Most managers will eventually have to relent on allowing staff to access social networking websites such as Facebook at work, a leading internet expert says.
With employers intruding into workers' home lives more and more, they must understand that the young generation expects such websites to provide meaning in their jobs, Dr Jeffrey Cole said.
He was commenting after a Galaxy survey found many young workers saw banning access to Facebook at work as a betrayal of trust.
The survey found that banning sites could also hamper efforts to recruit young workers in a tight labour market.
It found almost half those who used the sites at work would choose an obliging employer over one who blocked access.
Almost a third of 16- to 24-year olds and a quarter of 25- to 34-year olds who accessed the internet from work used it at some time for online social networking activity.
Dr Cole, a former director of the Centre for Communications Policy at the University of California, Los Angeles, is intricately involved with the World Internet Project which is looking at the social, political and economic impact of the internet and other new technologies.
"If you talk to human resource managers, this whole generation of 18 to 25 and 30 (year-olds) is very different and they expect their jobs to have meaning," he told the National Press Club.
"They don't want to be asked to work outside a work environment. They have to be treated in a suitable kind of way.
"It's a very different ethic than most of us grew up with. I'm not sure they're wrong.
"The belief that Facebook is not just a frittering away of time but actually is a way to communicate with your work network as well, I think is an accommodation that most managers are probably going to have to make over the coming years.
"But I don't see it imminently."
Dr Cole also had a warning for young people and their parents on what content was appropriate to post on networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace.
Echoing recent exposure in the broader media of photos of young world record swimmer Stephanie Rice that she had posted on her Facebook page, Dr Cole warned that posted material could be used against people for a long time - and not just predators.
"Keep in mind that everything you put on the web may be there forever when you apply for college or for a job," he said.
"If I were a parent, I would be nervous.
"In Australia, the US and almost any country, you can't sign a contract under you're 18 years old.
"The argument is you shouldn't be able to bind yourself to something until you're mature enough to understand the consequences of what that may mean.
"Where social networking is concerned - and I'm not implying you have to be 18 to use a social network site - we see 11- and 12-year olds posting things on Facebook and MySpace that may be far more damaging to them than any contract they could sign - things that may survive forever and will haunt them."
