Just what exactly is the CIA doing with US tax-dollars? Talking to citizens who want to help the US “war against terror”? Assisting families who are losing soldiers in Iraq at a steadily increasing rate (yes, occupation comes with a welcome high price.)
How about working with the PR industry? Enter Eugene Eric Kim:
For the past two days, I and several esteemed colleagues participated in a CIA workshop on blogs and Wikis, organized by MarkOehlert at BoozAllenHamilton. The intention was for people within the CIA to learn more about blogs and Wikis from us, but the learning was decidedly bidirectional. We got a glimpse of how the intelligence community works, and we got a chance to further guide the CIA’s thinking on how to improve the way it collaborates, both internally and with others.
I spent both days listening closely for patterns of effective collaboration. Given my previous experience with government work, I wasn’t optimistic. These folks surprised me. There were certainly horror stories, but they weren’t significantly worse than stories I have heard and experienced in other organizations. More importantly, there is a small group of vocal, committed champions who believe strongly in how some of these tools can improve the way the organization works and who are actively trying to make this happen.
It all sounds so benign and cuddly. Perhaps they talked about the CIA’s methods of torture and the ways in which this liberating method of interrogation could be proudly displayed on the web.
Dude, like many othes faced with a credibility-stricken government and media, you are becoming a Conspiracy Theorist.
Congratulations and welcome to the throng!
My reading of this article was that this meeting was a relatively harmless education session for CIA employees who wanted to set up blogs and Wikis within their own organisation, rather than a hackers' conference exploiting methods of spying on bloggers like you and me.
Having said that, I am convinced that there are covert US PsyOps programs specifically designed to monitor blogs and steer conversation in certain directions. I am sure the GOP has their own A-teams at work on this stuff too.
Over at http://www.boingboing.net is a story of a couple of guys who have taken waterboarding to the American public. A competition in other words to see who can stand the longest 'under the tap' as it were. Very revealing, no one has lasted more than a minute so far. Anyone know how to set it up here? Maybe man-of-steel John would like to have a go.