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In separate judgments, the Federal Court and the Constitutional Court recently decided that protection of freedom of opinion, guaranteed by Article 5, para. 1 of the Basic Law, took precedence over protection of personality rights, guaranteed by Article 2, para. 1, in conjunction with Article 1, para. 1. The Federal Court's judgment of 16 June 1996 was concerned with an application by the President of the Land Brandenburg (Ministerpräsident) for an injunction against the author of allegations that he had "for over 20 years, worked informally for the State Security Service (of the German Democratic...

In late July, the Director of the ZDF (Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen), issued a policy directive on the structure and assessment of " ZDF.online", the on-line service which the station runs in co-operation with the American Microsoft company. The ZDF's on-line involvement has been criticised on several scores. Magazine and newspaper publishers object, above all, to the fact that its Internet pages also carry regional news and information, while private operators and programme organisers object to its deriving advertising revenue from the new on-line market (as a public-service channel, it gets most...

Several Länder Media Authorities in North Germany intend to complain that two items shown by the private TV station, Sat.1, in its regional magazine programme early this year violated the ban on surreptitious advertising. The relevant committees of the Bremen Land Media Authority and the Hamburg new Media Authority have passed resolutions on this subject , and the Independent Land Broadcasting Authority in Schleswig-Holstein will be taking a decision on the matter early in June. The Land Media Authority of Niedersachsen, which is currently chairing the Land Media Authorities' Joint Advertising...

The first position paper on the Länder Media Authorities' Landesmedienanstalten powers in the border area between broadcasting and media services and on the differences between the two, adopted by the Directors of the Landesmedienanstalten on 16 December 1997, was the subject of a hearing in Düsseldorf on 27 April 1998, at which representatives of the Federal Association of German Newspaper Publishers ( BDZV), the Association of Private Broadcasting and Telecommunication Service Operators ( VPRT), the Association of Private Network Operators, the Satellite and Cable Communications Association (...

In a decision given at the beginning of February this year, the Federal Court ( Bundesgerichtshof - BGH) abandoned its previous position that comparative advertising violated Section 1 of the Unfair Competition Act ( Gesetz gegen den unlauteren Wettbewerb - UWG) and was thus on principal unlawful (see IRIS 1998-3:3). In reaching its decision, it relied on Directive 97/55/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 6 October 1997, amending Directive 84/450/EEC concerning misleading advertising ( see IRIS 1997-10: 4), so as to include comparative advertising - and did so before the time allowed...