Fired for blogging

There have been many people who have been fired for blogging either at work or about their work, but none (as far as I know) in high-level media positions.

Somehow I just came across the blog of an ex-CNN producer who was abruptly fired with little warning after blogging about work.

The interesting part is that he didn’t stop blogging just because he got fired. He kept on blogging and has received a pretty big audience.

During my final conversation with Ed Litvak (the blogger’s boss at CNN) and a representative from HR, they hammered home a single line in the CNN employee handbook which states that any writing done for a “non-CNN outlet” must be run through the network’s standards and practices department. They asked if I had seen this decree. As a matter of fact I had, but only about a month previously, when I stumbled across a copy of that handbook on someone’s desk and thumbed through it. I let them know exactly what I had thought when I read the rule, namely that it was staggeringly vague and couldn’t possibly apply to something as innocuous as a blog.

He goes on in great detail on how TV news is changing, mostly for the worse. One thing we can all learn from this is to be very careful about blogging on company time or letting our frustrations out about our coworkers over the internet.

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