Communication Technology

For the second month in succession is a new research article on work-related blogs.

It's by Abigail Schoneboom again.

The title of the article is Workblogging in a Facebook age.

The abstract is as follows:

In keeping with this journal’s recent attempt to revive worker narratives as a means of understanding social questions, this research note reflects on the significance of workblogging as a window on the labour process.

The article reflects on the impact of emerging social networking tools such as Facebook, as well as factors such as increased surveillance and blog searchability, on how and where workplace stories are told.

It assesses some of the problems of conducting research in a rapidly changing blogosphere and argues that researchers must sustain trusting relationships with bloggers, as well as staying abreast of emerging social networking practices, in order not to lose sight of these important recalcitrant voices.

For more details of the said article click here.

A new research article by Abigail Schoneboom on work-related blogs has just come out.

It has been published in the New Technology, Work and Employment journal.

It is entitled: Sleeping giants? Fired workbloggers and labour organisation.

The abstract reads as follows:

This paper argues that the Waterstone's fired blogger incident performed a labour organising function in terms of garnering pro-labour media attention and encouraging critical discourse.

Looking at the blog's distinctive features and evolution, it evaluates the strengths, limitations and potential for recurrence of similar high-profile incidents.

For more details click here.

Work-related blogs get quite a bit of attention in the popular media and last year saw three (that I know of) turned in to books.

Last week while Googling around for any further reports or mention of "work-related blogs", "employee blogs", "job blogs", "workblogging", etc. I came across an interesting piece of work on this very matter by Abigail Schoneboom.

The working paper is called Diary of a Working Boy: Creative Resistance Among Anonymous Workbloggers and can be downloaded here.

It's particularly ironic for myself as I'm just about in the final stages of finishing my second working paper (really a better version of the first!) on work-related blogs, for a conference in Amsterdam next month - a paper that I will put on-line after I've presented it.

...the study aims to understand the intersection between workblogging, creative writing, and social change, capturing the appeal of humdrum office jobs to aspiring writers and activists who pursue their emancipation clandestinely within the organisation.