We hear a lot about Web 2.0 technology and applications on the consumer side — think MySpace, LinkedIn, and Facebook. Less so on the government side. But that’s slowly changing. Recently, TIME Magazine listed A-Space among the top 50 best inventions of 2008. Launched in September by the Federal Government, A-Space is a “highly restricted Facebook-style website,” as TIME puts it, that serves as a platform of engagement for various intelligence agencies, including the CIA, FBI, and NSA.

A key player in the successful launch of A-Space has been Bob Coleman and the ManTech team. “There have been a lot of solutions developed over the years for the analytical community to help them collaborate and share information, but none of them has fully exploited modern networking techniques such as Web 2.0 and social networking concepts like MySpace or Facebook,” said Coleman in an interview with us earlier this year with us. “The new generation of analysts will want to work with tools that they are familiar with, similar to those they use on the Internet. ManTech is developing key components of A-Space, including the collaborative tools and capabilities that were being developed by McDonald Bradley before we acquired them.”

ExecutiveBiz members have had the pleasure of interacting with a long line of IT thought leaders. One of note is Chris Rasmussen, a great advocate for information sharing and collaboration within the federal space and a master of the use of new tools to get groups working together on hard problems (read more about Chris here). Chris will speak with members again on 24 April 2008 at The New, New Internet.

Federal users are making increasing use of Web2.0 capabilities, and we look forward to hearing Chris’s views on where this is all going. We are already seeing that some of the nation’s hardest problems, like those the intelligence community must address, are being tackled with Web2.0 tools and techniques. One recent development is a YouTube-type capability for the intelligence world called “iVideo.” (see Federal Computer Week’s article on “YouTube for the intell community” for more info). iVideo is based on Adobe technologies, and provides users from around the globe the ability to securely upload video and other media for the use by others. We can expect the use of iVideo will grow dramatically, like the adoption of other advanced Web2.0 tools provided by the Office of the Director of National intelligence (ODNI).

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IT leaders in government are wrestling with several competing forces in the Web2.0 world. The greatest force is a push for change towards more user-focused computing.  But a resisting counter force threatens to delay this change.

The counter force here is institutional inertia. Big organizations are just slow to change, and the larger, more complex the organization is the slower it can be to change.  Change in IT is particularly hard since new IT must work with the old IT and since users have varying degree of control over the organization’s IT budgets. All this adds to inertia in the adoption of new Web2.0 service models.

There are ways to address inertia and speed the delivery of Web2.0 concepts in large organization.  Here are a few proven methods:

1) Stay mission focused
2) Make fast gains that scale to the size of the enterprise
3) Leverage out of band networking
4) Address security and policy concerns up front

Here is more on each:

1) Stay mission focused. The greatest cause of inertia in large government organization is the need to keep everyone focused on critically important missions.  Use that fact to help speed the delivery of your Web2.0 project by ensuring everyone understands the mission-focused nature of your project.  You can build an overwhelming case for your project if you logically show a transformational improvement to your agency’s ability to accomplish its goals and support the mission. I’ve seen the power of staying mission focused help small teams make dramatic change at some of the largest agencies in the government, so this is a force you definitely want on your side.  

2) Make fast gains that scale to the size of the enterprise. Make your first Web2.0 project one that will serve a great number of users and help them all do something better.  For example, hosting a blog or wiki server is something that can reach all ends of your enterprise for a relatively low cost and will help you prove to management that you are focused on the mission. By fielding capabilities that can be used by the entire workforce you will be demonstrating to all that Web2.0 has incredible potential.  After fielding blogs and wikis you can move to secure enterprise mashups, a way to bring the true power of Web2.0 to every user in the enterprise. 

3) Leverage out of band networking.  The chain of command is very important in government organizations and all large enterprises, and I would never advocate going around it.  But direct contact with users, vendors and other mission partners is also critical to success of modern IT.  So why not use modern IT to help with your networking?  Interact with your users in their collaborative environment.  And meet them where they connect online… Does your agency have a database of experts?  Sign up.  Do your users and vendors use capabilities like LinkedIn.com or Second Life?  Meet them there. Don’t limit yourself to technical interactions.  Direct face to face connections via conferences and executive networking (like through our own ExecutiveBiz, of course) are critically important to ensuring strategic alignment between IT programs and the workforce.

 4) Address security and policy concerns up front.  A huge concern in all agencies today is the need for protection of the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information.  Web2.0 capabilities can be built with security, but only if that security is planned in from the start.   Policies for Web2.0 capability usage are also important to address.  Management will feel more confident in the program if you can propose sound policies that will accomplish the role out of new capabilities.  For example, what type of postings will be considered appropriate to your agencies internal blogs? And which ones will be considered appropriate to those that face your agencies customers?  Policies associated with Web2.0 capabilities, like all policies, are only effective when made public.  For a good one see the policy for the public facing blog of the US Government at http://blog.usa.gov/roller/govgab/page/policies

All citizens and the entire government workforce can benefit from the introduction of Web2.0 into government IT.  But we should all understand the government IT workforce faces some daunting challenges in fielding these capabilities.  It can take lots of work and lots of prior planning to succeed in this environment.  Success will come sooner by focusing on the mission, delivering early successes, staying connected with all mission partners, and by addressing security and policy issues up front.

Bob Gourley is the former CTO of the Defense Intelligence Agency and is the co-founder and CTO of Crucial Point LLC.  Bob blogs on enterprise IT at http://ctovision.com

Since 9/11, the intelligence community has been looking for ways to do a better job of sharing information between agencies. Chris Rasmussen is a knowledge manager and trainer for the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency within the Department of Defense, and he’s a dynamic part of that effort. He’s a thought leader in the application of Web 2.0 tools to intelligence goals, especially social software. You won’t want to miss his session in the government track at the upcoming Web 2.0 conference on November 1; Rasmussen is an exceptional speaker.

If you’re part of the intelligence community, then you know about Intellipedia and A-Space, two huge Web 2.0 developments that promote better interagency communication. Rasmussen has made it his mission to promote both tools, along with other social software tools like blogs and mashups—all of which are inexpensive and agency-neutral.

Let’s take Intellipedia first. If you’re unfamiliar with it, here’s a quick rundown. It’s a set of three wikis—one each for JWICS, SIPRNet, and Intelink-U—used by all 16 agencies in the US intelligence community. On screen, it looks exactly like Wikipedia, because it uses the same software, Mediawiki. Just like with Wikipedia, any user can make changes to any piece of data. However, with Intellipedia, the author’s name is always attached to the change.

Rasmussen points out that Intellipedia lets users connect with people who have the knowledge they need. He also believes that information that’s been edited by a huge number of people is much stronger than a single report. And everyone from generals to privates can use the system, he stresses. So people at all levels, from all agencies, involved in all kinds of projects, get involved in improving the information on Intellipedia.

A-Space incorporates Intellipedia and takes another step forward in complexity. It’s essentially a portal designed to eventually include all kinds of things: wikis, blogs, RSS feeds, joint Web-based word processing, mashups, tagging, and more, built on a services-oriented architecture. The goal is to provide an even larger framework in which the intelligence community can share information efficiently.

Intellipedia and A-Space just might be changing the face of intelligence communications. Chris Rasmussen is convinced that these open source methods of intelligence are the best thing for the future. Intrigued? Come hear more.

The national intelligence agencies have launched a social networking site, A-Space, modeled after the ultra-popular MySpace, further supplying ammunition to those who claim networking sites hold potential beyond teenage users. The government-only site will allow users who voluntarily sign up to access the vast network of federal intelligence agencies.

This move “will generate better analysis by breaking down firewalls across the traditionally stove-piped intelligence community,” said Thomas Fingar, deputy director of National Intelligence for Analysis in a recent interview with Financial Times.

The A-space network will have the traditional menu of social networking features from common networks to web-based email, but will also have a recommended area of interest, similar to Amazon’s “You May Also Like…” section that recommends products based previous purchases. This will allow users to be connected to relevant material and research they may not have otherwise encountered.

In addition to the social networking applications, the site will also allow the intelligence community to access the national intelligence library.

The Director of National Intelligence is also looking to open up the site to foreign intelligence agencies, most of whom have been reluctant to log on to the networking site, citing the potential leaks among their top concerns.

Looking ahead, the DNI and the Intelligence and National Security Alliance plan to hold a conference in September to solicit feedback from both the private section and academia.

Anyone out there have any insight into A-Space, or share any of the same concerns?