When ‘fake news’ isn’t fake, and the ethics of a spokesman
It’s been a few months since news organizations caught the criminal lie flung by Melissa Howard, a GOP candidate for the Florida House of Representatives. Short take: She claimed she had a degree from Miami University in Ohio, and she did not. Once caught, and after some lying before acknowledging the truth, she dropped out […]
Today in evil PR: A student loan company invents a guy who talked to journalists
The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that LendEDU invented a guy named Drew Cloud to run The Student Loan Report, which purported to provide fun insight and good information about the burgeoning student loan industry. Cloud was quoted by multiple media organizations, including MSNBC and The Washington Post. There was a picture of Cloud on […]
The Ethics of artificial intelligence: Platform magazine says public relations has to think about AI, too.
Artificial intelligence is slowly taking over the world. And, as usual, the technology is bounding far ahead of the law and the ethics. In this Platform magazine article, student writer Skylar Spencer raises some of the questions that everyone — whether in the AI business or a consumer of AI-enhanced technology — ought to be […]
Figures lie and liars figure: Journalists should be wary of bias behind numbers
By Serena Bailey In the immediate wake of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High in Parkland, Florida, Everytown for Gun Safety, an advocacy group that works to reduce gun violence, tweeted that the Parkland shooting had been the 18th school shooting of the year. This statistic was shared by Bernie Sanders and New York […]
Associated Press stylebook needs to step it up on language for covering the disabled community
By Zoe Norberg In the past several years, the Associated Press has added chapters ranging from social media to religion, and most recently, data journalism to the categorized section in the back of the AP Stylebook. Nevertheless, an in-depth chapter about the proper usage of disability language is absent from the stylebook––instead, this topic is […]
The New York Times talks about its own diversity. Shouldn’t everyone else?
The New York Times issued a press release in March 2018 noting its commitment to diversity – and backing it up with statistics. The nut graf: Over the past three years, representation of women has increased at every level of The Times. Over all, our employees are now evenly split between men and women. Women […]
How social media fed information about a Marine’s death
By Sonya Haines When a Marine, Private First Class (PFC) Ethan Barclay-Weberpal, was murdered at Camp Pendleton in January 2018 media outlets across the nation began scrambling to gain the most up-to-date information available. The original story did not surface from the Associated Press (AP), therefore, many news outlets turned to social media to gather […]
Lying ethics and ethical lying: How effective communication is a twisted business
By Mackenzie McClintock Start with constant criticism from high-profile government officials about news coverage. Then mix in increasingly prevalent screams of “Fake News!” directed at the media. That breaking news statistics piece was also slightly incorrect due to the source’s miscalculation, so issue an apology statement. The story will stir itself and result in a […]
Ram ad was bad, but Bell Pottinger story shows worse persuasion ethics
Discussions of the fundamental flaws of a Super Bowl truck ad are soaring higher today than any missed field goal during the game played Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. But that’s not the bigger story in persuasion ethics today. You’ll read much righteous indignation of the ad that peddled Ram trucks using Dr. Martin Luther King’s […]