What's Changed?

That's been a hot question for awhile, everyone knows that the CBC Lockout has changed things, but what has changed and how has been a question. The lockout allowed, or perhaps forced, CBC employees to explore new technologies. It also put a new twist on how you do a labour action. What has changed will be something that we can't answer definitively for years. It is likely that only looking back historically will anyone be able to say what changed. But, I think I've found one thing that you can say for sure that has changed and if you are a boss, an executive, a CEO, especially a secretive one, or one who enjoys power a bit too much this is going to be bad, bad news for you.

We've entered the age of public anonymity. With a few elementary precautions any of your employees, customers, clients, partners, fellow managers etc., can blog all over the internet and there will be no way to figure out who they are. Hotmail or any number of other places will let you set up an email account without giving any personal information, or at least they don't check to see if you are lying or not. Once you have an email account you have all you need to set up a blog, or two, or three from blogger or any number of other places.

With that done, people can say whatever they want and as long as they don't say anything that directly gives away who they are they can say whatever they want - attack management, second guess decisions, blow the whistle on questionable activities, etc., and there will be no way that anyone can ever prove who they are. Welcome to the new world.