Has anyone heard of someone been sacked because of things they wrote on Facebook or Twitter?
I have a friend who got sacked for refusing a drug test after some comments about his weekend was reported by his nosey team leader.
Has anyone else got views on the work/social network dilema?

No, I haven't. But what someone does in their free time is their own affair, nothing to do with their employers. As long as it doesn't affect their work.

There have been a few stories in the papers about people blogging and being dismissed; don't know about FB/Twitter per se. Google "blogging firing"

Hehe, interesting subject. Personally I think facebook, twitter and the like is a waste of time. I'm not very interested in knowing how many sheets of paper my friends use when they wipe their ass nor am I interested in sharing so with anyone either. :P
Apart from that, I have a very paranoiac attitude concerning Internet. People are willingly giving out information about them selfs. Sooner or later someone is destined to "invite" thieves to their house or to get fired from their job. What do you expect? "I'm so looking forward to my 5days of holiday in the snowy mountains. Hopefully I placed out enough food for my cat". Probably not a very clever thing to share with the world, yet a great percentage of people actually do this. Often. Why?

Personally I don't care about people loosing their job for something they published online. I do agree with BrianL that what you do in your spare time is private. But it's only private until you decide to tell the whole world about it. Saying that I don't defend employers to fire someone without any legal right to do so. It needs to be a violation of the contract or something else that is a reason enough to fire someone.

Never counted the number of sheets, I'm not that geeky Eww.

I agree that broadcasting personal information indiscriminately isn't always the smartest thing to do; on the other hand any determined effort will yield most of the information anyway and most of the Twitter et al. comments are sheer drivel lacking in any useful information, even to the criminally inclined.

Most contracts these days have something about maintaining professionalism or something of the sort. Most of the cases I've read/heard about involve other violations; ie. bad mouthing your employers or posting proprietary information. If you're a pharmacist, you probably also have contract stipulations that you don't get arrested, don't drive under the influence, use drugs and perform any other questionable or illegal activities even if they are on your own time.

Exactly, I think Facebook and Twitter and other such s*** is useless and brain-damaged. You'll never find me using either.

Personally I'm extremely reluctant to give out any personal info on the net, especially things like where I live (sure I might tell you which state or country, but nothing more). I never ever ever give out my IP, even tho sites I go to do know it. Even things like my birthday ... are 1 or 2 days off, I don't mind anyway When they ask me for a zip code, I use google maps to find an appropriate one. Hehe, you know probably I've never put anything completely true about myself on the net. I've had to put 1 or maybe 2 pictures of me on the net, well not really on the net, I submitted them via e-mail, which I most certainly was not very happy with, but I had to apply, so I had to. I don't even like giving people my e-mail address, well I actually have 2 gmail addresses, one for people I trust and have seen in person, and one for the rest.

I'm telling you, it's real easy for people to track you down if you post things like they do on Twitter ... the most extreme example, of course. There, I can guarantee they will track you down. So, f' twitter and facebook, and other such places. They're useless and can get you in trouble.

Note, however, that on the net, I'm not afraid to express my opinion, or troll a bit. I don't usually do this in real life, because there are consequences (getting beaten up or fired). Therefore anonymity must be maintained online, not only for this but because there are lots of bad people on the net ... like in real life actually, but harder to track down, and easier for them to manipulate you.

I don't use either, and I wouldn't be sad if something bad did happen to either of two sites. I don't use myspace either, and the only time I ever go to myspace is to get info on a band (like The Attery Squash, as myspace was first intended for, before it was invaded by stupidity & owned by Murdoch). Other than that, the majority users of facebook & myspace (99.999999%) are under-aged users, pervs, and spammers/phishers, etc. All I can do without.

I agree with what has been said. It is mainly drivel. I onced used blogging to make a big complaint about local police who harrassed me out of pure bullying and they were sacked because I was in the right.
I also used it to make my ex girlfriend get back with me with some tall tales.
So it can be used to manipulate too. For example if you want a certain job you can create websites about your work in that sector and beef it up so your prospective boss is more then impressed. They are sure to check up on you and then be impressed by your work.
But Twitter is so crap in my opinion. If someone today told us they had this web idea we would all say it was a bad idea and wouldn't work I am sure.
But I am just saying that these mediums can be used to boost your self in work just as much as get your sacked for coke use.

Twitter just makes me nauseous, and hurts my head. This is actually more comfortable than going onto twitter:

It might be a paranoid idea, but I think Twitter was invented to better spy on people, out of their own foolishness, of course. Think about it, what better way to know where people are and what they are doing than to have them post it online ... muhahahaha, what a wonderfully diabolical scheme. Maybe it's just me ... thinking strange thoughts.

Oh, kinda like that thing in England with the CCTV cameras, what better way to spy on people than to have them spy on themselves. Genius !
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/oc...lance-internet

I'd have thousands of women chasing or stalking me if I put a photo on the 'net. It's bad enough trying to satisfy dozens now.
(I've just put one in my profile...if you're of a nervous disposition - DON'T LOOK!!! )

nice one!

I joined facebook but didn't want to give my real name so i called myself whitney houston and every time I check to see the few real people I know I have a large number of blokes trying to chat me up. They come out with sexual chat ups and send me photos of themselves pretending to have guns and stuff. I am male by the way.
I think Twitter is crap beyond words. The only point I see in it is people who want to one day look back at what they wrote like a diary in their old age years if so they better hope Twitter still exists in the future.

I've done the same here on LQ. My real name's Britney Spears, but don't tell anybody.

I don't have Twitter, but I do have Facebook for networking purposes and keeping in touch with family and friends. The way I see it, driving a car is profoundly more dangerous than putting information on the net, but just as I am a defensive driver, I also use the net with caution and awareness. I get friend requests on Facebook all the time, and about 95% of them get rejected. The only ones that don't are people I really know/trust (which requires having spent time around them in real life). I certainly don't go by Facebook's recommendations: "Look! You went to school with this person! You know/want to know them don't you?" No thanks...

Risk assessment is a seriously under-rated skill.

Hmm, some of us are sharing photos and news with family, convenient and with Friends only and only Friends I know. Probably more than 0.000001%, but I don't have stats to back it up. Neither do you, I suspect. No harm if any of it gets published anywhere but it all seems a bit unlikely, I'm not that interesting, and if anyone really wants to know, they can google lots more stuff than ever shows on fb.