All reporters and sub-editors must start a company-authorised account on various social media platforms. They also have the option of converting existing personal social media accounts to company accounts. On these, they are free to discuss news and related material. The company will possess log-in credentials to such accounts and will be free to post any material to these accounts without journalists’ knowledge. It is now also mandatory to disclose all personal social-media accounts held by the journalist to the company. All intellectual property and any future revenue from these accounts belong to the company, it reserves the rights to continue operating that account event after the journalist quits BCCL the contract says.
Reporters who have raised concerns with their editors say they have mostly been told that those will be addressed in due course. BCCL’s newspapers recently started incorporating email ids of reporters into bylines.
The Hindu, another large English newspaper, had recently asked its journalists to not share links from rival news outlets on Twitter and Facebook.
