The New York Times (NYT) is updating its policy on how its journalists should use micro-blogging website Twitter. The new policy emphasises the social media platform is optional to protect the staff from online harassment.
According to New York Post, the company circulated a memo sent by its executive editor Dean Baquet which informed the staff about the NYT's Twitter policy “reset”. The memo, however, also said that the policy change was “absolutely not a ban”.
The Post story is based on a report by Business Insider, which obtained a copy of the memo.
“If you do choose to stay on, we encourage you to meaningfully reduce how much time you're spending on the platform, tweeting or scrolling, in relation to other parts of your job,” Baquet wrote in the memo, according to the report.
The policy change is a result of concerns raised by newsroom staffers over being targeted by internet trolls.
Baquet also announced a new in-house team to support journalists who fall victim to threats on social media.
The NYT head, however, added that reporters' tweets would be monitored by their bosses.
“Tweets or subtweets that attack, criticize or undermine the work of your colleagues are not allowed,” Baquet wrote in the memo, according to the Post.
The Daily Beast reported that the policy change is a response to criticism from reporters, most recently by Taylor Lorenz, who moved on to Washington Post. She had slammed the NYT's handling of online harassment and social media used of its journalists.
Lorenz had told MSNBC that Times editors “punish their journalists when they're subject to smear campaigns.”
On Thursday, she tweeted to say that the revised policy of the paper was “disappointing and contradictory”.
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