Sebastian H. Buckingham: Purveyors of Extraordinary Knowledge
Honesty is our heritage. Integrity is our foundation. Directness is our voice . Ethics is our guide.
Darrin Stephens, President of Sebastian H. Buckingham Public Relations.
On behalf of our diverse family of communications artisans, welcome. Over the past 350 years, Sebastian H. Buckingham has been afforded the impressive distinction of representing some of the most celebrated personal and corporate brands around the globe. Since our humble beginnings in a one-room office in Dublin, Ireland in 1673, Sebastian H. Buckingham has grown to have a presence in Dublin, Buenos Aires, Saigon, Casablanca, Melbourne, and Norwich, Connecticut.
Methods of communication have changed exponentially since Sebastian started his company over three centuries ago. Mass media was once only possible via the printing press. Now, mass communications can be conveyed instantly via social media. Today, anyone can self-publish. Today, everyone can convey a brand. The messages we communicate should be legal and ethical. This website is meant to be a virtual handbook for not only our family of communication artisans, but for anyone who uses social media. This handbook will offer guiding principles for legal and ethical communication.
With the guidance and input of Anne Marie, our Vice President of Legal Guidance and Jeannie Nelson, our Vice President of Ethical Guidance, we will briefly study The First Amendment as it applies to speech and press and three landmark Supreme Court cases that have helped define the parameters of The First Amendment and the impact these cases have had on communication on social media. We will explore various ethical theories, with an emphasis on the ethical approach we embrace at Sebastian H. Buckingham. We will highlight the differences between laws and ethics, while acknowledging that quite often the two overlap. We will perform a case study of the ethical impact that social media is having on the self-esteem of adolescents in The United States. Finally, we will present a set of the best legal and ethical practices that have made Sebastian H. Buckingham the successful public relations firm it is today. At the top of each page of this website is a sort of table of contents with links that will lead you to each of the individual topics addressed on this home page.
Thank you for joining us. We're glad you're here.
Darrin Stephens
Anne Marie, Vice President of Legal Guidance.
Welcome to Sebastian H. Buckingham. Every PR firm has a legal expert who specializes in First Amendment, Copyright, and Defamation Law. Here at Sebastian H. Buckingham, I'm that expert. To be less formal, I guess you could just say I'm that girl. Together, we're going to learn about The First Amendment and why it isn't a blank check to say or print whatever we want. We'll learn what we can and cannot say and print and why the government is severely limited in how it can restrict our words. We'll learn how to protect ourselves from civil lawsuits for what we print and say. We will learn how to avoid copyright infringement. We will look at privacy laws and balance those laws with the need to get accurate information. Finally, we will define obscenity. Once we've explored all of these topics, we'll assemble them into a list of the best practices that we embrace at Sebastian H. Buckingham.
I'm excited you've paid us a visit. I hope you enjoy this handbook as much as I've enjoyed collaborating in creating it.
Anne Marie
Jeannie Nelson, Vice President of Ethical Guidance.
Just because it's legal, it doesn't mean you should do it. Ethics offer refinement to law. That's what I do here at Sebastian H. Buckingham. Once Anne Marie tells our communications artisans that a message is legal, I tell them if it's ethical. In this handbook, we will identify various ethical theories to allow you to chose the one that suits your messaging best. We will then look at a case study and digest the ethics of using social media to target adolescents.
Ethics can sometimes be challenging to understand. Don't hesitate to reach out to me for further clarification about anything addressed in this handbook. I'll respond in the blink of an eye.
It's marvelous that you're here.
Jeannie Nelson