warfighting
The National Security Implications of Free 3D in a Browser
Jeffrey Carr sent a short broadcast via Twitter the other day: ”
New post on 3D imaging and Virtual Earth – mind blowing video http://bit.ly/3SxtdA ”
Jeffrey was blogging about a capability shown in the short clip below:
As you watch that, keep in mind that what you are seeing is a capability that can run on any PC that can run Internet Explorer (which is just about all of them).
The clip shows a capability that Microsoft’s Caligari toolset “TrueSpace” has to build high resolution 3D models then upload them into Virtual Earth.
Currently national security planners, as well as others with mission needs for geospatial information, have many choices for solutions. But most good solutions require loading specialized software on the workstation. This includes, of course, Google Earth. Google also provides 3D creation capabilities with Sketch-Up. And that is a powerful combination. But the need to load programs on workstations and move data to workstations complicates enterprise IT solutions. Additionally, Google Earth is reportedly not accurate in elevation measurements. Now the new capability shown in the YouTube clip indicates a solution that can give highly accurate 3D models to planners everywhere, and it can do that without having to instal large stand alone apps on workstations and without having to move large datasets to the workstation.
A use case: Imagine a USMC team preparing for an evacuation of a group of citizens. They shift into their Rapid Response Planning Process (R2P2) and move out. Although this process ensures all available information is used and can accomodate information from external sources, the urgency of the mission means it will proceed no matter what. No one involved is going to waste time trying to download new software programs or test applications or risk breaking systems that are working well. New data is fine, but new software is not needed. This 3D model that runs in a browser could be of tremendous use at times like this. If the data is there, models can be presented to the planning team and they can visually walk through buildings before their mission. The models can be provided from locations far away or from local data if available. And they can be presented on any computer with a browser.
That is just one use case. Many more can be brainstormed by planners, and I’d recommend this dialog get underway soon. But there is actually another meta-point to make. Consider the fact that this dialog can start much earlier in the process because of new web2.0 capabilities. Thanks to Jeffrey’s micro-blogging on Twitter and the Google YouTube posting on his Blog, the national security community has some early warning on things we should be thinking through.
My recommendation: If you haven’t done so already… sign up for Twitter. If you’d like to see some good feeds to follow start here.
I hope to see you at the Synergy Conference
The second annual Synergy Conference and expo will be held 12-15 August 2008 at Marco Island, FL. Last year’s conference provided a great way for participants to learn from each other and interact with speakers from both operational and intelligence backgrounds. I sure enjoyed it. It was one of my last official events before leaving DIA. I had a couple speaking parts, so I got to solicit feedback on my views of the future of technology, and I really appreciated that. But it was also really enjoyable to be on a panel led by Col Montgomery that let me interact with John Marshall of JFCOM, LTC Mahoney of NRO and Ms. Lynn Schnurr of the USA G2 (she is the CIO for G2).
I also spoke on a dinner panel with General Clapper and Rita Bush. What an honor to be seated next to them.
And then I ended up on a third panel moderated by Lewis Shepherd that included Rita Bush, Gayle von Eckartsberg and David Chaffee. I enjoyed that panel the most. Ten minutes before the panel Lewis reminded me that I should have graphics. No worries, I said, I’m a trained Naval Intelligence officer, I can produce graphics almost instantly. The result was the attached.
A key graphic in the presentation is shown here. This graphic is my list of who is wired and who is tired in enterprise technology. On the tired list, Acquisition Executives. They have a hard hard job that is thankless most of the time, largely because of the constant mission demands, the horrible government system they have to work in, and the fast pace of technology that is making them less relevant.
In my comments I mentioned that because of the rapid pace of technology and the increasing tech savvy of power users and the ability for users to “mashup” their own solutions, “Acquisition executives are becoming increasingly irrelevant to the delivery of capabilities to end users.”
I didn’t mean for that comment to generate drama, but it seemed to do just that! Friends/allies/associates in the audience went wild with the remark. Then my comrade and community leader Kevin Meiners asked me for my handwritten notes and used them in introducing Jennifer Walsmith, the Acquisition Executive for all of NSA! Much to my surprise, Jennifer agreed with me that things are getting harder on the acquisition community and there is a great need for change.
This year I’ll be spending most of my time watching/listening/visting the expo floor, but I do have a few brief moments on a panel and look forward to seeing how I can insert some drama/controversy to the proceedings.
Anyway, if you can make it to Synergy, please come. If you can’t make it, please stay tuned to the blog. I’ll try to capture interesting parts in future entries. I’ll also plan on posting to Twitter while there, so please sign up for your Twitter account and connect to me there at http://twitter.com/bobgourley
More on Synergy:
The 2nd Annual Synergy Conference and Expo
will provide a unique forum to highlight advances the Intelligence and
Operations communities have made in support to military operations in a
tactical wartime environment and how these may reform national-level
processes. It will give front line Operators, Key Decision Makers,
Intelligence professionals, Technologists, and Academia the opportunity
to learn from and work with experienced tactical-level representatives.
In conjunction
with U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM), the Government Emerging
Technology Alliance (GETA) is planning an event that will focus on:
-
Changes occurring and envisioned in the relationship between Operations
and Intelligence as a result of lessons learned from current wartime
activities. - Each of the Uniformed Services
sharing their front-line experiences and providing thought provoking
ideas about the critical need for change in an agile operational
environment. - Insight into activities at the
Commands and National Intelligence Agencies with the critical
challenges of better integrating Operations and Intelligence activities
during a period of Irregular Warfare.
Adm. Stavridis: Think, Read, Write and Publish, and Blog Too
In a previous post I mentioned the AFCEA/JFCOM Joint Warfighting Conference. I’ve e-mailed friends and associates more detailed thoughts on the significance of the conference. If you would like my views drop me a note and I’d be glad to share.
During the conference there were several very important messages for CTOs, including a few controversial points I’m still trying to think about how to diplomatically blog a
bout. One topic I’d like to discuss now is encouragement from Admiral Stavridis, the four star USN commander of U.S. Southern Command. He strongly supports and encourages leaders to publish, and I think that is a message all CTOs should listen to.
A good summation of his call to publish is on the Signal Scape blog at:
Adm. Stavridis: Think, Read, Write and Publish
Here is a quote from that entry:
Adm. James G. Stavridis, USN, commander, U.S. Southern Command,
stepped away from
AFCEA, JFCOM, Blogs and Twitter
AFCEA just pulled together another great conference (Joint Warfighting 2008). They have been
real pioneers when it comes to using new Web2.0 technologies during
these events, and that really came out during this conference. For example, some of
Signal Magazine's greatest writers, including Maryann Lawlor, were at
the conference blogging the highlights of the key events as they were
occurring (they also encouraged other bloggers to post, including the
military PAOs). For a look at what they did: The AFCEA blog for the Joint Warfighting 2008 conference starts here. The JFCOM blog for the conference starts here.
Both AFCEA and JFCOM also used Twitter to give a running feed of what is happening where. To see what the AFCEA Twitter Feed looked like click here. To see what the JFCOM feed looked like click here.
I've been using twitter a bit as well, and I encourage all CTOs to
check it out. If you use it wisely and configure it to automatically
update your Plaxo feed and Facebook it can be an easy way to keep comrades up to speed on items of interest. I've also posted a feed on my blog here as a bit of an experiment (I might decide to move that to my personal page instead).
Why do folks like me see a potential benefit from Twitter? One
example is in the post I did before going to the conference last
week. After some friends saw that we were able to pre-arrange some
meetings that we would not have done without Twitter. And, by
following Signal and AFCEA's twitter feed, I was able to maximize my time at
the conference.
You can check out my feed at: http://twitter.com/bobgourley
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