A little girl in my family got a typewriter for Christmas. Not a laptop. Nothing with a screen. The old-fashioned manual kind. Typewriters had pretty much gone the way of dodo birds quite some years before my granddaughter was born. But it was the typewriter used by a journalist in the movie "Kit Kittredge: An American Girl" that attracted her. Or maybe it was the way the typewriter was used. In the movie, Kit does old-fashioned journalism and writes stories that help right a wrong. In a challenging environment she keeps her wits -- and a strong sense of ethics   -- about her. However, another reporter, Chuck Tatum in "Ace in the Hole" is totally different. He tells an editor, "If there's no news, I'll go out and bite a dog." Later, referring to a sign in the newsroom that reads "Tell the Truth," Tatum acknowledges some guilt. But, "Not enough to stop me on my way to the top." In both movies, the journalists use typewriters. It's what they do with them that makes the difference. And today, it's what we do with our hardware -- the journalism we produce -- that makes the difference. Typewriters have long since given way to laptops, camera phones and video phones. But here at Thomson Reuters  , and in the media as a whole, the need for a strong sense of ethics has never been more necessary. To me, at the heart of ethics are the preservation   of honesty, independence and freedom from prejudice. It means ethics and standards are compatible with innovation  . In fact, they have to go hand in hand. There's a lot of room for innovation here, but there's no room for a Chuck Tatum, who would do anything to get to the top. In about 2020, my granddaughter will probably be using technology that hasn't been developed yet to work on her school "newspaper". She won't be using her typewriter but she will, I hope, be using what she's learned from the journalists of this generation. It's up to us to set the right example. Who are the intended readers of the passage?
People in general. Fans of American films. Children like his granddaughter. The journalists of this generation.