Roman is the chief executive officer of salty snax corporation. roman’s responsibilities include decisions on product development, marketing, and other significant business directions. roman is subject to the approval and oversight of salty snax’s board of directors. teri is a salty snax manager whose duties include the firm’s day-to-day hiring, firing, purchasing, and selling. umberto is a salty snax salesperson, whose daily activities are controlled by teri. velma writes sales manuals and promotional materials for salty snax’s products according to roman’s instructions and subject to salty snax’s control, but has no dealings with the company’s customers or suppliers. warren writes copy on a contract-per-project basis and is not otherwise subject to salty snax’s control. who is a principal? who is an agent? who is an employee? who is an independent contractor?

David burdick is the ceo of acme bubblegum, a successful public company. as one of the cofounders of the company, burdick has enjoyed speaking and writing about the success of acme bubblegum for several years. typically, he speaks at conferences or directly to the press, but recently, he has been blogging about his firm anonymously. specifically, he defended a recent advertising campaign that was unpopular among consumers and pointedly attacked one of acme bubblegum’s competitors. burdick deeply enjoys his anonymous blogging and believes that none of his readers actually know that he works for acme bubblegum.should burdick be allowed to praise his company’s performance anonymously online? should he be allowed to attack his competitors without disclosing his relationship with the company? how would you feel if the ceo of a company at which you shopped was secretly writing criticisms of his or her competition? how would you feel if you knew a writer for your favorite blog was actually closely involved in a company that the blog discussed? 1. define the ethical issue? 2. who are the primary stakeholders? 3. what are the possible alternatives? 4. how could you evaluate the ethical implications of the alternative actions (use appropriate decision rules)? 5. what action would you recommend and why?