Anyone sitting at home from 9am to 5pm reading this, I envy you.
I bet hundreds of people are saying the same thing right now, because they're just like me — sitting inside a mauve colored cubicle with a computer, free to use the bathroom, water cooler, walk to the copier, or break for lunch... but essentially chained for eight hours a day to this 6' x 6' prison-like workstation.
Thus, it's the pinnacle of corporate ignorance to allow that such a human experiment will not cause the subjects to surf the Internet, send messages, etc., to escape their cubicle routine. But of course, to all of you bloggers out there, these are welcome conditions for your daily communication. This is where you create your world of words.
I kept an online journal from 2000-02, well before the blog explosion, before the empire. Now, getting back to posting online this year has been a challenge. Sure, I blog a little during the day, but I still get my work done efficiently every day, so it works out for me.
Currently, the form I signed for my company says that the employee is allowed to peruse the Internet or send personal messages, but it should be kept to a minimum, and "not interfere with any company affairs." It's an honor system of sorts, but every one of us knows we take advantage of it so we can do our daily communications and (for you angry bloggers out there) circumvent our stress.
Eventually though, I wonder to what degree companies will do away with this honor system. That a security guard server will survey every time Mark updates his blog or visits a site that can't possibly have anything to do with company business, and hit me with an automated e-mail that docks me a twenty-spot for all unauthorized activity.
While I erase my Firefox cache almost every day, I wonder if that even matters anymore. How long will it be before our Internet freedoms at work are taken away for good?
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Read more Mark Sahm at Blogimus Prime, hosted by Magic Junk.
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* What's Playing on Cityfilter (my iPod) right now: "Web" by The Roots, from the album The Tipping Point.
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Article comments
1 - KOB
Your company has a fairly progressive policy on Internet use, and I guess you have good reason to fear its demise. But maybe not.
You are probably luckier than most. Most companies don't even tell employees whether they monitor or not, and I would suspect from this agreement form it can be assumed that your company is monitoring, or at least gives itself the option to check. Some companies use monitoring as one of the reasons to terminate someone, but usually there's a long list of other reasons that lead up to a firing, not someone's work habits. There are plenty of cubicle dwelling ADD's who spend 45 minutes surfing, 15 minutes working and accomplish more than most.
Clearing your cache does little. Monitoring is usually done off the network.
To me, the more interesting question concerns telecommuters. Let's say you use your work computer for home activities as well. What rules apply there?
2 - MrFinch
Joe is a welder, in a large automotive plant. During the day, Joe's boss notices him leaving the factory floor to use the telephone to pay some utility bills. He also notices Joe leaving the factory floor to chat with some friends in the accounts department, and once or twice he's come across Joe sitting outside reading the latest copy of 'Welder' magazine.
That payday, Joe was let go.
I've worked many years in Joe's position, and also many years as a cubicle dweller, in government and in the private sector. Why is there this assumption that it's okay for those in the cubicle farm business (for example) to use company time and resources for other purposes?
Joe was let go for not working during working hours. Where's the diff?
3 - SFC SKI
With the example above, I'd have to agree. It is a challenge not to get bored in an office environment, but it is a workplace, not a home.
4 - MCH
Yeah, but this doesn't apply to BC. I'm positive none of our commenters, whether in the private sector or government employees, would be so unscrupulous as to blog instead of doing the job they're being paid for...
5 - M. Sahm
Tomorrow I am drinking a 2nd cup of coffee. I missed it today and this blog suffered because of it. My bad, gents... and to think, I originally wanted to know how all you heavy bloggers out there find the time to blog during the work day. Guess I'll never know.
6 - MrFinch
sheesh, way to kill a discussion finchy!
I was just sayin', is all.....
7 - KOB
The original poster, Sahm, wasn't arguing that blogging at work is the right thing to do. As I read it, he was pointing out his employer's policy, which allows some Internet usage and simply ask the employee not to abuse it.
The factory worker example raised in MrFinch's post strikes me as too black and white. It's true for the circumstance he describes, but it doesn't cover the range of workplace environments.
A lot of cubicle dwellers are knowledge workers who don't punch a clock. Many of these workers are on the job longer than 8 hours a day, they may even take work home, work weekends, give up vacation time, and may also travel for their job, etc. So where does work begin and end for someone like that? All "company time" means is the minimum amount you need to put in; the amount of time you need to put in to keep your job is a lot longer. Employees in these cases are measured on the quality of what they produce.
8 - Mark Sahm
I've become aware that my words have shown up on a couple different sites outside of BC but only in fragments, and I fear I've been taken out of context a bit. So I just want to clear up a few things from my original blog:
** I don't spend all day in my cubicle writing blogs. I spend the same amount of time on a blog that anyone else would spend on an e-mail. I do it once a day, and most times during my lunch hour.
The point I originally wanted to make was that bloggers can be traced where excessive e-mail users (like internet accessible mail from AOL, Yahoo, or MSN) cannot be traced. I was hoping some of the seasoned bloggers would chime in on what they thought the future holds... not that I think everyone should burn their companies and blog for hours.
I merely wanted to suggest that most internet usage rules are unclear because they would persecute typing words on a computer in one place but not another.
9 - MrFinch
An interesting suggestion for discussion there-which I seem to have hi-jacked ;) my apologies.
I guess I waded in there without looking, partly because I had just been thinking about my own employer (the Federal Government of Australia) and their internet usage policy. Which, in a word, is: No.
*smiles somewhat sheepishly and steps back out of the way*