If you ever had any doubt about whether we live in a world where no corporate secret will stay secret for long, I offer you a story in today's New York Times by Steven Greenhouse and Michael Barbaro. The title is: "On Private Web Site, Wal-Mart Chief Talks Tough."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/17/business/17walmart.html

The anti-Wal-Mart group, Wal-Mart Watch, provided the Times with two years of the postings that Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott, Jr. made in response to questions from Wal-Mart managers all over the world.  The site is private and there's no comment about who gave the material to Wal-Mart Watch.

What is clear is that the group wanted the Times story to be as anti-Wal-Mart as their site. (http://walmartwatch.com/).  The only excerpt the site shares from two years of postings is selected to show the CEO and the company in a bad light.

Fortunately for Wal-Mart, though, the Times reporters read more than one posting.  In my reading of their story, Mr. Scott comes off as a human being with a variety of moods and hot buttons that drive his comments.

It's also clear to me from what's quoted in the story that Mr. Scott believed he was making those comments in a private forum with Wal-Mart managers. He obviously felt he could be more candid and direct than if he were in a public form.

But, alas, the forum turned out to be public after all.  And that probably means that Mr. Lee will be less candid in his "private" postings in the future.  I think that's a bad thing.

Candor is one of the most valuable things a group can have because without it the truth doesn't get spoken directly. Basic activities like performance appraisal are harder and less effective when it's not safe to tell the truth.

The fact is that people filter and edit messages when they're not sure who will see the message and how it will be used. 

For now, friend, just figure that anything you say, and certainly anything you write could wind up in tomorrow's paper or on a hostile web site.