A few weeks ago I was having a rally good chat about using social networks at work. You know, how useful they can be for making connections to other people, sharing information, chatting about work, chatting about things other than work...you know - all that human type stuff.

"ah yes", they said, "we can use them, but only outside of core hours. After 9:30 we can't access."

I was pretty surprised...so much so that I asked if I could write this blog post about it. It amazed me that an IT organisation would go to such lengths to change firewall rules, or access control rules at a specific time to stop people from accessing certain sites.

I've been in the IT guys shoes though, so I speak from experience. Ten years of managing hundreds of corporate servers, thousands of networked PC's and systems that spanned the globe. So, I know a thing or two about locking down desktops, maintaining access to critical systems and battling viruses.

All these things are interlinked. Lock down the desktop to minimise the risk of viruses getting in so you can maintain access to critical systems. It's all a circle and there are some very good reasons for maintaining control.

And yet, I am still surprised by this move. Perhaps it is because I wear a different hat nowadays, a hat that sees me advocate the use of social networks and support TALK. Or, perhaps it is because these kind of applications weren't a global phenomena when I was working in IT.

You see, I don't recall any so called 'leisure focused' web applications that infiltrated professional environments like they do today. The web is ubiquitous and so interwoven into our lives that the lines between leisure and work use are blurring.

Let's consider Facebook. Last year we had a flurry of activity around banning access to the rapidly growing social network site. Swathes of companies banned access (British Gas, Credit Suisse, Dresdner Kleinwort, Metropolitan Police), the TUC advocated restraint in banning it outright (in favour of time based blocking like the opening example) and there was a report that Kent County Council had blocked it entirely.

Since then, the hullabaloo seems to have calmed down a tad, whilst the user numbers on Facebook have exploded. This time last year, Facebook was a bizarre place where you could turn your friends into a vampire or play meaningless games. A year on and it is a slightly different world...my experience is that it's now more about networking and sharing media.

The Facebook platform has evolved and it may be time now to revisit the debate over whether it should be allowed within corporate firewalls.

Here's why I think we should be looking again:

• Social networking sites have crossed the chasm and are now embedded in our daily internet use.
• It is often difficult to separate our personal and professional lives and sites like Facebook provide brilliant vehicles to mesh the two.
• The purpose of sites like Facebook has evolved. We now use them as networking and communicative mediums.
• Gen Y, the employees of the future use these sites a s a primary communication method. They don't understand the world of email, let alone agendas, meetings and minutes.

In short, I think employers must adapt. We're applying rules and regulations that were appropriate in the days when we could more clearly demark between leisure and work. Those days weren't that long ago and whilst society has built new ways of communicating, socialising and yes, working, our organisations have struggled to get their heads around what this means and how best to harness it.

And at it's centre, this is a debate that swirls around issues such as respect, understanding, training and development, not least trust.

I'll leave you with this statistic from a recent survey by Telindus - 39% of those aged 18 - 24 would consider quitting their jobs if social networking was banned. The organisations that do adapt will attract the next generation of employees. Those that don't, well, what will become of them?

Plus, it troubles me that as we build TALK into a social site for local government and the public sector, will we be stifled by these policies? Is TALK just ahead of it's time for the sector?

I'm going to save that question for another time, but tell me about your place of work? Are you able to use Facebook, Bebo, MySpace et al? Is it blocked or is there partial access?

-pc.