Reporters On A Plane: The Ethics of the Air

So you’re a reporter sitting on an airplane, and the person in front of you is working on a PowerPoint presentation that happens to be about the direct beat you cover. There’s no obstruction — you have a clear path to view what may be valuable journalistic information. What do you do?

CNBC’s pharmaceutical reporter Mike Huckman writes about this experience on his Pharma Market blog on CNBC.com.

“For nearly the entire five-hour flight,” Huckman could see “dozens of pretty PowerPoint pages promising a ‘deep dive’ into how the company hopes to get insurance companies to pay for the drug.”

Huckman says the blog post will be the end of the reporting about the incident. “I couldn’t believe the guy was so cavalier,” Huckman tells TVNewser. “It was an open invitation.”

He also has a poll going on the post — so far 62% say “the guy should have been more careful.”

What do you think? Give your take in the comments…

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