fired for blogging?
Mar 8, 2005 Just Stuff...
I heard a bit about this (no details) last week. I was glad to see Bu$ters post on his blog about employees and blogging. I read the link to the article he had, which in turn had several more (that is the true meaning of a hyper-link).
Also, something else I found interesting is some companies actually encourage blogging. For the most part I really feel this could benefit a company in many ways. Of course there are always exceptions, but in general the more-the-marrier. Even just building overall morale at work can’t hurt. And not to mention any link backs to the company site. If you really had nothing to hide, what would be the problem?
As long as it was not viewed by the company as negative. I do feel employees should have some kind of protection. At least some notice by the company to remove such material if they felt it was negative. Just another example of your not innocent until proven guilty. I don’t know, I think the best answer would be to become self employed and forget the whole thing…:)
March 9th, 2005 at 8:27 am
i think we are in agreement james. blogging seems like a very powerful tool. as much as email and im. as we know some companies have problems with email and im and others embrace the technologiess as the powerful tools that they are. i would think that blogging would and should have more of a positive impact than a negative one. however, there certainly could be some negatives. the thing that is sooooo surprising is the fact that the companies firing people for blogging are what i would generally classify as innovative org’s. so it is surprising to see that they are reacting in an apparently extreme nature. i mean what was the big deal about what the google employee blogged???? i dont get it!
March 9th, 2005 at 11:32 am
I feel its a very good thing if a company sets aside space for a blog, I see it as cutting edge - innovative and freakin’ fun. its an awesome way to share info, yet some companies look at it as time consuming and counter-productive.
Now… i think the main thing we are talkin bout here is whether or not you should cross the line and blog about your ‘job’ on your personal blog. Although I think some companies are more sensitive than others - for instance Google’s firing, and the others… I doubt we would be having the same conversation about a 7-11 employee fired for blogging. I think there is no black and white on what is deemed “positive” or “negative” by a company. For instance… you could blog about a truck full of turtles that wrecked and spilled onto the highway and were ran over by several motorists - and make a joke about it. Couple days before you blogged about your job and who you worked for - what you did - and with nothing but a positive spin on it. Then your employer checks your blog - and the company has a strong stance on animal cruelty - this could put a negative image (in the minds of the corporates) on their company - if a visitor thought that maybe the company had something to do with this website.
The problem is, we think to much - we are smarter than the avg. user - so a person could easily think this site was somewhat affiliated with the company the person works for.
**hops off homemade soapbox**
I think I made my point. I am not against it - just think we should think or even get approval before we start posting about work related things. And never should a blogger blog about stuff that is coming up that isn’t announced by the company yet. obviously.
enough -heh- Dubz
ps. for those of you that do not know - Notorious B.I.G. died today back in ‘97. R.I.P.