Peek, the company that makes a no-thrills mobile email-only device, just released the TwitterPeek, a gadget that does nothing but allow you to send and receive tweets. Seriously? At a time where cellphones have become HD movie playing, video recording gaming consoles with built-in GPS, The People want a dedicated twitter device?

The Wired blog ‘Epicenter’ reports on a study commissioned by the IT staffing company Robert Half, which found that 54% of US companies have banned the use of social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn sites at work. Apparently, the primary concern is loss of worker productivity, but fears over unknown legal and brand exposure may also play a role in this.

“Using social networking sites may divert employees’ attention away from more pressing priorities, so it’s understandable that some companies limit access,” said Dave Willmer, executive director of Robert Half Technology, in a statement.

Another study conducted by Nucleus Research also indicated that employees who use social networking sites at work do so up to 2 hours a day. 87% of employees admitted they weren’t using the sites for business, but for personal purposes instead.

Does your company have a social networking use policy in place? Perhaps a good time to check before HR comes knocking.

Update: I just found this short presentation on slideshare…

Twitter has been making headlines for weeks, fueled by a celebrity powered media frenzy. With Ashton Kutcher beating CNN to 1 million Twitter followers last Friday and now even Oprah Winfrey joining in – Twitter is surely bracing for the Oprah effect.

So is Twitter over-hyped or the future of electronic communication?

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