Thanks to the USNI, I've spent major portions of the last three days at WEST 2010, "the the largest event on the West Coast for communications, electronics, intelligence, information systems, imaging, military weapon systems, aviation, shipbuilding, and more."
What was I doing there? I never was able to come up with a satisfactory answer, despite being asked that repeatedly. I finally just gave up and said I was blogging for USNI (it was because USNI was a co-sponsor of the AVC conference and liked my writing, but that's not the answer people were looking for).
Events included addresses by GEN Cartwright (Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, a man of blazing brilliance and a couple of disturbing ideas) and other bigwigs, a fascinating discussion of piracy, and so much talk about Information Systems and Networking that I feel like I should have some kind of Certificate of Completion for the schooling I got on the subject. And last night I walked the flight deck for an hour, listening in on a conversation about technology and strategy led by someone who's written tons of highly-regarded books on the subject (executive summary: be very afraid).
I also got to spend some great time with fellow Denizenne Boston Maggie, as well as the the wonderful naval bloggers of the USNI blog. Btw, Maggie's ego is now officially too big for Boston. She's going to have to tell you about it, but after she met Admiral Roughhead today, I don't know how she's going to get her head through the door of the airport tomorrow.
I'll be blogging about it all in detail over the next few days. I felt like a sponge this week, now fully saturated, so I'm still processing for now...
What was I doing there? I never was able to come up with a satisfactory answer, despite being asked that repeatedly. I finally just gave up and said I was blogging for USNI (it was because USNI was a co-sponsor of the AVC conference and liked my writing, but that's not the answer people were looking for).
Events included addresses by GEN Cartwright (Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, a man of blazing brilliance and a couple of disturbing ideas) and other bigwigs, a fascinating discussion of piracy, and so much talk about Information Systems and Networking that I feel like I should have some kind of Certificate of Completion for the schooling I got on the subject. And last night I walked the flight deck for an hour, listening in on a conversation about technology and strategy led by someone who's written tons of highly-regarded books on the subject (executive summary: be very afraid).
I also got to spend some great time with fellow Denizenne Boston Maggie, as well as the the wonderful naval bloggers of the USNI blog. Btw, Maggie's ego is now officially too big for Boston. She's going to have to tell you about it, but after she met Admiral Roughhead today, I don't know how she's going to get her head through the door of the airport tomorrow.
I'll be blogging about it all in detail over the next few days. I felt like a sponge this week, now fully saturated, so I'm still processing for now...
Maggie said that she was "all a-twittah" about the conference. (translation: she live-blogged it on "Twittah" and had a great time)
And I, for one, am again jealous. *sigh*
I wish I could go to these conferences and hang out with you guys!