As I passed by a University of Michigan librarian unlucky enough to have her computer screen visible to passers-by and saw that she was on Facebook, I thought about the rights of employers to restrict the internet use of their employees. I believe there have been mixed results from studies of whether or not allowing employees unfettered access to the internet hurts or helps productivity. I can't recall the source, but somewhere I recall reading that workers who take short breaks every hour to do some leisure web browsing are more productive than those who do not take those breaks.In any case, let's assume that businesses want to restrict their employees use of the internet for leisure purposes in order to boost productivity. I'm sure many employers block ESPN, YouTube, Facebook, maybe anything that's classified as having adult content using some sort of Net Nanny. But what if the employer wanted to really restrict their employees internet use? What if they thought that it would be better for their employees to, say, read the complete works of William Shakespeare or learn about particle physics than to be on Farmville for an hour or two a day? Somewhat less benignly, what if they wanted their employees to only read or watch materials that showed their company and product in a positive light, or endorsed a particular kind of lifestyle? Could they restrict their employees access to, say, one or two sites like this? Are they within their rights to restrict their employees in this manner?
I have little sympathy for employees demanding the right to surf the net at work. When you are at work, you're supposed to be working. Yes, there are the studies that say that these little breaks can boost productivity, but I don't think there's any research on whether certain kinds of restricted internet surfing is just as good at this. So the employee defense of "a bit of cyberslacking makes me more productive" wouldn't necessarily contradict an employer's right to limit their internet use how they see fit.
Its like having the ultimate captive audience. Sure, you could choose not to watch any of the content we make available to you, but then you'd have to do work (ugh!). Options that might have been unappealing at home suddenly seem interesting. Regarding the scenarios listed above, I'd have some faith that employees would forego any ham-handed attempts to brainwash them into loving the company they work for (opting to actually work instead of watching or reading poorly made, pro-corporate content) but (assuming a certain kind of intellectual curiosity) might actually respond to reading Shakespeare or learning particle physics. It wouldn't have to be Shakespeare, of course. Whatever the employer thought it would be enriching to know could be substituted.
Research on persuasion suggests that convincing someone to do or buy something they didn't already have some inclination to do or buy is extremely difficult if not impossible. If you restricted my access at work to Fox News, I wouldn't suddenly become a right-wing ideologue. I'd get back to work, or daydream, or talk to a coworker. But if its something you've been meaning to do, perhaps the work setting is the proper restrictive environment, providing that unappealing alternative, that would finally get you to read that classic you've been meaning to read.
