Redrawing the "church and state" line

The American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME), basking in the warmth of the American Magazine Conference in the Puerto Rico sun, have unveiled a revised set of guidelines about advertising. It is something of a 10 Commandments, boiled down from a much longer document that used to be used.

Like the old guidelines, however, the new ones call for anything that resembles editorial copy to be labelled to keep from fooling readers. However it is softened somewhat, allowing the term "promotion" to be used as a label in addition to "advertisement". It accepts sponsorship of non-recurring editorial features as long as they're marked as advertising.

The full text of the new guidelines can be read here.

Mark Whitaker, Editor of Newsweek and President of ASME, said of the new guidelines: "ASME is hoping to continue to be the conscience of the industry, without giving everyone a headache."