Blogs are CENTCOM's New Target
13 February St. Petersburgh Times - Blogs are CENTCOM's New Target by William Levesque.
Quote:
It begins almost imperceptibly, one lonely posting on a blog. It says that U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan use candy to lure children so they can be used as human shields.
Patently untrue.
But in an age when the lines between traditional media and the blogosphere are blurred, a dark rumor can spread like a kindergarten virus, unchecked and unchallenged.
U.S. Central Command at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa is taking notice.
Since 2005, CentCom officials have jumped into the blogging fray, facing the realities of a new electronic age in hopes of combating misinformation on the Web, or just getting its own news out.
A three-person team monitors blogs - Internet journals with commentary from ordinary citizens and, often, links to news articles - that concentrate on CentCom's area of responsibility, which includes Iraq and Afghanistan...
Efficacy Is Often In The Eye of The Beholder
Regarding the 'muscle' of a primary blog and its many affiliates and attachments, Obama may have a mighty machine at play but I note he has already developed some serious political baggage with his recent comments about the KIAs in Iraq. One comment in a non-blog environment, transmitted in a non-blog venue and he has taken a serious hit. MSN is already starting to spin that comment. Howard Dean's much vaunted Deaniacs seemed all the rage and an awesome force to be reckoned with until he screamed like a banshee that time in a non-blog venue and it was transmitted in non-blog venues, like the National News and Newspapers and it crippled him. John Dean's campaign just now took a technical hit via Amanda Marcotte resigning. She was the prime blog mover-n'-shaker in his cyber campaign. She got considerable flak and pressure from the people she was attacking in non-blog venues via phone calls and letters and emails. Conversely, look at the PR hit Zaqawri took when he couldn't even handle a machine gun. Rember when some video was recovered showing him fumbling around and his aides burning their hands on the barrel? All it took was a couple of people (Monitors...) who instantly capitalized on it and wham! it spread and he became the laughing stock and his image of being a Saladin was insantly crippled. You bet - his cyber followers got to see al-killer unable to even handle a simple machine gun. Everything starts small and I find it most encouraging that our military is venturing into these uncharted waters.
US Military -v- Internal blogging & Access to WWW
What the hell is the Army thinking?
I've had this conversation with friends who are military before: there are security implications and security violators, I get it. Well, way to throw the baby out with the bathwater. In this war, for the first time, service members have been able to offer virtually real time critique of the press coverage of the war from the combat zone. It is impossible to measure what impact or influence that has had, but the military keeps saying it believes this is an information war, and keeps acting as if information is completely irrelevant to the conduct of the war or to the ability to sustain support for the war.
Here's the reaction from one of the best known and best supported milbloggers: (no, I still haven't figured out how to embed links successfully, you'll need to cut and paste.) http://www.blackfive.net/main/2007/0...sec_regul.html
For those of you near decent university libraries, at the risk of sounding as if I'm self-promoting, there's this cite:
“Life in Wartime: Realtime War, Realtime Critique; Fighting in the New Media Environment,” in Military Culture, vol. 4 of Military Life: The Psychology of Serving in Peace and Combat eds. Thomas Britt, Carl Castro, and Amy Adler (Westport, Ct: Praeger Security International, 2006):180-210
I don't know that it's that insightful, it's just the only piece I know of that's out there that traces the importance of the dern things.
I am absolutely gobsmacked that the Army would take this step. And now of all times.
Here I am, Stuck in the Middle with You...
On the Left - We Need to Start Winning this IO 'Stuff' -- On the Right - Shut Up and Toe the Line