IC | Shepherd's Pi

A-SpaceX, Google, and Virtual Tuesday

Posted on July 9, 2008 by lewisshepherd

Yesterday I had a “virtual world vibe” going. At 5:30 a.m. when my dog Jack woke me up offering to take me for a walk, the first thing I noticed on my mobile was a series of tweets from Chris Rasmussen, NGA’s social software guru, posted the night before. Twitter is interesting for a lot of reasons, but one is the ability to snatch asynchronous stream-of-consciousness statements, from strangers and friends alike, as they pass by in the microblogosphere conversation.

Chris went on a tear about Second Life, with several hilarious observations and comments within the space of an hour, so here are several from his public Twitter feed:

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Filed under: Government, innovation, Intelligence, Microsoft, R&D, Technology | Tagged: A-Space, A-SpaceX, blogging, blogs, Bob Gourley, Chris Rasmussen, CIA, computer, DangerRoom, data mining, datamining, Drew Conway, espionage, FCW, Federal Computer Week, GigaOm, Google, Google Earth, Google Lively, IARPA, IC, Intelfusion, Intelligence, Intelligence Community, Intellipedia, internet, Jeffrey Carr, Lisa Porter, Lively, microblogging, Microsoft, New York Times, NGA, Noah Schactman, podcast, Sean Dennehy, Second Life, SL, social software, synthetic world, Twitter, virtual, Virtual Earth, virtual world, virtual worlds, VR, web, Wired, www, Zero Intelligence Agents | 7 Comments »

Sales Guy vs Web Dude

Posted on July 2, 2008 by lewisshepherd

The website where I first saw this video wrote, “This would be funny if it weren’t so true.” No – it’s funny because it’s so true! Yes, even in government IT settings.

The video’s here; adolescent language warning, a la South Park. If you don’t get the jokes, just reboot your system. 3 times.

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Filed under: Government, Society, Technology | Tagged: comedy, computer, computers, DIA, DISA, funny, Government, government IT, humor, IC, information technology, Intelligence Community, IT, sales, tech, Technology, web, website | Leave a comment »

Tradecraft in the Long Tail

Posted on June 26, 2008 by lewisshepherd

Fact: Chris Anderson, WIRED editor in chief and author of the Internet-era classic book “The Long Tail,” also runs a couple of Ning social networks focusing on what the intelligence community would call IMINT, or imagery intelligence – specifically DIY Drones, “a site for all things about amateur Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs): How-to’s, videos, discussion and more,” and PictEarth, “a Social Network used to collect, link and geotag RC, UAV/UAS or Kite derived Earth imagery for use in 3D Globe Programs including Google Earth, Virtual Earth, World Wind and ArcGIS Explorer.”

Analysis: With these sites, Chris Anderson is promoting what he calls “Crowdsourced Aerial Imagery.” In the mission statement for DIY Drones, he writes that “Reasons to make your own UAV range from a fun technical challenge, student contests, aerial photography and mapping (what we call “GeoCrawling”), and scientific sensing. We are primarily interested in civilian, not military, UAV uses here.” (Emphasis is in the original.)

Let’s presume that individual DoD or intelligence-agency personnel have an interest in such issues, and maybe even in spending their personal time by keeping current and following the crowd’s interest in such topics, by participating in these new social networks. One can then assume that others from foreign intelligence might have some interest in tracking those very IC personnel, by observing their activities within social networks (and not just Ning ones). No spectacular logic needed for that.

The CIA has had some challenges in understanding their field presence within the Long Tail.

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Filed under: Government, Intelligence, Society, Technology | Tagged: Abu Omar, aerial, ArcGIS, Chris Anderson, Chris Rasmussen, CIA, computer security, computers, cookies, DIY, DIY Drones, DoD, drone, drones, espionage, ESRI, Expedia.com, geograwling, geoint, geospatial intelligence, Google Earth, grid, IC, id theft, identity theft, imagery, IMINT, Intelligence, Intelligence Community, IT, Italy, long tail, mapping, maps, Microsoft, Milan, NGA, Ning, off the grid, OTG, PictEarth, security, social network, social networks, spies, spying, tech, Technology, trustworthy computing, twc, UAV, UAVs, Virtual Earth, Washington Post, Wired, World Wind | 2 Comments »

How to Find Research: Here, There, Everywhere

Posted on June 16, 2008 by lewisshepherd

FACT: The Washington Post today has a story in the Business section (“Intelligence Agency Joins U-Md. Research Center“) about the relationship between IARPA and the University of Maryland, the location of the planned new IARPA headquarters.

ANALYSIS: UMd has a set of valuable relationships with the public- and private-sector national security community, and the IARPA startup is just the latest agency to benefit. Proximity is key, for research and bureaucracy. In Maryland’s case, IARPA Director Lisa Porter told an IEEE interviewer last month that “It’s nice not to be sitting right next to one particular agency. It’s also nice to be near a university because we’re sending a message that we want to bring in nontraditional partners: academia, industry. It sends a nice message that we’re embracing the broad community to help us solve these challenging problems.”

I lament sometimes that Charlottesville (home to my undergraduate alma mater) is a good two hours away from DC, as even that distance puts a frustrating limit on the amount of joint work that winds up being done with Virginia faculty and students.

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Filed under: Government, innovation, Intelligence, Microsoft, R&D, Technology | Tagged: Abe Lederman, academia, academic, blogs, Charlottesville, China, computer, DARPA, database, Deep Web, DeepWeb Technologies, Defense, DoD, Europe, federal, federal government, federated search, Google, Government, IARPA, IC, IDA, IEEE, Intelligence, Intelligence Community, internet, IT, Lisa Porter, Maryland, Microsoft, Microsoft Research, MSR, OSTI, policy, politics, public policy, R&D, radius, RAND, ReadWriteWeb, research, Russia, scholar, science, search, search engines, STPI, tech, Technology, UMD, University of Maryland, University of Virginia, UVA, Verity, Virginia, web, White House, WorldWideScience | 1 Comment »

How to Run a State-of-the-Art Technology Program – Quietly

Posted on May 29, 2008 by lewisshepherd

FACT: In the new movie “Iron Man,” defense-contracting billionaire and engineering genius Tony Stark (played by Robert Downey Jr.) designs and builds a suit capable of individual flight (highly engineered control surfaces powered by an “arc-reactor” – it is Hollywood after all). During his first test flight, zooming straight up from Malibu and stressing the system to its max, he asks his onboard computer, “What’s the altitude record for the SR-71?” His computer responds back, “85,000 feet,” whereupon he zooms past that ceiling.

ANALYSIS: Funny moment, and excellent movie. In its honor, below I’m going to give you access to a remarkable, recently declassified document describing one of America’s boldest Cold War technical achievements. If you’ve ever run (or wanted to run) a high-tech company or program, like Tony Stark in the movie, you’ll appreciate the startling scope of the work – and if you’ve recently worked in DoD or the Intelligence Community you’ll marvel at how they did it “in the good old days.”

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Filed under: Government, innovation, Intelligence, R&D, Technology | Tagged: A-12, A12, Air Force, aircraft, airplane, airplanes, Area 51, astronaut, astronauts, Blackbird, Central Intelligence Agency, CIA, Clarence Kelly Johnson, computer, computers, Defense, Defense Department, DIA, DoD, DVTC, Eisenhower, espionage, F-117, Government, history, IC, Intelligence, Intelligence Community, Iron Man, ISR, Kelly Johnson, Ken Collins, Langley, Lockheed, Lockheed Martin, management, managing, Michael Hayden, Microsoft, military, NASA, news, OXCART, Pentagon, pilot, pilots, project management, R&D, reconnaissance, Robert Downey Jr., science, secrecy, secret, SharePoint, Skunk Works, Soviet, Soviet Union, space, space program, spacecraft, spies, spy, spying, SR-71, stealth, tech, Technology, Tony Stark, UFO, USAF, VTC | 2 Comments »

Is It Even Possible to Connect the Dots?

Posted on May 25, 2008 by lewisshepherd

FACT: Among the inspired ideas of polymath Danny Hillis (pioneer of parallel computing) was establishing the Long Now Foundation, whose projects include the millennial Long-Now Clock (“the world’s slowest computer”) and the notion of “Long Bets.” A Long Bet is an “accountable prediction,” meaning one that has a specified end-date and a testable, wagerable, proposition. One of the early Long Bets posted wagers $2,000 that “By 2020, no one will have won a Nobel Prize for work on superstring theory, membrane theory, or some other unified theory describing all the forces of nature.” That particular bet is one of many signs of scientific skepticism about string theory.

ANALYSIS: Even without the ease of hyperlinks, old-fashioned newspapers foster serendipitous connections between articles, particularly if you’re reading a Sunday morning paper with lots of sections. Sunday the Washington Post did me a service by placing in different sections a couple of articles which I connected, about intelligence “failures” and about stock-market prediction, leading me to some web-surfing about the questionable validity of string theory and some related observations about the difficulty of predicting human behavior.

In the Outlook section, the Post has an opinionated and thought-provoking op-ed piece by Mark Lowenthal, one of the most “intelligent” individuals in the recent history of the U.S. intelligence community (after all, he was the 1988 Jeopardy grand champion, as well as a former assistant director of CIA).

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Filed under: Technology | Tagged: 9/11, analysis, CIA, Columbia, Columbia University, computer science, cryptography, Daniel Kahneman, Danny Hillis, failure, foreign affairs, future, Government, human, hyperlinks, IC, Intelligence, intelligence analysis, Intelligence Community, intelligence reform, international relations, iraq, Jennifer Chayes, leather, Long Now, Mark Lowenthal, market forecasting, math, mathematics, media, membrane theory, Microsoft, Microsoft Research, newspaper, newspapers, Nobel, Nobel Prize, parallel computing, Pearl Harbor, Peter Woit, physics, prediction, predictive analysis, Princeton, Ramones, science, Serendipity, social, social networks, social science, social sciences, Society, stock market, string theory, superstring, superstring theory, terrorism, terrorists, The Times, Times of London, war, Washington Post | 6 Comments »

Business Executives for National Security, and Dana Carvey?

Posted on May 16, 2008 by lewisshepherd

Went to the big BENS gala last night (Business Executives for National Security) in downtown Washington, along with some Microsoft colleagues – the company was a sponsor – and several guests who fit right in with the rest of the crowd, military brass and IC muckety-mucks. I first met BENS founder Stanley Weiss back in the late 1980s when he came to Silicon Valley to recruit support for the new group, “a nonpartisan business organization aiming to cut through ideological debates on national security issues.”

The evening’s billed highlight was the awarding of the annual BENS Eisenhower Award to Sec. of Defense Robert Gates, who gave just a phenomenal speech (see Reuters and AP coverage today, and the full text here). I blogged a couple of days ago about his speech to the Heritage Foundation, which I read the text of, but seeing Gates deliver this speech really impressed me, to be honest. He comes across as sincerely dedicated to fixing some of the fundamental problems of DoD and the intelligence community (his career after all was at CIA and he is obviously a thoughtful critic of the DNI structure and “reforms”). I sat there wondering whether Gates would be willing to continue at the Pentagon in the next Administration (odds are much higher of that with a McCain victory, obviously, and infinitesimal otherwise).

Brent Scowcroft introduced Gates with a warm and witty tribute, and it was nice to see him in person. He told several jokes making fun of the Beltway culture, getting big laughs. Gates continued in kind at the beginning of his remarks, before he got serious – keep reading for one of Gates’s best jokes:

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Filed under: Government, Intelligence, Microsoft, Society | Tagged: AP, Beltway, BENS, books, Brit Hume, business, Charles Krauthammer, CIA, Civil War, Confederacy, DC, Defense, Department of Defense, diplomacy, DNI, DoD, Fords Theater, Fox News, Fred Barnes, history, humor, IC, Intelligence, Intelligence Community, James Swanson, Jefferson Davis, John McCain, John McLaughlin, John Wilkes Booth, jokes, Lincoln, Manhunt, McCain, McLaughlin Group, media, Michael Hayden, National Portrait Gallery, national security, Pentagon, political, politics, Reuters, Robert Gates, television, TV, University of Virginia, UVA, Virginia, Washington | 1 Comment »

IARPA and the Virtual Long Tail

Posted on May 2, 2008 by lewisshepherd

FACT: This week, the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity, an arm of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI), launched its new unclassified website. What’s there is initially fairly minimal, but they’ll be adding to the public information posted there regularly.

ANALYSIS: I spent the week in Orlando, as a Keynote speaker at the IARPA “Incisive Analysis Conference.” I’ll be writing a little more about the conference in the near future, as I saw some great demo’s and spoke to the principal investigators on many excellent and far-sighted advanced research projects sponsored by IARPA. It was great to be there and to see so many old friends from the intelligence community, the national labs (PNNL, Sandia, Oak Ridge, Livermore), DoD, and innovative commercial R&D outfits. Also, as the first IARPA conference since the organization’s launch, it was an opportunity to hear new director Lisa Porter communicate her vision and principles, which she did well and I’ll discuss those soon as well. (She also kidded me about my efforts to make her a cultural phenomenon, but I blamed it on WIRED magazine.)

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Filed under: Government, innovation, Intelligence, Microsoft, R&D, Technology | Tagged: analysis, analyst, analysts, cloud computing, computer, computer science, computers, computing, DARPA, data, Defense Department, DNI, DoD, geospatial, Government, IARPA, IC, innovation, Intelligence, Intelligence Community, IT, Lawrence Livermore, Lisa Porter, long tail, longtail, mashup, mashups, Microsoft, Microsoft Research, mirror world, mirror worlds, modeling, MSR, national laboratories, national labs, Oak Ridge, OODA, Pentagon, PNNL, R&D, research, Rita Bush, robot, robotics, robots, Sandia Labs, science, scientific, security, semantic, semantic analysis, semantic computing, semnantics, simulation, Society, tech, Technology, virtual world, virtual worlds, visualization, Wired, WIRED magazine | 3 Comments »

“Legally Blonde 2.0” – SoCal Spook at Harvard

Posted on April 23, 2008 by lewisshepherd

Shout out to Chris Rasmussen, a former colleague in the intell biz who emails that he’ll be speaking on uses of Web 2.0 approaches in the Intelligence Community at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government in June…. as he put it in his email, “I’m pretty sure Danish dudes from southern California have been blacklisted from Harvard for hundreds of years. Well the times are changing.”

Chris has been involved in social-networking and other 2.0 efforts in the IC, both at the enterprise level and in grass-roots form — accomplishing the latter and encouraging the former (strongly). The Kennedy School program, “Web 2.0: Taking Action in Government” is advertised as “examining the lessons learned from first movers in both business and government and distilling what actions government leaders must now take to harness the power of these new tools and business models.” (more info here)

I especially like that the conference is being organized with the help of Don Tapscott, co-author of an excellent book: Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything.

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Filed under: Government, innovation, Intelligence, Society, Technology | Tagged: blogging, blogs, Chris Rasmussen, citizens, collaboration, computer, computers, crowd-sourcing, Dan Tapscott, Don Tapscott, e2.0, Enterprise 2.0, enterprise computing, Government, Harvard, IC, innovation, Intelligence, Intelligence Community, kennedy school of government, KSG, new politics, politics, public, R&D, reform, social networks, Society, software, tech, Technology, Web 2.0, wiki, wikinomics, wikis, wisdom of crowds, wisdom of the crowd | Leave a comment »

SecDef Blasts Air Force on ISR

Posted on April 21, 2008 by lewisshepherd

FACT: U.S. military use of airborne drones (UAVs) dawned at the turn of the millenium, with nearly 100 vehicles in use before the Sept. 11 2001 attacks. By the end of that year the number had doubled, with the majority in use in Afghanistan. Today, according to a speech today by Sec. of Defense Bob Gates, “We now have more than 5,000 UAVs, a 25-fold increase since 2001.”

ANALYSIS: The Gates speech today, to an Air Force audience, is being covered mostly with a focus on his “harsh criticism” of that service. For example, CNN’s headline was “Defense Secretary Scolds Air Force for War Effort,” or Fox News “Gates Says Air Force Must Step Up Efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan.” And there was plenty of raw material for the tough stories, including CNN’s inclusion of the Gates soundbite that getting the Air Force to send more surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft to Iraq and Afghanistan has been “like pulling teeth.”

Others (like a Reuters story) struck a less frenzied tone, including more depth about his proposals going forward, and the Defense Department’s actual plans for improved acquisition and use of Intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, or ISR. I’d encourage you to read the full transcript (get it here). (By the way, here’s some background on ISR and its variants.)

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Filed under: Government, Intelligence, R&D, Technology | Tagged: 9/11, Afghanistan, Air Force, Bob Gates, CNN, defense intelligence, defense intelligence agency, Defense Separtment, DIA, DoD, drone, drones, Fox News, GWOT, IC, Intelligence, iraq, ISR, JFCC-ISR, Mike Maples, military, news, peace, Pentagon, reconnaissance, SecDef, secretary of Defense, STRATCOM, Strategic Command, surveillance, terrorism, terrorists, UAV, UAVs, unmanned aerial vehicle, unmanned aerial vehicles, US Air Force, USAF, war, war on terror | 2 Comments »

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