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Explains how, with the Internet increasingly being used for the conduct of electronic commerce, organizations are now cognizant of the need to control their employees’ usage of the Internet. Little research has been conducted to date into this important concern. Suggests that an Internet acceptable usage policy is one vehicle for providing this control, containing guidelines for employees indicating both acceptable and unacceptable Internet usages. The policy aims to control those employee behaviours and actions which contribute to the incidence and severity of internal and external Internet risks, while enabling employees and the organization to gain maximum business value from the Internet connection. Explores the issues to be considered in the development of an organization’s Internet acceptable usage policy. Uses a case study of a large Australian organization to illustrate the issues. Proposes a set of criteria for an effective Internet acceptable usage policy as a result of this research.

Internet monitoring in organizations can be used to monitor risks associated with Internet usage and information systems in organizations, such as employees' cyberloafing behavior and information security incidents. Extant research has mainly discussed the effect of Internet monitoring in achieving the targeted goals (e.g. mitigating cyberloafing behavior and information security incidents), but little attention has been paid to the possible side effects of Internet monitoring. Drawing on affective events theory, the authors attempt to reveal that Internet monitoring may cause side effects on employees' Internet usage policy satisfaction, intrinsic work motivation and affective organizational commitment.

The authors conducted a field experiment in a software development company. In total, 70 employees participated in the study. Mann–Whitney U test was employed to analyze the data.

The results suggest that Internet monitoring decreased employees' satisfaction with the Internet usage policy, intrinsic work motivation, as well as affective organizational commitment.

This study contributes to the literature by examining the side effects of Internet monitoring on employees. It also has implications for organizations to make appropriate decisions regarding whether to implement Internet monitoring.

Existing researches find that a gender difference exists in terms of Internet usage. In China, the singleton daughters resulting from China's one-child policy enjoy unprecedented parental support. The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether singleton daughters can, to some extent, break through the predicament of the digital divide.

The study collected data from a sample of 865 college students and obtained 811 valid questionnaires. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) is used to identify clusters of Internet usage from the perspective of statistical associations in various daily online activities. Two-way ANOVA and mean-comparison tests are used to analyze how singleton and non-singleton students use the Internet differently.

This study finds that singleton female students showed no significant differences from male students in aspirational activities of informational, educational use and social media use, which means that singleton female students have caught up with male students in these activities. However, female college students from multi-child families were still found to be disadvantaged in those activities.

There is a lack of consensus on the classification of Internet activities. We used EFA to cluster the varieties of Internet activities into three types: utilitarian use, exploratory use and aspirational use. The three identified types of Internet usage require different degrees of user initiative. We argue that initiative provides a useful lens through which to classify Internet usage. In addition, this study is among the few studies to investigate the impact of the one-child policy on the gender digital divide.

The subject of cyber‐slacking has prompted many organizations to respond by enforcing or implementing policies that restrict internet access. The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the impact of four internet monitoring policies on cyber‐slacking and work satisfaction.

Employees working in medium‐size organizations in Lebanon were surveyed. Chi‐square tests, correlation, ANOVA, and regression analysis were used to test the hypothesis.

Results indicated that having a free internet access had a positive relation with cyber‐slacking, leading to an increase in work satisfaction. The survey also indicated relationship with demographic factors.

Although the research provides useful insight on cyber‐slacking and monitoring policies, it is nevertheless restricted to Lebanese companies.

This paper adds to the literature on cyber‐slacking by empirically testing the effect of different monitoring policies.

Increased usage of the Internet at work has prompted organisations to write Internet Usage Policies to establish appropriate use. This article addresses the main components of an Internet Usage Policy, including security, monitoring and filtering, privacy rights, intellectual property, organisation representation, acceptable personal use, unacceptable personal use, investigation of violations and corrective action, and notification of policy. Each section explains what should be written in the policy, and how it should be written. Internet Usage Policies should be tailored to fit the organisation’s culture. Management must enforce the policies, but be careful not to act like big brother policing every activity employees engage in. Organisations will find that Internet Usage Policies provide a written basis for discouraging Internet misuse, but ultimately the organisational culture will have the strongest effect on employee behaviour.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the moderating effect of organizational policy on the relationship between online social networking (OSN) and job performance of IT professionals engaged full‐time in offshore outsourced IT firms in Sri Lanka.

Survey methodology was used and a random sample of 215 respondents who fulfilled the selection criteria set for the study, responded. To examine the hypothesized relationships, factor analysis and multiple regression were used.

It was found that individuals engaged in online social networking while at work enjoy several benefits such as solving work‐related problems collaboratively. However, individuals also suffer from several drawbacks, which could be mainly categorized into two in terms of interference to job tasks and interference to workplace. Further, it was found that online social networking has significant effects on individual job performance; organizational policy moderates the relationship between online social networking and job performance.

Although online social networking has attracted a substantial amount of media attention over the last few years empirical research attempts have not taken off worldwide. Therefore, the influence of online social networking on employee job performance would be of interest to academics and practitioners worldwide. It is expected that the findings of this study will provide insight into benefits, challenges and issues associated with OSN to allow individuals, organizational leaders, and IT decision‐makers to better understand and utilize online social structures for success. Further, it is expected that the findings of this study will be a source of general guidance in stimulating future research in this area.

There is an on-going debate about the role of workplace internet leisure (WIL) and whether it is a vice or virtue. Considering this, the purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of WIL on workplace outcome variables such as employee satisfaction (ES) and employee productivity in the Malaysian context.

Data were collected using a self-administered questionnaire that yielded 282 responses. Partial least square technique using SmartPLS-3 was used to test the study hypotheses.

Findings reveal that workplace WIL, workplace WIL policy and workplace autonomy orientation (WAO) affect employees’ satisfaction. Additionally, the mediating role of ES was found to be significant.

The findings of this study are valuable for both managers and policy makers. These results can benefit the managers of conventional banks in Malaysia to decide how to enhance employees’ satisfaction and productivity by focusing on the key drivers such as WIL, workplace internet leisure policy (WILP) and WAO.

This is a pioneering study which suggests that moderate use of WIL can have a positive and significant effect on workplace outcome variables. Moreover, this study theorised ES as a mediating variable; this helps to explain how organisations can transform workplace resources in term of internet leisure, WILP and WAO into high productivity by elevating employees’ satisfaction.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of internet filtering, and its impact on marginalized groups including non‐governmental organizations, female activists, ethnic, and religious minorities, the younger generation and the increase of the digital divide in Iran.

The paper raises two main questions: to what extent do information and communications technologies (ICTs) and in particular, the internet, promote freedom of speech, and gender equality in Iran? What is the impact of state censorship and ICT filtering on these activities? To answer these research questions, the author uses narratives of the internet's usage along with a comparison study with other Middle Eastern countries to analyze the impact of ICTs on citizen's freedom of expression.

The paper argues that restrictions imposed on ICT tools and services by the Government of Iran which has been claimed to protect country's national security against the corruption and immorality imposed by Western countries not only affect the expansion of ICTs negatively but also civil liberties – thus increasing the digital divide internally, regionally, as well as on a global scale.

Albeit this research is limited to the case study of Iran, the author believes that lessens learned from the Iran's case study can be applied to other Islamic countries and in particular countries located in the Middle East region.

ICT tools and services such as the internet and short message service are effective emancipatory media for citizens' participation and mobilization in democratic processes.

This paper contributes to the existing knowledge and understanding of the impact of ICTs on freedom and democracy.

This conceptual chapter introduces an interdisciplinary model of emotional ambivalence using an adapted framework based on the Affective Events Theory (AET). Given the preoccupation in the current literature with studying affective disposition and discrete emotions, there is opportunity for researchers to explore the presence and influence of conflicting emotions. I use the organizational context of Personal Web Usage (PWU) monitoring to set the stage for a hypothetical discussion of the AET-based model of emotional ambivalence. The likelihood of conflict in the cultural norms and values associated with both monitoring activity and employee behavior presents an opportune setting to study emotional ambivalence. After an in-depth description of the model and its application to the PWU-based monitoring context, I conclude with a brief discussion of potential areas for future research.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the language utilised in Acceptable Use Policies (AUP) in Scottish public libraries. Through this examination the paper aims to ascertain if power relationships between local authorities, public libraries and users are apparent. Finally, the paper aims to determine if Foucault’s theory of panopticism is relevant to public libraries in this context.

The paper analyses all 32 of the AUPs used in Scottish public libraries, applying a Foucaldian discourse analysis to the content of the policies.

By thorough examination of the literature the researchers were able to extract ten key features that ought to appear in an AUP. It was found that only one of 32 local authorities included information relating to all of these features. It was also found that one local authority contained as few as four of these key features. The median number of features included in the policies was seven. It was also found that power relationships are evident and can be perceived throughout the AUPs. By identifying the key Foucauldian themes of discipline, surveillance, knowledge, and power and resistance throughout the AUPs, the researchers were able to analyse and identify the existence of power relationships and consider the implications these could have on users and on the library services being provided.

The study examines one geographic region, and is only indicative of the region concerned. In addition the usage of the qualitative methodology utilised could be deemed to have elements of subjectivity.

The study would be of benefit to researchers and professionals interested in issues around AUPs and surveillance of library users.

The use of Foucaldian discourse analysis is limited in library and information science research, and this study helps fill this gap. It is the first study the researchers have found that critically examines a range of public library AUPs.