MxMIndia

Author: mxmadmin

  • Is auto-complete ruling your life? Or setting you up?

    Speaking of Which by Vidya Heble | The Laughter Edition

    By Vidya Heble

     

    Sundays are that much better since Ashish Shakya came into my life via the pages of the Hindustan Times. It is rare that a column by him does not leave me shaking with laughter, and that can only be a good thing.

     

    But Mr Shakya has competition, it seems. And it comes not from a fellow columnist but from an unlikely source – the very serious news pages of HT. These are the pages which, day after day, bring us reports of violence, assault, rape and murder. Amidst the unrelenting grimness, readers are hard pressed to find something to chuckle about. But the HT has unwittingly provided us with just that.

     

    A recent report on – but of course – severe punishment for rapists in uniform told us, at the tail end of its five paragraphs, that the death penalty “can be now invoked … in cases where any person who has once been coveted for sexual assault, is found guilty of repeating the act.” Did anyone hear “Freudian”? When I had finished laughing I wondered how on earth they managed that. Maybe someone should have submitted it to DYAC (Damn You Auto Correct, a repository of thumbs-generated howlers)?

     

    At least that one was at the bottom of the page, literally in a corner. But as if to make up for that, just two days later readers were treated to the story, leading on a facing Metro page, of a suspended woman police constable who consumed poison at Vidhan Bhavan. She was taken to hospital and readers were helpfully told about the procedure carried out to pump out the poison: “A gastric lavage includes inserting a pipe through the nose down the throat and to the stomach after which the contents of the stomach are auctioned out.”

     

    I… don’t think I want to make a bid in that one.

     

    These are embarrassing for the newspaper, but that’s about it. Not the end of the world, one would think. They’re not grammatical mistakes that can lead to gains or losses in the millions – unlike the 2006 case of Canadian company Rogers Inc which paid dearly for the presence of a comma in a contract.

     

    The contract said that the agreement “shall continue in force for a period of five years from the date it is made, and thereafter for successive five year terms, unless and until terminated by one year prior notice in writing by either party.” Rogers’ intent in 2002 was to lock into a long-term deal of at least five years. But the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) reached another conclusion.

     

    The validity of the contract and the millions of dollars at stake all came down to one point – the second comma in the sentence. Had it not been there, the right to cancel wouldn’t have applied to the first five years of the contract and Rogers would be protected from the higher rates it faced.

     

    “Based on the rules of punctuation,” the comma in question “allows for the termination of the [contract] at any time, without cause, upon one-year’s written notice,” the regulator said.

     

    Whoops.

     

    Closer to home, and more recent in memory, is the story of Air Asia, or the comma that let it in.

     

    “The government of India has reviewed the position in this regard and decided to permit foreign airlines also to invest, in the capital of Indian companies, operating scheduled and non-scheduled air transport services, up to the limit of 49% of their paid-up capital,” the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion said in its press note. Had there been no comma after “companies”, things would have been clear. It would have meant foreign airlines could only invest in existing carriers. The ambiguous comma allowed finance ministry officials to argue in favour of the Rs 800 million ($15 million) joint venture.

     

    So a little (more) attention to grammar can not only keep you from becoming an object of ridicule, it could also save you a lot of cash and save you from being sued.

     

    For which publishers should be properly grateful, as in the fictitious case of Paul Gallico’s Hiram Holliday, that gallant, Walter Mitty-like character who, with a firm pencil, had added a comma to a news report which saved the publisher a small fortune in a trial. The grateful publisher sent Mr Holliday on a world tour. Hint, hint.

     

    PS: I have long been a fan of Oh! Calcutta for its food, but a small ad it has been running in the dailies has left me disappointed. Describing a vegetarian food festival, the ad says the ingredients “intermingle with freshly grounded spices”. Yes, a firm foundation, especially when the ad is repeated a few days later. Oh, Oh! Calcutta, I am so disappointed. What next, misspelled menus?

     

  • 100 days of MxMIndia in the words of Deputy Editor Vidya Heble.

    Vidya Heble: A hundred bashes at the keyboard

    By Vidya Heble

     

    A hundred days, each ending with a feeling of triumph as we upload stories Big and small. Be it scoops, press events, awards nights, seminars, trade fairs or film festivals – each story is like another dollop of cement in the solid structure of MxM that the team has built up.

     

    A hundred moments of joy as we hit upon That Headline. Sometimes this is followed by a bout of despair when we realize that it won’t fit, and we scramble for an alternative.

     

    A hundred aaargh! moments when we come across oddly-phrased press releases that need to be deciphered by a scientist – sometimes a physicist and at times a microbiologist. And then the quiet elation when we manage to make it readable.

     

    A hundred plunges into despondency as we discover that we’ve goofed, and it’s too late to rectify it. The only cure for this is the dawn of the next day and a fresh palette to work on!

     

    A hundred questions – will this story work? Will this headline sing or sink? What’s a better word for…? Why didn’t I think of that (usually the next morning)?

     

    A hundred answers – every day. With every congratulatory message, every phone call and email and sms and chat popup that says “Good job!”  Yes, the answer is that we not only can, we did.

     

  • When a word or phrase is used slightly differently, its meaning can change, and not slightly. Vidya Heble makes a case for using the right word

    Speaking of Which | I Mean To Say

    By Vidya Heble

     

    Speaking of Which regulars may know that the Hindustan Times is my daily of choice. It’s not perfect but it’s good. Among the high points associated with it is the Sunday edition – one, for Ashish Shakya’s side-splitting column, and two, for Brunch.

     

    Brunch is in demand in my building; because of some foul-up with coupons, HT doesn’t come to the other family residence, which is in the same building as mine. They read other newspapers but HT Brunch gets shared between me and my nephew. Update: The coupon problem was solved, probably even as this was being posted, and HT arrives at the door of the other family house again.

     

    One reading quirk I have is that of starting magazines from the back page and reading them backwards, as it were. Apparently it’s not uncommon, and it may be a sign of a gifted person. Some would say “special”, but I digress. The fact is that the back of the magazine has the interesting little tasty bits, like the last page with fun stuff on it, etc. It just progresses from there.

     

    The Brunch of February 3 similarly ended up being opened from the back page, after I had looked at the front cover and then the back cover. This issue is the Readers’ Special with contributions by, well, readers. Readers aren’t writers (though I have to say some writers aren’t writers either), so I wouldn’t expect them to know the ins and outs of, um, writing. But the staff of the publication should. Nay, must. That’s what they get paid for, innit?

     

    So I read about this lawyer who ponders why people love books. The intro to his piece said, “Don’t scorn at those who read Twilight just because you’ve read Ulysses.” After I had retrieved my mind from the edges of space to which it had retreated, trying to assimilate Twilight and Ulysses in the same breath, I wondered whether I should write to Brunch. Because, as I expect and hope many of you will have noted, one does not say “scorn at”. One says “scorned”, or “heaped scorn upon”. Or “scoffed at”, which I am guessing is what was meant here, going by the general tone and content of the piece. Want a tip to remember it? “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” No “at”.

     

    Still, I thought I’d give it a rest, stop being a whiner and move on, and I turned the page. There was a media professional talking about how he had to perforce go on holidays with his parents when he was growing up. “Holidaying with parents has hardly ever been an option,” said the intro (and the copy said it too, varying the tense). When I first read the intro I thought this was a guy yearning to go on holidays with his parents and not being able to. Which is what it means, in the form it is in. But what the story says is that holidaying with his parents was not optional. This is the phrase to use when you mean that it is compulsory and there is no opting out. (Any of you remember those “optional” papers back in college?)

     

    Two of those in a row couldn’t be ignored. Here are people, educated and articulate, who are read by lots of other people who will then take these people’s words as given… This, this is why there is an onus of responsibility on publications to get it right, from facts to usage. Because people emulate, and imitate, and copy-paste. Because this is how mistakes get perpetuated.

     

    Fine, the sky won’t fall if a word is misused or a meaning is unclear. But letting something slide when you know it is wrong – that’s the first step to bypassing all rules. Even the ones you like. That way leads to anarchy.

     

  • Spelling and grammar is more important than looks, at least for nearly half of the single people in a recent survey. Vidya Heble wonders why

    Speaking of Which | Wats In A Date

    By Vidya Heble

     

    According to a recent online survey of 1,700 adults, 43 percent of online daters consider bad grammar a “major” turnoff. More than a third (35 percent) think good grammar is sexy, and 22 percent couldn’t care less.

     

    A longtime friend and former colleague read this and, naturally, thought of Speaking of Which, so he was kind enough to send it on.

     

    The survey said – ahem – women have stronger feelings about grammar than men do. Check it out: http://www.prdaily.com/Main/Articles/13777.aspx

     

    The survey was carried out by a firm that offers professional proofreading and editing services (yes, they exist, and in case you’re wondering about the difference between editing and proofreading, we shall speak of that too in a subsequent column). So it may seem like a vested interest, but the fact is, and I know it has struck a chord with some of you, that a clumsily worded self-portrait may not even attract a second look.

     

    As one of the commenters on the story said, “The lack of proper grammar is a sign of not putting much effort into how you come across to others. If you’re trying to date, or get a job, you should want to sound like you give a darn about the impression others will have of you. I can forgive the occasional typo if the majority of the written words look like thought and time have been put into them.”

     

    Another remarked: “It displays a lack of intelligence and intelligence is very very sexy. It also reveals a lack of attention to the world itself; good grammar can be achieved just by paying merely attention when one reads – if one reads. It’s also just plain rude. If a person really wants to find a life partner, taking the time to proofread is merely polite.”

     

    One does not need advanced degrees to ensure that what one says is reasonably accurate and free of boo-boos. Every program – short of, perhaps, Notepad – comes with spelling and grammar checks, those wavy green and red lines under flagged words and phrases in MS Word for example. Even Google and Gmail check your writing as you type. Your writing need not be flowery – in fact, such attempts usually backfire – but there is little reason it can’t be written in plain English (you know, no SMS-speak) and be free of basic mistakes. In this era, there is very little excuse for not doing so, especially when one is online. There is help for everything on the internet.

     

    Why does it matter? As the commenters on that survey said, it shows that you care at least that much about how you portray yourself. This is, of course, on a dating site where your image is vital. But the principle holds in other situations too, because every time you send out a piece of writing, you are sending out a message about yourself. The sub-text of what you write – is it clean, well formatted, efficiently worded, accurate as to spelling and grammar – tells the recipient that you care about your work.

     

    You don’t need to wait until you write something “significant”, if you make disciplined writing second nature, anything you write can be significant.

     

  • Vidya Heble entreats readers not to beg. The question, that is

    Speaking of Which | Begging the Question

    By Vidya Heble

     

    “Begs the question” does not mean “Gives rise to the question,” which is how I see it used sometimes, much to my dismay. Begging the question is not a phrase or clause, it is a logical fallacy, and it’s been around much before any of our identifiable ancestors. It is one of the classic informal fallacies in Aristotle’s Prior Analytics. The fallacy of petitio principii, or “begging the question”, is committed “when a proposition which requires proof is assumed without proof.” “Beg the question”, simply, means “to assume the truth of the conclusion of one’s argument without bothering to prove it”.

     

    Begging the question is what one does in an argument when one already assumes what one is supposed to be proving. Or, states question itself as the answer to the question. “Why is this a popular programme? Because viewers like it.” The fact that viewers like it makes it popular, so the response to this is, “That begs the question.” Another example is, “Why does opium induce sleep? Because it has a soporific quality.”

     

    “Begs the question” does not need to have an actual question following it; it is a phrase in itself, and the “question” it refers to is already inherent in the statement being discussed. Therefore, desist from talking about begging the question, unless you know for sure that you are using it in the right context. Or, of course, if you’re involved in a philosophical-logical discussion.

     

  • It is not always enough to get facts, spelling and grammar right. You also have to remember the sub-text of what you are saying, writes Vidya Heble

    Speaking of Which | The Last Resort

    By Vidya Heble

     

    If you are someone who writes – or edits – for a living, it is not always enough to get facts, spelling and grammar right. You also have to remember the sub-text of what you are saying. I’ve seen a reporter pulled up for describing someone in their 50s as “elderly”. Of course, this was in a newsroom which was extremely, um, straitlaced, but it drove home to me the importance of implication.

     

    One such mistake that reporters often make is implying that when police teargas, lathi-charge or open fire on protesters, they are forced to do so by the unrelenting provocation of the mob. This is done, probably unwittingly, through the simple expedient of using “resorted to”. “Police resorted to a lathi-charge,” is the most common example. It must be made clear that “resorted to” is not a synonym for “carried out”. “Resorted to” means that the police, at the end of their tether and unable to quell the frenzied crowd by any other means, resorted to violence and there was no other option available.

     

    With the explosion of media, the practice of plain old reporting seems to have fallen by the wayside, but one of the tenets of straightforward reporting is that there should be no slant or opinion injected into it. Implying that the police were pressed into firing or lathi-charging as a last resort is not recommended. “Had to” is another such phrase. Using such phrases implies that there was provocation from one side and retaliation by another. Hold off doing this. The reporter’s job is to be the word-camera, and all you need to do is think about each word as you write it.

     

    If someone says it, of course they can be quoted, and the same goes for an opinion piece. In reporting, stick with the facts. The mob marched, or threw stones, the police carried out a lathi-charge, or opened fire, or water-cannoned the protesters.

     

    Here I have used the police as an example; it can well be the other way round, as in one report where I read that the crowd resorted to stone-throwing and damaged some vehicles. Beats me why it couldn’t have been just “the crowd threw stones”. (None of them, I presume, live in glass houses.)

     

  • Verbs have their places in black and white, not including grey areas. Vidya Heble counts the shades

    Speaking of Which | Shall We Disappear You?

    By Vidya Heble

     

    There is a venerable text by a venerable pair of birds, Wren and Martin. Those over 40 should know about it, and those under that should too, if it is still the standard for school grammar education since I was there. It is titled High School English Grammar and Composition, and it is always called the Wren & Martin, and it has been published by S Chand & Co in slightly different versions of the same utilitarian cover with the insides, as far as I can tell, unchanged.

     

    And as far as I can tell again, there isn’t any reason to change them. Grammar has not, fundamentally, changed. Yes, some words and phrases have expanded in meaning and shifted shape a little, like elastic-waisted jeans that help the wearer absorb delicious dinners without popping a button. But the essentials of grammar are still what they were. A noun is a noun, and the parts of the sentence still need to be in their places for the sentence to make sense.

     

    We may not always need to know why something is right or wrong, except when we’re explaining them to someone else. Generally when writing or editing I don’t usually need to look up points of grammar. After 25 years on the job, language generally comes naturally to one. But when I get onto the Speaking of Which soapbox, and I have to justify my pontification, that’s when a tome is useful. There is a choice of volumes – Fowler’s, Oxford Companion, Websters, a selection of Penguin titles. But to explain one particular point of grammar I had to dig out my Wren and Martin.

     

    That point of grammar is the verb – transitive versus intransitive. In grammarese, an intransitive verb is a verb that has no direct object. This is distinct from a transitive verb, which takes one or more objects. The verb property is called transitivity. Very broadly and a bit simply, a transitive verb is something that you do to someone else. And an intransitive verb is one that you do yourself or to yourself. You don’t have to worry about which verb is called what, although the word “trans” = “transfer” will help you remember if you want to. Far more important is to remember that an intransitive verb should not be made to do a transitive verb’s work. One instance of this is people using (or misusing) “disappear” thus. “He disappeared the file,” was one. You can’t do that. You can make the file disappear, or you can do away with the file. Or you yourself can disappear, as I wish perpetrators of these grammatical injustices would do.

     

    In English, of course, there are grey areas. It has been compared to a woman’s wardrobe in terms of its lack of logic, although these days a man’s wardrobe would compete quite satisfactorily for that. The verb “grow” used in conjunction with money is one which baffled me for a while. “Grow your money” sounded terribly wrong but then what about growing plants? There’s no one-size-fits-all rule here. Finally I decided that you should not grow inanimate objects. Grow tomatoes, yes. Grow money – nice concept but it won’t happen. You can, however, make your money or your company grow, and here’s hoping you benefit majorly from it.

     

  • Don't be unnecessarily shameless, says Vidya Heble

    Speaking of Which | A little less shame, perhaps?

    By Vidya Heble

     

    This time we focus on the wrong use of a word – not incorrect but not quite what is intended to be meant. Chief among them is ‘shameless’, a word that I’ve noticed people using increasingly often. Shameless seems to be the default replacement word to mean anything from frank to brazen.

     

    The murderous assault in Delhi of a young woman and her companion left me drained of the will to be pedantic about word usage in the face of such far more vital issues, but duty does call.

     

    Shameless is a strong word and has a negative connotation. We usually don’t intend to imply this negative meaning when we use the word, so why don’t we take a few moments and look for words that actually mean what we intend? For instance, I unashamedly confess to being a fan of John Abraham. I might even be uninhibited when jumping with joy at the prospect of meeting him. But in neither case would I be shameless. You shouldn’t, either.

     

    Another word I’ve come across, mainly in word-portraits about some personality or the other, is ‘humble’. I can understand humble beginnings such as a handcart pusher going on to become a big businessman. But his personality remains, not humble but modest. In the Indian context modesty is practically synonymous with personal space, the invasion of which amounts to ‘outraging of modesty’. But modesty is also a character attribute, and it means something different from humility (and that is a word related to ‘humble’, in case you wondered).

     

    The big question: How do you know which word to use? How do you know there are these other words that express what you want to say? The only way to find out is to read, read, read. Not text messages but books.

     

  • It used to be suo moto. Now it seems to have turned into suo motu, which sounds wrong to Vidya Heble. Anyone there to clarify?

    Speaking of Which | So Suo Me

    By Vidya Heble

     

    Now and then I dip into other newspapers and every time I think I have indeed made the right choice with my Hindustan Times subscription. It’s not perfect, but no newspaper can be (ok maybe the New York Times but we don’t know for sure, do we?) and HT is probably as good as it can get. Mistakes are few and far between, and often excusable as what I call “genuine typos”.

     

    Now and then HT surprises one with a zinger of the nice kind, such as the other day when they described an upscale neighbourhood as “tony”. An unusual word to use but I’m glad they did; people who don’t know what it means will either get the drift, or (one hopes) look it up and thus be educated as well as edified.

     

    Then I turned a page.

     

    In a report about something to do with courts, there was the phrase “suo motto”. Even typing it makes me laugh; it evoked a hearty chuckle when I read it. Actually the phrase suo moto is one of the topics on the Speaking of Which list, because it usually gets printed as “suo motu”, which may be amusing to those of us who know Hindi, but is also incorrect. That is, as far as I know. Apparently a Wikipedia entry gives the definition for “suo motu”, but the only instances I can find of its use are on sub-continent news sites. I still think suo moto – which exists in Latin definition lists – is the right phrase, and anyone who can back it up with a proper Latin dictionary or the equivalent will get a box of chocolates with no compulsion to share it with me.

     

    Literally translated, suo moto means “on its own motion.” The term generally refers to a situation wherein a judge acts without request by either party to the action before the court. Perhaps if the judge made a quip while doing so, it could well be suo motto.

     

  • Perhaps afraid of committing themselves with a "will", or wanting to sound polite and ineffable, more and more people are using "would" in the wrong place. Vidya Heble tries to restore order

    Speaking of Which – The Woulds Are Not Lovely

    By Vidya Heble

     

    Perhaps afraid of committing themselves with a “will”, or wanting to sound polite and ineffable, more and more people are using “would” in the wrong place. It is reminiscent of the backlash against “me”, which resulted in everyone saying “I” even when “me” was the correct word. That wave has begun to recede, fortunately, but there’s a new one upon us. It’s the tsunami of the “would”.

     

    I see it in at least one press release every other day, and I kid you not. There’s an announcement of someone’s impending appointment or a product launch or an event, and we are told, “So-and-so would take charge on Monday.” “The gadget would be priced at Rs x.” It should be obvious to the reader that “will” is the right word to use in these instances. So why don’t they say “will”? (Or are they secretly telling us that So-and-so would take charge on Monday if he could shake off the massive hangover he’s bound to get after the Sunday party? And that the gadget would be priced at Rs x if the marketers felt generous, but instead they are selling it at Rs x++, suckers?)

     

    I can only imagine that it is some sort of desire to sound fancy – that is what drives most of the drivel these days.  But being wrong is not fancy at all, and the sooner the would-wielders learn it, the better.

     

    “Would” is, of course, used by news writers when quoting someone in indirect speech, ie without inverted commas. For example: The announcement would revolutionize the industry, he said. “The announcement will revolutionize the industry,” he said. When “would” is used in the context of a future event, it indicates a condition attached to it – ie, “I would if I could”. It is also a super-polite way to say “will”, but not quite in Press Release Land: “Mr Tochuka Sui would be happy to attend.”

     

    There are many other legitimate uses of “would”, and who better than the BBC (http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/learnit/learnitv43.shtml)  and the British Council (http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/english-grammar/verbs/modal-verbs/will-or-would) to explain them?

     

    I would hit the sack now if I could, but there are miles to go before I sleep.

     

    Vidya Heble is Deputy Editor at MxMIndia, when she is not twitching obsessive-compulsively.

     

  • If it's worth printing, it's worth getting it right. Especially if it's printed on the front page, says Vidya Heble

    Speaking of Which | Drawing the Line

    If I could manage without reading any newspapers at all, I would happily pick that option. But I can’t yet afford to live in a cocoon and, let’s face it, newspapers do give us the lowdown on the news that we may have sampled on the internet the previous day. I subscribe to the best option around, the Hindustan Times, and sometimes I browse other newspapers.

     

    But I seriously wonder if I can take it much longer. There has recently been a steady stream of language-related atrocities, and this is in the very limited news reading that I do. It started with Mumbai Mirror which reported various details surrounding the death of Asha Bhosle’s daughter. It also mentioned Ashaji’s sister “Lala” Mangeshkar. On the front page. Once I had stopped groaning I realized that it isn’t totally wrong, as someone in my family pointed out – she does sing “La la la la la…”

     

    But that one could have been what we call a “genuine typo”. Then came a report in Hindustan Times about the kidnapping of a boy, where the ransom note was written on a piece of “fullscape” paper. This was obvious an error of ignorance, because the term is actually “foolscap”, referring to the size of the typical “long book” that students use. I suppose a simple search for the term (even the wrong term) coupled with “paper size” would have cleared it up. That is, if the reporter or the sub-editor wanted to ensure it was correct. “Fullscape” is an unusual word. Why not look it up to make sure it’s correct?

     

    More serious than that, a few days later in HT, was a report blurbed on the front page and carried in full on an inside page, which left me much alarmed. It talked about the India-China border, referring to it all along as the “MacMohan Line”. (Mac Mohan is a Hindi film villain-sidekick actor!) I find it really hard to believe that no one, at all, on the desk and especially on the front page, knew that it is the McMahon Line. All right, assuming that the average age on the average desk is 24 and that the average range of knowledge considers the 1980s as ‘history’, still… what about looking it up? If they cared enough to look it up. Or cared at all.

     

    Why care? Why do a job well when you can get away with doing it slipshod? Because we are in the profession of disseminating information, that’s why. We should not be allowed to get away with doing it badly. Our job is not only to entertain (did I hear a gasp?) but chiefly to inform. And information needs to be correct. In my hierarchy of getting things right, facts are at the top. Then comes spelling and grammar. The McMahon boo-boo was an error of both fact and spelling. I don’t expect journalists to know everything. But I do expect them to look it up. In an era when search and reference tools are handier and more accessible than I have ever known them to be, there is no excuse for getting it wrong, at least on the front page. Besides, how else are we ourselves to learn anything new if we don’t find out?

     

    This is not a case for perfection. In a business where everything moves fast, and is getting increasingly so with stepped-up technology by the day, it’s not possible to dot every i and cross every t. But “MacMohan Line” is beyond the pale. It was considered important enough for the front page. It is very much an important fact (the India-China border, after all). Was it not important enough to get it right?

     

    PS: In despair, I turned to food. Reading about it, that is. BBC Good Food has been my refuge from the world, and I enjoy sinking into the luscious photographs and excellently presented recipes and articles. But the October issue brought great disappointment. For one, the brand Woh Hup was spelled Who Hup. Yes, the electronic spell checker “corrects” it, though the human eye should have been on the lookout for this particular word. Leaving that behind, later in the same issue I also came across “exhorbitantly” – a damning error if there was any. This is understandable and even forgivable if it appears in a high-frequency publication such as a daily, where a spell-check is sometimes overlooked in the hurry of meeting the daily deadline. But Good Food is a monthly and there is enough time to check everything. I know, I’ve worked in one and done it. Good Food is a publication of quality, not a two-bit magazine from which nothing great can be expected. It’s priced high enough that everything should be obsessively checked before it goes to print. And remember, a spell-check is only as good as the person carrying it out.

     

  • From the time we started operations in mid-2021, we are governed by a strict and unambiguous Code of Ethics

    MxM Code of Ethics

     

    Every six-odd months, we publish our Code of Ethics. For more than ever before, the Indian media needs to adopt one and practise it.

    We are now part of the Digital Publishers Association of India and will follow the self-regulatory procedures set by it. Our editor is also a member of the Editors Guild of India and the Press Club, Mumbai. More than ever before, it’s important the media acts responsibly as must people around it.

    MxMIndia adopted a Code of Ethics even before it was launched. Although it’s on the site, since it could have become a blindspot, we publish it as our Big Story once or twice a year. This is the link to the Code: http://www.mxmindia.com/code-of-ethics/

    Read on…

     

    The MxMIndia Code of Ethics

    This code of ethics is not meant to be a treatise in ethics. We believe all MxMers are mature professionals, of sound character and have values we agree with.

    However, since a Code of Ethics is not really followed in organisations that some of our employees may have worked with in the past, we have a formulated an easy-to-follow set of Do’s and Don’ts that each and every employee has agreed to follow.

    Also, since there’s a general belief that many media companies (business-to-business and mainstream) follow unethical practices, it’s hence critical to put the record straight on why MxMIndia isn’t like the ‘many’ others.

     

    1. While the objective of MxMIndia is to be a profitable enterprise, our revenues will not come from compromising editorial standards. Excellence is what we are setting out to achieve, Ethically and with Integrity.

     

    2. We will not be influenced in any way by advertisers – past, present or future, and will write or comment on an individual, service or organisation regardless of whether or not it advertises with MxMIndia.

     

    3. We will not sell our editorial content. Content includes text, photographs, videos or any visuals.

     

    4. Accuracy in presenting facts is of utmost importance and facts must be correctly presented.

     

    5. We will not present any bias in our news sections. If, however, MxM India does undertake a campaign, it will clearly state its editorial policy

     

    6. If there’s any advertisement that could be confused with editorial content in appearance, it will be clearly tagged as an Advertisement and be displayed in a style that is different from normal editorial content.

     

    7. Our reports and features will always attribute sources to people. In case, the source does not want to be named for fear of loss of employment or due to some sensitivity, every attempt must be made to look for an alternate source who could be named. If that fails, every attempt should be made to make the reader rest assured that our source is authentic and this may be done by describing who the source is.

     

    8. We have a no tolerance policy towards plagiarism. Employees may be given a warning if found plagiarising, but in most cases, the services of any employee found plagiarising – regardless of her/his seniority or utility to the organisation – would be terminated within 24 hours of the Editor-in-Chief conducting his/her investigation on the act of plagiarism.

     

    9. If any attempt is made to influence us by way of a threat to withdraw advertisements, we reserve the right to expose such individuals and/or their organisations.

     

    10. We will not publish photographs off the internet. If a picture is be taken from the internet, it will be done only after written permission of the source. Else, we will own the rights for the picture which may be procured by buying rights for appropriate usage. Ditto for text. If we do carry syndicated content, the source needs to be clearly be stated at the end of the article.

     

    11. Our journalists will take the permission of the interviewee to record her/his comments, especially when the meeting is not face-to-face.

     

    12. Unless approved by the Editor, we do not part with the transcript of any interview. A journalist may however play back a few quotes attributed to an individual.

     

    13. We will allow individuals or organisations adequate time to revert with their response to a question. In most case the adequate time would mean four to six hours. If it’s a non-critical story, then we would recommend holding the story for at least (and at most) a day.

     

    14. We will not accept any gifts that attempt to influence us. These should be returned immediately. Gifts in the form of chocolates, mithai, flowers or basic promotional material that is of reasonable value (of up to Rs 750-1000) is fine. Mementos or promotional material of nominal value may be accepted. No gifts must be solicited. If there’s a doubt, please consult the Editor-in-Chief/CEO. If an organisation is found to influence an MxMIndia journalist, under extreme cases, MxMIndia may even blacklist the organisation and/or its products and services.

     

    15. We will not solicit any outstation trips. If however there is an invitation for a junket, we will accept it only if the Editor believes there is a news value in the event. In such a case, MxMIndia will mention that the journalist concerned has visited an outstation venue at the invitation of the company which must be named. For local travel, all our employees are defrayed expenses towards local travel, and hence we discourage taxi pick-ups or drops, as is the norm in some sections of the media.

     

    16. We will not solicit any invitations for a meal or a drink. We discourage MxMIndia employees to drink beyond their limits at events, dinners, press conferences etc where they represent the Company. We will also not solicit free books, software, movie tickets etc.

     

    17. MxMIndia employees are discouraged from moonlighting. If, however, employees do receive requests to write an occasion article for a non-competing publication, the employee could do it after seeking permission via email.

     

    18 .Unlike some media houses, we are happy to see our employees – regardless of their seniority levels – to be interviewed and featured in other media. However, prior permission is desired for every appearance on television. Employees must ensure that their work at MxMIndia doesn’t suffer due to their appearances on TV, radio etc. While tweeting, participation in social networks like Facebook and Linked In are encouraged, every attempt must be taken to ensure that the values and interests of the organisation are not compromised.

     

    19. We will ensure that our ethical standards are followed in all that we do – events, conferences and awards. We will ensure our integrity is not compromised.

     

    20. We discourage the use of pirated products and services for official use. We advise our employees to only use legally procured software. Employees using their personal computer equipment for work are encouraged to switch to legal software.

     

    21. MxMIndia has a no tolerance policy on sexual harassment.

     

    22. Our employees are not allowed to deal in stocks related to the media and entertainment sector. If they hold shares before joining the organisation, they must disclose their holdings in writing to their immediate boss. They could, however, invest in mutual funds related to the M&E sector.

     

    23. While this Code is only applicable towards conduct as an employee, we advise all MxMers to ensure that they are ambassadors of MxMIndia and all that it stands for even outside of work hours.

     

    24. Over the last few years, there have been question marks raised about the ethical standards adopted by journalists and media organisations. While a lot of it may be untrue, we believe that journalists and others working in various media organisations are also responsible for this perception. At MxMIndia, our attempt will be to reverse this.

     

    25. This Code is applicable for all employees of MxMIndia. Associates, retainers, columnists, regular contributors are also required to adhere to the above Code.

     

    We encourage all our constituents and advertisers to read the above document and cooperate with us and enable us to abide by it. If you wish to report a dishonest act, write directly to pradyumanm [at] mxmindia.com.