Ethics AdviceLine

Anonymity exposed: Anonymity is a con game played on the public by some of the nation’s leading newspapers, says a story from the Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists archives. “Most reporters know that stories are only as good as the reliability of identified sources who are quoted,” says AdviceLine. Visit […]

High ethical standards in pursuit of news: The Center for Journalism Ethics names ProPublica a finalist for an ethics award. In telling the story of a high school student trying to escape gang membership, ProPublica did not publish his last name or run photos that might reveal his identity.   […]

A plea for school shooting standards: Education reporters should lead the way toward newsroom standards for covering shootings at schools, writes Emily Richmond; “They should ask managers when their news outlets will name perpetrators and how often,” she writes. “They should also ask whether coverage of such an event will […]

Brits propose global tech ethics code: Taking aim at fake news and disinformation, a United Kingdom parliament committee reports “our democracy is at risk” from election interference through social media.   Visit the Ethics AdviceLine blog for more.

The new take on editing photos: Pictures are vital to covering the news at a time when technology makes it easy to alter images, says a story in the Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists archives. “It was not considered a big deal a decade or more ago” to alter a picture. […]

Reinventing local TV news: Local TV newsrooms can’t expect to attract new audiences by producing the same kind of content they have for decades, write Mike Baudet and John Wihbey. Instead of short, fast-paced pieces, they say, try higher emotional impact, more context and a conversational styl   Visit […]

Saving local newspapers: Dwindling local news leads to partisan political polarization write Joshua P. Darr, Johanna Dunaway and Matthew P. Hitt. “Local newspapers provide a valuable service to democracy by keeping readers’ focus on their communities,” they write. “When they lose local newspapers, we have found, readers turn to their […]

Ethical boundaries–paying for interviews: “Reporters working with vulnerable populations, particularly in conflict situations, often face a high-stakes predicament: The job of bearing witness demands of us the highest ethical standards,” writes Annie Hylton. “At the same time, we confront extreme suffering, and even our pocket change might change someone’s circumstances, […]

Attribution and plagiarism: In the Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists archives, Stephen Rynkiewicz compares Renaissance artists with modern journalists. “If the rules on fair play are shifting, the Renaissance atelier may be where to look for direction,” he writes. “When they knew enough to transform their material, apprentices became journeymen and […]

Revealing a religion reporter’s religion: One religion reporter had a strict policy against revealing her faith, writes Jaweed Kaleem. “Today, as reporters become more diverse — by race, religion and more — and notions of objectivity become increasingly debated, some journalists on the religion beat are choosing to be more […]