The key line here is probably "which is now defunct"...
Yet another example emerges of a journalist fired for blogging on company time.
It's certainly an interesting phenomenon. I have to admit to looking over my shoulder figuratively if not literally sometimes. But its not - or shouldn't be - purely a time/resources argument. Surely it all comes down to reputation: how the news organisation sees itself and its relationship with its employees, its industry and its customers.
I'm not for a second suggesting that behaviour that warrants criticism shouldn't be commented on. If it's likely to become widely known in any case, it's all fair game, and since we rely on folks at other organisations to tell us what's happening there, one way or another, we should be prepared for the same sort of scrutiny where it's justified.
Obviously it's all case-by-case. But generally, discourse is encouraged and inside insights are always the best. What might be pushing things too far is a circumstance where someone for whatever reason sets out deliberately to undermine their colleagues by damaging their or their paper's collective reputation? And it really doesn't sound like this particular instance even falls into that category.
It's sure to be an ongoing debate. I've been talking with a couple of people here about putting together some kind of bloggers' "style guide"; which would be a list of tips for internal and external contributors who might be providing blog content for us. Seems like problems can arise most easily where there aren't any clear guidelines.
For example, when we upgraded our internal email system last year, in order to sign on now, you're presented with a standard piece of boilerplate that says that by signing on you agree to the company's "acceptable use policy" which covers them for well, anything they want to be covered against.
On a related note, I was trying to file a column last night by email - from home, not from work - and to cut a long story short, the attachment got bounced back to me undelivered because, I assume, I'd unthinkingly put the words "soft-porn" in the headline (of the attachment, not the subject line of the message); even though the column had virtually nothing to do to that topic, but was about the most popular uses of interactive television....
Yet another example emerges of a journalist fired for blogging on company time.
It's certainly an interesting phenomenon. I have to admit to looking over my shoulder figuratively if not literally sometimes. But its not - or shouldn't be - purely a time/resources argument. Surely it all comes down to reputation: how the news organisation sees itself and its relationship with its employees, its industry and its customers.
I'm not for a second suggesting that behaviour that warrants criticism shouldn't be commented on. If it's likely to become widely known in any case, it's all fair game, and since we rely on folks at other organisations to tell us what's happening there, one way or another, we should be prepared for the same sort of scrutiny where it's justified.
Obviously it's all case-by-case. But generally, discourse is encouraged and inside insights are always the best. What might be pushing things too far is a circumstance where someone for whatever reason sets out deliberately to undermine their colleagues by damaging their or their paper's collective reputation? And it really doesn't sound like this particular instance even falls into that category.
It's sure to be an ongoing debate. I've been talking with a couple of people here about putting together some kind of bloggers' "style guide"; which would be a list of tips for internal and external contributors who might be providing blog content for us. Seems like problems can arise most easily where there aren't any clear guidelines.
For example, when we upgraded our internal email system last year, in order to sign on now, you're presented with a standard piece of boilerplate that says that by signing on you agree to the company's "acceptable use policy" which covers them for well, anything they want to be covered against.
On a related note, I was trying to file a column last night by email - from home, not from work - and to cut a long story short, the attachment got bounced back to me undelivered because, I assume, I'd unthinkingly put the words "soft-porn" in the headline (of the attachment, not the subject line of the message); even though the column had virtually nothing to do to that topic, but was about the most popular uses of interactive television....
posted by Steve at 3:09 PM
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