After the NFL and ESPN’s recent attempts to control the way employees and athletes interact in Social Media, the NBA is set to unveil their official rules regarding communicating via social networks.  Based on this article by ESPN, it seems that the NBA will get applauded by the social media elite for a lax and open policy.  Regardless of these rules, this article contained a quote by Mav’s owner Marc Cuban:

“Asked if the Mavericks will impose their own Twitter restrictions on their players this season, Cuban said Sunday: “Not really. I will talk to the guys about never venting or talking about team business on Twitter. That’s usually what creates problems. [But] Twitter is just another form of media. What you say on Twitter is like saying it on ESPN.”

That’s the perfect interpretation of social media.  It’s just another form of media.  It’s a tool.  If you’re a business, training your employees to at least reach a certain level of media literacy is better than putting up restrictions and rules that may hurt employee morale or, if you’re high profile like ESPN, actually hurt corporate image.  It will be interesting to follow this story and see the exact verbiage of these guidelines, but initial reports look promising.  When more high profile organizations develop an understanding of these tools, it will help all businesses.