The L.A. Times reports that Disney may be taking some of Roy Disney and Stanley Gold’s complaints to heart. The “board of directors, which has come under fire for being too close to management, took another step Tuesday to strengthen its corporate governance guidelines. The changes include adopting a new code of conduct and business ethics for directors and tightening standards related to the independence of directors”. In his letter of resignation Gold complained that the previous guidelines “were carefully crafted to stifle dissent while allowing those supportive of senior management to continue business as usual”. He cited the fact that he was deemed to be not independent because he had a close association with major stockholder Roy Disney, while John Bryson was deemed independent “despite the fact that his wife is an executive officer at Lifetime Entertainment Television, a 50% owned subsidiary of Disney, where she earned in excess of $1 million in total compensation in fiscal 2001”. As a result of the new guidelines John Bryson has now lost his independent classification.