Ethics

I didn’t expect much to happen when I suggested journalism associations come together “to have their ethics committees (and/or boards) look at this issue, gather what material and policies they have, and determine what guidance they can offer to newsrooms. This needs to be an initiative that cuts across organizations, mediums and disciplines to serve all journalists.”

In addition to studying core journalism issues, the educators will create an online publication and establish a social media presence specific to their institute.

Just as proposals to tighten the belt on the online advertising industry pick up steam in Congress and the White House, the industry itself is touting a new ethics code, with a first-of-its-kind focus on social media and online privacy.

In both meteorology and metaphor, the sun came out Thursday in Columbia.

In an effort to improve the transparency in state and local government and encourage the use of data by citizens, journalists and businesses, David Herzog, a 2010-11 Donald W. Reynolds Fellow, has created Open Missouri, a website that helps make Missouri government data more accessible for those who wish to access it.

The advertising industry has a new ethics code, as the Institute for Advertising Ethics today released a set of eight principles on issues ranging from the blurry line between advertising, editorial and entertainment content to behavioral targeting and disclosure of compensation for social-media endorsements.

Seattle, perhaps more than any other American city, epitomizes the promise and challenges of American journalism at the local level.

Three days after Julian Assange released the most recent WikiLeaks documents, and 36 hours after deciding to publicly address the subject, the MCDM program put together the provocative event, “Open Secrets: An Open Conversation about WikiLeaks and Information Transparency in America,” drawing an excited crowd of roughly 130 people to the Microsoft Auditorium at the Seattle Public Library downtown on Friday evening, December 10. In addition to the crowd, the MCDM orchestrated a Livestream (watch video) of the event which by now has drawn 286 unique views and at the time had a peak of 80 participants. All discussion was bolstered by a vigorous Twitter feed (#opensecrets).