Platforms such as Twitter and Facebook have revolutionised marketing, sales and community engagement for the vast majority of brands, but what about within the workplace itself – are businesses practicing what they preach by letting employees use social media in the office?

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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Initially frowned upon – if not outright banned – the use of social media in the office is very much on the rise, as employers start to understand the benefits of these tools and how they can be best leveraged for office productivity. While less than half (43 percent) of firms have a completely open policy towards social networking, fewer than one in three (< 30 percent) block these channels altogether, and the number of organisations restricting access to these platforms is dropping by around 10 percent each year.

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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Four in five people around the world believe that internet access is a fundamental right. Some countries, including Finland and Estonia, have made broadband a legal requirement for its citizens.

Dr Hamadoun Toure, secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), says that governments must “regard the internet as basic infrastructure – just like roads, waste and water. We have entered the knowledge society and everyone must have access to participate.”

Few would disagree. But the internet as both an entity and concept is vast, and a fundamental right to access it as a whole is not the same thing as the right to access every part of it. And just how deep do these rights go – for example, is access to Twitter something that somebody in prison should expect? Or even demand?

After all, it’s not unheard of for prisoners to be using Facebook and other mediums to broadcast their message to the world. Right now, sure, it’s frowned upon, but as a society (certainly in the West) we’ve softened our expectations of prison life for all but the most evil of criminals. I don’t think anyone really likes the idea of Richard Ramirez having a Facebook page, but what about your more common or garden inmate? Should a guy doing six months for tax evasion lose all access to the social space, or is that excessive and unnecessary? Perhaps even cruel and unusual punishment?

Right now, I suspect that most people would feel that Twitter was a luxury, certainly for the majority of detainees. But times change, and much as everybody has a right to their one phone call, it’s not completely out of the realms of possibility that, somewhere down the line, access to social networks for prisoners will be fairly commonplace, albeit with inevitable (and necessary) restrictions in place. And there will always be exceptions, those that committed crimes so heinous that the very thought of them having any legitimate contact with the rest of the world would make us shudder.

Or will it? Rights are rights, after all, even for the most wicked of prisoners. And who are we to decide otherwise?

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Chances are if Twitter (or Facebook, for that matter) is blocked at your company then the person who made that decision almost certainly doesn’t use Twitter and is therefore completely ignorant about the benefits.

Don’t just accept it – educate them.

Of course, you have to understand the difference between using Twitter productively and goofing around, and be able to demonstrate that effectively.

Because if YOU don’t know, how can you possibly expect them to?

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Last year I wrote quite a popular article informing users how to work out if somebody has blocked them on Twitter. Well, that information is now a little dated, as Twitter has provided us with a much easier way to tell if you’ve been blocked – just click on the follow button.

That’s all it takes. If you’ve been blocked by that user, Twitter will tell you. I tried it on @stephenfry, and here’s a screenshot of the message I received.

There it is in black and white – this user has blocked you from following them.

Nice and simple, definitely. However, this will inevitably lead to more spats on the network, as people take offense to being blocked by their idols and peers. Sometimes, for no apparent reason.

(Hat-tip to Peter for the spot.)

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.