What are those European poster stands called?

If you ever woke up with amnesia like Matt Damon in one of those Bourne movies, and you saw a poster stand, you would almost certainly a) know you were in Europe and b) have a good chance of it being Germany.

They are called Litfaßsäule which has no proper English meaning but I guess poster column is close. The interesting thing is that, certainly here in South Germany they are always used and the City doesn't appear to have the sorts of fly-posting problems that Edinburgh and Glasgow have.

I suspect that the German penal code allows retribution across the entire distribution chain and no doubt printing firms have to take names and addresses and have a valid set of id cards before any transaction takes place. I don't have a problem with this and it is quite pleasant to observe that there doesn't appear to be a poster mafia in this part of the world.

The Liftßsäule are rather charming although I guess I notice them a lot more than the natives do, I think they add character to the area. This one is not far from the Lidl supermarket and there is always something interesting posted on it.

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