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In two appeal judgements given at the end of April, the Federal Court in Karlsruhe ruled that publication of lists of "top professionals" by news magazines constituted unfair competition, thus upholding the judgements previously given by the Munich Court of Appeal. The magazine, "Focus", had run a series of articles on doctors and lawyers in Germany and had used criteria such as "reputation among colleagues" and "membership of expert bodies" to produce lists of the "500 best doctors" and "500 best lawyers". The court saw this as harmful to other members of these professions, since claims that...

On Tuesday the 16th of September the European Parliament urged the governments of the Member States as well as the advertising industry to take a strong and decisive position against advertisements presenting offensive or degrading stereotypes of women. The European Parliament expressed the necessity that the Member States should take all the steps needed in order to prevent any form of pornography in the media and in the advertising. In the opinion of the European deputies both pornography and other forms of degrading portrayals of women can contribute to violence against women and to the enduring...

A year ago, the Commission published a Green Paper on "Commercial Communications in the Internal Market", in which it made suggestions on removing obstacles which discrepancies between the laws of different countries created for trade in the field of transfrontier commercial communications (see IRIS 1997-5: 6). The term "commercial communications" covers all forms of advertising, direct marketing, sponsorship, sales promotion and public relations promoting products and services. The Green Paper stressed that the development of new information society services might well make for additional trade...

The "Codex", which coordinates the various Flemish regulatory provisions concerning radio and television broadcasting, is in the news again (see IRIS 1997-8: 6 and IRIS 1997-7: 5). In a Decision on 26 June 1997, taken on the basis of Article 90(3) of the EC Treaty, the European Commission tackled the exclusive right to broadcast televised advertising in Flanders. The provisions in question are firstly Article 80, paragraph 2 of the Codex, which provides that the Flemish Government may only authorise, from among the television broadcasters which belong to it or have its authorisation and direct...

Amendments to the rules on advertising breaks have been announced by the Independent Television Commission which will allow cable, satellite and digital stations to carry more teleshopping advertising. The changes will also open up the possibility of licensing for self-promotional channels and will come into effect immediately. The following changes are made: Teleshopping The EC "Television Without Frontiers (TWF)" Directive has been revised (see IRIS 1997-7: 6-7) to allow up to a maximum of eight teleshopping 'windows' per day. A teleshopping window can last for a maximum duration of fifteen minutes...