February 15, 2005
-
First Amendment Rights Don’t Always Apply to Bloggers
My friend forwarded me this article. Luckily she’s going to be a lawyer and fight for your rights to parrrrrrtay. Seriously, though, eventhough all you Xanga authors are always sweet and generally positve about your lives (at least those of you who I read), you might want to take a look at this before you vent about Bossy McBoss. I’m all for starting a revolution, but I’ve got bills….
The article, written by Washington Post Staff Writer Amy Joyce, describes the punishmet that blogger Rachel Mosteller recived after venting about work in her live journal:
“This post, like all entries in Mosteller’s online diary, did not name her company or the writer. It did not name co-workers or bosses. It did not say where the company was based. But apparently, Mosteller’s supervisors and co-workers at the Durham (N.C.) Herald-Sun were well aware of her Web log.
The day after that posting, she was fired.”
Here is the link:
Washington Post ArticleIt will ask you to sign in. Go to www.bugmenot.com to get a sign in that won’t shovel emails into your box. But perhaps you want to subscribe–its up to you! Either way, its worth a read.
Comments (8)
I can’t post to Xanga at work, because of the filtering software, and no one there knows I blog. I don’t want people to mix up autobiographical fiction for biography.
I’m at work right now! I’m not sure if it’s a violation of the First Amendment right when your boss fires you because you talk about how you actively dislike your job and coworkers. I think it would only be in effect if you worked in the public sector and your boss was The Man (the governmental man, that is). Maybe the firing was a blessing in disguise! But what will she blog about now?
there’s no guarantee the agent will want it and i haven’t been accepted by a publishing company yet- so i’m a long way from published- i’m just ready to begin the process…. sigh! and the love of my life made the same edits you do. They want the ending in the short blurb- it won’t really go on a cover-that’s just the best way to think of this… it took me four months to write the novel and six to prepare it for publishing! and i love feedback so keep it coming!
and yes, blogging about your work can get you fired- it’s happened countless times. i’ve read a couple stories on it, and will go track them down. until a blogger wins a lawsuit, bloggers are unprotected currently. there are a couple heading towards the courts. while blogging has been around- they’re only recently gaining in popularity.
( o ‘ . ’ )b
Hi, sure I’ll decipher for you, and thanks for checking out my post. O is kirby’s hand the period is his mouth, the “b” is his other hand sticking a thumbs up
(o ‘ . ’ )b maybe I made him too wide, he should look like this.
huh… that sucks.
Wow, that’s a pretty intense article. I guess we can’t blame big brother for watching our publically expressed thoughts and feelings. But it does seem a bit much that we can get fired for complaining about our jobs. Perhaps our employers should use this as a chance to improve working environments.
“Truth in all its hideous splendor” does not require an apostrophe. ‘It’s’ is the contraction for ‘it is,’ ‘its’ is possessive. Normally I try not to be the spelling correction guy, because people don’t like the spelling correction guy – in fact, I bet you’re starting to hate me more as you read this – but since it’s in your tagline I thought I would mention it.
Feel free to fix it, delete this comment, and we’ll never speak of it again.