What are the rules for doing evil in social media? The Star Tribune explores this question in a story entitled “In social media, why let facts get in the way.”
One Facebook user, angry over a dispute with a neighbor, ridicules her online as a thief and a liar. On Twitter, someone accuses a murder suspect of being a killer. A blogger discloses sensitive details about a political candidate’s personal life.
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Court actions involving users on youth-dominated social media remain surprisingly low, suggesting a new outspoken culture that’s more tolerant of lies, rude behavior and character assassination.
The article deals with US cases, but raises the universal point that “A lot of people recognize that these unaffiliated bloggers don’t have a lot of financial resources.”
On the other hand, in some cases, the defamatory postings are made from their places of employment by people who can be easily identified. Last week, a federal government employee landed in hot water for writing an email bashing a Sun Media writer (and Sun Media itself).
What policies do you have in place for employee use of corporate facilities for personal activities? This theme continues to remind me of a piece I wrote more than 4 years ago: “4 degrees of impersonal communications.”  People say things in emails that they would never say to someone over the phone. And, over the phone (especially in a voice message), we seem willing to speak in ways that one would never consider saying face-to-face. What people say things in anonymous comments add the further dimension.