More ethical ponderings

I was working on a class assignment podcast that I turned into a round-table discussion with professors about the ethics of having an opinion while being a journalist. You can hear it here: utexaspodcasts.com

Anyway, the question I came away with after this is one people have been grappling with since new media came around - does the blog/podcast media almost demand that journalists express opinions in order for them to work? And if so, how does that mesh with our often very strict rules about ethics. If you talk to the old guard it seems like many think its a slippery slope that will eventually ruin the credibility of the mainstream media, turning us all in Perez Hilton. Me, I don't know. I'm very wary though.

Mostly, I'm just cruising the web and trying to figure out what I think. Here's some links I'm perusing right now.

Here's what Poynter came up with on online ethics code at their conference.
(if you don't look at Poynter regularly, I strongly recommend it. Even if you don't agree with everything or anything, the thoughts bouncing around that site are great)

Here is the traditional Society of Professional Journalists code of ethics: http://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp

And if you're interested, here's a little something from a Poynter writer about when it's okay to retract something from the Web: http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=101&aid=129083