So the screencap of a (rather boring part of a) porn site is actually enough? I remember a blog a while back that discussed how porn sites push account selling to the max with full-page-unredacted screengrabs. It was an interesting example, but I can't imagine that anybody would be punished for that here. Some people might look twice at the screen to confirm that it's not actual porn, but otherwise I wouldn't expect any consequences. So where's the border drawn here? Would the screencap in this case be fine if the girls were painted over? Or would that still be NSFW? (I'm aware that that's a fine line that can't be answered with a definite "here's the line and don't cross it")
I don't think it is a question of forbidden or crossed line. It is a question of self brand (reputation) that may be ternished.
In some situation when they have to pick employee A or B for a bonus, a promotion or to be fired, and there is no clear difference between the two, the choice will rely on subjective and detail differences like beeing once caught with a porn page on its screen. Some employees could jump on such opportunities to smear their competitors.
Thus, since it was not required to use such type of screen capture to illustrate the problem, and it is not the usual type of content we read here, it make sense it was initially flagged and frown upon. Though I don't think fair to say the author is lacking judgment. To me it is the result of a culture difference. None good, none bad.
Ok, thank you for your insight. No offense intended, but I still think it's narrow minded if people (or rather their peers) think along those lines, but alas, that's probably a culture thing. I think that a (work) culture that punishes reading this article looses out on some valuable insights.
As a completely unrelated side note: I think that picture was an excellent choice. It's a graphic example that pretty much everyone can relate to. I'm not embarrassed by having that picture on my screen but I'd be embarrassed if my email address could be verified to belong to a registered porn site account [1]. It gets the authors point across so much better than showing an MSDN account.
Some US employee avoid anything that could be used against them.