---
title: Web freedom survey
date: "2010-03-31T18:01:48Z"
lastmod: "2010-04-13T05:16:21Z"
categories:
  - business-realities
wp_id: 2499
---

There was a time when workers were searched when they left, to make sure they weren’t stealing. They were paid by their hour, and had to clock in/clock out. They had supervisors to ensure that they didn’t slack off. They weren’t allowed to make calls at work. After all, people were lazy and thieving in those days.

Nowadays, we’re enlightened. We respect and trust our employees. Like a family. We don’t micromanage their activities. We don’t tap their phone calls.

We don’t restrict or monitor their web usage.

Now, _your_ company is enlightened, of course. Surely you can access these sites I believe _essential_ for work? (If you work out of different offices, you should fill one for each office.)

So, please tell me: which sites can YOU access?

![Summary: Over 95% can access Google and Wikipedia, but less than 50% can access last.fm, YouTube, Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, or Yahoo Mail.](/blog/assets/web-freedom-survey.webp)

[Download the results](/blog/assets/web-freedom-survey.csv)

---

## Comments

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- **Rockey Nebhwani** _31 Mar 2010 11:01 pm_:
  I think you need another option in dropdown 'available on request'
- **GK** _1 Apr 2010 5:48 am_:
  After being 10+ years in US, and now in India for the past few months, the restrictions on web access in indian IT companies is truly surprising (for the lack of a better word). Sucks!! It is primarily cause of folks who work here and have misused the freedom.
- **[Veera](http://veerasundar.com/blog)** _22 Apr 2010 4:45 am_:
  there are no restrictions on web usage at my work location. The reason my HR said was that the company believe its employees won't be doing any bad thing with web and they gave full access to all employees.
- **[Thejesh GN](http://thejeshgn.com)** _6 Apr 2010 6:59 pm_:
  Presently where I work, all the above sites are allowed :)
- **[You are in prison | s-anand.net](http://www.s-anand.net/blog/you-are-in-prison/)** _21 May 2010 12:00 pm_ _(pingback)_:
  [...] 2010 Business realities S Anand (I had intended to write this post sarcastically, a bit like my web freedom survey. But sarcasm’s confusing to read. So I’ll just be straight and [...]
- **[nikhil](http://www.gooogle.in)** _24 Jul 2010 7:33 am_:
  Currently where I am working there is proxy which prevents downloading exe files but rest all is open. I guess in today's world you should not restrict users on using web power. It can be uge source of knowledge

<!-- wp-comments-end -->