I use Twitter to promote my site and meet like minded people. Looked like a good event this Digital Citezens thing, spewing I missed it.

When is the next one held?

The reason these laws exist is not to impinge on free speech – it’s to protect the rights of individuals and corporations from being defamed. It’s to stop bullies and liars from dragging people through the mud.

If I were to make a comment about an ex employee that wasn’t true, and they can prove the nature of that comment affected their livelihood and emotional well being, that employee is entitled to sue both my organisation and myself personally.

If I were to make a comment about an ex client that wasn’t true, the same rule applies.

If I were to make a defaming comment right here on a blog, my IP would be tracked to a VPN and the necessary criminal and or civil charges would result.

Cyber bullying and rumour mongering is still bullying and rumour mongering, and there are reasons there are laws to protect it – they have nothing to do with freedom of speech.

What people are talking about here, is abuse of peoples and corporations rights to exist without being harassed or shat-upon by jaded, bitter, individuals or corporations.

Hope that’s cleared it up for you.

How do you mean ‘permanently. forever’

Try searching for tweets from 2 years ago for me, bet you find some, but not many

Gavin

Journalists understand what publishing is, and the responsibility that (should) go with it. That when it goes to air/hits the press/makes the airwaves, it is out and public and impossible to erase or retract.

Whereas those that have never worked in this field (which includes many business and PR professionals) don’t appear to comprehend the significance of Twitter as a medium.

If it’s out, it’s out. And by god, if it’s Twittered, and thence picked up by Google, it is OUT. Permanently. Forever.

He is a frequent source of inspiration on http://Facebook.com/WordsDouchebagsSay

Again, that’s not an absolute, and there are legitimate defences. The QUT case above illuminates some of the complexities in firing someone for something they say in public.

North said: “What you say about Telstra around the dinner table is one thing. But what you say on Twitter is a different thing.”

In response to the suggestion that this reduced the right to freedom of speech, North said: ‘You never had that right. You had the right of private conversation.”

I’m not sure what it means to say that he wasn’t being literal in this sense? As far as I can tell the suggestion is that we never had the right to publicly (negatively) comment on our employer – which is not only legally untrue, but contradicts the foundations of the liberal democracy that we live in. On what grounds should someone like Fergus Kibble (in the Telstra directory dumping case) be denied the right to raise issues with particular practices? Why should he be punished for opening up reasonable discussion on the issue, or even just offering an opinion?

I’m not a lawyer, but as i recall the standard for what constitutes publishing in the context of defamation was simply that it was written for at least one other person. So writing a personal letter constituted publication, in that regard.

As for the freedom of speech issue, that’s something that can depend on your conditions of employment. This is an interesting example:
http://www.theaustralian.com.a.....1114145222

As Peter said, this is basic commonsense – you wouldn’t appear on TV slagging your employer because it might affect your pay and promotion prospects, right?

“debates” like this simply confirm to me that ‘social media’ has no chance of surviving as an independent marketing/comms discipline unless its adherents pull their heads out of their bums and realise that it is a communications tool, not some new societal paradigm

Thus real question ought to be something like:

“Under what circumstances should employers/clients – as corporate bodies (not individuals) be permitted to infringe on the freedom of speech that is recognised as a natural right of people in a liberal democracy?”

Reasons we might restrict freedom of speech generally revolve around harm that it can cause natural persons (e.g incitement to violence against particular people), if we restrict freedom of speech on the same grounds, but because of harm caused to corporations, then we are essentially subjectivising corporations – saying that corporations can be harmed in precisely the same way people can (not generalised financial harm, but specific affective/physical harm). For some that might be okay, after all, some people think that corporations should have the vote. For me, and any socially progressive individual in a liberal democracy, this should be considered a disaster.