ethics

Fiorina touts change as key to success

OAKLAND, Calif.--Former Hewlett-Packard Chief Executive Carly Fiorina, in a long-scheduled presentation Tuesday night as part of a Bay Area lecture series, made no specific mention of her political aspirations.

For me, however, the indicator she's considering a future run for office was the way she kept qualifying her assertions with "this isn't a political statement," even if they were arguably political in nature.

Fiorina's speech, which took place the same day News Corp. announced she'd be an on-air commentator for its upcoming Fox Business Network, focused on the importance of change as it … Read more

Future Implications: Ethics in technology

As I sat here today, trying to decide what the topic should be for this week's Future Implications piece, I thought of the ever-popular topics of computing, smart phones and even HDTVs. But alas, I came across this list from Ethisphere that lists the World's Most Ethical Companies for 2007.

Upon opening the link and examining the list, I was aghast at what I found: most major tech companies were nowhere to be found. Is this an endemic issue in the technology business? And more importantly, what can be done to fix it?… Read more

Time for blogosphere to get real about church and state

As they are wont to say back where I grew up, Chas Edwards is a stand-up guy. Full disclosure: Chas is a former CNET colleague who left the company more than a year ago to become the publisher of Federated Media, which has become ground zero in the storm over "conversational media."

So it is that Chas has now published his thoughts on the affair under the heading "Does relevant advertising mean selling out?"

But first a brief recap: On Friday, Valleywag reported about a site tied to a Microsoft ad campaign where several online publishers and venture capitalists lent their support to Microsoft's "People-Ready" advertising slogan.

That triggered an outpouring of conflicting opinions in the blogosphere. My Friday afternoon post asked why these guys would inexplicably pimp a Microsoft catchphrase. In a similar vein, Jeff Jarvis had it right when he headlined his comment on the situation "Buying their voices."

"So ultimately, this is a cautionary tale for all bloggers who take ads: You must set your own boundaries and not let them be pushed. When you do--whatever those boundaries are--that is the very definition of selling out."

I think Jarvis' is a cogent summary of the problem. It won't make a difference whether we're talking about "new media" or "old media." Without boundaries, there's going to be trouble in River City.

Uber-blogger Robert Scoble didn't agree and asked why it's OK for Leo LaPorte to endorse products for radio commercials but not Michael Arrington. Leo responded shortly thereafter, saying he wasn't crazy about doing ads on radio.

Do bloggers have ethics?

Tom and I discussed blogging ethics on our weekly podcast today. You can watch our studio session (actually, just me) in the viewer below. Or, listen in to the professionally-recorded audio:

Dos and don'ts of community Web sites

Just building a Web site is not enough for a blog or online community to thrive--Web site owners have to welcome the members, be diplomatic when disagreements arise and, above all, be honest and ethical, experts at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco said on Tuesday.

The biggest no-no for a Web site or blog is to lie, said Lisa Stone, co-founder of women's blogging site BlogHer, at a session titled "BlogHer Presents: World Domination via Collaboration." Wal-Mart learned that hard lesson after the blogosphere criticized the chain for not revealing that the writers behind a travel blog … Read more