Tuesday, April 18, 2006
MilBlog Conference 2006
This coming Saturday is the date for the first MilBlog Conference: "The 2006 Milblog Conference will take place in Washington, D.C. on Saturday, April 22, 2006. The conference is designed to bring milbloggers together for one full day of interesting discussion on topics associated with milblogging. We will explore the history of milblogs, as well as what the future may hold for this medium which the military community is using to tell their stories."
It should be an interesting time with good panelists and over 185 participants. One participant is starting a new version of a wire service, the Milblog Wire which "functions like any other wire service, aggregating stories from the field and making them available for your readership. The difference is now it comes direct from folks the American public has a high degree of trust in, not an overseas stringer.The content providers for the Milblog Wire are serving military members, their former comrades in arms, and their friends and families."
And,of course, the original Dawn Patrol aggregating service, the Mudville Gazette ,will also be there as a key participant and panelist. As will Col. Austin Bay, Bill Roggio, and a host of others.
By coincidence, the Defense Science Board (DSB) 2006 Summer Study (pdf) is addressing Information Management for Net-Centric Operations. The study terms of reference seem broad enough to include consideration of the uses and impacts of milblogging both in theater and at home. I wonder if they will send some one to get ideas from this conference?
It would be a great opportunity to learn about and explore the benefits and possibilities for milblogging and supportive blogging to aid extended operations in a long war of ideology mixed with combat. Blogs not only provide information (much of which never gets by media filters), they also foster immediate information exchanges which can discover or concentrate expertise on specific issues in real time. Understanding and using this phenomenon should benefit military operations as well as maintain citizen will and resolve through credible current news.
Of course, the milbloggers are already doing more to keep up morale and resolve on the home front than the media; but it would be nice if the DSB learned about it and how to cooperate with the bloggers. Milbloggers seem to be the modern information age version of minutemen and miltia. There should be a lot of advantage to conducting mutually desirable "joint operations" with the regulars and this new-age militia if we can be innovative about how we collaborate.
It should be an interesting time with good panelists and over 185 participants. One participant is starting a new version of a wire service, the Milblog Wire which "functions like any other wire service, aggregating stories from the field and making them available for your readership. The difference is now it comes direct from folks the American public has a high degree of trust in, not an overseas stringer.The content providers for the Milblog Wire are serving military members, their former comrades in arms, and their friends and families."
And,of course, the original Dawn Patrol aggregating service, the Mudville Gazette ,will also be there as a key participant and panelist. As will Col. Austin Bay, Bill Roggio, and a host of others.
By coincidence, the Defense Science Board (DSB) 2006 Summer Study (pdf) is addressing Information Management for Net-Centric Operations. The study terms of reference seem broad enough to include consideration of the uses and impacts of milblogging both in theater and at home. I wonder if they will send some one to get ideas from this conference?
It would be a great opportunity to learn about and explore the benefits and possibilities for milblogging and supportive blogging to aid extended operations in a long war of ideology mixed with combat. Blogs not only provide information (much of which never gets by media filters), they also foster immediate information exchanges which can discover or concentrate expertise on specific issues in real time. Understanding and using this phenomenon should benefit military operations as well as maintain citizen will and resolve through credible current news.
Of course, the milbloggers are already doing more to keep up morale and resolve on the home front than the media; but it would be nice if the DSB learned about it and how to cooperate with the bloggers. Milbloggers seem to be the modern information age version of minutemen and miltia. There should be a lot of advantage to conducting mutually desirable "joint operations" with the regulars and this new-age militia if we can be innovative about how we collaborate.
