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What “ethical conduct” means for our GateHouse newsrooms – in print and online.
There are five components to ethical conduct:
- Reporting accurately – in fact and in context
- Serving the public interest, while upholding the First Amendment
- Acting with integrity
- Serving our community
- Ensuring transparency
These components are inherent to the credibility of our newspapers, our websites and our related products. They are essential to the highest standards of professional and personal conduct. Ethical conduct applies to our work and our conduct across all platforms.
These guidelines are designed to:
1. Aid journalists in common-sense decision-making
2. Be the foundation for discussions among staff, supervisors and editors to ensure consistent
practices in each newsroom.
The GateHouse Ethics Statement for Newsrooms applies to all content, regardless of the format or platform. This may include text, photos, audio, video or blogs across multiple platforms: print, online, broadcast, email, podcasts and beyond.
Each newsroom must develop and implement consistent practices that support the Statement of Ethical Conduct and that recognize the inherently different media of print and online. These practices should be shared broadly in the newsroom and the newspaper, and with the readers and audience. These are minimum standards. A newsroom may develop and implement practices that are more stringent than those set forth in our Statement of Ethical Conduct and our guidelines. Sample policies for newsrooms are available at the GateHouse Newsroom website, GHnewsroom.com, under “ethics resources.”
Careful judgment and common sense should be applied in making decisions that best serve the public interest and result in the greatest good. The best decisions are obtained after open-minded consultations with appropriate colleagues and superiors – augmented, when necessary, by the advice of dispassionate outside parties, such as experts, lawyers, ethicists or others whose views in confidence may provide clarity in sorting out issues.
We accept that there will be occasions in which our principles and values will collide. At all times we will strive to do the right thing.
What “ethical conduct” means for our GateHouse newsrooms – in print and online.
There are five components to ethical conduct:
- Reporting accurately – in fact and in context
- Serving the public interest, while upholding the First Amendment
- Acting with integrity
- Serving our community
- Ensuring transparency
These components are inherent to the credibility of our newspapers, our websites and our related products. They are essential to the highest standards of professional and personal conduct. Ethical conduct applies to our work and our conduct across all platforms.
These guidelines are designed to:
1. Aid journalists in common-sense decision-making
2. Be the foundation for discussions among staff, supervisors and editors to ensure consistent
practices in each newsroom.
The GateHouse Ethics Statement for Newsrooms applies to all content, regardless of the format or platform. This may include text, photos, audio, video or blogs across multiple platforms: print, online, broadcast, email, podcasts and beyond.
Each newsroom must develop and implement consistent practices that support the Statement of Ethical Conduct and that recognize the inherently different media of print and online. These practices should be shared broadly in the newsroom and the newspaper, and with the readers and audience. These are minimum standards. A newsroom may develop and implement practices that are more stringent than those set forth in our Statement of Ethical Conduct and our guidelines. Sample policies for newsrooms are available at the GateHouse Newsroom website, GHnewsroom.com, under “ethics resources.”
Careful judgment and common sense should be applied in making decisions that best serve the public interest and result in the greatest good. The best decisions are obtained after open-minded consultations with appropriate colleagues and superiors – augmented, when necessary, by the advice of dispassionate outside parties, such as experts, lawyers, ethicists or others whose views in confidence may provide clarity in sorting out issues.
We accept that there will be occasions in which our principles and values will collide. At all times we will strive to do the right thing.
