On Friday in Bern, the Swiss Press Council presented the results of an analysis of the reporting on a paedophile priest from Neuchâtel. The investigation was triggered by the priest's suicide on February 3 of this year, after he was suspected of having committed pedophile abuse in the early 1980s. In a suicide note, he cited the "media hunt" as the reason for his suicide. However, the Press Council has now come to the conclusion that the reporting on paedophile priests in the Swiss media was appropriate. According to the Press Council, the Catholic Church in particular, which ascribes a special moral authority to itself, has a public interest in how it deals with suspicions of paedophile acts by priests.
The short-term flood of media reports on a single topic in French-speaking Switzerland at the beginning of 2008 was admittedly sensitive. However, such phenomena are part of media freedom, the importance of which for a democracy is undisputed. It was therefore not justified for church representatives to demand that the media refrain from reporting on suspected cases. An ethic of omission was only appropriate if the media ran the risk of digging in the dirt out of pure business addiction. This was not the case here. In addition, the media had reported on the case in a proportionate manner. Based on the media reports, the priest could only be identified by his close circle.
As the Press Council announced at its annual conference, it took a position on 63 complaints last year. This is roughly the same number as in previous years. Last year, the Press Council upheld 25 complainants in whole or in part. The most common grounds were violation of the principle of fairness, violation of privacy and unjustified naming of names.

 The speaker placement agency Speakers Excellence is expanding its activities. Founder and owner Gerd Kulhavy's company now has a branch in Zurich. From now on, old and new Swiss clients will be looked after from Leutschenbachstrasse in Oerlikon. The local office is managed by Simon Hubacher and Alexander Schungl. Hubacher is the owner of the Swissaffaires Communications agency, while Schungl is also responsible for Speakers Excellence Alpine's activities in Austria. The core business of the Stuttgart-based company is the placement of speakers, keynote speakers and coaches from the worlds of business, science, education, sport, culture and politics for corporate and educational events. Speakers Excellence also develops and implements event concepts for companies, associations and organizations. Speakers are offered further training seminars and advice on positioning and marketing issues. In March 2009, Speakers Excellence is organizing the 2nd Zurich Knowledge Forum.
The agency's placement pool has long included various Swiss personalities such as rhetoric coach Martin Betschart, Alinghi team member Dominik Neidhart, balloonist Bertrand Piccard and memory trainer Gregor Staub.
 
 

 The Airport Outlet sells fashion at factory prices. Recently, however, it is no longer on the airport site, but in the Coop-Center Riedmatt in Rümlang. The current campaign by the Ruf Lanz advertising agency aims to make customers aware of the change of location. Because Rümlang is located in a rural area, the Zurich-based creative team show farmers in unusually eye-catching outfits on advertisements and posters. For example, a bright red thong peeks out from under the skirt of a farmer's wife during milking, which seems to baffle even the cow. "New in the country; hot fashion at factory prices", reads the text, which is the responsibility of the Airport Outlet:
Peter Wider (overall responsibility). Responsible at Ruf Lanz: Markus Ruf, Danielle Lanz (Creative Direction), Grit Wolany (Art Direction), Torsten Maas (Text), Michèle Leibacher (Consulting). Photography: Stefan Minder. Image editing: Felix Schregenberger.

 The news network of Tages-Anzeiger, Basler Zeitung and Berner Zeitung announces even more additions. Christina Fassbind, Martin Kilian, Florian A. Lehmann, Reto Hunziker, Michèle Binswanger and Lorenz Schmid are coming on board. Christina Fassbind is taking over as head of the Zurich section of Tagesanzeiger.ch. She is moving from 20 Minuten Online, where she has worked since September 2007. Prior to that, she was Head of Input in the news editorial department at TeleZüri and worked for the industry service Kleinreport, Bluewin, the television magazine TR7 and the now defunct private broadcaster TV3.
Martin Kilian has been working as the USA correspondent for the Tages-Anzeiger since the beginning of 2004. He is already represented on Tagesanzeiger.ch with the blog "Der Amerikanist". Kilian has lived in the USA for more than 30 years and will also be working as a correspondent for Newsnetz.
Florian A. Lehmann strengthens the sports expertise of the Newsnetz. The sports editor has been on board with the commuter newspaper 20 Minuten since its launch in December 1999. The 49-year-old previously wrote for Sport-Information (SI), the newspaper Sport and the Zürichsee Zeitung.
Reto Hunziker joins the Newsnetz team as a reporter in the Society section. The 27-year-old is currently working as a producer at the Sonntagszeitung. Prior to that, he gained media experience as an intern and part-time employee, including at the Aargauer Zeitung, Magazin and the Munich-based magazine Neon.
Michèle Binswanger joins the online portal team as an editor in the culture and society section. The 36-year-old's professional experience includes Soda Magazin, the culture magazine of Basler Zeitung and Facts magazine. Since October 2007, she has been working as a freelance journalist and columnist for the Basler Zeitung and the lifestyle magazine Saisonelle.
Lorenz Schmid has joined the Newsnetz team as a local reporter for Tagesanzeiger.ch. The 30-year-old wrote for the Zürcher Unterländer during his studies in Winterthur and worked for the SMS news service Bexmedia. He joined the Tages-Anzeiger when the Zürcher Unterland regional edition was launched.

 
The Cannes Lions Awards are just around the corner. But before wild animals are unleashed on the most important and best advertisers in the world and before Advertising Week returns to Zurich at the end of July, we are spontaneously awarding some far less dangerous, and perhaps somewhat less important animals: the Rüschlikon sea lions!  
Don't worry, ladies and gentlemen, the gold, silver and rust-brown colors have of course been gently massaged into the animals' coats with delicate hands and will dissipate within a year except for a barely lethal lead residue. But now to the action: there is, for example, the virally effective
Nike spot
with basketball player Kobe Bryant. To prove his jumping ability and the quality of his new Hyperdunk shoes, he easily jumped over a passing Aston Martin at the beginning of April. As it turned out, he was helped by a deep dive into his bag of tricks. The anti-Republican commercial draws on a different bag of tricks. It's both nasty and convincing how the arguments are turned around in the mouths of the competitors. In their latest clip, the American rock band Weezer did not deal with competition, but with celebrities. The biggest YouTube stars do gymnastics to their great song "Pork And Beans". For example, the person who holds the record for the most T-shirts worn at the same time (there are 155 of them, from size S to ten times XL) or Britney's ex Kevin Federline and the guy who beats himself up with his fighting tools while training in Asian martial arts. Conclusion: good advertising on its own behalf. 
At least one rusty-brown sea lion has made the
from Barbecues Galore and the one from Comcast. In the print advertising category, the Golden Freshwater Lion was already awarded a few weeks ago. The German photographer received the coveted trophy for his campaign for master tailor Marc Jacobs. It simultaneously poked fun at Posh Spice Victoria Beckham and at least partially rehabilitated her reputation, you remember. (see ) - Well, and that's about it. Sorry if you went out without a wet Zürisee animal. But be that as it may, you can read all the latest news about the Cannes Lions, interviews with the possible Swiss winners and anecdotes about the awards ceremony on Werbewoche.ch from Monday!

 Hard disk recorders are slowly but surely beginning to make life difficult for the advertising managers of private television stations. They allow their users to enjoy all programs slightly delayed without any commercial breaks. Now various advertising strategists have thought about how they can trick the recorder system called Tivo, which is widely used in the USA. Their solution: a leap back in time to the 1940s. As was customary back then, commercials have recently been shown live on the television stage on Jimmy Kimmel's talk show and, on a trial basis, on the world-famous "Tonight Show" with Jay Leno. For example, a sandwich chain and a car manufacturer had their products presented in real time by the presenter and his Mexican assistant during the "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" program (see ). Devices such as Tivo therefore have no chance of recognizing and skipping over those implemented in the broadcast, but as the Süddeutsche Zeitung notes in its Friday edition, this is not a model that will be widely imitated. Firstly, live spots lasting one or two minutes are too expensive for many clients. And secondly, they are prone to breakdowns. Even today, many people still remember the advertising fairy who had to rattle the supposedly extremely easy-to-open refrigerator door for several minutes before it opened. Thirdly, the model is therefore only suitable for products that are easy to present.

 The Newsnetz greets us daily. Although the new joint online portal of the Tages-Anzeiger, Basler and Berner Zeitung will not go live until August 8, it is already providing us with new news practically every day. Thursday's announcement was - as recently (see ) - of a personnel nature. With Ralph Pöhner, Simon Eppenberger and Regina Borsos, Tamedia is taking on three additional journalists.Pöhner, who will be working as a reporter for economics at Newsnetz, has been head of the economics department at Weltwoche since February 2007. From 2003 to 2006, he was deputy editor-in-chief of the news magazine Facts.
Simon Eppenberger studied journalism at the MAZ Lucerne from 2005 to 2007. He has been writing for the Zurich Unterland regional edition of the Tages-Anzeiger since 2006. He became a local reporter for the Zurich section of Newsnetz.
Regina Borsos has joined the Culture and Society department. The 28-year-old is currently studying for a Master of Arts in Journalism at the MAZ in Lucerne, as part of which she completed a three-month internship at SR DRS Regionaljournal Zentralschweiz last summer.

 Euro RSCG and Wirz Werbung have been shortlisted in the largest German-language moving image competition Die Klappe. Euro RSCG has been nominated in the cinema category with its spot for the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, which had already won silver at ADC New York. Wirz Werbung is on the shortlist in the TV category with its spot "Sessellift" for Schweizerische Mobiliar. In September, the decision will be made as to whether it will be enough for precious metal and which one.

Swiss television's "Tagesschau" will have a new editorial director from the beginning of next year. The post will be taken by 52-year-old Thomas Schäppi, the current head of "Schweiz aktuell". He succeeds Heiner Hug, who is retiring at the end of 2008 after five years as editorial director of the news program.
Schäppi has been working for Swiss television for 22 years. He began his career as an editor and presenter on the early evening magazine show "Karussell". In 1988, he switched to the regional magazine program "Schweiz aktuell", which was still called "DRS aktuell" at the time. There he worked as an editor, presenter and producer and took over as editor-in-chief in 1999. According to SF, Schäppi initiated and managed various special projects for "Schweiz aktuell" in recent years, including the summer series "Leben wie zu Gotthelfs Zeiten", "Das Internat" and "Pfahlbauer von Pfyn - Steinzeit live". For the entertainment department, he was executive producer of the program "Traumjob - nur einer schafft es".

 Jung von Matt/Limmat has been entrusted by SR DRS and SRG with the advertising budget for DAB digital radio. The Zurich-based agency beat off competition from two other agencies to realize a national campaign for Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB). Jung von Matt/Limmat impressed with its interdisciplinary approach, according to a press release. The agency combines the disciplines of PR, dialog, digital media and advertising under one roof. The first works will be on display from September 2008.

 Football fans in Switzerland are still mourning the early elimination of the national team, but the match against Turkey brought Swiss television fantastic ratings: An average of 1,652,000 viewers watched the game at home on Wednesday evening. This corresponds to a market share of 75.3 percent. The match peaked at 1,804,000 viewers shortly before Turkey scored the winning goal, giving it a market share of 80.6%. This makes the match between Switzerland and Turkey the second most successful football match ever broadcast on Swiss television. The match ranks 7th among the most-watched programs on Swiss television since 1985.
The figures shown relate to use at home. Visitors to public viewings are not included.

 The minister presidents of the German federal states largely agreed on the key points for the new Interstate Broadcasting Treaty on Thursday. As reported by Werbewoche (see ), the politicians want to regulate the online activities of the public broadcasters ARD and ZDF more precisely. The heads of government now want to present the catalog of criteria to the EU Commission and discuss it with public and private broadcasters as well as publishers. What is certain is that ARD and ZDF will soon no longer be allowed to offer electronic press. In future, ARD and ZDF will only be allowed to offer broadcast-related content on their websites. Commercial offers such as dating sites, leisure tips or advice services will soon be taboo. The provision of content is also to be limited to seven days. The ministers only want to sign the regulations once the specific guidelines have been drawn up. A final decision is expected in the fall of 2008.
In addition, a negative list was drawn up to prevent commercial exploitation chains - such as cooking programs that not only provide the recipe online, but also the link to buy the cookbook. Recordings of major sporting events should also be allowed to be put online by public broadcasters in the future - albeit for a limited period of 24 hours after the event.
The regulations do not go far enough for the Federal Association of German Newspaper Publishers. In contrast, the German Journalists' Association finds the limits too rigid.