Managing Electronic Records: Methods, Best Practices, and Technologies

CHAPTER 13

Managing Social Media Business Records*

Social media use has skyrocketed over the past several years. Organizations are using social media and Web 2.0 platforms like blogs, podcasts, and wikis to connect people to corporate and government organizations, and to share information. In the government sector, agencies are able to directly provide information to the public, and can solicit responses on planned projects or policy changes in new, more collaborative, and personal ways.1 These new social media platforms are creating content that must be managed, monitored, and archived, and, in fact, some of the content supports key marketing or strategic business processes and may be classified as business records. Often social media content is not managed by information governance (IG) policies and monitored with controls that ensure protection of critical information assets and preservation of business records.

Types of Social Media in Web 2.0

The term Web 2.0 was coined to characterize the move from static websites on the Internet that passively provided information to consumers to more participative, interactive, collaborative, and user–oriented websites and web applications that allow for input, discussion, and sharing. Users actually can add content, increasing the value of the website or service. Examples may be blogs or podcasts (usually audio) where readers can post comments or pose questions; wikis that hyperlink to related information to create a knowledge base that ...