Twitter Is Mission Critical

I've been pushing for greater adaption of social media (and other Web 2.0 stuff) for a while now. I recently came across the CogBlog, which had this great comment on the US military's current approach to computer network security and operations.

To fight kinetic wars, the military gives its soldiers armor and modern weapons and trains them to exploit the native battlefield infrastructure and terrain. In contrast, to fight information wars, the military attempts to encase its soldiers in impenetrable bubbles that insulate them from the “information battlefield.” The analogy in kinetic space would be to encase our soldiers their vehicles and equipment in giant “hamster balls” and have them roll as best they can across the native infrastructure and terrain.

Exactly! When we decide to block off the most important and interesting parts of the internet, not allowing military types to use them to accomplish the mission, we're basically putting people in hamster balls, which doesn't exactly help.