ABSTRACT
This chapter paints a broad picture of the legal/ethical landscape. Students moving toward a career as editors will need to find out what community is served by the publication they are working for. They must work to learn the community's written and unwritten limits. The rules of a community regarding what is published about it and its members are usually codified in some manner: Administrative agencies create rules; legislative bodies pass laws; courts interpret these and issue rulings. One of most damaging habits editors can develop, perhaps the most damaging, is when they forget their community as an audience and begin editing for themselves or a nonrepresentative segment of the community. Because of pressures or other reasons, they cease paying attention to the larger community. Written and unwritten limits are present in any community, whether its members are the readers of a newspaper, magazine, public relations newsletter or users of a Web site.
