Friday, August 22, 2008

Internet Abuse

I saw the cartoon to the right and just had to comment. A person was fired from my day job several months ago for too much personal Internet usage. Our company's CEO warned us about using the Internet for personal use at the day job - or else. (Ditto for cell phone usage.) And yet, as I walk through my office at the day job, when we're swamped with work and people tell me they're so busy they can't get all their work done, I see Internet sights up on their computers that definitely have nothing to do with our day job. You know, QVC, Recipe Sites, Celebrity Pics, Amazon, E-bay... In case you can't read the cartoon, it says, "Stan correlates office productivity with periods when the Internet crashed." Hm...Internet misuse seems to be rampant in the business world. It lures me, too. I'm human. I need the day job and so I force myself to behave at the day job, but as you can see, now that I'm home and should be writing - my night job - I'm looking for and finding funny cartoons on the Internet for my blog. Oi! I have to go to Borders or somewhere that will let me sit and work on my computer for long periods of time just so I can avoid the Internet's siren-like draw so I can write. It's a good thing Borders charges an outrageous $ amount to use the Internet or I wouldn't get work done there either. I'm afraid the cartoon above is too true, too many times these days. As much as I love the Internet and all the good things about it, I'm not blind to its drawbacks, either. It's like anything else - we're adults and we have to be responsible for ourselves. Our boss shouldn't have to tell us to work and not play on the Internet. My day job polices the Internet as best they can. They've blocked AOL Mail (guess how I know that - yeah, I'm sooooo bad). They block job sites. They block naughty sites (no, I didn't find that one out personally - a little old lady coworker tried to pull up MSN and porn pictures popped up and she was shocked and shaking. Of course, my IS department tried to tell me they've blocked pop ups and so she must have gone to the porn site herself on her own initiative.) They run a "Top 10 Most Wanted Internet Abuser" list that they give to the CEO. (I have inside information.) So, if you have a job, do you get lured away by the Internet? Much? You'll also want to see what Amarinda Jones, Anika Hamilton, Anny Cook, Barbara Huffert, Brynn Paulin, Bronwyn Green, Dakota Rebel, Kelly Kirch, Molly Daniels, and Sandra Cox are up to, so make sure to visit them also. :)

7 comments:

Phoenix said...

Yeah, I'm on the internet all the time. My boss (me) is very understanding. ;) It's always up and running even while I'm working so that I can answer queries or do quick find research stuff.

Molly Daniels said...

I've found one redeeming quality of having a laptop! I can hook it up to the internet (right now, it's the only way I can READ my aol mail, ha ha!) and that way I don't have to close my document...I simply swivel my chair 90 degrees and check my mail! If there's nothing, I go back to the desktop and keep working:)

The only time the 'boss' complains is if he wants to talk to me, or the kids need it. Oh wait...that applies to any work I'm doing on the PC, no matter if I'm on the internet or not!

Brynn Paulin said...

Yeah, I do, but I work from home all day long, not at a job 8-5, so it's different.

I can always tell when I'm very very busy with work though. Those are the weeks when I only go to the internet to check mail (once a day), use the dictionary and use search tools to verify information. I think that shows part of the problem with work today -- it was the same when I had a traditional day job. When I wasn't busy, I'd spend more time on the internet. Because I was good at my job, I could get my 40 hour job done in about 20. I was constantly asking for more work. In my experience, not everyone does that. They stretch what they have to 40 hours (and intersperse a lot of 'non-work' activities in with it).

Unknown said...

I work a 9-5 and I am on the internet all day. My boss is awesome and as long as I don't have any pressing matters on my desk and answer the phones she pretends not to notice. But it really is all day every day.

She also knows that I have IM up all day and use it to talk with my best friend who works just down the hall from my cube. She doesn't care about that either.

Like I said, she's awesome. And for the most part I get my work done in a timely manner.

XoXoXo
Dakota

barbara huffert said...

That is one good thing about not having a network at work. No internet access at all, no temptation to misbehave.

Unknown said...

Using the internet at work? Well of course...why else is it there? Abuse? No, I think of it more as being 'personally' productive in work time

Unknown said...

As long as someone got a decent amount of work done at my office I wouldn't care. I did ignore one girl on the Internet the other day because she's such a good worker and she gets twice as much work done than most of the other people in the office. But I have no say over what the big boss sees on his reports from IS.

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