Company Accused of Firing Over Facebook Post (update: Facebook quote)

In what labor officials and lawyers view as a ground-breaking case involving workers and social media, the National Labor Relations Board has accused a company of illegally firing an employee after she criticized her supervisor on her Facebook page.

This is the first case in which the labor board has stepped in to argue that workers' criticisms of their bosses or companies on a social networking site are generally a protected activity and that employers would be violating the law by punishing workers for such statements. The labor relations board announced last week that it had filed a complaint against an ambulance service, American Medical Response of Connecticut, that fired an emergency medical technician, accusing her, among other things, of violating a policy that bars employees from depicting the company "in any way" on Facebook or other social media sites in which they post pictures of themselves. Lafe Solomon, the board's acting general counsel, said, "This is a fairly straightforward case under the National Labor Relations Act -- whether it takes place on Facebook or at the water cooler, it was employees talking jointly about working conditions, in this case about their supervisor, and they have a right to do that."

Update:
"Just as in your offline life, there are some people who you want to be more open with than others, which is why Facebook gives you complete control over how you share information," Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes said. "People who use Facebook should ensure their sharing settings are consistent with the way they conduct themselves in the real world."