We can all probably agree on this: Criticizing your employer on the Web is a stupid thing to do. But what should the punishment be?

Dan Leone was the west gate chief on game days at the Philadelphia Eagles’ Lincoln Financial Field. He worked on game days for the Eagles for six years.

Recently, he became upset at the Eagles’ decision to let longtime Safety Brian Dawkins sign with the Denver Broncos.

Leone expressed his frustration with Dawkins’ departure by posting this on his Facebook page: “Dan is [expletive] devastated about Dawkins signing with Denver … Dam Eagles R Retarted!!” (We haven’t corrected any spelling in the post.)

Leone regretted his post soon after making it and took it down.

Less than two days after posting his remarks, Leone says he was contacted by the team’s director of event operations, Leonard Bonacci, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer. Leone says Bonacci told him they had to talk about the Facebook post.

Two days later, Leone says, he received a call from the team’s guest services manager, Rachel Vitagliano, who fired him over the phone in a call that lasted less than 10 minutes. Leone says he never heard back from Bonacci.

Leone says he was ready to apologize, and did so when he got the call that he was fired. He says Vitagliano didn’t want to hear it and told him he couldn’t be trusted, the post made the team look bad and the only option was to fire him.

As you might imagine, Leone’s story has become a célèbre. The article in the Inquirer notes that he grew up in the shadow of the Eagles’ old Veterans Stadium and that he has a neurological disorder called transverse myelitis. The disorder requires him to do his job at the stadium sometimes in a wheelchair.

The title of the article is a rallying cry: Cold Eagles sure are thin-skinned. It suggests the Eagles could have handled the situation with a warning, a suspension and that Leone deserved a face-to-face meeting even though he was a part-time employee.

Leone says, “If they called me right now and told me to come back to work, I would. I’m not holding any grudges. I just want to do my job.”

So, what do you think? Was the firing too harsh? What about the way it was allegedly handled? (The Eagles won’t comment.) Is a suspension with a warning a better way to handle this situation? Does it depend on exactly what’s said in an employee’s Web post? How would you handle an employee’s Web post critical of your company?

Let us know what you think in the Comments Box below.

Newspapers, blogs and Web sites, including this one, recently wrote about Kyle Doyle, an Australian call center employee who allegedly got caught calling out sick for a hangover.

Now his employer, AAPT, issued a statement claiming it’s all bogus.

Doyle’s Facebook entry was circulated, along with an alleged e-mail exchange between Doyle and an HR rep.

In the exchange, he refuses to provide a doctor’s note for his sick day, until he’s confronted with a screen shot of his Facebook entry.

Newspapers haven’t been able to contact Doyle to ask him about the situation.

However, his Facebook page now lists his status as “trying to hide.” It’s also been swamped with messages of support for his alleged “sickie” day.

Apparently, some workers need to be reminded that their social networking Web pages can be read by their managers and HR reps, not just their friends. Probably nothing uncommon about this: An employee with a hangover calls out sick from work.

What makes this story unusual is that Kyle Doyle, a call center employee in Australia, decided to post that on his Facebook page — and his employer found out about it.

On his profile, Doyle wrote: “not going to work, **** it i’m still trashed SICKIE WOO.” (You can see a screen shot of the page here.)

Later, HR asked Doyle, via e-mail, for a doctor’s note for his day off. The request was followed by an e-mail exchange between HR and Doyle which all the world can now read in London’s Daily Mail.

Doyle replied that his contract didn’t require a doctor’s note for just one sick day.

HR responded that his manager had determined that he wasn’t absent due to medical reasons.

Doyle challenged his manager’s call on the matter.

At that point, HR sent Doyle a screen shot of his own Facebook page with his “sickie” plan on it, which probably made him feel sicker.

Do you have any good stories about workers who were caught, through their own stupidity, faking sick? You can share them via the Comments Box below.

Poland’s national police headquarters has banned officers from using Nasza-klasa.pl, a site similar to Facebook (it translates to “our class”).

An internal investigation had shown police officers were using the site  for idle chit-chat instead of working.

Officers will have access after their workdays end. Investigators on the police force using social networking Web sites to track down criminals will retain access at all times, according to the daily newspaper Dziennik.

Turns out, the other Polish government agencies have also prohibited their workers from viewing these sites on their work computers. 

What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. But what about employees’ or applicants’ social networking Web pages? With the popularity of Facebook and MySpace, the intersection of workers’ private and workplace lives is a tricky place to be for many HR pros and hiring managers.

Justin Varkony maintained a MySpace page. Among the info on the page is that, “Justin [is] a super trained killer ninja fighter of the night [and] has not had a chance to use this special skill yet.”

Varkony may or may not be a ninja fighter, but there’s no doubt that he’s a police officer in Oveido, FL. Apparently, that posting about being a ninja fighter caused some concern for his police department superiors.

Because of that MySpace entry, Varkony was placed on desk duty for a month while the department investigated.

The final verdict: Varkony got his badge and gun back and is now on street duty again.

Police Chief Jeffrey Chudnow said the post sounded inappropriate to him. However, Varkony never mentions on his Web page that he’s a police officer. That, apparently, saved him his badge.

Varkony said he posted that sentence in response to an online video game opponent.

The officer’s case got some local attention. At least one local TV station gave it coverage.

That station looked into Varkony’s longtime record as an officer. He had been investigated 25 times.

The Chief says some were minor traffic accidents. Some were sustained, some not. The Chief says each investigation is handled separately, as was the MySpace situation.

Should you ‘Google’ them?

Varkony’s situation isn’t unique — at least not anymore.

And in situations where social networking Web site comments are work-related, it has cost employees their jobs.

A substitute judge in Nevada lost his post after logging negative comments about prosecutors on his MySpace site (click here and scroll down to the August 2007 item).

So what if an executive at your company posts a vacation photo of himself at a nude beach? What if that executive is only wearing a hat with your company’s logo?

And what about applicants? If you “Google” them and distressing photos or statements show up, what do you do?

It’s a tricky call. Hiring managers should know that information gleaned from the Web, such as the person’s ethnic background, religion, age or disability, can’t be used in making any adverse employment decisions. Some state laws go further, adding sexual orientation and political affiliation to the list of protected categories.

If your company plans on checking out employees’ social networking Web pages, it’s a good idea to have a policy on the consequences of what may be found and to run that policy by legal counsel.

And remember, if you find something that could jeopardize employment, check with the person in question. It’s too easy for photos to be altered or for a person to post on the Web in someone else’s name.

Does your company have a policy on this? Do you check applicants’ social networking Web pages? Let us know. Drop us a few lines in the comment box below.