What's the difference?

As I was standing in the Bear Stearns trading floor on Friday, I glanced up at one of the TVs that was showing CNBC and saw that there was a reporter giving an account of what was happening in the bond market that day.

What struck me was the fact that the “report” was sponsored by PIMCO, one of the largest bond fund investors in the world. The PIMCO logo was up in the right-hand corner of the screen as the reporter talked about the ups and downs of certain bonds.

Why do I bring this up? The business journalism world has been up in arms in recent weeks about the fact that the Philadelphia Inquirer is allowing a bank to sponsor a column on the front page of its business section. The bank, Citizens Bank, has its logo on top of the PhillyInc. column, and its logo is also in the Business section masthead.

And I wonder what’s the difference between a business section getting a sponsor and a business cable network getting a sponsor for one of its news segments. In business journalism, we seem all upset with one, but not the other, but I’m having a hard time understanding the difference between the two.

Some may argue that the difference is that consumers of business news are used to seeing “sponsors” for TV programs but not for business sections of newspapers. But I’m not sure that argument holds water. If readers have grown accustomed to sponsors on TV and radio programs dealing with business or personal finance, why couldn’t they do the same with newspaper or printed business/personal finance content?

This ethical discussion came up at last weeks Society of American Business Editors and Writers annual conference. I’m sure the discussion will continue.