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The ethical guidelines that journalists are expected to follow exist for the benefit of journalism. Mainly they consist of: 1) identifying yourself up front to those you interview; 2) anything the person says is on the record unless there is prior agreement to the contrary; 3) prior agreements regarding "not for attribution" or "off the record" for certain bits of information must be respected by the journalist. There is also the two-source guideline, but it is violated frequently because too often it depends on the specific situation. In very rare cases, a journalist might go undercover (get a job in the meat-packing industry to expose health hazards, for example). That sort of situation doesn't fly unless it's very clear that the public health and safety is involved. Chip Berlet has posed as a right-winger and attended meetings, in order to collect intelligence information, and has also done some dumpster-diving. But I don't think he pretends to be a journalist -- or at least he's not a mainstream journalist. I also don't think Berlet would be able to get a Senate gallery press pass.
I recall that during Watergate, Woodward and Bernstein got some court records through slightly inappropriate means. If the story is big enough, you can get away with extraordinary techniques.
The bottom line is that if journalism had a tradition of constantly ignoring these basic guidelines, then there wouldn't be any such thing as journalism by now. No one would want to talk to them.
Look at this from the point of view of the person interviewed. Let's say it's a member of Congress. In the first hypothetical case, the person known as Katefan0 on Wikipedia says, "Hi. This is (name redacted) from the Congressional Quarterly. Can I ask you about so-and-so?"
In the second hypothetical case, she says, "Hi. This is (name redacted) from the Congressional Quarterly, but I'm also an anonymous administrator on Wikipedia and I play with articles about members of Congress and their politics. You don't know who I am on Wikipedia, so you won't be able to hold me accountable. Can I ask you about so-and-so?"
If you are a Congressman, would you talk to the reporter in the second hypothetical case? Not unless you're crazy. If you do, it's all going to be puff and fluff, because you cannot expect that reporter to treat any extra information you give her in a professional manner. If you give her information on background, it won't end up in the Congressional Quarterly, but you cannot assume that it won't show up on Wikipedia somewhere. That's because if it does show up on Wikipedia, you cannot prove who was responsible. You're already in a no-win situation in the second hypothetical situation.
That's why she should never have edited Wikipedia under a pseudonym while she is a professional journalist. In the long run, if enough journalists did the same thing it would damage the profession. It's not a question of whether her specific edits on Wikipedia were harmless (they probably were harmless -- I haven't studied them). It's more an issue of how she could have made them harmful if she was inclined to do so at some point in the future.
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Professional journalist is an anonymous admin
