Warning: Twitter could fire you.

Gisele Federicce_247 – After five years of existence, Twitter is far from fulfilling only the simple function for which it was created: reporting what users are doing at that moment. The social network has already been used to denounce crimes of racism, as a means of investigating important people (such as politicians and celebrities), and as a reason for employee dismissals. The most recent case is that of the Folha de S.Paulo newspaper, which last week fired reporters Alec Duarte and Carolina Rocha, the latter from the newspaper Agora, belonging to the same group.

The story boils down to a three-sentence dialogue between the two employees, following the death of former Vice President José Alencar, published on social media and replicated in Ombudsman Suzana Singer's column this Sunday, the 03rd. “Folha reporter: 'Never has an obituary been so ready. Just press the button.' Agora reporter: 'But nothing yet on Folha.com... they forgot to press the button. rs' (laughs). Folha reporter: 'Ah yes, the best advice ever. The last to report any death. It's the price for a very serious mistake.'” wrote Singer.

The Folha Ombudsman states in her column that this is "a bad dialogue, from all points of view." She points out the following problems: insensitivity in throwing in the reader's face the fact that there are pre-written obituaries, criticizing the company itself, and recalling a recent mistake by the company – in this case, the premature publication of the news about the death of Senator Romeu Tuma in September 2010.

Carolina Rocha, a reporter for Agora, completely disagrees with the dismissal and the problems pointed out by Suzana Singer regarding the dialogue in which she participated. On her blog, she publishes an email sent to the Ombudsman in which she says she believes it is a great hypocrisy "for a newspaper that so values ​​freedom of expression, that says it does not admit any type of censorship, to practice the same censorship against its employees (...) I don't know anyone who has criticized Folha and hasn't suffered reprisals."

The problem is that, for some users, a Twitter account ceases to be purely personal, depending on their profession, the company they work for, and, of course, the messages about their corporate environment. A journalist might express a negative opinion about a businessman on the social network, for example, and then be assigned to interview him, which would violate the rule of impartiality of the profession. A well-known story is that of Locaweb, which fired its commercial director for speaking ill of the São Paulo fans, a team the company sponsored. Or, as the reporter from Agora rightly pointed out, the case of a law intern who insulted people from the Northeast of Brazil.

This is where educating employees about the use of social media by companies comes in. According to André Telles, a social media expert and author of the first book on the subject in Brazil – “Orkut.com” – if a company doesn't include the use of this type of media in its communication plan, it needs to create a usage policy, establishing guidelines that often depend on the common sense of each individual. “It's essential to make it clear what can and cannot leave the company, and to establish limits without forcing employees,” he explains.

In the United States, the dismissal of an employee by the ambulance service company American Medical Response in late 2010 led the National Labor Relations Board to file a lawsuit. According to the board, the company lacked a clear document outlining rules regarding the type of content employees could publish on blogs, social media, or any other means of communication, thus negating the justification for dismissal. In its lawsuit, the board argued that any employee has the right to discuss terms and conditions of employment with other professionals, even online, and that this constitutes a "legally protected activity."

Twitter: @brasil247