|
Advertising Here is a summary, on the subject of advertising, of the official contents of the code of conduct Rights and Responsibilities of the Press in Quebec. The first column contains the rights of media organizations and journalists, and the second column, the responsibilities with regard to the information they broadcast or publish.
UNDER THE THEME:
ADVERTISING
NOTE: The Council doesn’t accept complaints regarding advertising, unless it has a direct influence on the informative content of the media. The complaints regarding advertising can be addressed to Advertising standards Canada. Advertising Advertisers are free to choose which media to use. At the same time, taxpayer-funded public bodies and institutions have no right to place or withhold advertising in order to reward, punish or influence media outlets for their ideological or political stances, or on the basis of whether their coverage has served those institutions’ interests. Private businesses, institutions, groups and individuals should also refrain from using their advertising in such ways.
The withholding of advertising as a pressure tactic to influence coverage or provoke self-censorship by one or more press outlets is a violation of press freedom and thus, of the public’s right to information.
| | | 
UNDER THE THEME:
ADVERTISING NOTE: The Council doesn’t accept complaints regarding advertising, unless it has a direct influence on the informative content of the media. The complaints regarding advertising can be addressed to Advertising standards Canada. News and Advertising It is the prerogative of publishers and managers to establish advertising policies for their outlets. But the public’s right to information makes it imperative that the media’s commercial interests related to their sale of advertising not influence editorial policy.
The media must establish a clear demarcation between news and advertisements by presenting them in different ways. Any failure to do so is liable to cause confusion for readers or viewers.
Not only must the media clearly identify advertorial content or paid programs, but these should be presented in a way that sets them apart from news content. This is particularly important with respect to advertising that takes the form of a news story—so-called “publireportages” or advertorial content.
The media should refrain from self-promotion in the form of news reports. Not only do such practices take time or space away from real news, but they compromise the credibility of the media outlets involved and of their journalists, and decrease public confidence in the quality of the information being transmitted.
The media and journalists must not insert hidden or indirect advertising into news content, and they must avoid becoming promoters or publicists for any cause, product, activity, or cultural or sporting event. In cases where a media outlet is a sponsor of an event, it must be particularly careful in covering it in order to avoid any confusion between its commercial activities and its impartial reporting of information. News and Advertising: separating the roles
Start-up costs and capital outlays for online news media are considerably smaller than those for traditional outlets. While this provides a clear advantage to the would-be publisher, the small size of many such operations also has a downside. In a one-person news organization, a single person must assume two fundamentally incompatible roles: acting on the one hand as editorial staff, and on the other, as advertising salesperson. Traditional journalistic ethics dictate that these roles not be played by the same person, regardless of the size of the business, so as not to compromise the integrity of the news operation.
| |
| | |
