Category: Media Ethics

By Posted on Posted in General Commentary, Marketing Trends/News, Media Ethics, Uncategorized

1. My friend and colleague Denise O’Berry, down in Floria, was born to blog. She’s a natural-born connector and networker. I stopped counting the times I got mentioned in some relatively obscure publication and got a clip of the article postally mailed to me with a personal note and Denise’s business card–and this was loooong before I met her in person two years ago. So it shouldn’t surprise me that Denise has put together a wonderful directory of business blogs. Now I just need her to set up an ethics category so I don’t have to try to shoehorn my own blog into one of the existing categories, none of which are quite right for this hybrid beast I’ve created.

2. More and more bloggers are functioning as journalists–but unlike professional journos, we are self-directed, in most cases have no direct supervision (e.g., a boss), and aren’t necessarily schooled in getting the story behind the story, knowing what’s true and what’s rumor, and how to behave responsibly. (Of course many bloggers do have journalism training and experience, including me–but many do not, and there have been consequences).

Cyberjournalist.net has jumped into the breach with a Blogger’s Code of Ethics. I quote it in full here:

Be Honest and Fair
Bloggers should be honest and fair in gathering, reporting and interpreting information.
Bloggers should:
• Never plagiarize.
• Identify and link to sources whenever feasible. The public is entitled to as much information as possible on sources’ reliability.
• Make certain that Weblog entries, quotations, headlines, photos and all other content do not misrepresent. They should not oversimplify or highlight incidents out of context.
• Never distort the content of photos without disclosing what has been changed. Image enhancement is only acceptable for for technical clarity. Label montages and photo illustrations.
• Never publish information they know is inaccurate — and if publishing questionable information, make it clear it’s in doubt.
• Distinguish between advocacy, commentary and factual information. Even advocacy writing and commentary should not misrepresent fact or context.
• Distinguish factual information and commentary from advertising and shun hybrids that blur the lines between the two.

Minimize Harm
Ethical bloggers treat sources and subjects as human beings deserving of respect.
Bloggers should:
• Show compassion for those who may be affected adversely by Weblog content. Use special sensitivity when dealing with children and inexperienced sources or subjects.
• Be sensitive when seeking or using interviews or photographs of those affected by tragedy or grief.
• Recognize that gathering and reporting information may cause harm or discomfort. Pursuit of information is not a license for arrogance.
• Recognize that private people have a greater right to control information about themselves than do public officials and others who seek power, influence or attention. Only an overriding public need can justify intrusion into anyone’s privacy.
• Show good taste. Avoid pandering to lurid curiosity.
Be cautious about identifying juvenile suspects, victims of sex crimes and criminal suspects before the formal filing of charges.

Be Accountable
Bloggers should:
• Admit mistakes and correct them promptly.
• Explain each Weblog’s mission and invite dialogue with the public over its content and the bloggers’ conduct.
• Disclose conflicts of interest, affiliations, activities and personal agendas.
• Deny favored treatment to advertisers and special interests and resist their pressure to influence content. When exceptions are made, disclose them fully to readers.
• Be wary of sources offering information for favors. When accepting such information, disclose the favors.
• Expose unethical practices of other bloggers.
• Abide by the same high standards to which they hold others.

As the moving force behind the Business Ethics Pledge, I welcome this, of course. Maybe some of the ethical bloggers will find their way to the Pledge.

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By Posted on Posted in Ethics in Government, Media Ethics

Unbelievable! The goon squad is going after veteran White House correspondent Helen Thomas, one of the few people in the White House Press Corps who actually still remembers how to ask an intelligent question or engage in critical thought.

Earth to Planet Bill O’Reilly: do you and your “colleagues” need a refresher course in the First Amendment?

It goes like this:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

You say we’re in Iraq to to fight for democracy–well, how about a little democracy at home?

Thomas was absolutely in line to ask why GWB took us to war in Iraq. After all, nobody’s found any weapons of mass destruction, Al Queda had no significant presence there until after the US attacked (though it certainly has one now, thanks to the predictably myopic policies of the Bush administration), and the enemy that had attacked us was thousands of miles away in Afghanistan.

Bush, who almost never calls on Thomas and rarely calls on other reporters he can expect to ask hard questions (such as NPR’s Don Gonyea), gave a rambling, unfocused, and materially incorrect answer, and then patted himself on the back for taking a question from Thomas. Did he get attacked for this shameful, embarrassing performance? No–the attacks were against Helen Thomas.

O’Reilly:”I would have laid into that woman, and I don’t care how old she is,”
Don Imus: “The old bag should shut up and get out. I’m sick of her.”
Ticker Carlson: “Propagandist.”

Hey, pundits–the reason we have a First Amendment is that our Founding Fathers recognized the importance of an open press wiling to examine critically the actions of those in power whether in government or in the private sector. Questioning a policy based on lies and foggy vision is a high act of patriotism, IMHO.

Or perhaps the O’Reillys and Imuses of the world think that Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin were unpatriotic scum. King George would have agreed with them, but he had some reasons. the ability to criticize was written into the Constitution by these true American heroes over 200 years ago, and thank goodness for their foresight.

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By Posted on Posted in Business Ethics, Media Ethics

Once again, that line between paid PR and actual journalism is getting kind of blurry. This time, the New York Times reports, the culprit is Wal-Mart.

At least Wal-Mart does not appear to be paying the bloggers who are spouting its press releases and pretending to raise independent voices of indignation–and to my mind, that’s an important distinction compared to the “news” people planted and paid for by the white House (e.g., Armstrong Williams)–but still, it’s deeply disturbing

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By Posted on Posted in Media Ethics

I wrote on January 29,

Meanwhile, the author claims he originally submitted it as fiction, the publisher–no tiny little outfit but Doubleday, one of the biggest in the nation–first called in creative nonfiction and when that didn’t fly, said that Frey had hoodwinked them.

It would be very illuminating to see Frey’s original book proposal and see where the truth lies. Meanwhile, the thing stinks.

Yesterday, Publishers Weekly interviewed Frey’s agent, Kassie Evashevski, who had this to say:

I think the confusion over fiction vs. nonfiction may stem from the fact that early in the submission process, James raised the issue of whether he could publish it as an autobiographical novel–ONLY, he said, to spare his family undue embarrassment, NOT because it wasn’t true. I told him I would bring it up with a few publishers, which I did, and the response was unanimous:if the book is true, it should be published as a memoir.

James personally explained to his editor that the events depicted in the book took place as described. Based on the information given us by the author, [editor] Sean McDonald and [publisher] Nan Talese believed in good faith they were buying a memoir, just as I believed I was selling them one.

I guess the only way we’ll know for certain is if someone can turn up his original correspondence–but of course, even that will have to be scrutinized, as in this case, it would be all-too-easy to pull the kind of faked-memo shenanigans that got Dan Rather in so much trouble back in ’04.

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By Posted on Posted in Media Ethics

I’ve been quietly following the James Frey flap for a couple of weeks now. This is the guy who got Oprah’s endorsement for his “memoir” of addiction, jail time, and so forth (I will not make it easier to locate by naming the book here)–only it turned out to be fiction.

When this was revealed, Oprah first defended him for creating a gripping read that addressed deep issues, etc. The other day, she snapped out of the trance and tore him apart on camera.

Meanwhile, the author claims he originally submitted it as fiction, the publisher–no tiny little outfit but Doubleday, one of the biggest in the nation–first called in creative nonfiction and when that didn’t fly, said that Frey had hoodwinked them.

It would be very illuminating to see Frey’s original book proposal and see where the truth lies. Meanwhile, the thing stinks.

Best commentary I’ve seen on it is from Pat Holt of Holt Uncensored–she is always worth reading.

As of this writing, she hasn’t archived the column yet, but she has some great suggestions:

  • Offer a refund for any reader who wants one, and make that process very easy
  • Hire website muckrakers like smokinggun.com to vet any book that claims to be nonfiction
  • Get Frey to rewrite the book and send him out on tour to flog the vastly different rewrite, which would be priced at half of the original
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    By Posted on Posted in Media Ethics

    We’ve all shared a laugh as improbable images cloned together in Photoshop make their way across the Internet. The problem is that image manipulation can be used very unethically–to fudge scientific results, for example

    A Boston Globe story documents how editorial staff at the Journal of Cell Biology is running all submitted photos through Photoshop to detect fraud. (The New York Times ran a rather clearer article, but it requires paid access.)

    And they’ve discovered fraud is rampant enough that they’ve had to yank 14 accepted papers. In some cases, they’re even notifying the institutions sponsoring the research to check into the accuracy of the researchers’ findings.

    After the scandal with Hwang Woo Suk and his faked stem cells, such caution is unfortunately necessary. And form a science point of view, I find it fascinating that Photoshop can not only alter images, but tell you if an image is already altered.

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    By Posted on Posted in Ethics in Government, Media Ethics

    The New York Times reports that China
    pressured Microsoft to take down a blog that mentioned a journalist
    strike at a Chinese paper following the firing of a journalist    . The blog was hosted on a server in the U.S.

    Mr.
    Zhao said in an interview Thursday that Microsoft chose to delete his
    blog on Dec. 30 with no warning. “I didn’t even say I supported the
    strike,” he said. “This action by Microsoft infringed upon my freedom
    of speech. They even deleted my blog and gave me no chance to back up
    my files without any warning.”

    Tacky, to be sure.
    But some bloggers speculate this could lead to much worse: Gridskipper
    claims the Chinese threatened to convert the whole country to Linux and
    Movable Type, e.g., non-Microsoft. That site won’t let me copy and
    quote, but here’s the link.

    And
    I’ve just spent ten minutes trying unsuccessfully to locate the comment
    I saw that wondered if MS would be equally cowardly in the face of
    illegal requests from our own US government–which, considering all the
    stuff coming out about illegal White House-authorized spying, etc., is
    not such a big leap.

    One of Microsoft’s own most public bloggers, Scobleizer, the “Microsoft Geek Blogger”, had this to say:

    OK,
    this one is depressing to me. It’s one thing to pull a list of words
    out of blogs using an algorithm. It’s another thing to become an agent
    of a government and censor an entire blogger’s work. Yes, I know the
    consequences. Yes, there are thousands of jobs at stake. Billions of
    dollars. But, the behavior of my company in this instance is not right.

    He
    goes on to talk about moral courage, his grandmother who stood up to
    the Nazis in Germany, and his own action contacting higher-ups at
    Microsoft about this issue. Good for him!

    Meanwhile, a message to all bloggers, and all who rely on any outside hosting for your data: Keep backups on your own system!

    I maintain this blog on two different servers–but maybe I should keep a file on my hard drive, as well.

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    By Posted on Posted in Ethics in Government, Media Ethics

    Some historical perspective on spying, as recorded in the New York times obit for Frank Wilkinson, McCarthyite scapegoat and First Amendment activist who went to jail to defend his principles

    But
    Mr. Wilkinson was not finished with the federal government. When he
    discovered, in 1986, that the Federal Bureau of Investigation had been
    compiling files on him, he filed a Freedom of Information Act request
    for their release.

    He was sent 4,500 documents. But he sued for
    more, and the next year the F.B.I. released an additional 30,000
    documents, and then 70,000 two years later. Eventually, there were
    132,000 documents covering 38 years of surveillance, including detailed
    reports of Mr. Wilkinson’s travel arrangements and speaking schedules,
    and vague and mysterious accusations of an assassination attempt
    against Mr. Wilkinson in 1964.

    Meanwhile, yet
    another right-wing extremist, lobbyist Jack Abramoff, has entered a
    plea bargain and promised to implicate a number of his buddies in
    Congress. He admits to influence peddling–and former Republican
    Senator Ben Knighthorse Campbell accuses him of trying to rig elections
    on Indian reservations, as well. Abramoff has close ties to former
    House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, current House Speaker Dennis Hastert,
    Grover Norquist, Ralph Reed, and other ultra-right honchos. The Wall
    Street Journal has said the number of US Representatives implicated
    could be as high as 60, most of them on the Republican side, but so
    far, only Robert Ney of Ohio has been specifically named. (Sorry, WSJ’s
    website structure doesn’t allow me to copy the link)

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    By Posted on Posted in Ethics in Government, Media Ethics

    To me, the most scandalous part of this latest Bush administration scandal–that GWB personally authorized and oversaw illegal spying on American citizens–is
    not event he spying itself, though that’s certainly bad enough (and one
    more reason why these dangerous and immoral people ought to be
    impeached). This program is so “out there” that a lot of prominent
    Republicans, including Arlen Spector and John McCain, are deeply
    concerned.

    But what’s really shocking to me is that the New York
    Times apparently knew at least a year ago, and chose to hold back on
    the story. Yes, of course, they’d need to thoroughly check their facts,
    in case it was another attempt to entrap and discredit journalists, a
    la the Dan Rather situation. But once they were sure, I would think the
    story of a US President knowingly and deliberately breaking the law
    would be considered news.

    It’s unclear to me whether the story
    was in the Times’ hands before the 2004 election–but surely, if they
    knew, going public with that data might have changed the course of
    history, given that the results were already not only close but highly
    questionable.

    The Times utterly failed in its responsibility to
    its readers and the world. Is this the same newspaper that was so
    active in reporting on the Pentagon Papers and Watergate?

    Moral
    choices in business lead to business success, says Shel Horowitz in his
    award-winning sixth book, Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People
    First.

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    By Posted on Posted in Ethics in Government, Media Ethics

    I suppose we should be grateful: this time, it’s not the government who’s paying pundits being. Still, it is disturbing to find out from both Business Week and the NY Times’ Paul Krugman that Tom DeLay’s good friend Jack Abramoff has been paying off think-tankers at the Cato Institute and elsewhere to spin op-eds that benefit his clients. And once again, there was no disclosure. Cato op-ed writer Doug Bandow, who writes a syndicated column for Copley, took payments of up to $2000 for each of at least 12 and as many as 24 columns promoting Abramoff’s clients.

    At least he has the good sense to say he made a mistake, as does his boss. What’s truly disturbing is the statement by another of Abramoff’s beneficiaries, Peter Ferrara (a noted architect of Social Security policy), who is completely shameless: “I do that all the time. I’ve done that in the past, and I’ll do it in the future.”

    Oh, and Ferrara’s boss at the Institute for Policy Innovation, Tom Giovanetti, hasn’t figured out the problem either. Giovanetti accuses critics of a “naive purity standard…I have a sense that there are a lot of people at think tanks who have similar arrangements.”

    Ugly, ugly, ugly.

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