For months, Blick Online and 20minuten.ch have been battling it out to see who can attract more surfers to their portal. According to the latest figures from Net-Metrix-Audit, 20minuten.ch now has the largest number of unique clients for the first time, i.e. the number of different computers from which a particular website is accessed: The portal of the free newspaper had 1,281,000 unique clients in November, while Blick Online had 1,229,000. 20minuten.ch lost out this time in terms of page impressions (PI): The site recorded a value of 83,033,658 PI here, while Blick.ch had 83,583,963 PI. These two portals hold the leading positions among the media sites. However, Bluewin and Search.ch - two internet portals that are not linked to a media title - continue to have the highest number of unique clients among websites with advertising. The Net-Metrix-Audit study shows the usage data of 164 websites in November. Six new sites were added.
The top ten Net-Metrix audit figures in November by unique clients:
Bluewin: 3'939'000
Search.ch: 2'442'000
20minuten.ch: 1'281'000
Blick Online: 1'229'000
NZZ Online: 1'198'000
Moneyhouse: 927,000
Tagesanzeiger.ch: 827,000
PCtipp Online: 754,000
MySwitzerland.com: 685'000
Homegate.ch : 655'000
The top ten Net-Metrix audit figures in November by visits (number of visits to a website):
Bluewin: 45'571'877
Blick Online: 9'874'705
Search.ch: 9'397'901
Netlog: 7'816'780
20minuten.ch: 7'401'760
NZZ Online: 6'488'186
Tagesanzeiger.ch: 4'919'274
PartyGuide.ch: 3'556'193
Romandie.com: 2'507'498
Teletext.ch: 2'343'738

 The Cineman website is now also available in English. After the German- and French-speakers, English-speaking residents of Switzerland can now also find out about everything to do with cinema. The English edition of Cineman.ch offers English reviews of all films, daily news, trailers in the original language and a cinema program geared towards film screenings in English. In addition to the domestic niche markets, the Cineman makers also want to grow abroad. Cineman.de was launched in June. The website currently provides the seventy largest German cities with cinema information. The Berlin-based site is already attracting 10,000 visitors a day.

 At the end of November, 178 federally certified sales managers from the 2007 examination year received their diplomas in Interlaken. The Swiss Marketing (SMC), KV Schweiz and Verkauf Schweiz associations have been organizing the sales manager examination for over 20 years. This year, 248 candidates took the exam. Of these, 72 percent were successful and 28 percent did not pass. Around 25 percent of the graduates were women. 173 of the new sales managers came from German-speaking Switzerland, while French-speaking Switzerland was represented by five graduates. The overall average grade of 4.2 was in line with the average of recent years, according to Swiss Marketing. Jean-Paul Zürcher, President of the Examination Board, hosted the graduation ceremony. A certain Ms. Elvira Iseli, alias Birgit Steinegger, provided humorous interludes.

 Clear Channel Outdoor promises a completely new advertising experience and unexpected sensory impressions with its new project at Unique Airport in Zurich-Kloten. Starting this month, the dynamic connection of seven consecutive displays will accompany travelers on their way through the airport with constantly changing advertising film sequences. The following can be shown on the 56-inch screens: Individual still images, images that are moved across the seven screens, animated spots and also videos in serial or dynamic progression. The placement of the new WalkSeven service along the moving walkways in the arrivals and departures corridor of the terminal is expected to generate over seven million passenger contacts per year.

 The web is more important to Internet users than the TV set. If they had to choose between the Internet and television, 61% of German online users would now opt for the Internet. Just six months ago, only 56% had decided in favor of the web and against television. Now, according to the survey conducted by the German consulting firm Fittkau & Maass, only 15 percent of Internet users can even imagine doing without the Internet in the future. "In any case, it can be assumed that the media budget of certain target groups will continue to shift from TV to the Internet in the short and medium term," predicts Susanne Fittkau, Managing Director of Fittkau & Maass, when asked by the Pressetext news service. The Internet plays a particularly important role for men and young users. According to the survey, 64 percent of men, but only 56 percent of women, can do without television. Among the under-30s, around 70 percent said they would opt for the Internet if in doubt.
The willingness to forego television is heavily dependent on the respective online usage behavior. The more video and television content a user consumes, the greater the willingness to forego traditional television. The consulting firm recommends that television stations take a proactive approach and further improve their online offering. Because this development cannot be stopped.

The new creative director at Publicis has been appointed: Martin Denecke takes over as head of creation. He is moving the clients of his agency Denecke AG, which includes Pfister, to Stadelhoferstrasse. Denecke will succeed Markus Gut, who is moving to the Y&R Group at the end of the year.
According to the communiqué, former GGK Basel CEO and Advertiser of the Year Martin Denecke and Publicis CEO Fredy Collioud have known and respected each other as friends and competitors for decades. Denecke is now joined at the helm by new Managing Partners Curdin Janett and Christian Siegrist, as well as Marion Marxer (Publicis Modem).
The replacement for creative director may come as a surprise, as Denecke was not among the names discussed for the post recently. "It was very important to me that our new creative director be a seasoned personality and bring experience with big clients," Collioud explained when asked by Werbewoche. "I didn't want someone who is just looking for a creative playground and wants to win awards for himself. With the size of our agency, management experience is extremely important."
According to Collioud, an internal solution was not an option. A survey among Publicis creatives had also shown that they preferred an external solution. Denecke is now moving from his one-man agency to the largest creative shop in the country. "This is nothing new for him, as he has already proven that he is capable of bearing the creative as well as entrepreneurial responsibility of a large agency. He has now wished to have a broader sphere of influence again," says Collioud.

Martin Denecke's stations include McCann Erickson in Zurich as well as Aebi und Partner. He then moved to GGK Basel, where he first acted as CD and then as managing director when Aloys Hirzel bought out GGK in 1991. Finally, in 1994, Denecke himself took over the majority with a management buyout, managed the turn-around with the agency and enjoyed great success. Clients such as Cash, A. Lange & Söhne, Sunrise and Credit Suisse were on the client list during these years. Martin Denecke was named Advertiser of the Year in 1995. In 1998, he sold his shares in Lowe and left the agency in 2002. He then set up his own business as a freelance creative consultant and founded Denecke AG, where he won the account of the furniture store Pfister in 2005.

 The specialized publisher Lürzer's Archive publishes every two months a magazine with good advertisements and posters from all over the world. But it also shows the ads online at Luerzersarchive.net. Each week, a winning work is selected there in the film and print categories. This week, the title of "Ad of the Week" goes to the Leica campaign "Zoom" by AY&R, which has already been successful at Epica and Eurobest. The ad can be admired online from Tuesday.

 From the new year, the SF Meteo team will be presenting the weather news on Radio Zürisee. The station is thus expanding its weather reporting. Thomas Bucheli and Co. will provide listeners with a weather service tailored to the region in the morning, over lunchtime and in the early evening. The new weather service is available seven days a week, according to Radio Zürisee. According to SF Meteo editorial manager Thomas Bucheli, such a service has already been running on Radio Basilisk for several years. Swiss Radio DRS is also a customer.
According to Managing Director Tony Immer, the collaboration with SF Meteo should help Radio Zürisee to expand its position in the highly competitive Zurich-Glarus concession area. Five stations are bidding for the area, but only three licenses will be awarded.

 After the Council of States, the National Council has now also rejected the media agreement with the EU. This forces the Federal Council to enter into new negotiations in Brussels. The agreement is an ambivalent matter: on the one hand, Swiss filmmakers would benefit equally from the EU funding program; on the other hand, the agreement clashes with the advertising bans in the Swiss Radio and Television Act (RTVA). In the EU, the regulations of the country of origin and no longer those of the recipient country will apply to advertising from 2009. For Switzerland, this would mean that it would not be able to maintain its ban on advertising for alcohol, politics and religion. For the majority of parliament, this was reason enough to reject the agreement. For Culture Minister Pascal Couchepin, the survival of the Swiss film industry in Europe is at stake. The same advertising rights should apply in Europe, that is a matter of common sense, he said during the debate. However, he would now look for a way out in Brussels and find one.
For its part, the EU has announced that it is prepared to "re-explain the conditions for the participation of third countries" to Switzerland. This includes compliance with the EU legal framework in the audiovisual sector. The responsible Commission spokesperson left it open as to whether the EU is prepared to renegotiate with Switzerland at all.

The General Assembly of Sat.1 Switzerland has elected Nik Niethammer as a new member of the Board of Directors. The Swiss TV personality has been responsible for the entire news and magazine division at Sat.1 in Berlin as Editor-in-Chief since last October. Before his promotion to Editor-in-Chief, he was Head of the Magazine Division at Sat.1 from 2004. Before that, Niethammer was a member of the editorial team at Blick for five years. Before moving to the tabloid, he was head of programming at Tele24 and a member of the founding team of TeleZüri. His professional experience also includes Swiss television, the Tages-Anzeiger and Schweizer Illustrierte.

 Switzerland has not violated the right to freedom of expression by convicting a journalist. This was the conclusion reached by the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights on Monday. The case revolves around the journalist Martin Stoll, who in 1997 quoted from a confidential paper by the then Swiss ambassador to the USA, Carlo Jagmetti. The two articles in the Sonntagszeitung caused a stir in the course of the debate on dormant assets. Jagmetti came under pressure because of the aggressive vocabulary used in his report and resigned.
Stoll was fined 800 francs by the Zurich judiciary for publishing official secret negotiations; the Federal Supreme Court confirmed this verdict a year later. Stoll lodged an appeal against the judgment with the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). In 2006, its fourth division came to the conclusion that Switzerland had violated freedom of expression with the fine (see
). Switzerland referred the case to the Grand Chamber of the ECtHR. On Monday, this chamber came to the conclusion by twelve votes to five that freedom of expression had not been violated after all.
The Strasbourg judges were of the opinion that the public had a fundamental interest in the information from Stoll's article. However, the publication of the passages in question from the Jagmetti report could have had a negative impact on the course of the Swiss negotiations. The articles were therefore likely to damage Swiss interests.
Overall, the court judged Stoll's contribution to the public debate to be minor. His texts were highly simplistic and abbreviated. The texts and the sensationalist titles were not appropriate to the topic of dormant assets.
The court thus shared the opinion of the Swiss government and the Press Council that Stoll's primary aim was not to inform the public, but to scandalize the Jagmetti report. The fine imposed was therefore not disproportionate to the objective pursued.

 The insurance company AXA Winterthur is expanding its Executive Board. Markus Keller, Head of Marketing, has been Head of Marketing at AXA Winterthur, which belongs to the French AXA Group, since July 1. The appointment of Keller as an additional member of the Executive Board is in line with the company's growth strategy and strengthens its positioning, according to a press release issued on Monday.