Instant Messaging Rules: A Business Guide to Managing Policies, Security,
and Legal Issues for Safe IM Communication
By Nancy Flynn
Amacom, July 2004
224 pages, $19.95
As the pun in the title notes, instant messaging started life as a way to let
teenagers, like, communicate. But now that IM is omnipresent in business, the
time has come to take it more seriously. Flynn is head of The ePolicy Institute,
a consulting and training firm in Ohio, and while she goes on too long about
the pros and cons of IM, the book is helpful in exploring the legal issues involved
in its use. After all, IM is a form of written correspondence, which means that
it can be subpoenaed, so your organization needs written policies about how
it is to be used, stored and managed.