Social Networking: Not IT's Problem

Sandra Gittlen.  "Social Networking: Not IT's Problem." ComputerWorld. 23 July 2007.

The faculty, students, and staff in California's Saugus Union School District now have social networking tools, including blogs, courtesy of Jim Klein and his IT team.  Klein is the Director of Information Services and Technology for the Saugus Union School District.   Klein does not want IT to be fully responisble for what is posted to the blogs.  He "put controls in place so that both IT and the school district are protected from users running amok."  If a business unit wants to start a blog, then a leader has to manage that blog.  For example, if a teacher wants his or her students to communicate through the school's web site, then the teacher must approve all the content being posted.  Accoriding to Rachel Happe, an analyst at market research firm IDC, since social networking is community development and not just operations, IT should not be in charge of it.  If organizations do not manage the technology, they could end up being held responsible for malicious behavior and be vulnerable to lawsuits.  Klein says that companies should spend some time planning before implementing social networking technology.  This article is relevant because as more and more schools and even businesses are using things like blogs to communicate, someone needs to be responsible for what is posted, and this needs to be someone other than the IT department.

Current Event for 8/23/07

Claburn, Thomas and Hoover, J. Nicholas. "Microsoft and Google resolve search dispute, for now". Information Week. 25 June 2007: 31.

Who: Microsoft (specifically Windows Vista) and Google. Also involved were the Justice Department, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Google's senior VP and chief legal officer David Drummond, and California Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr.

What: Google had filed a complaint with the Justice Department against Microsoft because the desktop search that comes with Windows Vista is hard to disable, and Google's search tool runs very slowly when it is run at the same time as Vista's search. The Justice Department and the District of Columbia said "Microsoft has agreed to change the way Vista's search product behaves when it releases the first service pack for the operating system." Users will then be able to select a default search program. However, searches from Vista's Control Panel and certain other windows will default to Microsoft's search tool, but will also include a link to competitive products. Neither Google or Microsoft are completely satisified with the agreement. David Drummond, Google's senior VP and chief legal officer, believes Microsoft should continue improving as to "give consumers greater access to alternate desktop search providers." Details of Google's complaint have not been made available to the public. Nor has Microsoft even seen the actual complaint.

Where: The complaint was filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

When: In March, Google had made no indication that it had a problem with its search tool's performance on Vista. In June, Microsoft aggred to change the way Vista handles desktop searches. The beta version of Vista's first service pack is due for release by the end of the year.

Relevance: This is relevant because there is an issue between to major companies. With so many people using software created by Microsoft and Google, whatever stems from those disputes will affect millions of people. A dispute such as this one shows that software is in constant need of fixes and improvements in order to satisfy other software companies. It does not appear that this is the last dispute to arrise between Microsoft and Google.