The video was produced by the civil rights movement Mass-Voll, as announced in a communiqué. In it, young women from the movement plead for free decisions about their own bodies and campaign for approval of the popular initiative "For freedom and physical integrity". This will be put to the vote on June 9.

@mass.full

♬ i like the way you kiss me - Artemas

"Your body belongs only to you"

"Your body belongs to you alone," says the first young speaker from Mass-Voll. "No one has the right to decide over you. Physical integrity is a human right." This self-evident fact is unfortunately not yet a reality in Switzerland, she continues.

"Fewer and fewer people are living self-determined lives," adds the second speaker. "It can't go on like this." - "Together, we can now improve the lives of a great many people," the third speaker said, promoting the initiative. Mass-Voll wrote that the campaign would be launched via video instead of an "old-fashioned press conference".

"Obviously instrumentalized"

Bernese SP National Councillor Tamara Funiciello makes an unwanted appearance in the video with the statement "It's our body, and it's our decision". She made the statement at the 2023 feminist strike on the right to abortion, Funiciello told the Keystone-SDA news agency.

"Obviously I'm being instrumentalized here." The individual freedom to have an abortion is different from the individual freedom not to be vaccinated, said Funiciello. Because that would jeopardize collective safety. She is now considering her next steps.

Submitted during the pandemic

The initiative launched by the Freedom Movement Switzerland (FBS) and submitted during the Covid-19 pandemic at the end of 2021 calls for the fundamental right to be able to decide for oneself. Anyone who does not want to be vaccinated should therefore not have to accept any professional or social disadvantages or risk punishment.

According to the committee, however, the demand does not only apply to the pandemic, but also "to vaccines, to chips, to digital information in the body, whatever it looks like", as Richard Koller, President of the FBS, said in a video for the Keystone-SDA news agency during the submission.

During Covid-19, the 2G rule applied for a time. At that time, only those who could provide proof of vaccination or recovery from Covid-19 with a certificate were admitted to public venues and events. This would no longer be permitted with the required constitutional amendment, the initiators write online.

This is because the 2G rule links the decision not to be vaccinated with social disadvantages. Companies are also no longer allowed to hire only vaccinated people.

"Getting a bad feeling"

The initiative committee includes Lucerne SVP National Councillor and doctor Yvette Estermann, who stepped down at the end of 2023. In the National Council debate on the recommendation to vote on the petition for a referendum, she said that many medical colleagues had not wanted to vaccinate during the pandemic and had felt this "badly".

The SVP would have liked to include self-determination in the National Council in relation to vaccinations or "any other biomedical procedure" with a counter-proposal. However, their proposals for a direct or indirect counter-proposal were unsuccessful. A counter-proposal was not discussed in the Council of States.

The initiative was launched by the FBS, based in Ostermundigen BE. In addition to FBS President Richard Koller, the committee includes comedian Marco Rima and vaccination critic Daniel Trappitsch. (SDA/swi)

Alexander Vegh, long-standing Director of Research & Development at Abacus Research, joined the management team of the Swiss software company as CAIO at the beginning of April 2024. He brings his extensive experience in the field of AI as well as an understanding of innovative technologies to his new role.

"Artificial intelligence is at the heart of our technological developments. By appointing a CAIO, we are ensuring that AI becomes important for both our managers and all employees and is an integral part of our product development," explains Claudio Hintermann, Co-CEO and Chief Research Officer at Abacus.

The key visual created with the help of AI and elaborate CGI animation transforms a city into a fantastic ball pit. The films for Minicity, which can now be seen on social media and digital advertising media, are completely devoid of artificial intelligence, but are full of childlike joy.

The key visual is also used on instream and display ads, posters, e-boards, flyers, postcards, in social media reels and other measures.

Responsible at Sihlcity: Mara Bonorand, Corine Gubler, Michelle Ferreira. Responsible at Karling: Ingrid Brun del Re, Patrick Suter, Daniel Serrano, Franziska Suter, Ilias Islam. Motion design, key visual: Simone Nucci.

"Not even during the coronavirus pandemic, with over 1,000 complaints in both 2020 and 2021, did the mediation office receive as many submissions within two months as it did for the events after October 7, 2023," according to the ombudsmen's annual report published on Friday.

According to the press release, the ombudsmen received a total of 836 submissions in the reporting year 2023. 35 of these were partially or fully approved.

Gender language less criticized

In addition to the Middle East conflict, the topics of climate, wolves, the SVP and Covid regularly led to complaints, as in previous years. However, the ombudsmen wrote that the anger over the gender language had died down or the critics had become accustomed to it.

There are now often complaints that too little attention is paid to the female form. As an example, the ombudsmen cited a criticism that only "farmers" were mentioned instead of "female farmers".

"Violent statements"

The ombudsmen also criticized the tone used by many of the complainants. They were repeatedly left speechless by the vehement statements and terms used in the complaints, they wrote. For example, they described SRF as partly responsible for the fact that Jewish citizens in Switzerland have increasingly been the target of anti-Semitic accusations since the terrorist attack on October 7. On the other hand, SRF has been accused of supporting genocide and the apartheid regime in Israel.

Overall, the ombudsmen gave SRF good marks. "Even if the ombudsmen would occasionally weight the contributions differently or welcome a different choice of topics, the work of the editorial teams is competent, varied and extremely impressive," they wrote. (SDA)

The Threads app from the Facebook group, which competes with Elon Musk's Twitter successor X, was also removed from the download platform. The Chinese internet regulatory authority cited national security concerns when issuing the order, the iPhone group told the Wall Street Journal with.

WhatsApp and Threads can only be used in China via VPN services anyway, which redirect the data traffic so that it appears to come from another country. Western communication apps are blocked in the country itself. However, some of them, such as WhatsApp, could at least be downloaded to devices from the App Store. Removing them closes a loophole in the so-called "great Chinese firewall", which the government in Beijing uses to control access to information on the internet.

Relations between the US and China are currently tense - including when it comes to apps. A bill is on its way through the US Congress to force a change in ownership of the popular video app TikTok. The parent company Bytedance is regarded in the USA as a Chinese company with headquarters in Beijing. TikTok rejects this - and points to a majority stake held by international investors. At the same time, the Chinese government expressed outrage at the political pressure for a change of ownership.

The corresponding US bill has passed the House of Representatives and is now in the Senate, the second chamber of Congress, where it could also be passed in the near future. (SDA)

The video streaming market leader thus far exceeded the expectations of analysts, who had anticipated an average increase of around 4.9 million customers. The uninterrupted inflow puts Netflix in a position of strength, while competitors such as Disney+ and Paramount+ are struggling to maintain profitability.

At the same time, Netflix wants to continue producing many films - and is also open to sports deals at a reasonable price. "We are not against sport, but for profitable growth," said Co-CEO Ted Sarandos after the presentation of quarterly figures on Thursday. Opportunities will be seized in more and more areas - but with cost discipline. At the same time, Sarandos rejected a media report that Netflix wanted to put the brakes on expensive film productions. They don't want to make fewer films - but better ones.

Netflix still has plenty of scope to make the service more attractive - "and then ask people to pay a little more money", said the second co-chief executive Greg Peters. Netflix had recently increased its prices.

Almost 270 million paying customers

Netflix now has 269.6 million paying customers worldwide. From next year onwards, the service will no longer provide information on the current number of subscribers every quarter. For market observers, this was previously an important indicator of the competition with other streaming providers. Netflix shares fell by 4.76 percent in after-hours trading on Thursday.

Netflix argues that pure customer figures are no longer as meaningful as they used to be in view of the various subscription models. Instead, the company wants to provide information about the financial situation with revenue and profit as well as the popularity of individual series and films.

Netflix holds out the prospect of growth

At the same time, the service signaled that growth would continue. For the current quarter, the service announced somewhat weaker customer growth, but a year-on-year increase in turnover of around 16%. In the past quarter, revenue rose by around 15 percent to 9.37 billion dollars. The quarterly profit jumped from 1.3 billion dollars a year ago to 2.33 billion dollars.

This growth is being driven by the popularity of Netflix series and films. In the coming months, the service aims to score points with a new season of the series "Bridgerton" and a new "Beverly Hills Cop" film with Eddie Murphy returning to his signature role, among other things. (SDA/swi)

The highest court of instance overturned a ruling by the Federal Administrative Court, which had largely confirmed the decision of the Competition Commission. According to the Federal Supreme Court ruling published on Thursday evening, Swisscom did have a dominant market position when it was awarded the contract for a Swiss Post network.

However, it did not impose unreasonable prices on either its competitor Sunrise or Swiss Post. In both cases, the element of enforcement was missing. According to the Federal Supreme Court, Swisscom acted correctly when setting prices for wholesale products, on which Sunrise was dependent. Furthermore, it was not proven that the prices were unreasonable or grossly excessive.

In the case of Swiss Post, the hammer price was the result of negotiations and was therefore not unilaterally determined by Swisscom. Apart from this, the Federal Court found that there was no element of unreasonableness, as the award price and Swisscom's profit margin were not to be regarded as excessively excessive. Finally, there was also no abusive behavior on the part of Swisscom in the sense of a margin squeeze vis-à-vis Sunrise.

In 2008, Swiss Post invited tenders for the construction and operation of a wide area network for its approximately 2,300 locations. Swisscom was awarded the contract. Sunrise, which lost out, filed a complaint with the Competition Commission. The ComCo came to the conclusion that Swisscom had violated the Cartel Act by abusing its dominant market position.

Specifically, the Competition Commission accused Swisscom of imposing unreasonable prices on Sunrise and Swiss Post, as well as a margin squeeze on Sunrise. The Competition Commission imposed a fine of CHF 7.9 million for this. The Federal Administrative Court rejected the main points of Swisscom's appeal against this, but reduced the fine to CHF 7.5 million.

With the margin squeeze, dominant companies cut the profit margins of competitors in a downstream market in which the competition sells its products. (SDA)

(judgment B-8386/2015)

"In Tobias Wedermann, we have gained a high-profile expert on the Swiss football scene and a journalist with an excellent network for this role," says Emanuel Gisi, Head of Sports at Viewon the new personnel. "With Wedermann and Finkbeiner at the helm, our football team is ideally equipped for everything that happens on and off the pitch."

At 20 minutes Wedermann headed the Zurich section for three years before his time as Head of Sport. Since 2018, he has also acted as print and online editor. From 2021, the Zurich native was also a member of the editorial board.

"The development and certification process for our information security management system was a lot of work that we carried out carefully," explains Sandro Albin, Managing Director of Capture Media. "Since the launch of our analytics tool Fusedeck, Capture Media has focused heavily on information security and data protection. With this certification, we now have the official stamp of approval that we are systematically dealing with these values. Above all, this includes active risk management, raising awareness among our employees and the willingness to continuously improve."

The Covid-19 pandemic triggered an unprecedented financial crisis. Between February 24, 2020 and March 20, 2020, the value of US companies on the stock market plummeted significantly, surpassing the decline during the financial crisis from 2008 to 2009.

At the beginning of the pandemic, several CEOs made statements in conference calls with financial analysts that were not directly related to the current business situation, but expressed concern for their fellow human beings. These expressions of empathy are the focus of a new study by researchers from the University of Zurich, the London School of Economics and Political Science and Cambridge Judge Business School.

The researchers analyzed 510 CEO conference calls from 448 large US companies during the Covid-19 pandemic. Despite the human challenge posed by the pandemic, only about half (51.8 %) of the CEOs expressed concern for the well-being of their fellow human beings. Moreover, most of these statements were superficial and did not contain any concrete protective or other measures. Nevertheless, the share prices of these companies outperformed those of companies whose CEOs did not comment on the impact of the pandemic.

"I mean, every time people are ill or tragically lose their lives, it's a much more important issue than anything we report on today. I just want to say that briefly." - Statement by Strauss H. Zelnick, CEO of Take-Two Interactive Software, in a conference call during the Covid-19 pandemic

Surprising effect of lip service

First author Lauren Howe was initially surprised that some CEOs expressed their concern for the health and safety of employees, customers and others affected by the virus in the conference calls: "At first glance, these statements seem to be of little relevance to financial analysts and therefore should not influence them."

At the same time, conference calls are one of the most important ways for investors to get in touch with CEOs live. What leaders say in these conversations and how they do so can have a significant impact on the markets. During a crisis like the Covid-19 pandemic, it is therefore plausible that investors pay extra attention to these direct exchanges.

In numerical terms, a single declaration of care was associated with an increase in cumulative returns of 2.49 percentage points. Considering that the average market value of the equity of the companies analyzed was approximately USD 3.17 billion, this effect resulted in approximately USD 78.9 million of company value being retained after the crisis.

"Obviously, the coronavirus is making the situation very volatile. [...] I would first like to emphasize that the safety of our employees, partners and customers is our top priority." - Statement by Zebra CEO Anders Gustafsson in a conference call during the Covid-19 pandemic

Corporate management is about performance and people

In further analyses, the researchers found that compassionate statements during the crisis were associated with lower stock volatility, but had no impact on analysts' estimates of future earnings. The results suggest that market participants discount a company's future earnings less heavily - and view stocks as less risky - when the CEO expresses compassionate concern. This is notable in that, again, these were general affirmations with no associated plans, actions or direct financial implications.

The results underline the importance of CEOs showing humanity in their communication and the impact this has on investor perception and company performance. CEOs who only focus on performance miss the opportunity to show the expected care for people. "Corporate governance is as much about performance as it is about people," adds last author Jochen Menges. "Our study shows that it pays to care about your fellow human beings - even in conference calls with analysts and investors who are expected to only care about performance."

"First of all, the whole coronavirus situation is a human situation. It's kind of a human tragedy." - Statement by Autodesk CEO Andrew Anagnost in a conference call during the Covid-19 pandemic

The underlying study by Howe et al. can be accessed here.

In 2005, the current owners from Graubünden bought back the 120-year-old Passugger mineral water brand from Feldschlösschen and from that moment on carried the range into the future with respect for the original and a feel for the needs of the catering and hotel industry.

To bring this value and the associated ambition to life, MetaDesign has turned the Passugger brand into a statement of originality, authenticity and consistency. Under the idea of "Unfiltered", Passugger shows profile and character in a fresh brand identity and makes a statement: A dynamic design language reflects the unique diversity of Passugger's six sources. A visual world with a clear focus emphasizes the content. In turn, a striking typeface makes Passugger's craftsmanship tangible. Concise messages get to the heart of Passugger's directness and self-confidence.

Mercedes-Benz is currently working with Drahtzug, a company with a social mission from Zurich, on an upcycling project to make its commitment to sustainability - including in sales and marketing - visible to the outside world.

Upgrading instead of disposal

The focus is on so-called megaposters, which were used as advertising space for Mercedes-Benz in Switzerland in 2023. The six posters with a total surface area of around 830 square meters will not be disposed of, but will be turned into shopping bags by Drahtzug. "With this initiative, we are not only contributing to the responsible use of resources," explains Patrick Bossart, Head of Marketing & Corporate Communications at Mercedes-Benz Switzerland. "We are also supporting a partner that makes a valuable contribution to promoting the second job market in Switzerland." Drahtzug cares for and employs people with mental disabilities, thereby supporting their sustainable integration into our society.

Landing page shows location

200 of the limited edition bags will be raffled off on Mercedes-Benz Switzerland's social media channels from Monday. Anyone who gets hold of one of the bags will learn interesting facts about their production and where the megaposter used for this was once in use on the landing page for the project. Mercedes-Benz Switzerland is giving away the majority of the approximately 1000 bags produced to its employees. In future, these will literally carry the company's commitment to sustainability out into the world.