Energy giant Exxon Mobil fell victim to a Twitter user spoofing official use of an account named ExxonMobilCorp, it was discovered yesterday, and now a discussion is unfolding among social media advocates about what the company should do.
Many people say that Twitter is frivolous and unimportant. In this case those people would be correct. Just six weeks ago the US Supreme Court rejected Exxon's appeal to drop a lawsuit alleging that its employees in Indonesia "committed murder, torture, sexual assault .. genocide and crimes against humanity" in defense of one of the world's largest liquid natural gas facilities. Placed in this context, whether or how this company deals with Twitter seems irrelevant.
The conversation about how Exxon should have or will deal with the spoofed Twitter account can be followed via a post last night on analyst Jeremiah Owyang's blog. It makes sense to tackle the general questions concerning "big brands" and new media, but a line should be drawn somewhere in order to keep technology in a larger perspective. The case of Exxon Mobil is on the other side of that line.
Indonesia is a sprawling country of more than 220 million people and an amazing 17,000 islands. It possesses huge amounts of liquid natural gas and gold and has major geo-political significance.
The country has a long and troubled history of international and internal conflicts but the US government's own documents detail US payment of local groups killing subversives based on US provided lists of individuals in the 1960's and US State Department acceptance of Indonesian government massacres of civilians using US supplied weapons in the 1970's.
Key player and Nixon Secretary of State Henry Kissinger retained financial interests in the country's natural resources throughout the 1980's, the human rights abuses alleged to have been committed by Indonesian soldiers working as Exxon employees were far from the only crimes alleged to have been committed in the 1990's (see in addition the Dili Massacre, for example) and since the turn of the 21st century multiple US administrations have sent elite US military training groups to "train the trainers" in Indonesia despite US Congressional bans against direct co-operation with the Indonesian military on the basis of documented human rights abuses.
It's not a pretty picture. There's an intense history of globe-dominating nations doing horrible things to the people of Indonesia.
On June 16th, 2008 the US Supreme Court denied a request by Exxon Mobil to dismiss a lawsuit titled Exxon Mobil v. John Doe, 07-81, brought by international rights groups on behalf of 11 villagers in Indonesia's Aceh province. The suit alleges that Indonesian soldiers hired by Exxon Mobil "committed murder, torture, sexual assault .. genocide and crimes against humanity."
One British rights organization specializing in Indonesia, called Down To Earth, further reports that "the company has been accused of providing the military with buildings used for torturing local people suspected of involvement in the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) and excavators to dig mass graves for the victims of military violence." The worst accounts of the treatment of civilians in Indonesia are something no one wants to read.
Exxon argued to the Supreme Court that the lawsuit against it should be dismissed because it involves issues of international relations that should be left to the Executive Branch. In 2002 the US State Department said that "adjudication of this lawsuit at this time would in fact risk a potentially serious adverse impact on significant interests of the United States..." Indonesia is a country heavily populated with Muslims and the US argued that a ruling on the Exxon lawsuit could harm anti-terrorist efforts, among other concerns.
Since that time various courts have shaped the debate such that now-resigned Solicitor General Paul Clement said this May that the case had been sufficiently narrowed to avoid harm to the nation's foreign policy interests. According to the Associated Press, the Bush administration urged the US Supreme Court to reject Exxon's request to drop the case this June.
Thus the lawsuit still stands and Exxon may, years later, have to answer to some allegations of human rights violations.
And what about Twitter? There may or may not be a time when Exxon's engagement with new social media is important, but this same summer when the Supreme Court has just said they will be judged is not that time.
In October we wrote here about the last active bloggers in Burma, fighting to let the world know what was happening there as the military massacred monks and turned the country inside-out. In December we wrote about YouTube's deleting videos documenting torture of civilians by Egyptian police because of the site's policy against violent imagery. On the Fourth of July we wrote about the Iranian Parliament's consideration of the death penalty for subversive bloggers.
The internet and human rights intersect often. If we are to believe that these democratizing media are going to make the world a better place, then it's important to keep them in context regarding what's going on in the world outside of our tech niche. It's with that in mind that we point at the lawsuit and Supreme Court ruling against Exxon when the company's communication strategy with the world comes up in conversation.
After all, as Exxon Spokesperson Alan Jeffers said yesterday about Twitter: "It's our perception that social networking is based on honesty, transparency and trust..."
Photo: A market in Aceh, Indonesia. Creative Commons from Flickr user A. www.viajar24h.com
Comments
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On the one hand, the very fact that Exxon was seen to be embracing twitter made it seem innovative and softened its image. On the other hand, use of the company logo was an implied endorsement and trademark violation that "Janet" should have avoided. At this point, Janet should continue under "her" own steam in the same fashion that Robert Scoble did while blogging about Microsoft as an employee. Assuming Janet is one.
Posted by: Robin Carey | August 2, 2008 8:10 AM
Marshall, it's true that the recent Twitter brand-jacking incident is unimportant in comparison with Exxon's other problems. You make a good point and do us a favor by placing things in (international) context.
However, I don't agree with you that Exxon should do nothing about Twitter. I don't see how this conclusion follows from the claims you make.
I think Exxon should do something about Twitter. See, if it weren't for the Twitter incident, RWW wouldn't write about Exxon's other, bigger problems. For some people, they might go unnoticed. It is possible that this small brand-jacking incident, or any other conversation about Exxon that starts in social media can escalate into what Exxon will experience as another full-blown crisis. IMO Exxon cannot afford to ignore this incident or social media conversations about them.
Not having done enough research on Exxon's situation, I won't volunteer any advice about what they should do. I'm sure there are smart people there who can figure it out. But do nothing? That's too dangerous.
Posted by: Mihaela V | August 2, 2008 8:12 AM
I see this is the first post tagged with "human rights". As I don't read "web technology" blogs for condescending human rights rants, and as this post had nothing to do with the web or technology (besides a transparent use of a minor kerfluffle on Twitter to segue into an unrelated but predictable oil-companies-are-evil and America-is-Satan diatribe), I'm just wondering if we can expect more of these sorts of posts. If so, maybe you could change your About page to reference your new broader scope so subscribers and visitors would know what to expect. Just a suggestion.
Posted by: joe | August 2, 2008 9:03 AM
Joe, that's a typical response. I did try to say that the US is not the only country with a history of doing terrible things in Indonesia and I don't know where I said anything about oil companies in general. If you don't think the particular actions discussed are evil well then I don't know what to do for you.
Posted by: Marshall Kirkpatrick
|
August 2, 2008 9:08 AM
Joe
While I agree, this is a slightly off topic take to the whole situation, Marshall is going "up" the discussion to focus on the bigger issues rather than getting punk'd and brandjacking.
Although it's not something we expect from every RWW post, in a case like this, we have to be reminded of the larger issues at hand.
Posted by: Jeremiah Owyang | August 2, 2008 9:11 AM
Don't Bag Marshal entirely 'casue of one post. Marshal writes great shit. Call him out when you feel it is necessary, but question him on the whole. Marshal writes great content, and if you don't agree with it, at least he is opening the conversation.
Posted by: Lurking iibserver | August 2, 2008 9:29 AM
you have the makings of a very good investigative reporter.
Posted by: gregorylent | August 2, 2008 1:57 PM
Imagine if a member of John McCain's staff created a "BarackObama" twitter account and used it to damage Obama politically. You would be outraged, but that's basically the same as what you're condoning here.
I don't doubt for a second that Exxon is capable of doing horrible things in Indonesia. But that's for the courts to determine, and punish Exxon accordingly.
Posted by: josh kadis | August 2, 2008 2:15 PM
Josh
Well sort of. We don't know it's a competitive party to Exxon. (in your analogy of mccain/obama) in fact, it could be a good hearted ex or current employee --we just don't know.
We do know one thing --some of Janet's responses are making people pretty angry, they feel she is trivializing the valdez spill.
In any case, I get your point.
Posted by: Jeremiah Owyang | August 2, 2008 9:16 PM
This is really interesting. I had recently written a satirical article about Exxon Mobil and put it on my Twitter page also. A couple of days later, I was being followed on Twitter by "Exxon Mobil Corp," which turned out to be this Janet person. I was wondering why someone from Exxon Mobil would have wanted to follow someone like me. I assume she just searched for "Exxon Mobil" and followed whoever mentioned it or something, but it makes more sense now, considering she's not an official spokesperson or anything.
Posted by: Jerome | August 3, 2008 2:11 AM
Excellent article Marshall, as usual. Thank you for tackling the higher purpose. As you have said, the internet and human rights issues intersect in many areas. My guess is that trend will continue.
I agree, now is probably not the best time for EM to 'go social'. Actually, I can't think of a good time, for that particular company. As you quoted their guy: "It's our perception that social networking is based on honesty, transparency and trust..."
Somehow, I don't think they fit that perception.
Posted by: Jon | August 3, 2008 10:31 AM
I can't believe you only have 11 comments (as of now) but this issue is explosive. For the very reasons you point out, Exxon Mobil should take their social viewpoint seriously. Twitter is a piece of sh!t compared to their crimes against humanity and the world in general. But it's that social aspect that could paint a face that is different from the face they have today. Obviously they're doing fine, having posted an $11B profit for the 2nd quarter of 2008 alone. But no company wants this. The very fact that a fake posted on Twitter has gotten attention and it's not the attention Exxon Mobil wants.
I'm not a forgiver of Exxon Mobil either. I want them to fall. This is completely subjective. As a company, they need damage control (which I'm sure they're on).
Also, F them.
Posted by: Chris | August 3, 2008 11:57 PM
Marshall, I don't even understand why people continue to use Twitter. It's just another platform for microblogging, and you can do the microblogging from within your own blog. In that case, I don't really give importance to building my twitter profile at all.
I believe that Twitter doesn't really get you any big benefits when you have a thousand people you follow. Because, everyone follows a thousand people and each of these individuals' post gets lost in it.
If Twitter is down, all the buzz about these things would eventually end. When a new company emerges and becomes quite popular such as Twitter here, good big companies may have problems from the urchins like that guy who created Twitter profile with Exxon. Really, we can't do anything about that, other than be part of the group not giving much importance to Twitter.
Lenin
Posted by: Lenin Nair | August 4, 2008 4:12 AM
It's actually astounding how few brands have protected their brand IDs on social networks.
We looked at the FTSE100 (the top 100 companies on the London Stock Exchange, though my guess is you'd have the same result in NY), and in 69 cases, the Twitter ID matching the brand was vacant:
http://www.thisisherd.com/2008/08/major-brands-at-risk-of-brand-jacking.html
So I have to agree with Chris. No doubt all these things about EM are absolutely true.
But corporations should as a rule of thumb be engaging their critics on platforms like Twitter...after all, one of the reasons why "Janet" got so much attention was because her comments were - relatively speaking of course - so refreshingly open.
It was a rare case of positive PR for the company...before they got caught with their pants down when it turned out they don't even monitor Twitter.
Posted by: Dirk Singer | August 4, 2008 6:37 AM