PERSONAL PUBLISHING AND EMPLOYEE BLOGS

Wikis, blogs, and podcasts can all be used as forms of personal publishing or personal broadcasting. Increasing ease of use, lower (or zero) set-up costs, and higher bandwidth go a long way to explaining the explosion in popularity of this new publishing medium. And yet it’s this same open access, transparency, and ease of use that contributes to the problematic nature of the social web, or at least that part of the social web on the open Internet. Writing about the educational value of blogs an Educause briefing paper comments that “Because blogs are often produced and maintained by individuals, they can include biased or inaccurate information. Users visiting a blog might see it as factual or authoritative when, in fact, it is the online equivalent of a soap box: a place to speak and to be heard.” (The Educause Learning Initiative, 2005).

Although there are many examples of individual bloggers whose work aspires to present a balanced, or at least a well-reasoned, perspective; there are other personal blogs where this effort is less evident. So what’s the problem? Shouldn’t an individual be able to write about whatever they think and feel? Well, leaving aside the issues arising from “Hate Speech” on the web (McCullagh, 2002), employers are increasingly faced with working out the best way to respond to employee blogs where the blogger is blogging about work-related issues (often in an anonymous capacity). Personnel Today described the case of an employee of Waterstone’s book stores who’s critical comments about his employer in his blog were considered by the company so damaging as to warrant dismissal on the grounds of gross misconduct (Personnel Today, 2006). The article goes on to discuss the pros and cons of such action on the part of employers and to suggest an employee blogger code of conduct based on IBM’s code. However, in a subsequent article within the same publication, a National Officer of the Retail Book Association - who represented the Waterstone’s employee at an appeal against the decision - pointed out that the decision to dismiss the employee blogger had subsequently been rescinded and an amicable case settlement reached. Key to the appeal was the view that “The statements it contained were thus considered to be no more than the musings one would find in a private diary - a diary that did not truly enter into the public domain until after the dismissal.” (Lee, 2006)

Since work is for many of us a core part of our identity it’s not surprising that employees choose to blog about work related issues. The web includes blogs maintained by individual police officers; nurses; occupational therapists; and yes, even social workers. The Metropolitan Police are so concerned about “a series of weblogs or blogs where authors - claiming to be police officers - have offered their views on a number of issues in a highly personalised, often controversial manner” that they recently introduced guidelines to prevent individuals "...expressing views and opinions that are damaging to the organisation or bring the organisation into disrepute" (Vallance, 2006). Although the guidelines did not prohibit blogging they were enough for one well known police blogger ([worldwearydetective.blogspot.com]) to close his blog creating a stir about censorship and control in the blogosphere (as the blogging world is sometimes described). Since the exponential growth of personal blogs shows no sign of slowing it seems likely that relationships between employers and employee bloggers (and perhaps service user bloggers) will continue to be a source of tension and controversy.

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