Welcome To 2007: Johnston Press Bans Facebook | paidContent:UK July 2, 2009
Posted by Jonathan Hewett in : delicious links , add a comment"Can any modern news publishing business justify banning its staff from accessing social networking sites? While many national and regional newspapers have now reversed earlier decisions to ban workplace access to time-sapping Facebook—Johnston Press has set the clock back to 2007 and informed staff at The Scotsman and its other Edinburgh papers that Facebook is banned except in special cases. In a memo, (via Allmediascotland), JP management warn reporters that “a recent review” found more than half of the company’s entire outbound traffic is to Facebook so it has no choice but it stop people visiting. the Memo reads: “Journalists who require access should seek approval from their departmental head, who should contact the Group Helpdesk to have the permission restored.”
Just like Friends Reunited before it, Facebook has become a standard reporting tool for many local and regional reporters—one JP journalist told me recently they couldn’t imagine working without it.
A twitterable Twitter policy (Gruntled Employees) June 26, 2009
Posted by Jonathan Hewett in : delicious links , 1 comment so farJay Shepherd’s commonsense approach to corporate policy for use of social media. Includes 140-character policy for Twitter:
“I generally advocate a simpler approach that involves treating employees as grown-ups who have judgment. See, for example, “A two-word corporate blogging policy” and “The world’s shortest employee handbook.”
With that said, here is my take at a corporate Twitter policy that has the extra added benefit of being itself twitterable:
Our Twitter policy: Be professional, kind, discreet, authentic. Represent us well. Remember that you can’t control it once you hit ‘update.’ ”
Poynter Online – New York Times' Policy on Facebook and Other Social Networking Sites February 27, 2009
Posted by Jonathan Hewett in : delicious links , add a commentNYT takes a cautious line on the potential risks:
"Be careful not to write anything on a blog or a personal Web page that you could not write in The Times — don't editorialize, for instance, if you work for the News Department.
Anything you post online can and might be publicly disseminated, and can be twisted to be used against you by those who wish you or The Times ill — whether it's text, photographs, or video. That includes things you recommend on TimesPeople or articles you post to Facebook and Digg, content you share with friends on MySpace, and articles you recommend through TimesPeople. It can also include things posted by outside parties to your Facebook page, so keep an eye on what appears there.
Just remember that we are always under scrutiny by magnifying glass and that the possibilities of digital distortion are virtually unlimited, so always ask yourself, could this be deliberately misconstrued or misunderstood by somebody who wants to make me look bad?"
Economic woe could end inequality in the education system | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk October 17, 2008
Posted by Jonathan Hewett in : delicious links , add a commentFrancis Beckett's take on how, in the long term, "Britain's economic woes could be good news for our schools". Wonder what he makes of business/industry links with universities. Or maybe we can guess:
"First, they will decouple business from academies…
Second, they will weaken the stranglehold business has over education. It is essentially to appease business that the government seeks to divide children at 11 or 14 into successes and failures, expanding the number of schools that are allowed to select some or all of their pupils. It damages the children, but it is convenient for their future employers.
Top business people will have less time to spend dictating how schools are run. And if they have any shame, they will be less inclined to consider themselves qualified to lecture to schools. Just possibly, Gordon Brown and his ministers will be less inclined to suppose that anything the public sector does, the private sector is bound to do better."