The world is listening and Google never forgets. These are important things to keep in mind no matter if you are an army general stuck in an airport with a Rolling Stones reporter during a volcanic eruption or a lawyer pondering if you can blog about a subject in which you represent a client.

One of my former media colleagues George Merlis wrote some good wisdom on his blog today: "In media training we teach the following: Always treat a microphone as if it is a gun. You treat a gun as if it is always loaded. Similarly, treat a microphone as if it is always on. Never say anything in proximity to a microphone that you don’t want the whole world to hear. And treat a reporter as if he is a microphone. Reporters are always working, always mentally recording, always looking for a story."

Now I recently heard Arvind Puri VP, Data Platform at MySpace speak at an event and he asserted that one should be posting to ones blog or twitter feed once a day. As much as I agree with this wisdom for the sake of presence if nothing else, I must say I find doing so a bit of a challenge.

It is not for a lack of ideas, clever quip, or even interesting articles I could re-tweet however often professional discretion, a myriad of non-disclosure agreements and or just good common sense keep me from sharing to much.

Now for those who are intentionally promoting or marketing products, saying something is not the issue but saying to much or not finding a good balance between valuable content and promotional content can be the issue. Marketing people should beware that the best crafted marketing message can and will back fire.

Now for those of you feeling safe and secure in your disconnected executive existences don't think message control does not apply to you as well. As a fellow executive said to me the other day, if you say it, write it or share it in anyway you loose control of your message and it might end up with distinctly the wrong person.

So how can we be the master of our messages without putting at risk communication misdirection or even collateral communication damage so much that we do not regret our messages or ongoing online presence?

Join me as we explore communicating in a flat and connected world where anything we say or do can and will be seen by anyone and everyone.

As always, there is no better way to meet and connect with other executives then over dinner and conversation. $21 in advance via PayPal or $25 at the event gets you a full dinner, drink and the best networking around.