Games on company gear? Depends who you ask

Only about a third of more than a thousand respondents to a Network World online survey believe it's always wrong to use company equipment to host private video game sessions for groups of players.

The rest of those registering an opinion are OK with the practice, although some approve only with caveats.

And while those proportions are debatable because the poll results are unscientific, the raw numbers along with attendant comments on the story do illustrate a cavernous divide of opinion about the propriety of the practice and confirm at minimum that a lot of IT pros have no problem with it.

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Only about a third of more than a thousand respondents to a Network World online survey believe it's always wrong to use company equipment to host private video game sessions for groups of players.

The rest of those registering an opinion are OK with the practice, although some approve only with caveats.

And while those proportions are debatable because the poll results are unscientific, the raw numbers along with attendant comments on the story do illustrate a cavernous divide of opinion about the propriety of the practice and confirm at minimum that a lot of IT pros have no problem with it.

The survey has been running with a news story I wrote for our March 21 edition headlined: "On the company dime: Rogue game server admins tell all." It features four anonymous network professionals explaining and defending their use of company gear - usually without explicit permission - to host multiplayer video game sessions.

Respondents were asked: "Games on company servers are?" A total of 1,161 people have voted and here are the results:

 "OK only with permission," 16.8% (195 votes);

 "OK if they cause no harm," 35.75% (415 votes);

 "OK if you don't get caught," 10.77% (125 votes);

 And, "What are you nuts? Never," 36.69% (426 votes).

In addition to Network World's regular audience, a significant number of people who read this story arrived at it from Digg, a social bookmarking site whose audience skews young. Another slice of potential survey participants was directed from Blue News, a gamer site that helped us solicit the volunteers who were interviewed in the story.

Comments left on the story reflect the divergent views held by IT professionals regarding the practice of hosting video games on company equipment.

"It is amazing to me how people can rationalize and justify bad behavior," writes one. "I would fire them in a heartbeat."

More representative of the consensus view among those leaving comments was the following:

"Literally, since the dawn of computers there have been system admins playing games on them. The desire for better games and game performance has driven innovation in the industry. As one of the sysadmins stated (in the story), it's a great way for his techs to stay sharp.

"Is it unethical to play games using company resources? Yes it is, but so is surfing the Web, using Facebook, checking personal email, reading a book, taking a nap and hundreds of other non-work related things employees do every day. ... Most gaming takes place during off hours because IT folks do a LOT of their work during off hours. If you've ever sat through an OS or firmware patch or upgrade, you know it can be hours of watching dots crawl across the screen. How is playing a game any different than sitting there reading a book or watching TV?"

My guess is that the guy who would fire him in a heartbeat wouldn't have any trouble answering that question.

Care to take a shot yourself? The address is buzz@nww.com.

Read more about security in Network World's Security section.