Pharmaceutical takes on Facebook

17:25 THE German pharmaceutical firm Merck is taking legal action against Facebook after what was described by the firm’s lawyer as an “apparent takeover of its facebook page” by their US rival Merck & Co.

Merck KGaA said that Facebook: “is an important marketing device,” that its page is of great value and that it had entered into an agreement with Facebook for the exclusive rights to www.facebook.com/merck in March 2010.

However, by 11 October this year Merck KGaA said it had lost control of the page, and that content on the site now belonged to Merck & Co.

Facebook said they would look into it.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.