CeBit, one of the biggest IT trade fairs, kicked off in Hanover on Thursday under the motto "Digital Solutions for Work and Life". To kick things off, German Chancellor Angela Merkel took a brisk tour of the stands and reminded companies: "You have to encourage customers to embrace new things".  
According to Heise.de, Mrs. Merkel said to the stand operators that many customers have had to "drill through a really thick wall" until they understand how new devices work. Merkel's message: IT companies should not overwhelm their customers, new technology must be easy to use. "Anyone who can do that will have an audience of millions."
 
At Fujitsu Siemens, its President Bernd Bischoff explained how the company aims to reduce its electricity consumption by 87 percent. At Microsoft, together with the Secretary General of the German Skilled Crafts Association, she gave the starting signal for the IT fitness test, with the help of which four million young people are to be made fit for the Internet over the next few years. And SAP CEO Henning Kagermann described to the Chancellor how the company intends to implement the resolutions of the first IT summit last December.
 
It is obvious that the doctor of physics is interested in the technical innovations at the trade fair. After all, she handles many of her own affairs with the help of technology - even during the two-hour tour, she frequently takes out her cell phone and reads new text messages. Merkel writes text messages faster with her old cell phone than he does with his new one, marvels Lower Saxony's Minister President Christian Wulff. "But that's why she's Chancellor."

March 15 is World Consumer Rights Day. The Federal Commission for Consumer Affairs is taking this opportunity to call for better protection against abuses in telephone sales.  
In a recommendation to the Federal Council, the commission demands that older people in particular should be better protected from such abuses. As reported by the SDA news agency, it therefore wants to introduce a right of withdrawal for telephone sales, as already exists for door-to-door sales. According to this, those affected who have concluded a contract by telephone should be able to withdraw from the contract within seven days of receiving written confirmation. The prerequisite is that they have been approached by the telemarketer.
 
In addition, further measures such as a prefix number are to be introduced so that telemarketers can be identified. The Foundation for Consumer Protection (SKS) has also set up an office where telemarketing companies that do not respect the asterisk in the telephone directory can be reported. These are published on the SKS website. The Foundation reserves the right to take legal action against particularly aggressive companies.

On the occasion of the ADC Festival Berlin on March 23, the German media group will present the 15th Journalism Award for groundbreaking print advertising. A top-class jury of editors-in-chief will select the best print advertising campaign of the past year.  
"Print advertising must enrich the newspaper or magazine in terms of content and design. My colleagues and I will evaluate the advertisements with this in mind," said jury chairman and Welt am Sonntag editor-in-chief Christoph Keese in an Axel Springer press release. This year's jury once again reflects the diversity of the German print media; the editors-in-chief of Vogue Germany, Maxim, Architectural Digest and Vanity Fair as well as Bild der Frau and Handelsblatt are also taking part.
 
The Journalist Award for Pioneering Print Advertising is the only German award that exclusively evaluates print advertising. Over 350 advertising professionals and experts from the advertising market are expected to attend the event. The Axel Springer prize is one of the extremely popular highlights of the ADC Festival in Berlin. "The award is important and relevant for us advertisers and agencies because it adds the journalistic component to the creative horizon we are familiar with," says Michael Preiswerk, Spokesman of the Board of the Art Directors Club Germany. The festival will take place from March 21 to 26, 2007.

The APG awarded the Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH) first prize in its «Poster of the Year» contest. The poster featuring two naked female fencers, which is part of the FOPH’s «Love Life, Stop AIDS» campaign, was selected via e-voting. Thirteen percent of visitors to the APG website chose the FOPH poster over the other 41 nominees. According to a press release, the FOPH and the creative agency
Euro RSCG Partner, the agency responsible for designing the poster, was presented with a trophy. In addition, a raffle was held among the e-voting participants, and three of them also received prizes, including a weekend at a luxury hotel.The FOPH is delighted with the award and points out that the image and the message «You protect yourself here, too,» which appear on the poster, are intended to help make self-protection a matter of course.

For thousands of years, Asians have relied on the healing properties of tiger balm. For its new online presence, the traditional Tiger Balm brand has put its trust in the Zurich-based creative team at Nemos. Visitors to the website will not only find information on the individual products, but also answers to important questions, a Chinese horoscope and tips on preparing Asian dishes. The design was created to reflect the origin and tradition of the brand. The basis for the implementation is the CMS Butler from Nemos. The content is transferred to the Flash frontend via a standardized XML interface.

On April 2, 2007, Radio 24 will launch its biggest programming changes in five years. The Zurich-based station aims to further consolidate its leading position and is significantly expanding its programming: Radio 24 is the first and only German-Swiss radio station to broadcast half-hourly news updates from 5:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.  
As the station announced in a press release, traffic, stock market, and business news coverage will also be expanded, Saturday evenings will feature a new show, and Radio 24«s music programming will become more varied and diverse. Program Director Markus Mager is convinced that these changes will set Radio 24 even further apart from its competitors: »In an era when radio is facing increasing competition from new media formats such as the internet and podcasts, a station must be innovative and consistently capitalize on its strengths and advantages.” Radio 24 isn’t being reinvented, but it is becoming even better. The programming team is implementing changes across all aspects of the lineup: news and information, public service content, and the daytime, evening, and weekend schedules are being expanded and adapted to the new landscape.

Next Monday sees the launch of the binational media platform Grenzlandzeitung, a project by unemployed media professionals who have lost their jobs. All employees are over 50 and see this launch as their last chance on the job market.  
At the heart of this unique media platform is the online service, which is accessible free of charge. The news, pictures, comments, letters to the editor and advertisements are constantly updated. The creators expect around 17,000 users per month. The project also includes Grenzland TV, which informs users about important current events in short video clips. The individual clips are embedded in the respective articles, giving them considerable added value. The users then determine which clips are shown in the Grenzland-TV program. The clips are presented each week by an advertiser in the form of an advertising spot. The printed edition will appear every Friday, with a planned print run of 17,000 copies.
 
The project is coached by the British publishing group Nexstar International. The five-member editorial team manages itself in weekly editorial meetings. After 100 days, a review will be carried out together with the project coach - and a democratic decision will be made on whether to continue or discontinue the project, as the Grenzlandzeitung writes in a press release.

Last December, the Federal Court had obliged Ringier to hand over to Willy Schnyder the profits that SonntagsBlick had made from articles that violated his personality in the dispute with his daughter Patty. Now the Federal Court has given written reasons for the ruling.  
According to the report, especially those media risk a conviction for profit issue, which continuously drive a line "sharply along the violation of personality" to satisfy reader expectations, as the SDA reports.
 
According to the Federal Court, there is a connection between violation of personality rights and profit if the reporting contributes to the maintenance of circulation in terms of its orientation and presentation. SonntagsBlick, for example, can only maintain its circulation if it meets the specific expectations of its readers. It distinguishes itself from other Sunday newspapers by being "up close and personal. If you want that, you have to stoke and satisfy the audience's curiosity with scandals.
 
Love, hate and big business No proof is needed that SonntagsBlick is permanently walking a tightrope in terms of personal rights. In the Schnyder case, the newspaper had gone into a story with the ingredients love, hate, big business and crime. The reporting had appealed to the curiosity of the audience and had been tailored to bind a specific readership. In this respect, the Schnyder series had an overwhelmingly likely impact on business success.

News, entertainment and interesting facts from the field of market research - that's what the new LP Marktforschung news bulletin offers. The first issue deals with the effects of smoking bans on going out and consumer behavior. LP Marktforschung surveyed over 500 smokers throughout Switzerland.  
According to the press release, Basler Mint Werbung is responsible for the concept and design of the newsletter. For the texts, LP Marktforschung relies on the in.f.a.m. Medienbüro for the texts. The newsletter is available on the LP Marktforschung website and can also be subscribed to.
 
Basler LP Marktforschung was founded in 1994 by Charles Wyler and Peter Löwenheck. Its services include price and product range analyses as well as customer surveys. Thanks to a close-knit network of regional managers and over 300 active freelancers, LP Marktforschung is present throughout Switzerland.

"The twelve most important economists in the world" is the title of the new book that René Lüchinger is publishing in collaboration with Orell Füssli Verlag Most of us are familiar with the names Adam Smith, Karl Marx and John Meynard Keynes. We may also have a rough idea of what they created. According to a press release, René Lüchinger's new book aims to show the extent to which the research and theories of these important economists have set the pace for progress from industrialization to globalization. The book also aims to provide the reader with an overview of the economists' lives in relation to important world events.
The principle: take a handful of renowned journalists (including the publisher himself), get them to write a series for Bilanz magazine, find an interested publisher and turn the whole thing into a book.
René Lüchinger has been editor-in-chief of the business magazine Bilanz since the end of 2003. He previously headed the magazine Facts and is the editor of the book "Swissair Mythos und Grounding".

SBB is organizing a tender competition for its advertising space. At the beginning of 2009, it intends to entrust a new partner with the management of the billboards and megaposters at railroad stations and the advertising lettering on buildings along the SBB lines.as existing contracts expire at the end of 2008, SBB is looking for a new partner to take over the management and marketing of its advertising space. According to the press release of March 15, the package on offer includes around 8,000 poster sites, 13 mega poster spaces and 130 neon signs and lettering.
Interested advertising companies have until mid-May to apply to SBB Real Estate in accordance with the invitation to tender published in the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce (SOGC) and submit their bids.

From today, Weltwoche journalist Walter De Gregorio will be running a weblog about the adventures of the Swiss national football team.Walter De Gregorio will remain at the side of Köbi Kuhn and his team for two weeks. According to the press release, he will provide his readers with daily sporting reading pleasure on the Weltwoche blog. You can look forward to interviews, analyses and anecdotes as well as detailed reports on the matches between Jamaica and Switzerland on March 22 and Colombia and Switzerland on March 25.