he was appointed deputy editor-in-chief of Sonntagsblick by the Ringier Group.