Search results : 1375

With majority support from the Government coalition, the German Bundestag (lower house of parliament) passed the so-called Informationsfreiheitsgesetz (Freedom of Information Act - IFG) on 3 June 2005. The Act is designed to give citizens the right to access official information held by the federal authorities. Opponents of the Act fear it could lead to a heavier workload for the administrative authorities and courts. On the other hand, some people think the Act does not go far enough, particularly in view of the extensive list of exceptions to the right to information. Now it is up to the Bundesrat...

On 20 January 2005, the Munich Obe rlandesgericht (Court of Appeal - OLG) dismissed a complaint by a management consultancy company against a journalist. The plaintiff had made a claim for an injunction, information and damages because the defendant, while investigating an allegation of surreptitious advertising in an ARD evening series, had used business documents belonging to the plaintiff and a secretly filmed video. The video shows a female employee of the plaintiff in a sales meeting with syndicate representatives, offering to place certain themes or products in the series in return for payment....

Two years after it was set up, the Kommission für Jugendschutz der Landesmedienanstalten (Youth Protection Commission of the regional media authorities - KJM) published an activity report at the beginning of April 2005. Since being established in 2003, the KJM has identified a total of 49 infringements of the provisions of the Jugendmedienschutz-Staatsvertrag (Inter-State Agreement on youth protection in the media - JMStV) in the programmes of private broadcasters. More than half of the 91 complaints it has dealt with have therefore been upheld. At present, the courts are examining the programme...

The Landesmedienanstalten (regional media authorities) are currently investigating several alleged cases of surreptitious advertising by private TV broadcasters. After a meeting on 30 March 2005, the Gemeinsame Stelle Programm, Werbung und Medienkompetenz (Joint Body on Programming, Advertising and Media Competence - GSPWM) announced that it had found a number of infringements of current advertising rules by various TV broadcasters: SAT. 1, Vox, Super RTL, MTV and n-tv. For example, music channel MTV had excessively lauded a new games console. In a Vox programme, a particular brand of gravy thickeners...

At its meeting in Saarbrücken on 30 March 2005, the Gemeinsame Stelle Programm, Werbung und Medienkompetenz (Joint Body on Programming, Advertising and Media Competence - GSPWM) of the Landesmedienanstalten (regional media authorities) discussed the issue of advertising for mobile phone ring tone downloads on a private TV channel. The GSPWM recommended that the media authority responsible for the broadcaster concerned should take legal measures on account of a breach of advertising rules. The TV broadcaster advertises ring tones containing excerpts from the theme music of several of its programmes....