Law.com:  “Imagine a supervisor making an inappropriate remark to one of his direct reports in an after-hours conversation.  If he made the comment verbally, and the employee then reported it to the supervisor’s employer, any resulting litigation would have involved the usual ‘he said, she said’ situation, in which lawyers would have challenged the employee’s credibility.   But what if the comment occurred in a text message?  Then, lawyers for the company are at a disadvantage, since a written record of the comment exists.   Harassment by text message — or ‘textual harassment’ — is becoming more prevalent.  Texas and 45 other states have laws expressly criminalizing electronic forms of harassment, including text messages.”

Digital Media Lawyer Blog:  “A Tennessee trial court adopted a version of the ‘heavy’ Dendrite standard for permitting discovery of the identity of the anonymous poster of an allegedly defamatory blog.  However, as interpreted by the trial court, this standard was not insuperable, and resulted in an order that the plaintiffs were entitled to discovery of the identity and personal information of the blogger.”

Social Networking and the Law:  Attorney Megan Erickson’s second article in a series of articles that employers should consider when drafting an employee policy dealing with social media.

I discussed some things an employer may want to think about before drafting social networking policies — including some things to keep in mind when starting with a sample policy. I’ll build upon that by offering a few considerations here for employers to ponder as they begin thinking about drafting, updating, or maintaining a social media policy.

See Megan’s first article on this subject.

Social Networking and the Law:  “Employers often want to know more about permissible or effective social networking policies for their employees.  Of course, there’s no such thing as a ‘one size fits all’ social media policy for employers, but I think readers might find it helpful if we took some time to address important considerations involved in drafting, updating, or maintaining a policy addressing employees’ online activities.  With that goal in mind, I’m going to begin a series of entries specifically tackling some of those issues.”