The State of Michigan (SOM) engages with the public through many digital outlets. We do this to provide information of statewide interest to state residents, the business community, visitors to our great state, and other members of the general public.  We encourage you to engage with the state through these digital outlets, especially through official SOM social media pages.  Please feel free to submit comments and questions for a specific agency, or even for Michigan government as a whole, regarding topics posted on official SOM social media platforms. Please also feel free to share the information that the SOM posts on our digital outlets with your friends and family.   

If you decide to submit comments or questions on official SOM social media sites, we will do our best to respond to you as soon as we can.  However, as you can imagine, the SOM receives a lot of correspondence – via social media and otherwise – so responses should only be expected during regular SOM business hours, and it may take some time to get back to you.

When engaging with the state through social media you agree to the following SOM Social Media Customer Use Policy.

SOM Social Media Customer Use Policy

When engaging with the SOM on social media you are subject to the terms of service (TOS) of the host site. The SOM encourages anyone interested in sending comments or questions to the state via social media to review host site terms of service (TOS) prior to engaging with the state on specific social media sites.  Please make sure that you fully understand your rights before posting. 

If you decide to comment or ask questions on social media, please keep in mind that the SOM uses social media to engage with all members of the public.  Thus, the state will moderate discussions on social media to ensure that everyone who wants to comment feels welcome and is able to do so. The SOM reserves the right to remove content and comments that contain:

• Profane or obscene language or content;
• Content that promotes or perpetuates discrimination against protected classes; 
• Content intended to sexually harass others;
• Content that encourages or promotes illegal activity;
• Spam, or any content that links to external sites;
• Solicitations of commerce, or advertisements, which include promotion or endorsement of a product, service, or individual;
• Promotions of services, products, or political candidates or organizations;
• Content that violates intellectual property interests of any third party (i.e. copyright or trademark infringement);
• Content that includes sensitive personal identifying information, including, but not limited to social security numbers, financial account numbers, or driver’s license numbers.  For your protection, never post sensitive personal identifying information on social media!
• Information that may compromise the safety or security of the public, including public systems, and infrastructure;
• Information that may compromise the safety or security of the state, including state employees;
• Threats of violence;
• Trolling, or posting inflammatory, off-topic, or inappropriate comments or content for the purpose of upsetting other users and provoking an emotional response or disrupting on-topic discussion.  

Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)

All content posted on official SOM social media pages is public record.   Content removed from official SOM social media sites that is archived becomes public record as well.  With limited exceptions, such content is therefore not exempt from FOIA requests. FOIA requests should be submitted through official SOM request processes.

Disclaimer

• Content posted by the public on SOM social media pages will not replace statutory, administrative, or other requirements to provide the SOM agencies with required information.  Failure to provide the SOM with required information in the required manner will not be deemed satisfaction of this requirement.  Put another way, if a SOM agency or statute requires you to provide the state with information, posting it on social media will not satisfy this requirement.  
• SOM social media posts may include content or hypertext links to information created and maintained by other public or private sources. When viewing content or a link outside of the Michigan.gov domain, users are subject to security and privacy policies of the host website.
• The SOM is not responsible for, nor can it control, content on, or the design of, third-party sites.
• Comments and content posted by the public on SOM social media do not reflect the opinions or position of the SOM.
• The SOM is not responsible for loss of sensitive personal identifying information that is voluntarily provided and posted by the public on SOM social media sites.  It is your responsibility to protect your sensitive information by not posting such information on social media sites designed to be viewed by members of the public.   

Questions about the state of Michigan’s Community Guidelines and Customer Use Policy should be submitted to SocialMedia@Michigan.gov.