Folio 2006: VIDEO of Balinese Dance for Editors

VIDEO: Robin Sherman led editors in a Balinese dance to increase the “energy” in the room, before talking about an ethics survey.

While everyone in Arizona does the “Big Think” thing, over at the Folio Show in New York the editors who actually get the work done are figuring out how to do their jobs — and dancing with a man whose hair stands on end. Before his panel on why ethics in magazine journalism are a good thing, Robin Sherman, associate director/newsletter editor of the American Society of Business Publication Editors, combed his hair out for us, then led the crowd in a dance he said comes from Bali and would create “energy” in the room. (VIDEO here or by clicking the photo, above.)

Noting his hair is his brand — even if it makes him less likely to get jobs — he then went on to tell us about the findings of an ethics survey ASBPE released last month. Among them:

76 percent of editors said they had faced ad-related editorial demands

30 percent succumbed to those demands, such as corporate profiles of advertisers.

Advertisers have asked editors to kill stories, threatened to withdraw advertising based on negative coverage, or asked editors to lie or soften an objectionable story.

He also made the case that acquiescing to such demands will lead to a decline in a publication’s credibility and ultimately hurt its position with readers, and therefore hurt the business. “The editor’s in charge,” he told FishbowlNY before the talk. “Everybody else, stay out of the way. You’re hiring an editor to be an editor.”

You can see the full results of the survey at ASBPE.org.

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