Michael Hyatt, CEO of one of the largest publicly traded publishing companies in the world, and his in-house counsel have developed a corporate blogging policy for Thomas Neslon Publishers and they are now looking for feedback. Michael writes...
Like many companies, we have struggled with what guidance to give to our bloggers. I personally checked with several companies. None had formalized a set of blogging rules or written guidance. One Microsoft blogger told me that the only rule his company provided was, “Be smart.” I thought we probably needed a little more guidance than that, so several of us cooked up a list of “Blogging Terms and Conditions.” Our corporate counsel has also had a crack at it.
I am posting this draft publicly so that you can comment on it. If we have missed anything, I would like to know. Also, I am hoping that this might be helpful to other companies who are struggling with this same issue. I now that it would have been much easier for us if we could have started with someone else’s work first.
Most of the policy seems sound, although I am not a lawyer nor do I play one on TV. However, this one clause certainly jumped out at me...
You agree not to post any material that violates the privacy or publicity rights of another.
I think is open to a lot of interpretation. I never heard of publicity rights - have you? Did I miss an amendment to the Constitution?
In all seriousness, this is a noble effort that should generate some good feedback. However, maybe someone should throw this up on a wiki for editing to see what happens. I don't see a Creative Commons license on Mike's site so anyone interested in doing so should check with Mike first. Here's how the blogosphere is reacting so far.
