April Fools Prank: Australian public servant wearing Google Goggles banned from departmental offices and warned away from all government buildings

UPDATE: APRIL FOOLS PRANK
I know some people were taken in by this post earlier this week, while others called it out as an April Fools prank. I can confirm it was a prank - but one that's not far away from being realised.

Is your agency ready for the first staff member, or visitor, who walks into your office wearing Google Glass?


APRIL FOOLS PRANK
I've learnt from a source in a major Australian Government department that a public servant who showed up for work yesterday morning wearing Google Glass was unceremoniously escorted out of the building by security.

The public servant was given written correspondence from HR, signed by a senior manager, banning them access to any departmental offices and was warned away from entering any other Australian Government offices wearing Google Glass until their case was fully investigated.

Promotional image of Google Glass from Google

The letter included details that simply by wearing Google Glass the public servant might pose a privacy risk to other staff, and that it also raised security concerns in the workplace as senior management could not know what the person was filming or photographing.

It referenced an article in yesterday's Australian Financial Review (since updated), which highlighted the potential collision between Australia's new privacy laws and the use of personal recording devices such as Google Glass, Proposed privacy laws put blinkers on Google Glass.

Apparently the public servant had borrowed a pair of Google Glass from a friend, who had access to one of the few (around eight) pairs of Google Glasses in Australia through his work.

He had worn them to work to show his colleagues their capabilities and begin a discussion of the ramifications for their department in providing services to the public.

The public servant is now being investigated to determine whether they had ever previously brought 'personal recording devices' to work - apparently ignoring the mobile phones carried by most workers today.

The public servant is currently being threatened with a reassessment of their grade and has been requested to undertake a psychological evaluation to assess whether this is a once-off or a pattern of behaviour, due to the tendency of the individual to bring 'new and unapproved technologies' into the office.

I'll provide more details as I get them, however I have been asked not to identify the agency or individual as it could prejudice the process.


New technologies are a challenge for society and organisations, as they can transform social norms and over-turn bureaucratic apple carts.

However it is important to avoid over-reacting to potential risks and consider the benefits as well.

In this case I think the department has massively over-reacted, possibly because one or a few senior people had read an article in a newspaper (the AFR article referenced above) and leapt to the worst conclusions.

I've seen this happen previously in concerns over social media, where a few individuals, without personal experience of specific channels, have reviewed a (scaremongering) media representation of the risks at face value and responded without due consideration and thought.

In this situation, politely asking the person to refrain from recording and transmitting on premises, except with consent and where there's no potentially confidential documents in the background, could have sufficed. Or even asking them not to wear them on premises until the department could look at their capabilities first.

However it doesn't surprise me to see an agency leap first and then ask for forgiveness later - isn't that what we're often told to do in the workplace?

It is also important to keep in mind that just because the form changes, the policy may not need to. It may be possible to consider cameras, mobile phones, Google Glass, smart watches and even artificial eyes with cameras within the same policy framework - both the risks AND the benefits.

What agencies need to avoid doing is leaping at shadows and, where technology already exists (like the Google Glass), take the necessary steps to review their privacy and security policies to ensure that they cover devices adequately.

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Content Management for Government - watch the webcast

Below is the video from the live webcast on Content Marketing for Government that Content Group managed, hosted by David Pembroke with Gina Cianco of the Australian Government Department of Human Services, Kanchan Dutt and myself as guests.

It's an interesting watch.


I'll buy a drink for anyone who accurately counts the number of 'ums' I say!

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What should agencies do when online services change their terms of use?

Governments around the world now rely on social media services to reach and engage citizens, disseminate information, to monitor what people are saying and source intelligence to help address crises.

Many businesses also rely on digital channels for revenue and engagement reasons.

So what happens when an online service that an organisation uses updates its terms and conditions in a way that gives them rights that are uncomfortable for an agency or business - such as when a service claims ownership over anything published on its service, or takes an unlimited right to people's personal information?

Organisations can choose to stop using such a service, however it can be difficult to do so.

Firstly the practicalities of removing all the legacy data you've saved on the service - be it posts, presentations or documents - can be tricky. Some services may not even allow you to delete, or keep copies in the background.

Secondly organisations will need to find another place - an acceptable place - to put all the content they removed - noting that they may have to move again if a second service changes its terms.

Thirdly there's the issue of abandoning the organisation's community. Both the people who were already using the service and used it to interact with the organisation and the people who joined the service specifically to interact with the organisation. How does the organisation access them if it's not using the service anymore?

If you think this is just a theoretical exercise, sorry - we've seen this type of issue before, when online services have modified their terms and faced a huge backlash from their users.

And I think we're about to see it again with the release of the new LinkedIn and Slideshare terms.

LinkedIn recently changed the Terms of Use for all of its properties (including SlideShare which they own) to state, in part (bold italics are mine):

2.2. License and warranty for your submissions to LinkedIn 
You still own what you own, but you grant us a license to the content and/or information you provide us. As between you and LinkedIn, you own the content and information you provide LinkedIn under this Agreement, and may request its deletion at any time, unless you have shared information or content with others and they have not deleted it, or it was copied or stored by other users.
Additionally, you grant LinkedIn a nonexclusive, irrevocable, worldwide, perpetual, unlimited, assignable, sublicenseable, fully paid up and royalty-free right to us to copy, prepare derivative works of, improve, distribute, publish, remove, retain, add, process, analyze, use and commercialize, in any way now known or in the future discovered, any information you provide, directly or indirectly to LinkedIn, including, but not limited to, any user generated content, ideas, concepts, techniques and/or data to the services, you submit to LinkedIn, without any further consent, notice and/or compensation to you or to any third parties.

What does this mean in plain English?

The first bit sounds OK "You still own what you own, but you grant us a license to the content and/or information you provide us." That's pretty standard for an online service. They need a license to publish the material online on my behalf, so no problems there.

However when an oganisation says that I am granting them "a nonexclusive, irrevocable, worldwide, perpetual, unlimited, assignable, sublicenseable, fully paid up and royalty-free right", red flags start to fly.

Anything that is irrevocable, global, perpetual and free is potentially likely to cause issues at some point down the track - but the term by its wording removes any ability to retract that right, such as by deleting a file or discontinuing my account.

The next part is even worse - the right LinkedIn and Slideshare is taking (on an irrevocable, worldwide basis) is to not only display my presentations or information, but to "copy, prepare derivative works of, improve, distribute, publish, remove, retain, add, process, analyze, use and commercialize,  in any way now known or in the future discovered, any information you provide, directly or indirectly to LinkedIn".

In other words, I may own the original work, but LinkedIn can make a derivative work, publish it and then charge people for it and I can't do a thing about it. Suddenly any slides I've put up on Slideshare with useful data becomes a revenue stream for them - and I lost my recourse by publishing it on their service, even if I did so before they changed their terms.

Not only this, but they don't only get the right to take my slides, delete a few and sell the rest, they can also turn them into any any format and monetise them as well. If I told a good story in a slideshow, LinkedIn could publish it as a book, if I published a slide with the design for a cold fusion reactor, LinkedIn could build the reactor and sell it - paying me nothing in return.

Now that's scary - but it even gets worse... "including, but not limited to, any user generated content, ideas, concepts, techniques and/or data to the services"

So if I publish a presentation about my new start up concept to Slideshare, now LinkedIn can take my concept or technique and use it themselves, royalty-free, in any way they see fit.

And they never have to compensate me, or even tell me that they've done it (per "without any further consent, notice and/or compensation to you or to any third parties.")


Any organisation with intellectual property or data should carefully consider whether they're prepared to continue to use Slideshare or LinkedIn to publish information about their services, products, potential products or data - because simply by publishing it in one of these platforms, LinkedIn takes ownership.

Even worse, as their new terms came into force when they were published, anything you've already published on these platforms is now theirs.

I'm going to be far more careful about how I use Slideshare and LinkedIn in future - and will be advising the organisations I work with to similarly think carefully before they publish anything on these channels.

Any government agency or business who wants to retain control over their own content - including whether it can be copied, restructured and sold by an online service - should now be very careful about publishing in either LinkedIn or Slideshare.

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Can governments support crowdfunding?

This is a topic quite close to my heart at present, as I'm running a Kickstarter crowdfunding project myself - at www.kickstarter.com/projects/socialmediaplanner/social-media-planner (please check it out!)

It's teaching me a great deal about the challenges involved, and I'll be reporting back on this at the end of the process.

A broader question is whether governments in Australia are able to support crowdfunding, whether simply backing a project they wish to see funded or as an approach for investing money in new projects with community backing.

The first scenario is potentially the hardest for agencies under existing procurement frameworks.

Except in NSW and soon Victoria (which have the notion of unsolicited proposals), governments across Australia have quite a rigid process for buying 'stuff' (goods or services).

First they must identify that they need it. Next they must try to figure out if they can afford it. Then they have to go to market to buy it.

Within these constraints there is a fair bit of flexibility - there's many ways to identify the need, fund the 'stuff' and even to buy it.

As part of this process governments even buy 'stuff' which hasn't yet been developed all the time - such as when they ask someone to design new software, build a custom ship, develop a road or provide a structural review.

Crowdfunding generally works this way - people back a project that hasn't yet been completely developed in order to fund final development.

However governments often struggle to 'buy with friends' - to join in a joint purchase process as just one of the participants. They always want custom assurances and contracts, have specific requirements and otherwise make it difficult for themselves to participate in group processes - such as via crowdfunding.

Despite this, several Australian governments have found a way to participate in crowdfunding exercises, with both WA and Tasmanian governments now actively involved in the process.

Arts Tasmania has teamed up with Pozible, Australia's leading crowdfunding service for the Crowbar funding initiative. The initiative offers approved art projects the opportunity to receive up to $2,000 in funds from Arts Tasmania (capped at 50% of the funds raised) if these projects are successfully funded on Pozible.

On top of simply matching cash, Arts Tasmania is also offering one-on-one campaign development support, additional promotional opportunities from Arts Tasmania and having their projects presented in the Arts Tasmania Collection on Pozible.

It's a great opportunity for artists, who only have to find funding for 50% of their project, and for Arts Tasmania, which gets to support more projects (as the public funds part of them), as well as gets a community view on whether a particular project is worth funding.

The initiative also opens the door to new artists with new ideas that don't necessarily fit into other grant programs.

So far Crowbar has only supported one project, the Cranky Ladies of History. This has exceeded it's Pozible target, which is great to see.

I hope to see more projects funded in the same way - though I appreciate there may also be a learning curve for artists, who are not used to pitching their ideas to the public in this way.

ScreenWest in WA has run a similar program for film makers called 3 to 1.

Also involving Pozible, the program offers three dollars in funding for every dollar contributed by the public to crowdfunded film projects, up to an overall cap of $250,000.

This project has seen almost 30 projects try to raise the funds they need to proceed - with mixed success.  Overall it is achieving the same thing for ScreenWest as Crowbar is for Arts Tasmania - helping them to prioritise projects that have significant community interest while allowing them to stretch their grants funding further.


Besides these approaches in Australia, the UK Government has become a significant supporting of the crowd loan scene. The UK government has partnered with a number of crowd loan services including Funding Circle and Crowdcube through its Start Up Loans initiative to provide up to 20% of the funds from the government.

Essentially organisations looking for a start-up or business development loan can use a crowd site to tell their story and provide their numbers. Individuals then loan money in small amounts, setting the interest rate they want to receive.

Once a loan reaches a certain threshold (80-95%), the government will provide the rest of the funds at the average interest rate.

The loan is then managed as any other and paid back over an agreed term.

The benefit of this system is that it reduces risk for government, by ensuring that the community supports a loan before they put money in. It also is very low cost, even profitable, for government, as they get their money back plus interest and can choose to reinvest it each year.

This is, in my view, a very strong model for businesses, and I can personally testify to its effectiveness as Delib used this last year in the UK for additional product development funds.


We're also beginning to see crowdfunding supported by governments in the US as a way for businesses to raise money beyond the equity or debt models.

Washington State recently passed a very interesting bill (through one house at least) allowing businesses to raise up to a million dollars per year via crowdfunding.

Some other US states are also considering legislation.

Australia is a bit further behind, but the Australian Government is starting to make interesting noises in this area.

As reported in the Saturday Paper, Federal government encouraged to free up crowd funding,

Malcolm Turnbull recently wrote on his blog: “Crowd funding has become an increasingly popular way of promoting financing for innovative projects, allowing start-ups and rapidly growing companies to access diversified sources of capital … however, regulatory arrangements in Australia are not particularly tailored to this type of capital raising. The government is determined to see if we can match the regulatory environment that’s present in the US, here in Australia.”

Of course noise is one thing, changing financial regulations and laws is quite another - and can take some time.

However as the Arts Tasmania and ScreenWest examples show, there's opportunities right now for government agencies to consider crowdfunding, if they're prepared to think outside the square.

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In which circumstances should a democratic nation ban access to social networks?

During the UK riots in 2011, the UK Prime Minister suggested shutting down social networks in future riots to prevent information sharing amongst rioters.

Now Turkey has blocked access to Twitter, stating the service was 'biased' and did nothing to stop the 'character assassination' of politicians in the current ruling party accused of bribery.

Like the UK, Turkey is a secular democracy, with a constitution that guarantees freedom of expression, in fact Turkey's constitution goes much further than Australia's constitution, where freedom of expression only covers certain political expression.

Turkey is also a member of the Open Government Partnership (OGP), an international organisation of nations committed to fostering increasing accountability in government through openness and transparency. Though it should be noted that Turkey has fallen behind in their OGP openness commitments.

Australia committed to OGP membership under our last government, however has not completed the tasks necessary to join as yet.

The question this raises for me is when is it appropriate for nations - particularly secular democracies - to block access to social networks and thereby limit the ability for citizens to share information and organise?

The normal practice for nations seems to be to say that if the information shared is illegal, inaccurate or might lead people to commit crimes, there is a place for the courts or parliament to restrict expression across, or access to, any form of media.

This is the position taken both in the UK and in Turkey and has been expressed by democratically elected politicians in other states as well.

However what happens when the law makers decide to legislate to make content that is potentially true, but embarrassing to the government, illegal. Or what happens when a head of state, by degree, bans content that could damage a political party or individual politician?

While there is a case to say that content that is illegal should be unavailable online, and this is a practice Australia already follows with a secret blacklist of banned content and websites (which currently has no review process and no public scrutiny of what gets added to it), it becomes problematic for a democracy when the legislators make laws to block content that is simply 'uncomfortable' to them or their major backers.

This uncomfortable content only becomes illegal because it might affect the interests of individuals or groups linked to the ruling party if the population knew about it - which is also an argument as to why citizens should be told, so they can factor it into their future voting decisions.

There's little evidence that blocking social networks does much to prevent the spread of information - certainly the blocks in Tunisia and Egypt did not change the outcome for the former governments of those countries and looks to be doing little to put allegations of inappropriate behaviour by Turkish politicians back in the bottle.

At times blocks could have the reverse effect, inflaming situations by calling attention to both the content in question and throwing a harsh light on the politicians calling for and implementing blocks. An issue that could otherwise be managed, could easily become unmanageable once a government begins demonstrating it is not as open as it claims to be.

In fact this is precisely what appears to be happening in Turkey, with Twitter use actually increasing following the ban and increasing international attention on the claims being made.

So when is it appropriate for democratic governments to temporarily or permanently ban entire online services?

I would recommend that this is only appropriate when the service is designed and used solely for illegal purposes, such as a social network purely for sharing illegal pornography or buying illegal drugs.

However most services are simply designed to allow people to share content and make no distinction between the type of content they carry. These services should never be blocked by a government, as the damage in preventing legal discussions and content sharing far outweighs the cost of a level of illegal activities and enforcement services can at least track and address illegal activities, which would otherwise disappear underground into places harder for police to uncover.

Discomfort to politicians or prominent people should never be a reason to take any service offline, although there might be legal recourse to address the conduct of individuals using the service - which Australia's defamation laws already covers.

At the end of the day, nations committed to freedom of expression, whether explicitly stated in their constitutions or not, need to reconcile themselves to the increased volume of conversation via social channels and find a balanced path which punishes anti-social behaviour while supporting free expression.

It is clear this is still an area in flux and I trust and hope that politicians around the world recognise that shutting down debate is no longer the best or most appropriate solution to a situation, and could cause them greater harm than good with their constituents.

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