BUSINESS ETHICS

MEDIA- A SOURCE OF
INFORMATION OR
DISINFORMATION
INSTRUCTOR: SIR ASAD SHEHZAD

GROUP MEMBERS:
1. ABEERA KHAN
2. SUMRAN RANI
3. MARIAM BURHAN
What is Media?
Media are the communication outlets or tools used to store and
deliver information or data. It is associated with the mass media communication
businesses such as print media, the press, photography, advertising, cinema,
broadcasting which include radio and television, and publishing. Media is plural
of medium. It’s cheapest and the most popular way of communication, Media
tells us what is happening around the world, we can get any information of any
thing just in a few clicks.
Purpose of Media is to make world, a global village, reduce the communication
gaps among the people living in the far areas And Keeps the people updated.

Evolution of Media:
The media in Pakistan dates back to pre-partition years of British India, where
a number of newspapers were established. The newspaper Dawn, founded by
Muhammad Ali Jinnah and first published in 1941, was dedicated to promoting
for an independent Pakistan. Pakistan Television was launched in November
1964 which switched over to colour transmission 12 year In March 2002, it was
decided to set up Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA)
with a view to facilitate, license and regulate the growth of electronic media in
the private sectors later.

Roles of media:
Media has many roles but these are the main three roles of media.
 Flow of information
 Interpreter of Information
 Watchdog Function

Flow of Information:
Information flow is the movement of information between people and
systems. Efficient and secure information flows are a central factor
in communication. Also known as gate keeper, simply means that the elites who
control a particular news entity decide what gets on the air or in a newspaper.
Thus, if the story runs, it becomes news. There are also types of information
flow. Names are given below:

 Publish and subscribe

 Pull
 Push
 Choreography
 Orchestration
 Event handling
 Communication
 Knowledge

Interpretation of Knowledge:
Also known as score keeper, it tends to add numbers to spice up the content of
the story itself. For instance, a reporter may tell you a story about three people
injured in a crash or that stock prices dropped by 22 points. Numbers and
statistics bring life to a story. Simply it interprets information by telling
numbers.

Watchdog function:
When the media plays the watchdog, they are acting as a protector or as an
investigator regarding events that might have an impact on your life. An
example would be an investigation into government corruption and how that
corruption has affected your wallet or pocketbook.

Advantages of Media:
 One advantage of the media is that it is able to get information to the public
in a quick and timely manner.
 The media can warn us of impending bad weather, dangerous situations in a
city, a state, or the country.
 The media has the resources to expose injustices, corruption, or abuse of
power that an average citizen would never be able to expose. This can lead to
positive change in our country.
 The media has uncovered events where elected officials have been using
government workers to campaign for them while they are supposedly working
on the government business.
 The media has uncovered scams where people try to take our money
dishonestly.
 The media keeps us updated on news, weather, and sporting events.

Disadvantages of Media:
 A risk of inaccurate reporting and a loss of privacy.
 Sometimes, in a rush to be the first to break a story, the media puts out
incorrect or inaccurate information. This can be embarrassing, and
depending on the information, it can harm a person’s reputation.
Example: In the election of 1948, many newspapers reported that Dewey
defeated Truman when in reality it was the other way around.
 It is very easy for people to use the media to make false claims or make
claims that are only half true. Political candidates sometimes do this, and we
recently saw a high-profile news reporter do this. It is hard to check
everything that is reported or stated by the media.
 Additionally, with all the cameras and coverage today, there really is no
privacy. When somebody makes a mistake or inadvertently says something
wrong, it can get blown way out of proportion.

Duties and Responsibilities of media:

 It should be truthful, fair and objective.
 It should follow agreed codes of ethics and professional conducts.
 It should represent the public and should speak for them.
 The content of media should reflect truth, accuracy, objectivity and balance.
 it should be self-regulating within the framework of law and established
institutions.
 It should avoid whatever might lead to crime, violence or civil disorder or
give offense to minority groups.
 The media has a responsibility to inform and educate the people through the
various channels available such as radio, magazines, newspaper, television
and the Internet.

Types of Media:
 Print media
 Broadcasting media
 Digital media

Broadcasting Media:
 Broadcast advertising is radio, television, and Internet advertising. The
commercials aired on radio and televisions are an essential part of broadcast
advertising.
 The broadcast media like radio and television reaches a wider audience as
opposed to the print media. The radio and television commercials fall under
the category of mass marketing as the national as well as global audience
can be reached through it.
 The role of broadcast advertising is to persuade consumers about the
benefits of the product. It is considered as a very effective medium of
advertising. The cost of advertising on this channel depends on the time of
the commercial and the specific time at which it is aired. For example, the
cost of an ad in the premium slot will be greater than in any other slot.

Print media:
 Print media is one of the oldest and basic forms of communication. It
includes newspapers, weeklies, magazines, monthlies, banners & graphics,
posters and other forms of printed material.
 The contribution of print media in providing information and transfer of
knowledge is remarkable. Even after the advent of electronic media, the
print media has not lost its charm or relevance.
 Print media has the advantage of making a longer impact on the minds of
the reader, with more in-depth reporting and analysis.
 Magazines and newspapers are the dominant traditional print media used in
advertising. Brochures, flyers and other collateral pieces also are sometimes
referred to as print collateral. While digital media expansion has affected
use of print, it remains a viable way to advertise.
 Primary strengths of print relative to digital include tangibility, an enduring
message and high credibility. Some people prefer to read media in print as
opposed to digital formats.

Digital Media:
Digital media are any media that are encoded in machine-readable formats.
Digital media can be created, viewed, distributed, modified and preserved on
digital electronics devices. The world we live in today is populated by digital
media products, and these products enable and deliver experiences in many
industries, including industries that aren’t typically associated with digital
media—such as health, government and education.

Role of media in politics:

The role of the media in contemporary politics forces us to ask what kind of
a world and what kind of a society we want to live in, and in particular in
what sense of democracy do we want this to be a democratic society.
Media plays a vital role in promoting politics in its favour and up to some
extent it has done so.
For instance in 2002, when Imran Khan fought election and did not win one
of the main reasons were that media did not highlight him as much as it did
in the election held in 2018. In the elections of all of his campaigns and
achievements were highlighted. All of this was because media want to
influence the decision of the people for whom to vote.

Concepts of democracy:
There are two different concepts of democracy:

1. One conception of democracy has it that a democratic society is

one in which the public has the means to participate in some
 meaningful way in the management of their own affairs and the
means of information are open and free.
2. An alternative conception of democracy is that the public must be
barred from managing of their own affairs and the means of
information must be kept narrowly and rigidly controlled. That
may sound like an odd conception of democracy, but it's important
to understand that it is the prevailing conception.

What is spectator democracy?

Walter Lippmann, who was the dean of American journalists, argued that in a
properly functioning democracy there are classes of citizens. There is first of all
the class of citizens who have to take some active role in running general
affairs. That's the specialized class. They are the people who analyse, execute,
make decisions, and run things in the political, economic, and ideological
systems. Those others, who are out of the small group, the big majority of the
population, they are what Lippmann called "the bewildered herd." The
specialized class, the responsible men, carry out the executive function, which
means they do the thinking and planning and understand the common interests.
Then, there is the bewildered herd, and they have a function in democracy too.
Their function in a democracy, he said, is to be "spectators," not participants in
action. But they have more of a function than that, because it's a democracy.
They're allowed to say, "We want you to be our leader" or "We want you to be
our leader."

How do media deceive people?

Political deception, this can occur through:
1. Hiding information
2. Delivery of misleading information
3. Encouraging others to use a frame or lens that leads to a distorted way of
understanding what is going on.

For example: the plight of the unemployed can be hidden by not

collecting statistics, not publishing them or not mentioning them.
Methods of misleading people about unemployment include giving
 incorrect figures or using a misleading definition of employment, such as
counting working one hour per week as employed (Best 2001). Deceptive
methods of framing unemployment include focussing on the booming
economy or assuming a certain level of unemployment is natural.
Today's establishment media practice very little journalism and they
devote minimal resources to reporting actual news. Instead they have
become a mechanism to create and maintain public perception. They
spend most of their resources to create a false reality for the public while
they distract you from the most important issues facing our world. For all
practical purposes you can safely say that the reality portrayed by the
establishment media bears little resemblance to the actual world in which
we live. This is not theory, this is obvious and it becomes clear to anyone
who cares to pay attention. An easy way to think of this is that the people
in the establishment media are holding up an orange for you to look at
while they tell you that it is an apple. We don't often think about how
profoundly the mass media influences the lies we tell ourselves. On
television, in movies, and in advertisements, we are fed information
about who we should be in our culture. As a woman living in mainstream
American culture, for example, attaining the perfect appearance is
fundamental to your value from a cultural perspective. Specifically, you
need to look eternally 18 years old with perfect skin, big eyes
surrounded by long eyelashes, white teeth, and a very thin yet feminine
figure. If you do not meet this ideal and are deemed unattractive, there
is nothing you can do to make up for it.  No matter how hard you try,
you cannot be smart enough, funny enough, nice enough to compensate
for your imperfect looks—you will never be as valuable as the “beautiful
woman” sitting next to you.

Negative effects of media:

1. May raise blood pressure and create negative feelings.
2. Over exposer to media may cause health problems too.
3. Easy availability of adult content on internet.
4. High dependence of children on Google, Wikipedia etc.
Positive effects of media:
1. Common man gets latest news within fraction of seconds.
2. Helps to exchange information helps to bring out hidden talents of people. .
3. The games increase logical thinking, grasping power.
4. Let public to take part in social events

How Capitalism and Media related?

By succumbing to the pressures of the government and the private sector,
journalists are violating these values, and in turn the maxims that guide their
profession. By being part of the “propaganda machine”, journalists are not
being accurate; they are compromising the importance of the truth. Journalists
are also not independent. Mass media corporations heavily depend on the
government and the private sector for access to information in order to maintain
financial stability. Moreover, journalists are not ensuring limitation of harm.
They are divulging information that is harming society, in that it does not
comprise the whole truth. Some elements or entire stories are left out in order to
maintain their relationships with the government and the private sector.
By promoting stories that are favorable for the private sector and the
government, mass media corporations are in effect discriminating. They are
only publishing negative stories of foreign corporations and foreign
governments, not their own.  Mass media corporations are also undermining the
primacy of the individual. From a Western perspective, journalists are seen as
the ultimate autonomous individual. They are capable of separating themselves
from society, which allows them to detect any abuses of power. By being at the
mercy of large private corporations and the government, journalists are
incapable of doing so, because any such abuses involving the government or the
private sector would not be shared with the rest of society. Journalists, as a
result, are not revealing abuses of power, but rather they are hiding them.
Capitalism is affecting media in ethically troubling ways from a utilitarian
perspective as well. As previously mentioned, mass media corporations are part
of the “propaganda machine”. As a result, journalists working for these
corporations perpetuate a false image of the government and the private sector.
Mass media corporations are therefore compromising the role of journalism
within a democratic context; that is, to provide regular political, economic and
social updates to all citizens in an unbiased manner. Capitalism, therefore, is not
creating the greatest good for the greatest number, as democracy is considered
the best social model discovered to date.
Moreover, a properly functioning press serves the good of the community, as it
provides the higher pleasures alluded to by John Stuart Mill: that is, “pleasures
of the intellect, of the feelings and imagination, and of the moral
sentiments”(Mill). Mass media corporations however cannot be considered
“properly functioning”, as they favor the elites of society. Mass media
companies therefore cannot provide the aforementioned higher pleasures, and as
result cannot create the greatest good for the greatest number.
     To sum up, capitalism is affecting media in ethically troubling ways from
both a deontological and utilitarian perspective. There is no straightforward
solution to this ethical issue, as most Western countries have some form
capitalistic economic system. What Western societies can do is promote
publicly funded broadcasters, and safeguard their autonomy and independence.
Western communities can also reduce the size and power of mass media
corporations that monopolize the industry. The output of information would in
turn be controlled by a multitude of broadcasters, rather than a single one

CONCLUSION:
The media plays an important role in the welfare of society. It works as an
informer to the world, a form of entertainment and an influencer. Political issues
are highly dependent on the media as it highlights what is important and is
highly influential. With constantly bombardment of governance issues towards
society, media users now yearn for a different point of view, shifting to
alternative media to abstract their diverse opinions. The information received
from the media is affecting the social and cultural life of a society both of
perception of their attitude and behavior. Impact of Media on Pakistani Society
Media is strengthening development in Pakistan. Media has supported
Democracy Media has highlighted Public issues. Media has given voice to
neglected element of society. Media has become entertainment industry; it
satisfies all segments, age groups of our society.
 BIBLIOGRAPHY
Book reference: MEDIA CONTROL – NOAM CHOUSKY
www.google.com
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_of_Pakistan

www.quora.com