We were astounded to read of the Italian Google convictions last week, but the timing was uncanny – the announcement came on the very day of our UGC and the Law event and eBook launch.

We issued an official statement to the press below:

“Many publishers feel the risk of not moderating and relying on alerts from users is worth taking with ‘safe harbour’ providing a cushion against prosecution. This case has potentially created a landmark ruling for those reactively moderating content on their sites and will send a warning shot across the bows of those operating within Social Media.”

“For sites such as YouTube, moderating every single video is near impossible but such large scale sites are going to have to implement additional protection measures to avoid similar cases. Law lords are going to have to think carefully about how such a ruling is implemented in the future to avoid an onslaught of appeals and lobbying from many corporations.”

In reality we agree with Econsultancy that the Italian Google convictions are a wake up call for UGC services. The convictions seem likely to be overturned and are predominantly symbolic. But is this kind of industry shake-up necessary? Can the UK expect more of the same?

We fully expect the UK to follow suit with some high-profile legal action against one or two service providers here. If there’s anything our work on the eBook highlighted it’s that even basic and pre-existing legislation is  being breached on a regular basis in the land grab for social media. [*cough* Data Protection Act *cough*]

Does it really matter? Aren’t most of these just minor infringements? Yes and no. We love the social web and don’t want to be the fun police, but we’re particularly concerned at the lack of safeguards being put in place for young people online.  For adults, with no privacy laws in the UK, it’s particularly important that we feel assured our data is being protected and sites are contactable and responsive to requests to investigate or remove content.

So now the world waits – What Will Google Do?

Last night we launched our new eBook ‘”UGC and the law”.

Research we conducted with over 200 senior level executives found that brands may be falling foul of laws online with 81% rating their knowledge as only limited to non-existence when it comes to the laws regulating their social media activity.

So we decided  that for the first time someone could pull together all the disparate information and guidance out there and put it into one handy reference eBook.

The eBook is available free to download from

The book was launched at a glittering event with a few beers at our Central London office. We had a fantastic range of speakers come along:

• Danvers Baillieu (Winston & Strawn and Bootlaw.com)
• John Robinson (NHS Choices)
• Jon Bishop (Gumtree)
• Molly Flatt (WOM UK)
• Debbie Towersey (HR2HR Solutions)

All of the above contributed to the guide in addition to Dominic Campbell (FutureGov) and Agnes Nairn – a huge thank you to all who helped over the past few weeks.

I attempted to use Cover It Live to capture some of the chat, which you can see displayed below.

Is your social media activity breaking the law?

Last week @VodafoneUK had to deal with an embarrassing tweet incident.  This prompted the Guardian to write a list of Top 5 Twitter gaffes. Having a look at the list we spotted only one of the five could’ve been prevented by moderation (The Telegraph’s #budget twitterfall), two resulted in actual fines for the tweeting offender (Footballer Darren Bent and Mark Cuban owner of the Dallas Cowboys), and one resulted in a reputation issue (Australian Cricketer Philip Hughes revealed he’d been dropped from the Ashes team before official announcements).

We recently conducted some research into social media concerns amongst blue chip brands which is soon to be released but a sneak peek indicated:

16% of brands surveyed think employee misuse  poses the greatest risk to their brand from social media usage

An overwhelming 79% thought damage to their brand’s reputation is a bigger risk for their brand than an actual lawsuit

In general over half (51%) felt the risk to their brand in using external social media sites like Twitter and Facebook was Low

The Vodafone incident was unfortunate but not isolated. It’s obvious to say but all companies using social media should have an employee best practice and policy in place – in this case it’s been suggested that the breach resulted from an unattended PC logged in to the @vodafoneUK account.

In fact if there’s one learning from the incident it was how Vodafone dealt with the issue afterwards, they responded extremely well, but the multiple@ tweets to each and every person discussing the incident was probably a little overkill. But perhaps we should applaud they wanted to personally apologise to each and every customer?

Image: Telegraph

Today is European Safer Internet Day. The annual event aims to promote safer and more responsible use of online technology and mobile phones – particularly amongst young people.

It’s a great day to take stock of all the fantastic resource available around internet safety. Here’s a round-up:

• Insafe: The organisers behind Safer Internet Day, Insafe are a European network of Awareness Centres promoting safer use of technology http://www.saferinternet.org
• ThinkUKnow: Comprehensive portal providing age appropriate resources and sections for parents and teachers from the folks at CEOP http://www.thinkuknow.co.uk/
• CEOP: The Child Exploitation & Online Protection Centre is dedicated to eradicating the exploitation of children. The site is less consumer friendly than ThinkUKnow but contains additional useful and official information http://www.ceop.police.uk/
• UKCCIS: The UK Council for Child Internet Safety unites over 100 organisations from the public and private sector to help deliver the recommendations from the Byron Report http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/ukccis/
• IWF: The Internet Watch Foundation provides a hotline for the public and IT professionals to report illegal online content and be the ‘notice and take-down’ body for this content. The site is handily divided into resource for a range of parties; the public, media, charities, corporates etc. http://www.iwf.org.uk/

Tempero’s MD, Dominic Sparkes, raised this question in an NMA opinion column last week [issue 28 January 2010). Since October 2009 it is now illegal to moderate “a public electronic interactive communication service” likely to be used “wholly or mainly by children” unless you are compliant with the Government's vetting and barring scheme (like CRB checks).

Think you're not moderating? Think again. The Government defines moderation as "an activity or process whereby a person or technical filter is responsible for reviewing content posted by users”.

This could be as simple as reviewing photos submitted as part of a Flickr campaign aimed at teens or running a brand page on Bebo.

What remains to be seen is will the digital industry get on board and self-regulate or will Ofcom or equivalent  organisation have to be given the remit to enforce the legislation?

In a letter to the editor in the same issue ["Prohibition isn't answer to keeping kids safe"] Paul Robinson from KidsCo commented,

“It’s down to content providers and media agencies to work together to make sure our web-savvy children are exposed to safe websites.”

Confused about your legal obligations regarding child safety online? Check out our guide produced in conjunction with EConsultancy.

Image: maccath

Available in Tempero colours and lovingly tailored by our very own Graeme.

It was an interesting week on the topic of marketing to children, particularly online.

Dr Agnes Nairn warned that the digital age has created grey areas in terms of marketing to children, which are impossible to police despite ongoing reviews by CAP and BCAP.

Following on from David Cameron’s threats that marketers may face further regulation on advertising to children,  alcohol advertising came under fire from a House of Commons select committee report which called for all alcohol advertising to be banned on social networking sites.

Our MD, Dominic Sparkes, was asked to comment specifically on the logistics and implications of banning alcohol advertising in social networks to protect young people stating that

Online advertising needs to be redefined before it can be more tightly regulated

You can read the full article here.

For best practice on marketing to young people online, and where the law currently stands, you can download our guide from Econsultancy.

In it we identify:

• Key issues in marketing to young people via online communities
• Who regulates this area
• Data Collection laws
• What to consider before launching any social media marketing activity

To understand what is changing and what that means check out what The iPlatform are saying here – in a nutshell you’re going to need to run any activity of this kind on a third-party app, adhere to local and Facebook guidelines, and work with a Facebook Account Manager to get your promotion approved – 7 DAYS BEFORE LAUNCH.

You can read the full set of guidelines at http://www.facebook.com/promotions_guidelines.php

Is the move an attempt to crack down on poorly run and illegal promotions on Facebook or part of a greater strategy to pull brands into having more of a commercial relationship with Facebook?

Tempero supported the official Marmarati site reviewing text, images, and video submitted by Marmite lovers hoping to receive one of 200 limited edition jars of a new product launching soon.

Hat tip to social media agency we are social for conceiving and executing the campaign as well as looping Tempero in.

While the idea was to tap into an already established community of Marmite *lovers*,  it was smart thinking to include moderation on the site even if just to ensure submissions adhered to the guidelines e.g. profanity, copyright etc. in relation to such an iconic brand.

You can read more including a presentation on the campaign strategy over on we are social’s blog.

Well last week it started snowing and today we were finally allowed to raid the presents under the tree for that traditional Christmas treat – the office Secret Santa.

We put some pics of the more “interesting” gifts Tempero staffers received up on Flickr. You can also listen to the office Christmas playlist on Spotify.