Blog Notes

FYI, for those asking I was sick, thus the blog suffered. I don't get sick often, but when I do I get beat up and usually lose my voice, which has happened. It was an interesting experience though, the lack of content allowed me to get a good measure of the daily community activity. The regulars: the daily community of this blog is now around 2000 people, producing average visits of 3500 and average hits of around 5000 daily. The audience is still a majority industry, government, academic, and the services. Very nitch, which also means very few fools. For those who care, StatCounter beats the hell out of Sitemeter. I'm late in learning this.

I have added a couple of authors to the blog. I'll let them introduce themselves, although both are regulars. I'm going to let them do their thing without much guidance. Only 9 comments have ever been moderated since I started blogging, so clearly I have very little interest being mother to content authors. Ultimately, the community will decide. I stand behind both authors 100%.

Next weeks theme will be China. Its a short week with Monday being a US holiday, but there is a lot of new, interesting content out regarding China worth discussing. Until then content will remain random.

Tuesday I have a special DDG-1000 discussion planned. I've been very scattered and unfocused on that topic, and not very proud of how that discussion has evolved on the blog. Sometimes I write something that I feel really good about, and I'm thinking the next DDG-1000 discussion will reaffirm why people enjoy reading the blog, agree or not.

I got way behind on my email, and spent most of the day going through it. It is interesting to see the names of the people who I get email from. After going through several hundred I'm convinced the patient is running the asylum here. The community of this blog is a who's who of a Linkedn community of the defense/political/industry establishment of this country. I told my wife tonight I might be running the best scam on the Internet. She called me a nerd.

I got an email today from an executive of one of the big defense companies who suggested "the power of the fourth estate" could potentially be near for the blogosphere. That comment goes to the heart of the open question of the blog:

What is the role of blogging in the national security discussion?

This is an elusive question that I do not have the answer to. I know several Admirals read the blog. I know that many active COs and XOs in the fleet read the blog. I know that a number of government employees both executive and legislative branch read the blog. I know that executives of almost every defense company read the blog. I know many folks in the Pentagon read the blog. I know professors at Annapolis, the NWC, and the NPS read the blog. I know a number of employees of the major think tanks read the blog.

I also know that very few, if any, of those folks ever leave a comment. I don't believe "the power of the fourth estate" will be realized in the Navy blogosphere until those folks feel comfortable debating ideas openly. That means it is important to keep the comments professional and courteous. I have no expectations that this medium will evolve faster than the pace of necessity, and there is a lack of necessity for Web 2.0 to drive discussion right now for naval content.

That will not always be the case, but I'm content letting the evolution take place without pushing it. If by that time there are 10 Navy blogs better than this one, I'll be very content with that as well.

In the meantime we'll be back to business shortly. For those who have emailed with a request to read something for feedback, if I have not returned a response, send me a reminder.

And now, back to the regularly scheduled programming.