Robert Scoble, the Microsoft blogger is always worth checking, even if you don’t work in Microsoft, or have any interest in the software biz. Why? he gives you a fresh perspective on how employees ought to speak on behalf of their companies, whether of not they blog about it.

Take this post from Friday, September 16. Scoble comments on a post from someone writing about his CEO, Steve Ballmer:

SteveB, the Web isn’t something you can win. The Web is something you can love. Or something you can hate. But it’s not something you can enslave or own — anymore than you can own or enslave oxygen or water.

I think SteveB assumes we all know what he’s talking about. I think he’s talking about businesses on the Web and not the Web itself. Sorta like you can own a fish that swims in the sea, but you can’t own the sea itself. I know I’ve often heard him speak and find myself saying "huh?" but when I add "profitable business" to what he’s saying it makes a lot more sense.

How often would talk back to your CEO like that?

Which brings me to aomething else. Corporate-lingua franca. In IABC’s magazine CW, this month, John Freivalds speaks of how marketing slogans, ads, trademarks are only a limited part f a company’s identity. He cites Microsoft as having a web site for developers and corporate communictors called Dr. International. How many companies take the time to give its external players that kind of support?