Mo Money Mo Problems

The money part of the NYTimes handbook is basically logical, but I guess not to anyone familiar with "independent news".
I didn't actually think about the fact that reporters may own stock in companies they might eventually cover- it seems like an out-there predicament but I guess a good thing to cover. Considering our publication is a bunch of 20-somethings, I doubt we'll own stock in anything ever, so it's not something we'd want to directly address. However, the next few points that any conflict that their spouse or family has might create the same problem might apply. I think this is probably more for how readers might perceive this bias than any worry of actual bias.
(The next entire section is basically just telling anyone associated with business or business stories that they cannot own stock with any company beside NYTImes)
Transition to.... SPORTS.
Again for perceiving bias reasons, no one in the sports department may gamble on sports games. However, does this apply to things like Fantasy Baseball? Since our project isn't planning on directly covering sports, I don't think this will be in our ethics code. Not accepting tickets or anything from promoters is probably good from any section. To our application, this would also include theater tickets and anything from people with sports teams or even local businesses.
The next part involves culture: is this part implying that someone in the lifestyles section cannot take part in or help someone take part in writing a book? Because I feel like this happens all of the time. Not recommending people for hire makes sense, because then clearly that's showing some sort of bias. The next part about not taking part or suggesting anything in the news reporters cover would definitely be a part of our ethics code. Once a journalist steps in, it is no longer objective reporting. One should never become part of the story they cover.
As for photographers, they cannot accept gifts but (I didn't think of this one) they also cannot endorse anything relating to their art or even offer advice in their art.
Likewise, travel editors/writers cannot accept gifts or freebies from anyone in the travel business. Again, our website won't have enough money to send people on these trips anyway so I'm not worried about things like restaurant and travel reviews quite yet.