Syndicom, the media and communications union, writes that the Basler Zeitung Medien (Werbewoche.ch reported) ignores the fact that the falling circulation figures and the dwindling acceptance of the flagship Basler Zeitung are largely due to the newspaper's trimming to a hard right-wing course. It is also ignored that in the background Christoph Blocher with his project "Baz nackt" had long since set the course to drop the newspaper printing plant.

The employees of the newspaper printing plant have not remained idle in recent weeks; they see realistic chances for a newspaper printing plant in Basel. To date, several variants for a management buyout or a continuation of the printing plant at a new location in Basel have been worked out. Syndicom demands that these staff projects for a Basel printing plant with a future be given a serious chance by the owners of Baz Medien. Closure at the end of March would be too short notice for a successful new start.

The staff deserved this chance and the owners of Baz Medien had the money to be able to bear losses even for a few months, Syndicom added. Next Friday, the staff will discuss the further procedure together with the union.
 

BZM's printing plant, which was installed in 2003, is suffering from weak capacity utilization. Whereas 300 million newspapers were printed per year until 2007, the figure was 160 million newspapers in 2012. At the same time, sales shrank from 75 million Swiss francs to 23 million Swiss francs. This has recently resulted in a high single-digit million loss every year.

BZM cites the loss of large print jobs - including in particular a partial run of the Coop newspaper - as well as declining newspaper circulations and volumes. The negative trend is likely to "intensify" in the coming years. The overcapacities of the entire industry put pressure on prices.

Definitive decision on January 22

The BZM subsidiary Die Zeitungsdrucker Schweiz and the staff restaurant on Hochbergerstrasse in Basel will be closed. The future of the large printing plant building next to the BZM headquarters on the Wiese River is open, according to a BZM spokesman. He did not want to quantify the book value of this property, which today belongs to Christoph Blocher. A social plan will be announced for those made redundant, the statement added. This is to be based on the one negotiated with the social partners in 2010. In addition, those affected will be offered a placement in cooperation with a job placement company.

Partnership with Tamedia ever closer

However, the Baz's circulation decline is also partly homemade: Under the new editor-in-chief, Blocher biographer Markus Somm, with his legal course, and after former Federal Councilor and SVP National Councilor Christoph Blocher secretly joined as de facto owner, there has been a hail of subscription cancellations since 2010. At the same time, local competition is growing.

Blocher himself had already announced the closure of the printing plant: At the end of October, he said in an interview with the Sonntagszeitung that he was aiming for a pure Baz, an independent newspaper without unnecessary other parts of the group. If the printing plant was not working to capacity, it would have to close down.

Trade unions alternatives

of the Basler Zeitung, which was causing the newspaper's acceptance and circulation to dwindle.

A management buyout or the continuation of the print shop at a new location in Basel are under discussion. However, an alternative solution only has a chance if the Baz continues to be printed in Basel in the future, said Graf.

Should the closure of the print shop be unavoidable, Brutschin expects a generous social plan from the owners and active support for those affected in finding jobs. CEO Rolf Bollmann, meanwhile, sees no alternatives to closure in view of the millions in losses, as he told Radio SRF's Regionaljournal. (SDA)
 

 

A dark-skinned woman was insulted by a "rabid racist" and then pushed onto a subway track. "The victim "had a hair's breadth" of a chance of death, knows 20min.ch. She didn't really jump, because due to a broken heel she couldn't get herself to safety. A railroad worker saved her from the train that arrived a little later.

Who doesn't spontaneously feel like playing the subway quiz? "Let's dive under the city and take the public transport". The placement doesn't seem to be an accident, because a reader comment already points out the somewhat unusual connection between game, fun and the deed. (hae)

 

If existing .li domain holders do not choose a new domain partner by February 13, 2013, Switch will automatically transfer their customers to Switchplus. Switch is thus once again favoring its subsidiary switchplus in a questionable manner and is putting pressure on domain holders and registration partners with an extremely short deadline.

In a letter sent to its registration partners last week, the Switch Foundation, which has been commissioned by OFCOM and the Office of Communications Liechtenstein to operate the registry for .ch and .li domains, announced that it intends to concentrate "fully" on its registry activities and hand over the direct customer business to its partners. Switch will therefore discontinue its direct customer business with .li domains as of February 14, 2013. The foundation will inform existing .li customers in the next few days. They should transfer their .li domains to a partner of their choice by February 13. Switch intends to automatically transfer .li domains that have not been transferred to a partner by then to its commercial subsidiary Switchplus after February 13, 2013.

Questionable preferential treatment of the Switchplus subsidiary

For Hostpoint, the largest web hosting provider in Switzerland, this is yet another attempt by the semi-public Switch Foundation to unilaterally favor its commercial subsidiary Switchplus over the other providers active on the Swiss market and thus exploit its position of market power, according to a statement issued on Monday. It is to be feared that a large proportion of .-li domains will automatically fall to Switchplus due to the technical complexity for customers and the short transition period. This would give Switch's subsidiary Switchplus an unjustifiably high market share.

Hostpoint welcomes Switch's move to hand over the domain customers it has long held as a monopoly to its partners and to concentrate on the registry business in future. However, the distribution of .li domain customers must be in line with the market. Hostpoint therefore considers it appropriate that the domain customers are distributed among the registry partners on the basis of a key based on the registry partners' market share in the .li market.

Preference for switchplus also for .ch domains?

In the letter, Switch points out that it no longer considers the current model, in which Switch is both registry and registrar, to be in line with the market and that it had informed Bakom of this in a survey on the future of the Swiss domain market. According to Hostpoint, this clearly shows that Switch intends to follow the same pattern for the more widespread Swiss domain extension .ch. If the .ch domains were indeed to follow the same pattern, the still young company Switchplus would become one of the largest domain registrars in Switzerland in one fell swoop, practically without any action on its part.
 

Daniel Schneller began his career as Sales District Manager in the GM Group in 2008, as detailed in a press release. He has been Marketing Director Opel Switzerland since June 2011. In addition to a Master's degree in Marketing Management, Daniel Schneller has a Marketing and Sales Manager Diploma and experience with the Swiss media.

"Exciting products are about to be launched on the Swiss market and will help to expand Chevrolet's market position in Switzerland. My main focus over the coming weeks will be on the launch of the new compact SUV Chevrolet Trax. I am looking forward to the new challenges and the contact with the Swiss media," says Daniel Schneller.

In his new role, Daniel Schneller reports to Steffen Raschig, Managing Director Chevrolet Germany & Central Cluster, which also includes Switzerland. Schneller takes over responsibility for press relations from René Kreis, who is now fully responsible for the GM brand Cadillac as Manager Public Relations.

Herbert Seiler retired as planned at the age of 71 on Dec. 31, 2011, according to a statement Monday. Marti. Seiler. has been operating in the market since January 2010. Since the merger, the company has continued to develop and now offers cross-media communications services with a team of around 20 specialists, the statement added. This also includes permanently employed Internet and social media specialists.

In the course of the agency's development, the management decided to give the company name a slight facelift. Thus Marti. Seiler. Communications will become Marti Communications "smart ideas" as of January 1, 2013. This takes account of the fact that the company will continue to be run by Peter Marti as owner.

In addition to further expansion in the area of digital media, Marti Communications also plans to strengthen its corporate responsibility and public relations activities. This is to meet the diverse demands of existing customers, but also of future markets.
 

In doing so, Stahel is returning to the place where he entered advertising in the 1980s and learned copywriting from Peter Lesch and Aldo Frei, according to a statement Monday. Stahel then worked as a copywriter/conceptual designer at Cash/RSCG, in the Globus advertising department, at Aebi + Partner and as a CD and co-owner at GGK Basel (later Lowe) before setting up his own agency, Stahelpartner, in 2006.

Stahel, an ADC member who has won several awards, brings not only a wealth of experience as a writer but also know-how from all areas of new media, the statement added.

 

After a long period of uninterrupted growth, Adscreen recorded a decline of four index points for the first time at 623, as Goldbach writes in a press release. The Internet and Teletext media also declined. At 635, Internet lost four index points, while Teletext dropped three index points to 83.

TV and radio show a continuous increase. At 616, TV gained six index points, while radio recorded an increase of three index points at 418. The overall market and electronic media as a whole are stable: in contrast to the overall market, which lost one point at 234 index points, electronic media gained a full five points at 615.
 

The program "Beobachter TV" offers the audience weekly advice on problems from various areas of life, according to a statement on Monday. In each episode, presenter Roland Luder meets with a person from the Swiss population who is currently facing a major challenge. A team of Observer experts then analyzes the issues and works out a solution together with the protagonists. Roland Luder: "It's incredibly exciting to meet a wide variety of people and work with them to overcome a major challenge. The experts create a small miracle in every issue."

Each season of the program "Beobachter TV" is devoted to a main topic; the eight self-contained episodes deal with important sub-aspects of the main topic. The first season is entitled "Start-up" and accompanies people who want to become self-employed with a business idea. Andres Büchi, Editor-in-Chief of Beobachter: "These will be interesting and entertaining shows with a high utility value for viewers."

"Beobachter TV" is accompanied by the new Internet platform Observerv.ch. There, the audience can find further links and information on the episodes as well as service packages for download. After each episode, the Observer experts are available for questions in a live chat. In addition, the case stories can be commented on continuously. All episodes of the "Beobachter TV" program are also available on Srf.ch and Observerv.ch archived. The program "Beobachter TV" is produced by Faro TV on behalf of SRF. Sponsor of the show is Swisscanto. The format will start on SRF two on February 20, 2013, with the first broadcast on SRF 1 following on February 24.

 

Duval Guillaume Modem has impressively demonstrated this for Newspaperwork, the marketing platform for all Belgian newspaper publishers: Nothing is studied with more concentration than the good old newspaper. The agency provided the representatives of three advertising clients (Coca Cola, Telenet and BNP Paribas) with a limousine and chauffeur for a day - so that they could read the newspaper in peace. They were so engrossed that they completely missed what the agency, which specializes in precisely timed guerrilla and stunt campaigns (e.g. "Push to add drama") on the way to work:

Reinhardt holds a Master of Science degree from the University of Zurich, according to a press release issued on Monday. The 28-year-old has been an editor at Radio Top in Winterthur for two years and is replacing Tobias Schneider at Radio 1, who is moving to Radio SRF1.

 

The number of over-50s actively on Facebook rose from 228,000 to nearly 394,000 between 2010 and 2012, according to expert Michael Walther of communications firm Bernet in a blog post published Monday. Overall, the number of users over the age of 30 rose from just under 1.1 million to a good 1.55 million. However, the age group with the most Facebook profiles is still the 20- to 29-year-olds. The number of users under 30 has risen from just under 1.39 million to a good 1.50 million in the same period. Among the under-15s, however, Facebook has lost massive popularity: the number of active profiles fell by more than 15 percent from just under 122,000 to a good 78,000.

Over 3 million users

Last December, Facebook counted 3.06 million profiles in Switzerland that are regularly used by their owners. The social network grew by 12 percent last year, following a 10 percent increase the year before. The biggest increase in profiles occurred three years ago and four years ago. Currently, about 38 percent of the population uses a profile on the Facebook page to provide their friends with news, pictures and topics. In 2011, it had been 35 percent, in 2010 33 percent, in 2009 23 percent and the year before 13 percent.

Growth continues

The social network's penetration in Switzerland is far lower than in Anglo-Saxon countries, but about as high as its German-speaking neighbors. Looking at the population with everyday access to the Internet, the proportion of Facebook users is 45 percent. In the USA, the proportion is 73 percent, in the UK 63 percent. Austria reaches 48 percent, Germany 37 percent. Whether the social network has over a billion users worldwide, as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg claimed, is disputed. It depends on who you consider to be an active user, writes Michael Walter.

Too much advertising is frowned upon

The expert expects that more than half of the Swiss population with Internet access will have a Facebook profile in the course of the new year. One of the reasons he gives for his forecast is the triumphant advance of smartphones and tablet computers. However, according to Walters, a prerequisite for increasing penetration is also that Facebook does not annoy customers with too much advertising or paid content.
sucks. (SDA)