Revised July 16, 2024
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Social Media and the Library Mission
In keeping with the Pillsbury Free Library’s mission to serve the public by providing the freedom and opportunity to access information, knowledge, and ideas from a wide variety of sources, the library participates in various social media applications where library staff and community members can interact via virtual communication.
I. Media Platforms
A. The Pillsbury Free Library has established the following social media methods to better engage with our community:
1. Facebook 2. Instagram 3. Website 4. E-mail 5. Digital Newsletter 6. X/Twitter 7. Others, as needed
B. These platforms offer the ability to:
1. Inform patrons about library programs, services, and additions to the collection;
2. Provide an additional method for limited community feedback;
3. Foster the courteous exchange of ideas;
4. Offer expanded service to our patrons, and
5. Access content, research platform-specific data, and/or communicate with others.
II. Comments
A. Best practices are to offer a forum for moderated comments. If no moderation services are available or it’s impractical, comments may be turned off.
B. Comments are subject to review for content, relevancy, and courtesy. If a comment’s subject matter is not related to the purpose of the library post, it is subject to removal and possibly to reporting to local authorities and/or to the social media site’s company. Before comments are removed, they may be screen shot and saved in case of future need.
C. Examples of comments that may be subject to removal:
1. Content, materials, or links not related to the specific purpose of the original post, or which are totally unrelated or contrary to the library’s mission.
2. Those that contain hyperlinks to material that is unrelated to the topic.
3. False or misleading information.
4. Phishing attempts or other scams, such as posing as the payment portal for an event.
5. Content that contains profane, racist, or hate speech language.
6. Personal attacks, insults, or threatening language.
7. Potentially libelous statements.
8. Partisan language or organized political activity.
9. Plagiarized or copyrighted material without attribution or permission.
10. Private, personal information published without consent of the individual.
11. Commercial promotions, spam, or solicitations.
12. Sexual content or links to sexual content.
13. Illegal conduct or encouragement of illegal activity.
14. Content that violates local, state, or federal laws, ordinances, or regulations.
III. Who May Create Social Media for the Library
A. Certain staff members and trustees shall be approved and appointed by the library director to post directly to the Pillsbury Free Library social media accounts. The person who posts, along with the library director, will monitor posts and traffic to the site, and maintain decorum, removing comments as outlined in this policy (Section II. C.).
B. Comments as Pillsbury Free Library to other posts should consist of information only; no personal commentary should be included in a post or comment when utilizing the Pillsbury Free Library avatar.
IV. Privacy
Pillsbury Free Library does not collect, maintain, or otherwise use personal information stored on any third-party site. Users may remove themselves at any time from the library’s friends or fans lists, unfollow the library, or request that the library remove them.
V. Parental Controls
As with more traditional resources, the library does not act in place of a parent and is not responsible for enforcing any restrictions which a parent or guardian may place on a minor’s use of social media applications.
VI. Liability
The Pillsbury Free Library assumes no liability regarding any event or interaction that takes place by any participant in any Library-sponsored social media, and does not endorse content outside of the pages maintained by the library and the posts created by Pillsbury Free Library staff in the course of their work duties. Participation in Pillsbury Free Library’s social media services implies agreement with all Library policies and terms of service for each individual third-party service.
VII. Participation
A. Participation in the Pillsbury Free Library’s social media implies agreement with all library policies, including its Computer Use and Internet Safety Policy, and the terms of service of each individual third-party service. By posting a comment or other content participants agree to indemnify the Pillsbury Free Library and its officers and employees from and against all liabilities, judgments, damages, and costs incurred which arise out of, or are related to the content that the participant posts.
B. The library reserves the right to use any comments, posts, and messages on library social media sites for use in public relations and marketing materials, first removing any personal information from the comment, post, or message such as last name, school, phone, or e-mail.
VIII. Ongoing Use Evaluation
The role and utility of social media in relation to the goals and purposes of the library will be evaluated periodically by the library staff and Board of Trustees, and may be terminated at any time without notice to subscribers.