Cover Your Blog
Of course you need policies for social software tools. If nothing else, it's a cover your rear tactic. Okay, so I'm not a fan of having a policy that won't allow me to add friends to the library MySpace page unless they're an author, musician, or teen that I can confirm comes to the library regularly and bears no profanity or otherwise offensive material on their personal pages. It's social networking! What good is a MySpace if you take out the network and the social tools? Still, I have to go for the policy. When you add real people, you can't predict what'll happen. One week your users might be chatting about the latest bestseller and the next week might have a thread about penguin world domination. The next week could bounce over to world hunger. It's I suppose a balancing act. If you restrict users too much, you'll scare people off and there goes your plans Web 2.0 fame. If you make it a free for all, the library could suddenly offend all the wrong people. You might obtain Web 2.0 fame, but that's not the kind of fame you want for your library.
As to barriers, policies might be a problem. Sure, I think it's a nice safety net, but tying it up like a gag gift wrapped in duct tape is not the way to go. In addition to scaring off patrons, you'll scare off staff too. The staff genuinely interested in Web 2.0 might consider the extra expenditure of energy while trying not to trip on all of the policies could very well let apathy take over. If you're putting in policies of higher ups that have no clue what social networking even is, be wary of the tech savy that will throw their arms up in disgust at not being able to do what they want. Of course, this doesn't mean putting hateful messages and blogging about torturing small puppies, but when bar the users from tools they would normally use in a personal setting, things get frustrating.
The solution is to be sensitive about social software. By all means, have fun and use the tools as they were created, but remember to cover your rear with things that really isn't in your power. Hiring a small brigade of nerds to monitor your Facebook is by no means a solution. Just talk with the people that use whatever and collaborate with those that can predict most of the legal pitfalls you're liable to come across.
