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Real-World Consequences of Social Networking Posts
gbulmash sends in a classic Streisand Effect story of a Chicago landlord suing a tenant over a tweet complaining of mold in her apartment. The landlord claims that the tweet caused $50,000 damage to their reputation. If it didn't, then the fallout from their own ill-advised lawsuit surely will. The woman's Twitter account is now gone (possibly on advice of counsel), but the tweet that started it all lives on. And in a similar vein, reader levicivita notes a firing over a political comment on a Facebook page. "Lee Landor, who had been the deputy press secretary to Manhattan Borough President Scott M. Stringer since May, posted comments on her Facebook page criticizing Mr. Gates [Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr.] and the president, whom she referred to at one point as 'O-dumb-a.' ... The borough president has accepted Ms. Landor's resignation, effective immediately."
Programmer and account manager for a small consultancy firm.
Went on to twitter and said that I got a user-error and for the program I was administering to unfuck itself.
Apparently the parent company didnt have a twitter presence but was having people search / spy. It got back to my company and viola - collecting unemployment.
Since then I have locked down my online profile to a MUCH greater degree - and as such im posting this anon ;)
Actually - the Sun-Times article has a quote that I'd say is way more damaging than the accusation: Tweet about apartment mold draws lawsuit:
He said that while she moved out recently, the company never had a conversation about the post and never asked her to take it down.
"We're a sue first, ask questions later kind of an organization," [italics mine] he said, noting that the company manages 1,500 apartments in Chicago and has a good reputation it wants to preserve.