The partial revision of the Graubünden Health Act comes into force in stages. The first implementations will take place on April 1, but the government is granting some exceptions, reports the SDA news agency. The advertising industry, among others, will be given a short grace period, as the ban on alcohol and tobacco advertising will not come into force until July 1. Article 15 states that advertising for alcohol products with more than 20 percent alcohol by volume as well as for tobacco and tobacco products is prohibited. It is also prohibited to sell tobacco and tobacco products to persons under the age of 16 or to give them to this age group for advertising purposes. The government has also issued an ordinance to the Health Act, which regulates advertising in the healthcare sector.

The Internet company Google will be working even more closely with America Online (AOL) on Internet advertising in future. AOL belongs to the world's largest media group Time Warner. According to the news agency SDA, the two companies want to increase their revenues in this way. In December, it was announced that Google had acquired a five percent stake in AOL, which corresponds to a sum of around one billion dollars. 

Electrolux, manufacturer of household appliances, has created the website www.kochzeit.ch. On the cooking portal, interested parties can find recipes and all sorts of interesting facts about nutrition, wine and design trends - perfectly coordinated with the latest appliances from Electrolux. kochzeit.ch also has a cooking encyclopaedia, sends out a monthly newsletter and offers cooking and lifestyle courses.

At its meeting on Tuesday 28 March, the Board of Trustees of the Swiss Press Council Foundation decided to enter into negotiations with publishers and event organizers on expanding its sponsorship. This was announced by the foundation in a press release on Thursday. An expansion of the sponsorship to include publishers and event organizers has been controversial among the Foundation Board and the journalists' associations for years, and corresponding requests have always been rejected to date. In a new fundamental discussion, the Board of Trustees has now clearly decided not to close itself off to a dialog and to enter into negotiations. Initially, these are to be conducted with the Swiss Press Association and ASRG SSR idée suisse. At a further meeting in June, the Board of Trustees will discuss and approve a negotiating mandate. Negotiations are expected to begin in the second half of 2006.

On Thursday, the Military Court of Cassation in Solothurn overturned the verdict against a SonntagsBlick editor and referred it back to the lower court. However, the guilty verdict was confirmed. On June 7, 2005, the Military Court of Appeal had sentenced the journalist to six months conditionally for violating military secrets. The defendant is accused of publishing images and information about a classified air force facility in Buochs NW - which is subject to military secrecy - in 2003. The chairman of the military cassation court, Colonel Theo Bopp, found the verdict of the lower court to be blatant and untenable, reports the SDA news agency. He is of the opinion that the reassessment should be within the framework of the first-instance judgment. On December 3, 2004, the military court handed down a ten-day conditional sentence, which was contested by the journalist and the prosecutor. Auditor Michael Nonn had originally demanded 45 days. Meanwhile, the media trade union Comedia has described the latest developments as scandalous: the trial and the sentence are in themselves hostile to the media and unworthy of a modern information society. In addition, the media must be able to publish questionable events in the public interest.

The Regional Council approved the annual report of SRG idée suisse Deutschschweiz on Wednesday evening. As announced in a communiqué on Thursday, the Board of Directors and management of Swiss television and radio consider themselves to be "on the right track". Despite strong competition, the market shares are 33.4 percent for Swiss television and a very high 62.8 percent for Radio DRS. Both media were also financially convincing last year: SR DRS closed with a profit of CHF 2 million, SF with a loss of CHF 0.9 million. Both companies closed their 2005 annual accounts CHF 2 million better than budgeted. However, SF's market share of 33.4 percent, which is 1.2 percent below the previous year's average, is not a cause for concern. According to SF Director Ingrid Deltenre, the figures have been on the rise again since September. The Board of Directors of SRG Deutschschweiz presented a newly designed annual report this year. This contains over 80 pages of the company's annual report, the accounts of the two business units and information on corporate governance. In addition to the annual report, SR DRS and SF each present a program and performance report, which document in detail the fulfillment of the public service mandate.

The Lucerne-based marketing and communications agency Ana pursues an unconventional strategy. On request, its specialists slip into a disruptive role and carry out part of the work - namely the creation and development of ideas - together with the client on site. This saves time and money in marketing, according to a press release. Ana won silver at the Marketing Trophy two weeks ago with her disruptive concept for the BSZ Foundation.

At the 2006 bowling evening, the Free Professional Journalists Zurich (FBZ) asked the publishers or journalistic directors of ten publishing houses to give the shirt off their backs for journalism. Charles von Graffenried, Dr. Hugo Bütler, Dr. Hans Heinrich Coninx, Urs Gossweiler, Dr. Matthias Hagemann, Hanspeter Lebrument, Filippo Leutenegger, Christof Nietlispach, Guido Weber and Michael Ringier have been asked to give up their shirts. The shirts can be won on April 11, 2006 at the bowling alley in Restaurant Hegibach in Zurich, if any have arrived by then. The above-mentioned were cordially invited to take part in the competition and the event organized by the Association of Independent Professional Journalists in Zurich, where they may be able to talk to independent journalists in person.

The organizers of Flims Klang 06 have commissioned the Zurich agency Flowcube Communications with communications consulting and public relations for the music festival. The mandate includes all media relations and the management of the press office. Flims Klang 06 will take place for the fourth time from July 13 to 29, 2006 in Flims, Laax and Falera and will offer classical concerts and jazz performances at the usual venues as well as in natural settings.

On March 28, Switzerland signed the Singapore Treaty on the Law of Trademarks (Singapore TLT). The agreement makes it easier for Swiss depositors of trademarks to obtain trademark protection from foreign trademark offices, the Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property announced on Thursday. This could reduce the costs of international trademark protection. The treaty continues the harmonization of trademark law at international level and takes account of the latest international developments. The new treaty also applies to new forms of trademarks such as colors, sounds and smells. Parliament still has to approve the ratification, however. 41 countries have signed the treaty so far.

The creative department of Internet specialist Namics, Namics rotweiss, founded in January, reports various new clients and projects. These include the relaunch of the Cailler website, the Rivella website, online campaigns for Audi, Seat and VW as well as online campaigns and competitions for CoopMobile. The team now has ten employees at the St. Gallen and Zurich locations. Namics' creative unit aims to combine technology and process expertise with knowledge of creative brand management in the creative and consulting sector.

The Burda Advertising Center, the marketing organization of Hubert Burda Media and the direct marketing specialist Burda Direct, which also belongs to Burda, have created a new marketing offer. The new marketing model is based on the realization that media communities are the
socio-demographic target groups. Instead of anonymous
target groups, it is aimed at communities that use media to
topics and interests. They stand above the usual
classifications such as age or gender, they are based on the
Basis of common activities or living environments. Traditional mass marketing has passed its zenith and will be replaced by the individual and interactive exchange of messages in a highly fragmented media world, explained the two managing directors Andreas Schilling (BAC) and Jürgen Siegloch (Burda Direct) on Thursday in Munich. "For us, the future of advertising lies in community marketing and direct dialog with people. This enables us to offer our customers a fast and measurable return on investment," explained Andreas Schilling. "This new approach will revolutionize brand communication." To realize this, Burda has founded the subsidiary Media Community Network GmbH. It bundles creation, strategy and media deployment and coordinates cooperation with an international network of experts and the marketing partners of the Burda Advertising Center. In addition to Burda Direct, these include Tomorrow FOCUS AG, the mobile marketing specialist Burda Wireless, the ambient media service provider Edgar Medien AG and the producer of events STARnetONE.