Say it ain't so, John! - DOD jumps on wiki bandwagon - Techipedia! aahh!
It seems like it was only a month or so that I wrote about Bureaupedia. Why Techipedia now? It's not like DOD didn't know. (I've added emphasis and comments to some excerpts below.)
DOD Techipedia is similar to online encyclopedia Wikipedia and the intelligence community’s Intellipedia, said John Young, undersecretary of Defense for acquisition, technology and logistics....
DOD spends about $10 billion a year on science and technology, and that money must be used effectively to help warfighters in the field, Young said. The new wiki will help DOD officials better coordinate their efforts, he added. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like DOD officials are not coordinating their efforts to well with the Intelligence Community.“You want to do this so all the individuals out there executing some of that $10 billion can look elsewhere in the Defense Department and see if someone else has already tried an idea,” Young said. “That way we can get the collaboration [and] coordination and reduce duplication. It also lets us avoid learning the same lesson two or three times in our enterprise.” Reduce duplication? Really? Why doesn't DOD use Intellipedia then? When will the lesson be learned that creating stovepipes is not the answer?
Am I the only one who thinks this wrong? Or are there deeper reasons for doing this?
Please help me understand. (Please comment while I go talk to my CPA about how I can give the government less money to waste.)
Tags: intellipedia, techipedia, bureaupedia, intelligencecommunity, wiki, wikipedia, duplication, waste, dod, defense department, wiki bandwagon
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Comments
This is not unusual behavior. There are three stages of Wiki-acceptance that we have seen time and time again:
1.) Shock and horror that we would "put all of our information Out There"
2.) The desire to have "our OWN wiki"
3.) The realization that "our wiki is empty and sad"
4.) The populace of your org realizes #3, and starts using Intellipedia
Give it time, eMarv; give it time.
Posted by: Tad | November 4, 2008 08:07 AM
Thanks Tad! It just bothers me that so time, effort and taxpayer dollars are wasted when this lesson is learned and relearned. Aaahh!
It is especially bothersome because one of the benefits touted is that they are trying to reduce duplication when the wiki itself is a duplicative effort.
Posted by: eMarv![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://esenai.com/blog/intellipedia/nav-commenters.gif)
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November 4, 2008 10:07 AM
I am not sure if separate wikis is necessary a bad idea.
A. Some stuff simply doesn't need to be shared with everyone in the intelligence community. Wiki's on Wikia like Memory Alpha do go in far greater depth than wikipedia on their particular topics. Does the intelligence community really need to know how to maintain an m1 abrams tank? But having a page for M1 abram tanks would be a good thing to have wikified.
B. While giving more ppl access to a wiki ultimately does create better results, security risks still need to be worked out. intellipedia has only been around for a little over 2 years. like all new things, there are going to be mistakes made. Some security mess ups. Separate wikis limit the damage one person could do.
3. these separate wikis are great "training wheels" for intellipedia. Ideally everyone would be rational and jump into intellipedia whole heartedly, but many ppl do have fears that are based on point 2. one people see how a wiki of any sort does find a way of self correcting itself, and the benefits of using one, than going to the next step intellipedia is pretty good.
4. Once something is wikified, no matter where it is, it is easy to copy and paste.
Posted by: Steve | November 21, 2008 11:21 PM
Thanks for posting Steve.
Please see below for responses to some of your comments/questions:
A. Does the intelligence community really need to know how to maintain an m1 abrams tank?
MC-Not necessarily, but you never know. It is better to have the information out there easily searchable than to run around looking for information when you need it.
B. While giving more ppl access to a wiki ultimately does create better results, security risks still need to be worked out. intellipedia has only been around for a little over 2 years. like all new things, there are going to be mistakes made. Some security mess ups. Separate wikis limit the damage one person could do.
MC-Have all security risks been worked out with phones and email? What can you do with intellipedia or another wiki that you can't do with email or telephones or a voice recorder?
3. these separate wikis are great "training wheels" for intellipedia. Ideally everyone would be rational and jump into intellipedia whole heartedly, but many ppl do have fears that are based on point 2.
MC-I can see why you say this, but it is still duplication of effort. They can learn by doing on Intellipedia itself.
4. Once something is wikified, no matter where it is, it is easy to copy and paste.
MC-Again, duplication of effort. Even if it is easy to copy and paste, people will often not do it because they have already invested time and effort in that one place and they have a following and/or comments in that place.
Thanks again for commenting and I welcome additional discussion.
Posted by: eMarv | November 22, 2008 11:44 AM