“On Tuesday, September 23, the online website of the Philippine Daily Inquirer released a feature article about “multivitamins that support an active lifestyle”.
“The article in question does not read like an article at all. In fact, it even reads as a promotional material for a product rather than an article itself. It completely failed to be objective and is obviously biased toward the “featured” product. Furthermore, it also failed to disclose that the product does not have any approved therapeutic claims.
“This is a direct ethical violation because it was intentionally made to look like an article when, in fact, it is actually an advertisement in disguise. (Not once was it even stated within the article that it is an advertisement.) This is a huge blow to the Inquirer’s credibility and integrity as the way the article was written was clearly meant to deceive its readers and advertise a product by stealth.
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by Steph Ledesma on: “State of the Nation with Jessica Soho last September 18, 2014. It was a coverage of John Consulta which showed an ambush raid of 6 cybersex den in Bataan. Here are some positive and negative points of the coverage.
“One positive note on the coverage was the shots used. On the first part, it was noticeable that the cameras seemed undercover. Due to this, most of the shots were shaky and there were also some which did not show as much relevance to the entire coverage. There were times when only backs of NBI personnel were focused on, sometimes footsteps, and worse, plain walls. Maybe this was caused by the distraction and pace during the raid. Part of the guiding principles of journalists was to avoid undercover ways of collecting information for reports but as for this, these types of shots were fine since the purpose was to show how the raid operation went as they were trying to chase the suspects.
“On the negative side, I don’t think it was necessary to show shots of firearms being assembled. Aside from connoting violence, I think the shots of firearms should not be included since it doesn’t show much relevance to the coverage.
“Aside from the irrelevance of the gun shots, I noticed on the latter parts of the coverage that people on the background were on freeze. This was during John Consulta’s wrap up. Suspects on freeze with their hands on their heads could be considered normal or natural but it was unbelievable that even NBI personnel during an operation were on freeze. I think this was problematic because it was a clear manipulation of the supposed setting of the crime area.”
