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Creativity—A Neuroscientific Perspective. Daniel Goleman—psychologist, neuroscientist, New York Times editor, and bestselling author—describes creativity as the ability to work purposefully toward the moment of the gamma spike. He calls this impulse the «gamma spike»—the process that brings together existing thoughts from different regions of the brain and gives rise to a new thought, or, at best, a brilliant idea. James Webb Young (1886–1973), the first chairman of the American Advertising Council, sums up the path to the gamma spike in his remarkable little book *A Technique for Producing Ideas* with the saying, «Ideas Are New Combinations.».

LEGO – Building blocks of creative inspiration. Lego is plastic molded into bricks, with a clear mission: «Get kids to build things.» The secret to Lego’s success, however, lies above all in the precision with which Lego pieces are manufactured. The margin of error is two microns, which is equivalent to 0.000079 inches. Even the eager Chinese have now given up on copying and are instead focusing on collaboration. Collaboration is, in fact, the first of two magic words on the social web. The term “co-creation” is more commonly used: Lay the first brick, and let the social web community continue building the structures or writing the stories. “Combination” is the second magic word. 

BRICKSY.  Our first Lego story, *Bricksy*, is all about both co-creation and combination. Photographer Jeff Friesen is our co-creator, and the title already gives a hint of what he brings together. Friesen reimagines the works of the world-famous street artist and graffiti artist Bransky using LEGO bricks. You can check out more of Friesen’s LEGO stories at www.thebrickfanstatic.com. Take «50 States of Lego,» for example, where he recreates a typical scene from each U.S. state using LEGO bricks. One could also imagine this idea as “Brick Swiss” for Switzerland Tourism, featuring the 26 cantons. On social media, this kind of content goes viral faster than traditional postcard-perfect scenes. #Bricksy is leading the way and causing quite a stir on Twitter and other social media channels. 

MOVIE SCENES. Our second Lego story takes us straight from the street into the world of film. More specifically, into well-known movie scenes that Vesa Lehtimäki reimagines through photography, blending Lego figures with real-life settings. Originally published on the social photo-sharing platform Imgur, these LEGO interpretations of scenes from movies such as «Indiana Jones» and «Star Wars,» have garnered 3,440 likes and over 400 comments on Reddit alone—the world’s leading social media review platform. Reddit user Disc-Golf jumps on the co-creation bandwagon and contributes ideas for new scenes: «Lego pirate ship next, please»—likely thinking of Johnny Depp, aka Captain Sparrow, on his Black Pearl. 

LEGOGRAPHER.  In our third story, we take an unusual look at the world. Andrew Whyte presents the settings of his world from the perspective of a little Lego figure. He places the little Lego man between his iPhone and the object and snaps a photo. He then edits the images using Instagram or another photo app. Whyte demonstrates what’s possible with a simple idea. His work is attracting a lot of attention across the web. On www.fastcocreate.com, a news website for creative professionals from around the world, the «Legographer» story has garnered 316 pins on Pinterest, 1,100 likes on Google+, 3,300 tweets, and 176,200 likes on Facebook. For Whyte, one thing has been clear ever since: “For the whole year, I really never left home without the figure.” 
 
LEAH  aka Lego. Adweek asks: «Most adorable résumé ever?» Our next story is about the exceptionally creative cover letter from an advertising assistant named Leah. Leah built a Lego model of herself and turned the whole thing into an original cover letter story. The best part: Recipients can assemble the 62-piece set into a miniature model of Leah. A delightful appeal to our inner child. «I wanted a fun way to stand out to agencies and get my résumé out of the trash can,» writes Leah, in true social media style, in a photo gallery on Imgur. On Reddit.com alone, Leah’s post has garnered over 2,300 comments and more than 3,000 upvotes. 
 
BUSINESS BRICK.  Time.com runs the headline: «This is what your business card looks like if you’re a Lego designer.‘ The creative fun usually ends with the business card. After all, it has to fit into the credit card slot of an average wallet. Lego has broken away from this run-of-the-mill solution: Instead of boring cards, the managers at the world’s largest toy manufacturer hand out Lego figures with their names on them. One enthusiastic recipient thought this original way of sharing contact information was worth a photo post on Imgur. From there, the story spread via Twitter on social media and via Time.com on the mainstream web. 
 
CREATIVE PIXALATION.  Marco Sodano is an Italian designer and a huge Lego fan. Last year, on his own initiative, he created a Lego series featuring famous paintings. In these works, Lego bricks are arranged in such a way that, when viewed from a distance, an image emerges, similar to a pixel grid. Thanks to social media, the series garnered significant attention worldwide, leading LEGO to hire Sodano as an art director for future projects. The Lego marketing managers were likely also impressed by the motivations behind the idea. Sodano says: «I want to convey the belief that every child with Lego can become a great artist like Da Vinci and Vermeer.»  Creative advertising on social media is advertising that inspires creativity, and Lego is the prime example. Do you know of other examples, or do you use other strategies to inspire creativity? I look forward to your participation in the discussion on my blog at www.huerlimanncc.com. Lego Banksy – Balloon Girl.  
 
Beat Hürlimann

In the stores of certain luxury brands, people with normal incomes are treated badly, which contradicts a good customer experience - and is used very consciously to cultivate the brand image," explains Lukas Widmer, Brand Manager at Swisscom. Behavioral branding aims to influence employee behavior and use it as a contribution to brand management. After all, brands are not only built and maintained through marketing communication, but also through the behavior and personal communication of employees, among other things. Successful behavioral branding makes a decisive contribution to increasing the value of a brand. Unlike a luxury brand, the telecommunications provider Swisscom aims to create good customer experiences for broad customer groups. But the experiences in a Swisscom store are also brand-specific, Widmer emphasizes. They are specifically geared to all or at least one of the three brand attributes "trustworthy, inspiring and simple ". The attribute trustworthy is made tangible in the store, for example, by allowing the employee to look at the customer's screen when processing their data. For contact points from home visits to trade fairs, Swisscom consciously implements the brand attributes and takes employee behavior into account, along with other components. The topic of employee activation has gained a lot of attention from experts and scientists in recent years. In practice, however, behavioral branding is still far from being implemented consistently everywhere. Many companies do not even rate the topic as particularly important. Only about half state that employees play a role in their brand management - slightly more have recognized the importance, but have not yet taken any measures. And in only one in ten companies does brand management closely coordinate with HR. A consistent brand experience across all channels is now seen by the majority of companies as a key challenge in the area of brand management - and employees in particular play a key role in this, because they are often the primary points of contact with a brand.

Not just targeting the buyer

Brand-compliant behavior is scrutinized particularly closely where direct customer contact takes place. Swisscom also evaluates specific contact points as part of its regular brand image measurements. "First we look at how the customer behaved on the journey through the store. Then we ask ourselves whether that corresponds to what we want to say with the brand and where we might need to make the brand a little more visible." The weighting of the brand attributes is implemented differently for each point of contact. "Trustworthiness, for example, is very important when a technician visits customers at home. At a trade show, inspiration can be more prominent - you're more likely to highlight new products there." But you're not only a brand ambassador when you're dealing directly with customers - "but also, for example, in contact with family, friends and acquaintances - or, as in my case, with agencies," Widmer says. Behavioral branding can even be seen as one aspect of the tendency for brand managers to no longer focus directly on the potential buyer. Brand strategy is formulated with the interests of current or potential employees, investors, suppliers and society as a whole in mind. The focus is on building long-term relationships through identification with the brand. A brand can only achieve this by establishing a clear image in the minds of all internal and external target groups. When Swisscom introduced a new design in 2008, the company therefore also took into account the behavior of all employees and management as part of the uniform "One Swisscom" brand positioning. This was done on two levels: First, explicitly via a clearly formulated mission statement, which was adapted to the new strategy. It includes the promise to be the best companion for customers in a networked world. A tool was introduced for managers to help create the right framework for implementing this promise. On the other hand, the implicit communication of the Swisscom spirit plays an important role, from the Swisscom Games held every two years to the architecture. "At first glance, it may not always be obvious what this has to do with branding. But all of these activities convey important components of the Swisscom spirit. They just don't come across as 'in your face'."

Just not too many dry specifications

UBS does not have any employee conduct guides, denies Johan Jervoe, Group Chief Marketing Officer. "I personally believe that you don't succeed in the medium or long term with such dry guidelines. Customer orientation comes about on its own when people enjoy going to work, find themselves in a brand and are proud of it." That's why UBS wants to attract a certain type of employee above all. In addition, he says, the company is very interested in employee motivation, whether employees feel good at work and what can be done to increase satisfaction. Jervoe is convinced that employee behavior plays a key role for the brand. But just as critical, he says, is how the brand behaves and how that affects the employee. "Behavioral branding is too simple a word for me as someone who helps design brands: to me, it falls short of ensuring that employees enjoy going to work and are motivated to work with colleagues, subject areas and customers. They can only make a brand tangible by working quite consistently to ensure that the brand is also worn." Making the brand tangible is projected into trainings, but not treated as a special chapter. Jervoe clearly distances himself from the idea of an instruction manual.

From horror stories to redesign

Under the motto "We surpr!se", the Swiss automobile dealership group AMAG has trained its employees in recent years and committed them to positive customer surprise both externally and internally. "But you can't put 5400 employees on the same page - we want to introduce them to the topic of service orientation and let an ongoing discourse develop," emphasizes Dino Graf, Head of Corporate Communication and responsible for the behavioral branding campaign that AMAG launched in 2012. The way in which a customer can be surprised with a small gesture always depends on the situation and is individual. If it's raining, you might accompany them to the car with an umbrella. On a hot day, they are more likely to be pleased to find a cool bottle of water in the car. In addition to the involvement of management, it is therefore also crucial that employees help shape this process. In one-day workshops, the campaign first got the management on board. Woke up at the beginning with the facts: Customer expectations or how drastically self-image and external image differ. Participants then had to work out how service could be changed in specific situations, based on horror and hero stories presented. The managers repeated the same workshops with their teams in a next step. "The system/process doesn't allow it," was no longer accepted as an excuse in real customer conversations afterwards. "It is obvious to hide behind processes and systems. That's why we introduced the so-called joker card. If you have this carte blanche, you are officially allowed to disregard a process for the benefit of a customer. It was used almost too little, although it was allowed to be used without restriction," says Graf. A brand promise is only credible if it is lived internally. The company followed this textbook path from internal brand understanding to the new corporate design: the large-scale behavioral branding campaign first clearly had friendly customer service in mind. Because "the experiences in the garages still had potential toward the top," as Graf puts it. "We started with the behavioral branding program and then, in the course of that, asked ourselves what the AMAG brand stood for, what we wanted to achieve in the future and how we wanted to be perceived. That led to us also changing our overall appearance last year." This overhaul of the appearance has since been completed. Working with employees, on the other hand, is a "never-ending story."

Simone Isliker

 

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"Brand-compliant employee behavior should be developed together with employees"

Prof. Dr. Sven Henkel is currently Assistant Professor and Vice Director of the Research Center for Customer Insight at the University of St. Gallen. In July 2014, he will take over as Senior Professor for Consumer Behavior & Sales at the EBS University of Business and Law. Henkel's research and consulting focus is on branding and human resources development.  

WW: The term Behavioral Branding was invented at the University of St. Gallen. What did you miss about the term Internal Branding?
Sven Henkel: "Behavioral" was very en vogue in terms of the term. Behavioral economics was just coming up at the time. The term brings the aspect of behavior to the fore. Internal branding was very much focused inward: it was about how to use the brand to bind employees to the company. Behavioral branding aims to align the employee's behavior externally with the brand. Ultimately, the addressee is not the employee, but the customer.

Only half of the companies state that employees play a role in their brand management. Why do many companies not practice behavioral branding, even though the topic has been getting a lot of attention in theory for several years?
On the one hand, many industrial companies have not yet discovered the topic of branding and tend to focus on sales training. On the other hand, the topic must at least be supported by the board or management, because it entails a cultural change. Short-term goal-setting systems mean that behavioral branding is not pursued sustainably in many companies. That's a shame, because those who do it are definitely more successful.

One also often hears the objection that dictatorial guidelines are counterproductive and that employees who are controlled by others quickly feel demotivated.
Yes, I know these reservations. The uniformity of employees resonates. The Behavioral Branding Funnel of the University of St. Gallen contains three conditions for brand-compliant behavior: knowing, wanting and being able. First, the employee must know what the brand stands for; second, he or she must have a commitment to the brand; and third, he or she must be able to communicate the brand in interactions with customers. The wanting component makes it clear that employees should be empowered and motivated. They should work on the big topic of the brand of their own free will.

In many cases, employees are nevertheless given very specific instructions on how to behave at individual touchpoints in order to present the brand attributes.
That's right. We have learned that an employee needs 95 percent routine processes to be efficient enough to have time for the moment of specialness. The more action alternatives an employer presents, the better the employee can form routines and thus has the opportunity to react very emphatically in between, for example. In addition, the level of training plays an important role. The lower it is, the more likely someone is to simply want to know what to do. The better the training, the more varied the professional context. Then you can no longer work with process specifications. It is important that a company involves every employee in development. He absolutely has to realize that he is not part of a top-down process.

Can problems also arise from the high expectation that all employees must identify with the brand?
The strongest Swiss brand in terms of brand behavior is probably Hilti. They have such a clear culture that there are only people who are either fans or enemies. Anyone who doesn't feel comfortable there leaves immediately. But that's also important, because a brand has to polarize. Marking simply means: some people like it, others don't. In the best case, the employees are already enthusiastic about the brand from the outset. There are about 40 percent in every company who do what's right anyway. When I work for an airline, I usually enjoy traveling and am service-oriented. In addition, there are employees who neither know nor want to. Most of the time, they are happy to be transferred to less contact-intensive positions. As a company, you can live with the fact that some employees are neutral. More importantly, I have few employees who work against me.

You have announced a practical book on the subject. What current research findings or new topics will be included in the publication?
We are currently investigating the influence of external communication on employees. We will probably also look at tools such as scenario techniques and storytelling. We now know quite a bit about scenic learning, for example in theater workshops. All of these tools are designed to motivate employees to enjoy engaging with the brand. Moving away from "one explained" to interactive "develop together ". Gamification approaches work very well because part of our deepest needs is to learn through play.

Interview: Simone Isliker
 

WW: Yesterday I drank two glasses of red wine from Australia. Was that a faux pas on my part, as a Swiss with Italian roots?
Tyler Brûlé: (laughs). Everyone has their own morals. I can't help you there.

You are accepted as a trend guru. You know what to eat and where. You recommend brands and "places to go. What actually makes you so sure about your taste?
Our work is based on an international team. That is also one reason why international companies want to work with us. It takes a mix of experts from all over the world to be able to assess something correctly together. Travel is also an essential factor in shaping my judgment in matters of taste. But the key thing is the diversity of our team. If I need a good graphic designer, I ask the one from the New York Times. When launching a new media project, I rely on marketing people who know the US market very well. For really beautiful and elegant packaging, I can hire someone from Japan to do the job. So clients choose our agency because of our international focus. And because we do things a little differently. Our competitors build big networks with branches around the globe. We keep it small in London. But from there, we manage projects all over the world. Hong Kong, San Francisco. Zurich.

This is the second time you've created a new identity for a Swiss brand. And in both cases, you're playing with our famous white cross. What is your relationship to the Swiss flag and to our country?
My reference: I pay taxes here. I have been registered here since 2002 and I feel at home here. Since my first job for Swiss International Air Lines, I feel a bit "arrested " in these Swiss colors and shapes. But if you look at my creation for Swiss Wine now, the play on "Swiss" came out quite differently. I didn't start from the flag. We do work with the structure of the cross. But I see more associations with the architecture of a vineyard. And for me, the new logo has a lot of dynamism.

With your work for Swiss, you have established a Winkorp company here. You still pay your taxes through this company. Does that give you any advantages over the tax authorities in London?
It was convenient for several reasons. I sold the rest of my shares in Wallpaper magazine. That was a significant "changing point" in my life. I was living in Zurich at the time and this was the center of my life. So it made sense for me to have my papers and my company here as well.

Have you handled other mandates in Switzerland since the big Swiss job?
Yes, in Geneva we have been working for Bank Pictet, Publishing Work, for four years. In Zug, we are currently working for Kjus, a ski fashion company. Both mandates are a bit under the radar and not big budgets, but a nice task for us. In the pipeline, however, is a Swiss media project that I can't talk about yet. That promises to be pretty exciting.

What exactly was your job for Swiss Wine?
The centerpiece is a new identity. But we also talked a lot about marketing with various people. Swiss wine is a product that is rather unknown internationally. So we wanted to create the possibility for a mouthpiece through which you can also communicate with a hotel in Hong Kong about the quality of Swiss wines.

When your new Swiss logo was presented in 2002, I happened to be sitting in the office of Karl Gerstner, the creator of the replaced logo. He was surprised by your design. It was also the subject of much discussion in the media. In the meantime, people seem to love the cool part. How do you see it all in retrospect?
It was a very emotional moment for the country at the time. Who would have thought that the airline of one of the richest countries in the world and a brand like Swissair would be forced to ground. In such an emotionally charged moment, you only look for someone to blame. There is nothing positive to be gained from a new logo. So I knew that probably more than half of the Swiss people would not love my work. We actually tried to give the old look the greatest possible respect. But we had to create something new. And the most important thing for us was to be able to put a white cross as clearly as possible on the tail fin again, so that this symbol, as a guarantor of Swiss quality, can once again bring this message to the runways all over the world. Apart from that, it's fair to say that the painted surfaces of Swissair's planes at the time were a terrible smorgasbord of tastelessness, and in the rest of the documents there was an exuberant lack of concept. We wanted to bring everything back to a "level of purity and cleanliness". And we also wanted to make a symbolic statement: This is a fresh start for the brand. Let's cut away the frills and create a new ground from which we can grow again. When I look back today and am also asked whether the comments back then hurt me, I can say: no, a strong brand needs its development. And Swiss is only a little over ten years old today. I think the machines look inviting to today's passengers.

How does it feel for you to have created something that can be seen in all the airports in the world?
"Yeah, it's good." I've just come from Tokyo and flown with Swiss. It's a special feeling when you taxi to takeoff in such a big Airbus and recognize through the window the design that you yourself have worked for. I am also still recognized by many captains and greeted in a friendly manner. And I think the white airplane has style, when I compare it with these Tutti-Frutti colors and the fantasy paintings of many low-cost airlines. That makes me really proud.

Worldwide, your agency Winkreative and the editorial team of Monocle magazine employ 135 people. What are your current projects?
At Monocle, my second magazine, which I founded in 2007, we are working on a new book. A first one came out in September 2013. We realized it together with the publishing house Die Gestalten in Berlin. It was called "Monocle Guide to Better Living." The new book in September 2014 is about business. How to launch a company. We consulted inspiring startups around the world for that. To that end, we're also kind of going with a political message with all of our publications. We still believe in the paper and are not ashamed to say so. I don't believe that the really big thing will ever be discovered on an even bigger canvas.

In another interview, you stated, "I don't care about social media." Are you still not to be found on Facebook?
I am probably on Facebook. But that's not my account. Our PR department has a direct link to Facebook and Twitter. But that still leaves me cold myself.

But your magazine Monocle is still available in the iPad version?
Yes. We also make the services of our archive available via the Internet. But we don't present this "augmented print experience" on the tablet. I don't believe in that. You can listen to our Monocle radio on the iPad. "That's Great." But I don't want an e-reader. No.

What is your message with Monocle magazine?
A message for consumers. We try to navigate people a bit. The magazine is published once a month. We are in daily contact with the radio. We want to present stories to people that they probably won't get to read anywhere else. Discover products and trends for them. But we don't necessarily want to be trendsetters. Sometimes it's just as interesting to find something tried and true and to be able to follow that discovery properly.

You also run a Monocle Café in London and first stores in various places around the world. What motivates you to keep starting new businesses?
We have also opened a coffee shop in Tokyo and are looking for more booths. Coffee houses are a great meeting place to read, talk to people and observe the world. Again, we are a bit "political". We don't have Wi-Fi in the coffee shop. What's the point of having people hidden behind their screens? We want our guests to have eye contact. Unless they're reading our Monocle (laughs). But we also put on other magazines or, for example, newspapers like Le Monde. For me, that's the best symbiosis: reading a magazine while drinking a coffee or a glass of wine.

Swiss Wine ...
Yes. Our company started with the claim to be able to offer good products. We want to show our readers what they might enjoy. In the meantime, this has become a corporate social responsibility program. As a major media company, we have the power to find a market for meaningful things. A small leather goods manufacturer in Appenzell can find a market with real chances of survival through our channels. Or any other product from South America. We can already guarantee interesting sales to a whole series of small companies. In this way, we support them in their fight against copyists or the ever more destructive mass production. Our readership appreciates this and we are able to navigate them to products they could not find otherwise. We support old family businesses as well as young start-ups.

Design with a political approach?
A little bit. It was not like that at the beginning. For example, we have a radio from China in our product range. We checked very carefully which guidelines our supplier uses to manufacture his products. Because everyone who works on our lost and found should be able to go home satisfied in the evening. Regardless of whether they manufacture something in Appenzell or in Liguria.

Interview: Andreas Panzeri 

Swiss Wine Promotion is now working with the design and branding agency Winkreative in Zurich. Canadian Tyler Brûlé, who previously lived in London, installed this agency on Nordstrasse as part of his mandate for Swissair, when he was allowed to create the new logo with the Swiss name for them in 2002. The photo shows Brûlé presenting his latest work for Swiss Wine, together with wine expert Chandra Kurt.
 

At least that's my hope for the readers. So why is the topic of premium interesting here? It's not because we are greeted with a real premium price for the espresso at Zurich airport, but because Switzerland has a very special relationship with sophisticated film. This is what distinguishes Switzerland from most of its European neighbors, where the number of moviegoers who go to the cinema is much lower than here. This Brunner - a legendary figure in the scene of Swiss cinematography and the corresponding arthouse cinemas - once explained and justified this to me by referring to Switzerland's cultural diversity. He sees in Switzerland, which is characterized by four linguistic and cultural regions, the necessary sensitization for film topics outside the mainstream. This might also be a good explanation for why so many films in Switzerland are seen in the original version - i.e. not dubbed. Both are a cultural value that the Swiss - from their neighbor's point of view - can only envy. At the same time, the success of arthouse film is also its threat. In today's digital age, many more films are being shown in cinemas than in previous years, because the technical (and cost) barrier of 35mm film has fallen. Production costs and especially duplication costs are dramatically lower today. This does not always mean that the quality of all film stock is truly premium. On the other hand, cinema operators are increasingly investing in studio cinemas to attract more discerning customers. I am convinced that this important segment will develop positively with a broader and larger offering.

People with aspiration

These films and cinemas reach people who today can only be reached with great difficulty via other media channels, and certainly not with moving images. People who have special demands on their leisure activities, on their cultural environment, on their media consumption. A few selected print titles will get in there, TV only on special topics and occasions, online is more for information than entertainment. That's a tough nut to crack for brand communications. The list of premium brands that would like to land here is long. Our goal here is to build a functioning communication chain via premium cinemas and films. We are focusing in particular on the strong emotional bond that these discerning people have with the cinema and the film. This is an extremely conscious media consumption that takes place here, which is carefully planned and in which the content - today we would perhaps call it content - plays a special, central role. There is virtually no "by the way," no distractions, and no second screen. It is not very likely that the arthouse audience will reassure itself of its affiliation to digital social systems via Twitter or Facebook during the film; after all, it is experiencing this social context live.

From all the impact studies available to us, we know that the degree of content-related and, above all, emotional involvement in media consumption is decisive for the enforcement and impact of content - including advertising. That is Premium!

We must also admit that the demand of this audience is also directed to the content before the film. Banality, clumsiness, gimmicks are on lost ground there. But that doesn't mean that we have to compete with Hollywood-style production budgets. It does mean that a brand has to deal intensively with the view of this very large and important target group in Switzerland. But creativity, wit and ideas are not a question of budget. No one should come with that, counter-examples are easy to cite, better still to show. Even at the Festival of Creativity in Cannes, the Olympus of advertising, ideas and not budgets win.

That would be a great hope, that in this special segment of cinema we not only bring together special people and special films, but also touch and reach them with campaigns that are also premium in creative terms. And that without any question marks at all.

Florian Weischer, Managing Director WerbeWeischer
 

Last week, the Zurich youth station that radio pioneer Roger Schawinski had bought out of bankruptcy proceedings announced a name change from "105" to "Planet 105". The background was the legal dispute with the station's former co-owner, who insisted on protection of the name. Schawinski countered that while the word and picture were, the number was not.

Schawinski's Radio 1 announced on Thursday morning that the Italians had filed a lawsuit to prohibit the further use of the logo of the radio station "105" on a super-provisional basis and thus with immediate effect. On Tuesday, however, the Commercial Court rejected this request.

Nevertheless, Schawinski decided to stop using the logo. "In the longer term, we would have had to transfer millions to Milan for the logo. That didn't make sense," he is quoted as saying in the communiqué. With immediate effect, the previous "word picture mark" will no longer be used.

Instead, the station's homepage is emblazoned with a provisional logo that puts the number "105" in the center. The lettering "under construction" complements the logo. Schawinski already announced last week that it would hold an international competition for a new logo. The relaunch is scheduled for mid-August. (SDA)
 

The internet has changed the world over the last twenty years, and Google has been and continues to be a key part of this change. And Google is about to play a formative role in another megatrend over the next two decades: The search engine and advertising giant is ahead in the development of self-driving cars. If this revolutionizes local passenger and freight transport, it will have far-reaching social consequences. The vision is well and truly fifty years old: in the technology-enthusiastic 1960s, there was no shortage of ideas for allowing cars to transport their passengers from A to B without them having to do anything. Since then, car companies have been trying to put this idea into practice, which has worked reasonably well on closed test sites, with several vehicles independently forming a closely-knit convoy. The military also dreamed of robotic vehicles. Contrary to what some might think, Google did not become active in this area because marketing dreamed of gaining access to a captive audience for advertising messages - Google's DNA is not commercial, but in the use of computers. As project manager Chris Urmson explains in a YouTube video, Google realized in 2008 that self-driving cars were primarily a challenge for software development. And Googlers love solving problems that can significantly change the world. According to Urmson, 1.2 million people die in traffic accidents worldwide every year, with human error being the cause in more than 90 percent of cases. If the Googlers succeed in finding a technical solution that is always alert, never distracted and can see what is going on all around it, lives could be saved and the world made safer. (In Switzerland, 269 people died on the roads last year and 21,379 were injured in traffic accidents). So Google set itself two bold goals: to drive 100,000 miles on public roads automatically and to drive 1,000 miles in particularly interesting places. A year and a half later, these hurdles had been overcome, giving the company confidence that it was on the right track. While cars from other manufacturers were converted for these tests, Google announced prototypes for its own vehicles at the end of May, heralding a new development phase: There is no steering wheel or brake pedals in these little cars.

All research

There are good reasons not to dismiss the trend towards self-driving cars as the playground of computer-loving tinkerers. The entire automotive industry is developing and researching in this area - the driving assistants available today are precursors to this development. Volvo, for example, has stated that it is striving to be a leader in this field and is confident that this technology will be ready for series production from 2020. A Volvo V60 is currently driving autonomously through the city center of Gothenburg, albeit under the supervision of engineers - this test fleet is to be expanded to one hundred vehicles by 2017. And at Mercedes- Benz, a special S 500 autonomously drove the hundred-kilometre route from Mannheim to Pforzheim over land and through cities in August last year. It will be several years before self-driving cars appear regularly on the roads. Nevertheless, it is worth looking at this trend on the long-term radar today. It is quite possible that advertising will play a role in this, in that fares can be rewarded with attention for advertising messages, market research surveys and the like. The use of such vehicles in branding will probably become more significant. Weekly shopping? Simply use the app to order a Migros car to drive you to the nearest supermarket, point out current promotions and then drive you home with your shopping. It will even be possible to make an additional stop at a competitor - for an extra charge, of course. Many small service providers - from hairdressers to innkeepers - will entice their customers with offers for a free pick-up service. They will not need their own fleet, but will work with specialized service providers, the descendants of today's cab entrepreneurs. This way, the new hairstyle can arrive at its first appearance undamaged and the pissed-off pub guest can be chauffeured home safely. And both - so the hidden consideration - will return as loyal customers next time thanks to the good service.

Better mobility for all

If self-driving cars make life more pleasant for many in such cases, it will be possible for entire population groups (too young, too old, disabled) to enjoy the benefits of individual motor vehicle transportation at all. Children and young people can drive to school safely. Mothers can keep an eye on their toddlers during the journey and older people can drive to an evening of cards with friends in the neighboring village. Anyone who is dependent on a wheelchair can get to a job that would be inaccessible without this transportation option. Because work can be done during the journey - all teleworking functions are available - even longer commutes become acceptable. And so self-driving cars will not only change society, but also the landscape. People who live in the city will no longer need a car, and all the parking lots and parking garages can be repurposed. In the countryside, more remote areas will become attractive again, where the population has previously migrated to urban centers due to poor transport connections, among other things. Self-driving cars will not only transport people, but also goods - to remote villages as well as through the Alps. For example, convoys of trucks could travel autonomously at night on the north-south axis. This has implications for infrastructure planning. Such cars travel faster and at shorter distances on highways, which means more cars can travel on the same roads: There are no more traffic jams and additional lanes do not need to be built. And because there are no more collisions, such vehicles can be built more easily and require less energy.

Foreseeable opposition

But not everyone will be happy about such prospects. If the concept of owning a car becomes obsolete, many professions will become redundant. Starting with the car salesman, through the garage owner or coachbuilder, to the insurance agent and damage inspector. And if thought through to its logical conclusion, rail transport could also become obsolete. It is therefore clear that the relevant lobbies will do everything in their power to at least delay this development. This is because the technology in this area is far ahead of the legislation. And so it will not only be arguments about jobs that will be brought into play. Privacy concerns will also play a role, as will liability issues in the event of an accident: Is the manufacturer of the car or the software liable, the fleet owner or the passenger? And anyway, how safe are such computer cars when everyone knows that computers regularly crash? What if the software is infected by a virus? What rules should there be to control the behavior of a vehicle when a crash is unavoidable? If a fully loaded bus crosses into the oncoming lane on a bridge, will the oncoming car jump over the parapet because the algorithm has quickly calculated that this will minimize the number of casualties? Can optimized crash behaviour be sold as a premium upgrade? Or should we even fear that all self-driving cars will suddenly drive onto a container ship with their passengers and only let them off the ship on an island where they will be enslaved by computers? It is clear that self-driving cars offer great opportunities. To seize them for the benefit of all, we need to act early - now! - action must be taken early - now! This includes legislation like that in the American states of California and Nevada, where such vehicles are already permitted. Here too, politicians can pave the way for this development today, so that Switzerland becomes the European leader in the implementation of this technology. From universities to numerous high-tech companies, we have the best prerequisites for this. However, politicians will only advocate such a change if they can be sure that they will not be punished by their voters. And so it will (once again) be the media that will play a decisive role here, depending on how they portray this development.

Christoph J. Walther
 

Personal stories, emotions, important information and opinions from around the world about the World Cup are currently flooding all social media channels. The official hashtag for the opening match #BRAvsCRO was used 12.2 million times in over 150 countries within 24 hours - just on Twitter. In addition, there are millions of photos, videos and messages on Instagram, Facebook, Vine and all other platforms.

The Zurich-based social media agency SMLY has brought order to the flood of postings with the #feelbrazil2014 project: the website Feelbrazil2014.com shows the World Cup from the people's point of view - captured by thousands of cameras and published on various social networks. With one click, visitors are transported directly to the stands of one of the twelve stadiums in Brazil. Another click and they find themselves in the dressing room of their favorite team. Or in the middle of a demonstration against FIFA.

The project has no commercial purpose. "We have deliberately dispensed with sponsors and advertising and thus retained the freedom to also depict topics that are critical of the World Cup and FIFA," explains Marc Leuzinger, founder and CEO of SMLY, who launched the project. And even social media abstainers can immerse themselves in the world of personal World Cup posts, emotions and images: To browse through the photos, videos and messages, visitors do not need to be registered on any platform.

The project is based on the newsroom tool Content Fry, which filters data from the social web according to criteria such as hashtags, geo-location and users, links them together and organizes them by topic. This separates relevant from unimportant posts and displays various platforms in an overview. (uma)

According to two independent sources cited by the newspaper, a new merger attempt with Orange is being discussed. Orange is also owned by a holding company, Apax. The Swiss telecoms companies Sunrise and Orange declined to comment on the speculation when asked. Sunrise spokesman Markus Werner said that the investment company CVC had repeatedly communicated that there were several possible scenarios for the exit. "These include a sale or an IPO of Sunrise."

Around four years ago, the Competition Commission prohibited a merger between the two companies, which industry exponents have repeatedly regretted since then. According to the newspaper report, the conditions may now have changed due to UPC Cablecom's entry into the mobile telephony market. (SDA)
 

Kargo Kommunikation essentially focused on simplification when redesigning the brand. The entire brand structure with umbrella brand and sub-brands was redefined and consistently applied. The familiar Adrianos bean remains, but it was drawn more simply in black and white, and the product packaging design was given more color and typographic accents. The overall appearance is therefore calmer, more orderly and consistent.

The CMS and the store is an in-house programming by Whatwedo. The frontend was developed on current web standards with HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript and especially optimized for fast speed.

Responsible at Adrianos: Adrian Iten, Sascha Müller (Managing Director). Responsible at Kargo Communication: Christoph Balsiger (Creative Director), Fabia Dellsperger (Art Director), Marc Zenhäusern (Graphic Design Website, Product Photography), Nicole Gerber (Consultant, Online), Claudia Strässle (Consultant, Print). Responsible at Ignaz: Stefan Vogt (Project Management Web). Responsible at whatwedo: Ueli Banholzer (backend programming) and René Stalder (mobile UX and frontend development).
 

 

The industry agreement will enter into force on July 1, 2014. The conclusion of this industry agreement is the result of respectful social partnership discussions and negotiations between representatives of Unikom, the SSM and the member radio stations at the beginning of this year, the contractual partners said in a statement. "Together, we have defined minimum standards for working conditions that we believe must not be undercut." At a time when working conditions in the media industry are tending to deteriorate, Unikom and the SSM are sending a signal to the entire industry, the statement continues. Fair working conditions are necessary and possible. "Not least, they have a decisive influence on the quality of journalistic work."

The SSM continues to advocate collective regulation of working conditions and collective employment contracts for all employees in the private radio and television station sector, the press release continues. The conclusion of the industry agreement with Unikom is a first milestone on this path.

 

The merger is the last logical step to bundle the strengths of both companies even more efficiently, according to a statement from Goldbach Interactive. The decision to merge is a reaction to the merging of the two companies' business units, which has been observed for some time and which were already managed by a joint management team and merged in terms of location a year ago. The new organization provides a structural basis for the cooperation already practiced today.

For Frank Lang, Managing Director of Goldbach Interactive and the former Goldbach Mobile, this is a logical decision: "Today, mobile is an integral part of communication strategies and measures, which is why our customers want the complete orchestration of all digital channels. With the full integration of our mobile specialists into the existing campaign team, the synergies are brought together in a meaningful way. This enables us to offer efficient, innovative and technologically savvy solutions from a single source."

From the customer's point of view, the dividing line between the two companies was hardly noticeable, the statement continues. The merger, in turn, allows a significant sharpening of the agency profile and a corresponding expansion of the service portfolio. In the future, interdisciplinary teams will work on the various projects and campaigns without barriers and across the board. The merger is thus a further step in the consistent expansion of Goldbach Interactive's Zurich agency location.

But Goldbach Interactive (Switzerland) will continue to rely on two locations in the future: Zurich Wollishofen for comprehensive communication solutions, Biel for digital presences. After completion and registration of the merger, however, the legal headquarters will move from Biel to Zurich. Close cooperation between Biel and Zurich will continue to characterize the agency culture across locations.

 

The result is an overall view of Bishops work as well as an independent artist's book. The Psychobook takes the viewer into the absurd cosmos of the St. Gallen artist, where chaotic circumstances prevail, but where the ridiculousness of general activity is also displayed with merciless humor.

The book launch at Liste Art Fair Basel will take place on Thursday, June 19, starting at 7 pm.