To evaluate how these blogs were playing out in the workplace, Ghose and his colleagues followed the posting and reading behavior over a 15-month period of 2, 396 employees at a large information technology and consulting firm.

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And users from those three countries were also the most likely to engage in other risky behavior on work PCs, including reading personal e-mail, downloading music and video and even peer-to-peer file-sharing, a practice that often spreads malicious software or inadvertently gives outsiders access to sensitive documents.

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Reading a book on what is essentially a portable computer changes consumer behavior in subtle and not so subtle ways.

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And they raise most of the money to pay for the books. (Only about a third to a half of the book funds come from matching funds provided by the national Reach Out and Read office.) The program works because it is rooted in individual responsibility: the responsible behavior of parents who, who once they understand the importance of reading to their young children, do so.

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