An interesting legal case in the US could determine who owns a company’s Twitter feed – the writer of the feed or the company.
Blogger Noah Kravitz, used to blog about his company PhoneDog, but is now being sued by his former employer. When Kravtiz left the company his employer asked him to give up his Twitter account, titled @ PhoneDog_Noah, which was followed by 17,000 Internet users. Kravitz refused.
Since then he has been hired by a competitor, TechnoBuffalo, and according to the lawsuit uses its Twitter feed “to denigrate PhoneDog.”
PhoneDog is seeking $340,000 (approx £220,00) in damages, based on a value of $ 2.50 per user. It strikes me that places a large value on the ability to connect.
Mr. Kravitz testified that he had left PhoneDog on good terms, and with the consent of the company to carry on tweeting. Yet he says he found himself the target of legal proceedings eight months later, after he says he claimed 15% of gross advertising revenue from PhoneDog.
PhoneDog has defended itself in a statement released by the newspaper: “The costs and resources invested by PhoneDog Media to advance its reputation and its number of subscribers in social media are important, PhoneDog Media considers them his property “.
We intend to act decisively to protect our client lists and confidential information, as well as our intellectual property and brands,” added the company.
Legal experts are saying the outcome of the case is likely to set a precedent in the online world in terms of ownership of accounts on social media.
It’s a fascinating case. And there are two ways of looking at it. Its either evil conapny claiming the life and identity of poor wage slave? Or unscrupulous employee running off with company assets as he leaves. Take your choice. I’m not sure what side I am on. But I am keen to learn the outcome.
Sounds like another case of the top brass not knowing the power of social media and then realising too late!
Good on noah I say!
He is the one that created the account and therefore it should be his to own.
I think the company owner has the right over the said account since the blogger is still associating the name of the company to his twitter account. If he decided to leave PhoneDog, he should have changed his account name to another title since he was no longer part of it.
Since the employee is no longer connected with the company, the owner have the right to sue the person for using the company’s name in the social media.
I agree on the comment above, since he is not a part of the said company anymore he should leave the PhoneDog twitter account and make a new account. This will affect his name if he will continue to use the account which is not him or which he is not committed to anymore.