Professional code of ethics
Professional codes of ethics guide all communication professionals, public relations, and marketing professionals to apply ethical skills and comply with societal regulations. The professional code of ethics expounds on the ethical principles that employees need to be aligned with to protect the organization’s behaviour direction and reputation. It handles safety issues, including conflicts of interest, harassment, and the socially accepted behavior of employees. The professional code of conduct is essential to Talkbox as it establishes rules of behavior that ensure that all employees are compliant with the company’s moral culture.
The main purpose of a code of ethics is to ensure integrity in social interaction and maintain the company’s good image. In an institution such as Talkbox, where public interaction is the order of the day, prevention of breach their code of ethics will lead to expulsion from n professional order. These codes are key in providing positive stimulus for ethical behavior and solicit guidance concerning members’ roles and obligations. The code of ethical consumer fosters interpretation and development of social commitments.
The ethical codes in the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) include moral values as advocacy, honesty, expertise, integrity, fairness, and loyalty to spreading favorable information in regards to a company or corporation. This has been applied in Brian Williams’ case of MSNBC News. The impacts of not following ethical guidelines spread from job loss to loss of reputation, credibility, and general productivity of an organization.
The US copyright laws cover the protection of properties and the original works of a person, including authors, dramatic and musical works, computer software innovation, and architecture. These laws give control over creative work and provide the creator with a chance to issue permission of use or not. Also, the fair exceptions enable the use of work with no copyright owners’ permission ad without giving any permission to the creator. This is limited to certain circumstances. For instance, there is no line test for examining the use of certain copyrights laws under US laws. “The fair use of legal copyrights provides unlinked citation and legal incorporations under the use of another copyrighted author under a four-factor test” (Elkin-Koren, 2016, p. 74).
The eight works of authorship eligible for copyright protection include
- Literary Works
- Musical Works
- Dramatic Works
- Pantomimes and Choreographic Works
- Pictorial, Graphic, and Sculptural Works.
- Motion Pictures and Other Audiovisual Works.
- Sound Recordings.
The ethical concerns regarding the photo, video, and audio manipulation include a lack of maintenance of the integrity of the content and context of photographic images. The major negative impact of digital manipulation is unrealism, for instance, the creation of unrealistic ideas about the human body.
The creative common laws lie under the copyright law and permit the creators to give permission to anyone to use their created works in certain ways. They are like public licenses that are automatically protected under the copyright, but the need for permission is easily given to anyone by the copyright owner.
In regards to defamation law, a plaintiff is required to show a false statement that is purported to be a fact, public instructions of the purported statement to a third party, as well as a fault amounting to at least negligence. The plaintiff also needs to prove that damages are caused to the third party who forms the basis of the statement. The main importance of defamation law is to protect reputations and protect legitimate criticism of wrongdoings. Slander is an act of making false statements about one’s reputation. On the other hand, Libel is written defamation where statements are published to damage one’s reputation. Also, malice relates to defamation law as convincing evidence must be provided on a statement made with actual malice, which fosters falsity and disregard to truth.
Confidentiality amounts to the duty to keep the information secret to the extent possible. Confidential sources provide information to media with an agreement that their identities are concealed in reporting the details that are provided. The privacy of a person’s right is based on the control of personal information, its usage, and how it is disclosed. The privacy laws impact internal and external communication messages. The privacy laws enable personal protection against troublesome judgments as it fosters the creation of boundaries form others. Breaches of these boundaries mean that the privacy laws are broken, which leads to damage to people’s relationships. The privacy laws also drive the profitability of corporations by increasing workers’ motivation and productivity through meaningful engagement.
The Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964) was important as it amended the US constitution to enable restriction on the ability of American public officials to sue for defamation. Alsip, 911 has had an impact on the perception of the protections afforded journalism as it offers specialized quick response calls to journalists under distress. The main issues surrounding journalists and confidential sources are that sources could dry up, leading to loss of trust of the media house or the journalist. Also, there is the issue of the risks to the source outweighing those to the journalist or the media.
The issues regarding the expectation of privacy in the online environment include information security in terms of data transfer safety, back-up, storage of data, and safety of information as credit card info and passwords. Government surveillance online has adverse effects as it erodes intellectual freedom and damages the social connectivity of affected societies. According to the ECPA, employers have the right to monitor their employees electronically but with their consent. Regarding Facebook and privacy, there are concerns on emails and other private user data indefinite storage on Facebook’s servers. There is also the issue of fake accounts with fake identities.