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IBM to Regulate Employee Second Life Behavior
mytrip writes "In hopes of avoiding potentially embarrassing incidents, IBM is taking the unusual step of establishing official guidelines for its more than 5,000 employees who inhabit Second Life and other virtual worlds. 'IBM appears to be the first corporation to create rules governing virtual worlds. The move has critics, who say that mandating behavior for the so-called "metaverse" is unlikely to reform impish avatars. They also question why IBM would add a layer of buttoned-down bureaucracy to this relatively rollicking corner of the Internet. IBM executives counter that having a code of conduct is akin to a corporate stamp of approval, encouraging workers to explore more than 100 worlds IBM collectively calls the 3D Internet.'" This regulation may be coming from more than self-interest: IBM sees these environments as management training courses in some ways; working inter-personal skills via chat and human resources via guild activities.
So IBM sanctions playing Secondlife while on the clock?
This, I have to see for myself.
When logged onto Second Life at work (or presumably using the same account you use at work), they want you to project the corporate image. This seems reasonable, although perhaps overly anal.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
Okay, aside from the concept of "meeting with IBM clients" in Second Life
When you're on your own you can whatever you want to be.
Seriously, anyone who needs to be told what is appropriate for meeting clients really should NOT be meeting clients. In real life or online.
No flying genitalia in IBM business attire then, eh?
Are they suggesting that they should be able to govern how their employees spend their spare time, or are they just expecting their employees to play the game when they are supposed to be working?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I'll see that Huh?, and raise you a WTF?
Strange things are afoot at the Circle-K.
1) Don't use Second Life. It is embarrassing and no one in the real world cares besides the news media and misc. company bosses.
(it is kinda like the "news media" just discovered that you can make a virtual world online)
IBM would like to discourage employees from
aimless wandering around
dressing up as a flying phallus (without a tie)
crowding around the "hot looking"
starting conversations with "check out my new script"
Honest question here (IANAL): can it even be legal for the employer to issue guidelines/codes of conduct for activities that are presumably not happening at the workplace?
Hello! I'm a disaster waiting to happen!
I'd love to see the IBM Employee Handbook section on yiffing etiquette.
attempt to justify their existence.
The whole point of the rules is that IBM is using Second Life for business purposes. It's a no-brainer, really: if you're doing business in SL from the office during work hours then obviously you should act like it.
What's next, YouTube? Facebook? MySpace?
Damn, all this world needs is another 5,000 people in blue suits.
The IBM worker homepage links to this article. Basically, it's due to the fact that IBM uses tools like Secondlife to conduct business. A lot of us use virtual offices anyway, and the guides for IM, et. Al are out there already: what's the difference really? In the scope of things: if you represent the company, you are (if you value your job) liable to uphold the ethics and code you agreed to. So if you use the same avatar for both work and play, you're just courting trouble.
because so many IBM consultants are dicks.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Looks like fur parties are still in!
For those that are interested, you can read IBM's Business Conduct Guidelines, specifically the section On Your Own Time, as well as IBM's Blogging Policy and Guidelines and the Virtual World Guidelines.
This mean I'm going to have to run the destruction of Matari terrorists by my boss now? :P
If you know enough about that scene you could write up such a section as a humor article.
And maybe some clueless IBM HR drone would buy it to use for real!
Lends new meaning to the phrase "blue balls".
If they are, then Big Blue has every right to tell them how to behave. After all, they are at least in some small way representing the company.
If they are not, then IBM's rights are much more limited: They have only as much right to dictate behavior in the game as they do real-life off-hours behavior. This is usually limited to not violating confidentiality, not doing anything illegal, or not doing anything that would violate a reasonable "morals clause" you see in some employee handbooks. For example, some companies have rules against disparaging their competition on or off the clock. Others have rules against gambling for employees in sensitive positions. These rules would apply in-game the same as out-of-game.
Frankly, a bigger problem for IBM and the rest of Corporate America is probably bleary-eyed employees who spend too much time fighting and not enough time sleeping.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
"Years after most people had figured out that the Internet wasn't a virtual world"
And the internet wasn't mocked-up text and graphics either, until the Nexus browser brought us the World Wide Web
...retroactively, please. Sometime pre-Neuromancer would be nice. Bonus: You'd prevent Pattern Recognition while you were at it!
These journalists! They try too hard to be hip; they pretend to be well-versed in technology -- and yet they coin nonsense phrases like "Cyberspace!" It is they who are responsible for this! (Regina Lynn on Wired: I'm looking at you too. At least Gibson wrote some Cyberpunk.) So, while -- fine -- shooting might be a bit harsh, I do think the pillory could be in order...
[Neal Stephenson gets off the hook completely, 'cus even though he had a "Metaverse" in Snow Crash, he at least (1) clearly knows what he's talking about, and (2) wrote Cryptonomicon (and after you write something as mindshatteringly awesome as Cryptonomicon, you can get away with a lot.)]
EOF.A friend's sibling was telling us at diner last night that IBM (their employer) encourages them to use Second Life for virtual meetings, hence these guidelines.
IBM has always had strict guidelines about how IBM employees relate to the rest of the world, but at least in the last two decades (the main time I've had any involvement with them, including time contracting there) I have not been aware of them ever crossing the line you're asking about. At any ate, I haven't seen any evidence they are in this case.
A company that restricts your off-hours activities is way out of bounds. Yes, i know it happens all the time, but that doesn't make it right by any stretch of the imagination.
Now if they are talking on-hours, then thats a bit different as you are on their dime. I cant get to the story to see which we are talking about.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
all they are doing is making sure that employees don't reflect badly on the company. Imagine if a Microsoft employee started spouting negatively and inaccurately about a non-MS product in SL. Or Slashdot. Instant flame and bad rep for MS. Also, consider the litigation opportunities.
IBM's pretty permissive in what it allows its employees to do on work time. Little Internet port blocking. No onerous logging. For me it makes for an innovative environment where I feel I can relax and try stuff out. I'd recommend IBM as an employer at least for that aspect.
Pretty much. They'd have a selection. Male and female of different appearances. So you can sort of match it to you. And so you don't look like Agent Smith when a group of five of you show up.
And they'd hire people to polish them. You want to present the most professional appearance possible (if you're IBM). So spending money on getting the textures and shadows right is important. It's all about paying attention to the smallest details.
You'd all have the same "look" and that "look" would be "polished professional".
http://www.sutor.com/newsite/blog-open/?p=1633
Where he posts an image of Second Life running under Feisty. Since the image apparently shows his avatar we now know what the IBM dress code is in virtual worlds - Muscle Tee shirts and sunglasses.
block it from work.
it's completely unecessary.
Anyone who uses it is a co-dependent basket case.
They're using their grammar skills there.
They also question why IBM would add a layer of buttoned-down bureaucracy to this relatively rollicking corner of the Internet.
The real question, of course, is to ask why they only added one layer of bureaucracy. IBM manages to add twenty layers of it to everything else they do, to the extent that working in a tech job there just is not even vaguely interesting.
-- Even if a god did exist, why the fsck should I worship it?
1. Have never tried Second Life
2. Tried it for 20 min and declared "The graphics suck, the game sucks" (even though technically it's not a "game")
3. Hate Second Life (or any other tech that is popular) and love being "Devil's advocates"
How on Earth are companies allowed to regulate the private lives of it's employees?
It's not like government jobs, where there is a genuine conflict of interest or national security is at stake. An example would be how Gaming Board employees aren't allowed to enter/gamble/conduct any kind of business in casinos.
Companies that do this, such as Blockbuster, and now IBM, claim that the actions of their employees reflect on the company. That may be true, albeit insignificantly, but it is going to have to be a risk that companies with employees are going to have to accept. Regulating personal and private life for the perceived "image" of a company is definitely going to far.
I don't know about other companies, but Blockbuster Video (aka "Lackluster Video), has a policy that is pretty good at punishing you for personal, non-work related indiscretions:
It is Blockbuster company policy for employees to report indiscretions that may reflect negatively upon the company. Failure to do so can resuly in 'disciplinary action' (*Not verbatim, but the best I can remember. It was really short and simple). Basically, you can be fired any kind of run-in with the law, business-related or not.
Knowing Google's lust for data collection, the Soviet Union is still alive and well inside the psyche of Sergey Brin....
It is embarrassing and no one in the real world cares besides the news media and misc. company bosses.
People are making money in SL. This is the biggest differentiator between SL and previous virtual worlds. As soon as profit enters the picture, everyone starts paying attention.
Your comment reminds me of comments in '94/'95 about the Web. That flash in the pan has carried on pretty well, I'd say.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
A couple of considerations that the IBMers probably made: 1. Nobody is as they seem, and everyone has a deep dark secret. Just ask Bill Clinton! 2. People are more likely to say what is on their mind when hiding from behind a computer screen. 3. Its always good to have guidelines for legal reasons.
Next thing you know, they'll be gassing people by the millions with Zyklon-B just because it boosts their profit margins.
Just kidding Second Life users. Your characters are completely safe.
IBM only does things like that in the real world.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Interestingly, for the past two years all new hires to the IBM corporation have been provided with new laptops running the Intel 950xx graphics chipset ... one of the only chipsets incompatible with Second Life ... a coincidence?