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The iconic phrase ‘Früher war mehr Lametta’, coined by German comedian Loriot, is not protected under copyright according to a recently published decision of the Landgericht München (Munich Regional Court – LG) of 18 July 2019, which was upheld by the Oberlandesgericht München (Munich Regional Appeal Court – OLG) on 14 August 2019. The heirs of the artist Bernhard-Viktor Christoph-Carl von Bülow, known by the pseudonym Loriot, who died in 2011, had applied for interim legal protection to prevent the sale of T-shirts and other products with the quote...

On 5 December 2019, the Ministerpräsidentenkonferenz (Conference of Minister-Presidents) of the Bundesländer agreed a draft inter-state agreement to modernise media regulation in Germany, where media legislation is the responsibility of the Bundesländer. The new regulations are designed to ensure that the legislative framework takes into account media digitalisation, in particular platforms and streaming services, and replace the Inter-State Broadcasting Agreement. The new agreement puts Germany in a pioneering role in terms of the implementation of the EU Audiovisual Media Services...

The Kommission für Jugendmedienschutz (Committee for the protection of minors in the media – KJM) has adopted a revised version of its criteria for evaluating age verification systems. The KJM is an organ of the German regional media authorities and comprises experts from national government and the Länder. It is Germany’s central supervisory body for the protection of minors in private broadcasting and on the Internet.  According to Article 4(2) of the Jugendmedienschutzstaatsvertrag (Inter-State Agreement on the protection of minors in the media – JMStV), content...

At the end of last year, the Medienanstalt Hamburg/Schleswig-Holstein (Hamburg/Schleswig-Holstein Media Authority – MA HSH), one of the 14 media regulators of the German Bundesländer, announced that it had instigated proceedings against social networking platform Twitter on account of breaches of provisions on the protection of minors in the media. According to the MA HSH, the US-based company, whose European headquarters are in Ireland, had already been asked to improve its youth protection procedures and the MA HSH had threatened further measures, possibly involving the Irish regulator,...

At its meeting on 19 November 2019, the Kommission für Zulassung und Aufsicht (Commission on Licensing and Supervision – ZAK), the central organ of the German media authorities with responsibility for monitoring advertising on national television channels, decided that Sport1’s teleshopping window, Channel21, had infringed current advertising laws enshrined in Article 7(1)(3) and (4) of the Rundfunkstaatsvertrag (Inter-State Broadcasting Agreement – RStV) and Article 41(1)(4) in conjunction with Article 3 of the Heilmittelwerbegesetz (Medicinal Product Advertising Act –...