You probably overlooked this, but the Securities and Exchange Commission is trying something new with its latest amendments to federal proxy rules: encouraging public companies to establish online shareholder forums.

The rule amendments were approved on Nov. 28, 2007, but were quickly overshadowed by the Commission’s vote on the same day to let companies block shareholder access to the proxy. The SEC issued its final rule on proxy access Dec. 6, but as of last week, the Commission still had not published its final rule for shareholder e-forums. The devil may be in the details, but we do know in general ...