knowledge
You Really Have to See This: From MIT Media Lab
Words can hardly describe how neat this technology is. I’m excited and enthused for many reasons, including the potential power of this technology to help us all make better decisions and of course to bring even more fun to our lives. Watch and let your imagine go… Think of the wonderful ways we can interact with data to do good things in the world.
Other thoughts: Look for the dynamic, moving newspaper. Yet again there is more evidence that Hollywood is driving enterprise technology.
Unrestricted Warfare Symposium, Sponsored by JHU’s APL and SAIS
For enterprise technologists and national security professionals and most of all for those who fit both of those descriptions, please check out Johns Hopkins University’s 2009 Unrestricted Warfare Symposium at: http://www.jhuapl.edu/urw_symposium This symposium seeks to advance our understanding of and solutions for some very complex problems related to our nation’s defense. I’ll be speaking on a panel at the conference (on issues of cyber war and cyber defense) and hope to see you there.
The following is from an e-mail from Dr. Ron Luman (Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory National Security Analysis Department Head)
National Security Community Colleagues:
This is a reminder that the Johns Hopkins University’s 2009 Unrestricted Warfare Symposium will be held 24-25 March 2009, and I encourage you to register now at http://www.jhuapl.edu/urw_symposium/.The fourth annual symposium is in Laurel, MD at JHU’s Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), and is jointly sponsored by APL and the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). Last year more than 300 participants from government, industry, and academia interacted with distinguished speakers and expert panelists who addressed national security issues from three perspectives: strategy, analysis, and technology. In 2009, this uniquely synergistic approach will be applied to the challenge of identifying interagency imperatives and capabilities.
The symposium presentations and panels are organized around four potential unrestricted lines of attack – cyber, resource, economic/financial, and terrorism. We’ll begin each session with a discussion of the potential for such attacks and then expert roundtable panelists will discuss imperatives for interagency action, offering ideas for enhancing interagency capabilities. A fifth session will focus on the role of analysis in identifying and assessing interagency approaches for preventing and combating these types of attacks.
I am particularly pleased that The Honorable James R. Locher, III, Executive Director of the Project for National Security Reform, will open the symposium as our keynote speaker, providing the Project’s timely findings and recommendations for interagency reform. Throughout the two days featured speakers and distinguished panelists, include: Dr. George Akst, MCCDC; Mr. Eric Coulter, OSD(PA&E); Dr. Richard Cooper, Harvard University; Dr. Stephen Flynn, Council on Foreign Relations; Representative Jane Harman; Professor Bruce Hoffman, Georgetown University; Professor Michael Klare, Hampshire College; Dr. Michael Levi, Council on Foreign Relations; Dr. Matthew Levitt, Washington Institute; Dr. Pete Nanos (DTRA); Mr. James Rickards, Omnis, Inc.; Mr. Frank Ruggiero (Department of State); Dr. Khatuna Salukvadze, Georgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Mr. Dan Wolf, Cyber Pack Ventures Inc.; Mr. Bob Work, CSBA, to name a few.
The attached announcement identifies confirmed speakers and other essential information. We encourage dynamic networking, and to facilitate audience participation, we will again be utilizing electronic groupware to collect comments, insights, and questions. The collection of papers and transcripts of discussions will again be published as Proceedings, in both hard copy and electronic form. The 2006 -2008 Proceedings, the current agenda/speakers, and 2009 registration details can be found at the symposium website: http://www.jhuapl.edu/urw_symposium/.
Your experience in national security and defense will contribute unique perspectives and challenging questions to our understanding of Unrestricted Warfare, and I look forward to seeing you next month.
Best regards,
Ron Luman, General Chair
I hope to see you all there.
Symposium Attachment:
URW2009Flyer 4Feb-1.pdf
A Google Knol on Disruptive Technology
Google just opened up their Knol capability to all Internet users. The Google concept for a Knol is that it is an authoritative article about a specific topic. It is a unit of knowledge. People can write what they want, but the idea is that they should put their name on it so there is some way to measure credibility. Others can contribute to the knol in measured ways. For example, a setting can be selected so that anyone can edit the entry, or anyone can suggest entries, or no one can suggest changes.
From the Google Blog entry:
The web contains vast amounts of information, but not everything worth knowing is on the web. An enormous amount of information resides in people’s heads:
millions of people know useful things and billions more could benefit
from that knowledge. Knol will encourage these people to contribute
their knowledge online and make it accessible to everyone.The
key principle behind Knol is authorship. Every knol will have an author
(or group of authors) who put their name behind their content. It’s
their knol, their voice, their opinion. We expect that there will be
multiple knols on the same subject, and we think that is good.
Sounds cool, so I thought I’d give it a try. The first and most important step was trying to think of a subject to write about. I decided to take the easy way out and self-plagerize myself. I copied my list of disruptive technology and created a knol based on it.
I found the knol page was very easy to configure. Within about a minute I had my account active and copied in a bio so anyone interested could read about who I assert I am. I copied in my info on disruptive IT and hit publish and my knol was up. You can check it out here: Disruptive IT knol.
So far, I have to admit, I am not impressed. How could this be of more value than the list I already maintain?
But I’ll keep an open mind for a little while. My goal is to keep that list up to date with new information that will be of actionalble use to the enterprise Chief Technology Officer (CTO). If the knol concept enables a wider swath of people to read and contribute to that list, then it may be a useful concept. If, however, it generates no new information for me or my readers, then it will probably be easier for me just to maintain the list on my blog. Stay tuned and I’ll post more info on this topic after I see results.