Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 18:26, 8 August 2006

This article was considered for deletion: Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Open source intelligence. The result of the debate was expedited keep.

The reference is to page 413

The reference is to page 413, which is a block and wire diagram that shows an Open Source Agency separately from the Central Intelligence Agency. There was no supporting text because the staff director, who now works for Condi Rice, was captured by the CIA people who were strongly opposed to any new open source organization. The SES who got the reference put in told me privately that he had to shed blood at three in the morning to go against the bureaucracy, but because Lee Hamilton was a boss, and had seen the Burundi exercise and been one of the Aspin-Brown folks that found access to OSINT severely deficient, he supported the SES. That tiny little box is being used by Congressman Rob Simmons, R-CT-02, to champion an open source agency that meets the needs of both the military and the department of homeland security, but it is a very tough uphill battle because the chairman of the appropriations committee has been captured by CIA and refuses to entertain an independent agency that could be used to publicly question white house claims that pupport to be based on secret intelligence. Hope this helps. I did not enter that reference, by the way, that was part of the CIA effort to take over this wiki page. Robert Steele 18:03, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

The United States' National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States issued a report in July 2004 recommending the creation of an open-source intelligence agency, but without further detail or comment. source: Somone should double-check on this, but it checks out insofar as I can tell, so I have boldly edited. -FZ 20:07, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

-Advertising? The update on 29 Jan by "ISRIA" read like an advertisement. Are you ready for every DOD contracting company to jump in with advertisements or can we revert back to the basic facts? Kirby 23:13, 30 January 2006 (UTC) It is irrelevant an advertising in the text of OSINT, an external link is enough.84.73.52.197 14:35, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

See press release here: OSS CEO Speaks Out on First Amendment, Open Source Intelligence as Antidotes to State Secrecy and Questionable Practices -- ?? --— Catherine\ 08:20, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

What exactly is this?

Reads like an essay... I've taken this to AFD. - Ta bu shi da yu 15:04, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

love the new tag

The new tag is GREAT. Am trying to understand why there might be a problem with primary sources. Is there anything I can do to make this better before we meet (I hope) in Boston? What set you off on deletion in the first place? Have removed all "tone" that might be critical, solicit your help in making this a success story. I have asked my international colleagues, notably Arno Reuser, the top OSINT guy in Europe, to start contributing. He liked the expanded page that you seemed to feel merited deletion. If that was you way of getting folks to make useful comments, it certainly worked. Robert Steele 13:48, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Deletion is a centralized system, so usually there are many people watching what articles come up for deletion. It's not uncommon for an article to be greatly improved due to an AFD because of the increased visibility. Also, this article was mentioned on the mailing list, which has a great many subscribers indeed. That's how I found it. --Ryan Delaney 18:38, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

very biased article

The whole article in general lacks a balanced discussion of OSINT and reads like propaganda text. The sub-headline "Why Open Source Intelligence is Important to the Public and to National Security" might fit into an essay or an op-ed, but certainly not in an encyclopedia article. Suggest at least deletion of that part. Also, the sentence "Misplaced Pages could be a useful contributor toward developing an open source intelligence sharing network" might be interesting to discuss at WP conferences, but does not belong into an entry here. The part "Modern History of OSINT" is too US-centered, and also too biased: "Unfortunately, Mr. Jardines does not have Program Authority" - come on! If the article stays in, a lot of the current politics of OSINT in the US should be cut, in order to make the article last longer.

• OSINT is not just a US exclusivity. There is a world also outside US. Many other countries have adopted it: UK, Switzerland, Australia, Qatar, ... OSINT is also not an instrument to support just the US War on Terror campaign ant it is not even just an instrument for supporting security or wars; it is used also for other reasons, for example many NGO's use it for peacekeeping (e.g. Red Cross), the International Olympic Committee for planning the games, and many governments use it for planning development projects in Africa, Asia and Middle East. It is also used by many private organisations, for example in the pharmaceutical industry for pharmacovigilance, in the financial industry for money laundering prevention… Why this propaganda stuff. It is a shame that the opportunity to have a well done OSINT page in wikipadia is misused for low-cost propaganda scopes. I ask al real OSINT professionals to change this attitude in the wikipedia. The credibility of OSINT is in danger. A. Galli

automated peer review

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You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions (and the javascript checklist; see the last paragraph in the lead) for further ideas. Thanks, Andy _t 14:27, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Add by -- 75.24.106.52 14:27, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

printed automated guidelines, complying, comment

have printed the automated guidelines and will comply today. this article is NOT biased, It *is* too US centric because I have only now started to mobilize international inputs. Arno Reuser from The Netherlands has weighed in and will help. this will be fixed over time. BIASED is when you have your head in the sand and want to leave the article the way it was because it avoids pointing out just how naked the CIA emperor is. I will rely on the common sense of the group. if this gets too silly I will quit and create the private wiki that everyone wanted in the first place, but for now I am sticking to my instinct that being part of[REDACTED] is potentially more useful to the largest possible number of individuals. 68.227.195.23 15:06, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Vendor list

How is a long list of vendors not going against wikipedias anti-advertising policy? Ansell 07:13, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

I completely agree with Ansell/Esperanza. My original intent was to force all the vendors into their own Wiki SHORT page (one paragraph on capabilities, one paragraph on relevance to OSINT, and then have that subpage limited to appearing on one or more of the Open sources of information or Open source intelligence softwares or Open source intelligence services. I was castrated by the President of your foundation, who has a real issue with orchestrated additions to the Misplaced Pages. I worked very diligently to respond to the suggestions of the group. I think the vendor list should be removed. I also think that some of the vendor pages, e.g. LEXIS-NEXIS, are grotesquely overblown, while others, e.g. Janes, or Deep Web, come closer to the mark. Misplaced Pages is not ready for evaluative input, but one day I would like to see specific sources, softwares, and services able to earn karma points from users of the Misplaced Pages. Robert Steele 11:58, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Comments on the Page

I am abstaining from making direct changes until after the Misplaced Pages confernce (and thank the user who told me not to leave). However, I have three comments for the group to consider:

1) It is inappropriate to define the discipline by its newest entitity, the Open Source Center, which is in addition not open to the public and a US center rather than an international center. I recommend someone restore the previous definition of six sources (FYI, the Open Source Center is not allowed to use experts and individuals the way the discipline demands).

2) I personally feel it is inappropriate to show Robert David Steele under see also. I did not create the page about myself, although now that I know it exists I made two minor corrections but have refrained from adding to it. Recommend that "See Also" listing of Robert David Steele be removed from the OSINT page. It is enough to have the name in brackets within the main body under history.

3) I was trying very hard to get international governments, non-governmental organizations, academic institutions and others to contribute. Deleting Communities of Interest is a very serious mistake. It should be restored.

Best wishes to all of you, Robert

Vendor section moved here from article

I don't understand the criteria for who should be listed here amd who shouldn't. I don't understand the justification for this section. Perhaps Robert can identify the half dozen we can best use as a source for improving the article? WAS 4.250 13:59, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Vendors

• BBC Monitoring Subscription service from the BBC.
• C4I.org- Private open-source intelligence clearinghouse.
• Dialog leader in providing online-based information services to organizations seeking competitive advantages.
• EastView Since 1989, East View has been the world's leader in providing high-quality information services from Russia and the NIS to the widest variety of customers.
• Factiva a Dow Jones & Reuters Company, provides world class global content, including Dow Jones and Reuters Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.
• Infosphere AB- Corporate OSINT from Commercial Intelligence & Knowledge Strategy consultancy Infosphere AB (Sweden).
• Lexis Nexis provides authoritative legal, news, public records and business information; including tax and regulatory publications in online, print or CD-ROM formats
• MarketResearch.com is the leading provider of global market intelligence products and services.
• Open Sources Center Subscription-based OSINT from ISRIA.
• The OSINT Center Geopolitical, Tourism and Energy OSINT from Alan Simpson
• SENTINEL- Government and private sector OSINT services from Elsag Solutions AG (Switzerland).
• Silobreaker- integrated sources and analytical webservice created by and for OSINT and CI users- Intelligence for Everyone (2005)
• World News Connection - global news from Federal Broadcast Information Service (FBIS is run by CIA, now under the DNI Open Source Center(OSC)).

definition at top is wrong

wish to respectfully point out that DoD is not defining OSINT properly. The best and most authoritative definition of OSINT remains:

Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) combines the proven process of intelligence (requirements definition, collection management, source discovery and validation, multi-source fusion, and compelling actionable presentation) with a deep and broad understanding of what open sources of information (OSIF) are available in 29+ languages.

Source: http://www.oss.net/extra/news/?module_instance=1&id=1943

Then restore the six specific types of sourceuy

There are actually several distinct categories:

Raw open source information includes commercial imagery and geospatial information, all analog and digital information in all forms, and original knowledge elicited from human beings, both expert and individual in situ. I continue to believe that the earlier listing of six sources was more effective.

Processed open source information is provided to generic audiences. Dissertations, the New York Times, special reports.

Open Source Intelligence (OSINT), contrary to the DoD definition, is open source information that has been specifically collected, processed, analyzed, and is presented in a decision support product that helps a specific person or group make a decision. Contrary to the claims of the Open Source Center, MOST of what they produce is OSIF, not OSINT (World News Connection). The 30 paragraphs they have gotten into the President's Daily Brief is certainly a step in the right direction, but until we are spending at least 10% of the U.S. Intelligence budget on OSINT covering all topics including the ten threats, we will not be serious.

Finally, there is Validated OSINT or OSINT-V, which is OSINT produced by anyone that is subsequently confirmed by government analysts with access to secret information. This distinction was created by Dr. Joe Markowitz, the only real director of OSINT CIA has ever had (Community Open Source Program Office). All four of these distinctions appear in:

http://www.oss.net/dynamaster/file_archive/040312/7a231eef008bf3f1ccb00841ed1fed31/02%2dCINC%20Brief%20%2810Min%29.ppt#284,4,Slide 4

Markowitz is the only real expert the USG has on OSINT, his 2003 presentation is at: http://www.oss.net/dynamaster/file_archive/030924/f7eac294881ba3e0d8907cd05b2b3f90/Markowitz%20on%20OSINT.ppt

His 2006 presentation on the key DoD document that finally got OSINT established as a discipline in DoD is at: http://www.oss.net/dynamaster/file_archive/060118/4f1cd46401216167c47d18eb0c9b1314/US%5fTransitions%5fto%5fand%5ffrom%5fHostilities.ppt

Best wishes to all, Robert

answer to question on vendors

Sorry, just noticed question addressed to me. IMHO, no vendors should appear as links on the master page. However, I also disagree with the President of the Misplaced Pages foundation, who told me he plans to blackball vendors. I killed the two press releases mentioning Misplaced Pages and also changed my own web site to really focus vendors on Wiki guidelines. In my view, the place for vendors to appear is BRIEFLY on their own Wiki page, with one paragraph about them and one paragraph showing their relevance to either Open sources of information or Open source intelligence software or Open source intelligence services.

Personally, although I appreciate the rational for moving communities of interest to the page someone else created about me, I still feel that the eight communities of interest should be listed on the master page, and the correct place for the Open Source Center to appear is on the Government OSINT page, with a link to its own Wiki page. Then I could go about encouraging the UK, South Africa, Norway, Sweden, Canada and a bunch of others that have government OSINT centers, to create their own bottom level two paragraph Wiki page, and links from the Government OSINT page. Similarly for the other groups.

But that's just my opinion. I hope you are all comfortable with my floating stuff here while avoiding any direct edits, it seems to work better this way and the page should be stable for a while.

Best wishes, Robert

great definition, sources missing three

the new definition is much better. nice work. it is important, in specifying the sources, to list geospatial information, experts, and individuals, not only because they are sources, but because they are the three things the CIA refuses to get right, mostly because their security mind-set is dead set against allowing analysts with access to top secret stuff to talk to foreigners who might "elicit" "secrets".

CIA toyed with geospatial information in the Office of Scientific and Weapons Research, and they were stunned by what they could learn simply by mapping offices to see who was near who. However, the turf in the US IC is such that NGA claims an exclusive of geospatial intelligence, and the lines in the road keep CIA from getting serious in this area.

On experts, I used the Social Science Citation Index and the Science Citation Index to identify the top 100 people in the world on any topic, and through them, if needed, I can identify the topp 100 unpublished experts. CIA grew up under the proposition that only secrets matter, and that you can take young white kids from Kansas and teach them everything they need to know about a topic. This is flat out wrong.

On individuals, we are doing Friday sermon monitoring, and other legal ethical collection around the world, using individuals whose only necessary qualification be that they can listen the sermon and report its gist. CIA requires that anyone who works for it as a secret agent (US government spy handlers, I was one, are called Case Officers) agree to take money and commit treason. They simply cannot compute a Misplaced Pages approach that makes it possible for people to contribute what they know from the street (the CIA wikipedia, just gettiing off the ground , requires that you have a top secret clearance and be a US government employee).

For all of the above reasons, if you are going to list sources, I recommend that you add geospatial, experts, and individuals.

I am very excited about being in Boston and being able to absorb the Misplaced Pages culture. Also going to Hackers on Planet Earth in New York 20-22 July, a different set of unique perspectives.

Best wishes, Robert

Citations for 95% on secrets

There are two refs for this ((fact)), the first is the Forbes article mentioned in the sentence which is down below as a reference, and the second is my briefing on "Searching for Bin Laden: The Use of Intelligence in the War on Terror or How NOT to Spend the Taxpayers' Treature" at http://www.oss.net/WAC. I was tempted to try to do this myself, but I believe everyone is more comfortable if I just offer suggestions and get out of the way, so that is what I am doing. I love sushi. Anyone working on this page and going to Boston, I am good for a sushi blow-out while we are there.

Interesting to note

It might be of interest to anyone dealing with NPOV that Robert Steele (OSS.net) is a vendor, hence the reason he finds it so important to get his definition of OSINT as the encyclopedic version.

note from Robert Steele

On balance, the additions outweigh the errors. Am quite happy to see so much energy going into this page. If you do mentioon anywhere, Robert David Steele leads to the page someone else created on me some time in the past.

Re OSS.Net as a vendor. I beg to differ. OSS.Net does have two minor contracts with the US military, but if you look carefully at OSS.Net website you will see that it is my personal blog and all business connections to the web site have been severed precisely to avoid the vendor aspect. I have spent 18 years, at great sacrifice to myself and my family, as the Chief OSINT Evangelist. If you want to consider me a vendor fine, but anyone who knows me knows that I live to spread the gospel of OSINT, not to make a buck. I still remember 1993-1997 at $27K a year. A lesser person would have committed suicide, and I sometimes wondered, since I have 17 suicides in my professional past, if there was a CIA pool on WHEN I might do so. What you see is what you get. Make of what you wish. 68.227.195.23 18:33, 7 July 2006 (UTC) Robert Steele 18:34, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Ref for Aspin-Brown:

Here is the ref for all of the respondents to Aspin Brown, recommend the ref go at the top before the first example.

"INFORMATION PEACKEEPING: The Purest Form of War" by Robert David Steele

Sorry I don't know how to do this right. Robert Steele 18:50, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

No problem. I fixed it. And someone will improve what I did and so on ... It's a great system! WAS 4.250 19:58, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

No original research

"No original research" is a key rule here. Balanced treatments, no undue weight, and sourcing data are all important. On the one hand, Steele is a recognized expert in the field. On the other hand, Steele is an advocate and a party with emotional and financial interests involved. Too much of the artcile is about Steele and verified by Steele - but the solution is to add stuff verified by others and from others' points of view. Steele, you are an expert. Will you help us to fill out this article with stuff sourced by people other than yourself and your close friends? Or chage any current source from one by you to someone else? For example our evidence for the Brundi thing is that you say it happened. And I believe you. But a second source from someone else would help. Thanks. I'm tired now. Maybe I'll return to this article tomorrow. WAS 4.250 19:56, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Sources for others to mine

I really do like this system, and believe that the energy we have unleashed is beginning to show. You have a lot of folks post the stuff they have did, but I honestly believed when I set out to energize this page and correct CIA mis=statements that my own contributions would be swamped by the thousands of folks that read OSS.Net--we get 3,000 to 5,000 distinct hits a day, and I love it when I touch a CIA nerve and have a huge jump in "undisclosed net addresses." It makes my day.

I will buy sushi for anyone that is willing to spend a few hours going through the OSS.Net Archives or the OSS.Net portal pages. There are over 600 authorities on OSINT in the Archives, including such people as Peter Fuchs, then Director of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Paul van Tongeren, Director of the European Center for Conflict Prevention, and on and on and on. There is *no other site* that has been dedicated for 18 years to drawing people out. If this had been a CIA operation to expose international government intelligence capabilities in OSINT, I would have gotten several awards by now, instead of being vilified by the matrons of Reston. It is what it is. Everything anyone ever wanted to know about OSINT sources and methods is in either the portal pages or the archives. The only thing that does NOT exist, and I am thinking about how to do it, is a Moody's with karma points so that for any given open source, software, or service, you can get a Wiki like read on best practices, best prices, best product. The other thing I was to do is create a global directory of OSINT funded by anyone, so that OSINT, once paid for, can be shared. We're going to kill copyright in the traditional sense by implementing Doug Englebart's Open Hypertextdocument System (OHS) that will allow a doubling of the market by selling paragraphs with citations for microcash instead of books and documents for tens of dollars. All in good time. You all have really energized me. I will gladly answer questions and point at sources if asked, and will for now abstain from posting since that seems to work best. If someone would ask the President of the Wiki Foundation to call me, I want to introduce him to the person writing the strategic plan for FirstGov, we want to Wiki'ize the entire US Government and let the U.S. Intelligence play catch up in the next Administration.

Warmest regards to all, Robert Steele 20:44, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Letter from Dick Cheney defeating intelligence reform

If anyone wishes to post the link to the letter from Dick Cheney defeating intelligence reform, here it is. I got a hard copy in 1992 and saved it, digitized it in 2005 or whenever. THis guy was given intelligence and terrorism as his special portfolio in 2000, and he blew them both off to work with now dead Ken Lay and other energy barons to plan for US occupation of the "stans" and of Iraq.

http://www.oss.net/dynamaster/file_archive/040804/1f3c8048c52d3061ed57dd33641342df/Cheney%201992%20Letters%20Defeating%20Intelligence%20Reform.ppt

Robert Steele 21:54, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Recommend OSINT and Iraq War be changed to OSINT Subordinate to IO

If anyone wants to use a reference to IO and Intel now taking up 70% of a Brigade Commander's time in Iraq, with fire and maneuver, which used to be 90% getting only 30%, that link is:

http://www.army.mil/professionalwriting/volumes/volume4/july_2006/7_06_3.html

Images

I would be very glad to share images relevant to OSINT. For example, at http://www.oss.net/WAC there is a an image of how badly we are doing on the ten threats and twelve policies, simply because the DNI is totally unwilling to focus on OSINT. At the link http://www.oss.net/HACKERS there are several relevant images. I do not want to spoil this effort, so if anyone will tell me what images they want, I can send them to them via email as JPEGS, or post them separately to OSS.Net as JPEGS. Robert Steele 21:59, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Mercado

I have an issue with Mercado. A well-intentioned author, he is somewhat unethical in not acknowledging my work. While he may think that helps him get published in CIA journals, I regard it as unprofessional. Robert Steele 00:01, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

I am afraid that attribution is not a top priority here at Misplaced Pages. Look at me: I am an anon contributor and my IP address changes often. I have no reputation whatsoever. The encyclopedia is free. Sure, some Misplaced Pages authors care about their edit counts and such, but in the end, the Foundation owns the results - the moment after you hit "Save page". OK, if there is copyrighted material on Fondation servers, then it can be removed. But if the CIA web sute offers some information and attributes it to Mr. Marcado, then I am afraid that the general attitude is that we will not censor ourselves and boycott links to such a page simply because of such a dispute. All we do is publish the URL - not much more. Try to understand that the general Misplaced Pages is a college-age student just hoping to share information that is reasonably well-organized - the Internet "as it should be"; it is difficult to track down information sources and provide attribution in the real world about something in this encyclopedia. The attitude is rather laisse-faire: if you have a dispute about that CIA aritcle on that web page, then you should take it up with them. Really, it is more like communism than like private enterprise - it takes some getting used to if you are accustommed to strict academic journalistic standards. -- 67.116.255.18 03:54, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Sailing the Sea of OSINT in the Information Age by Mr. Mercado get an even higher ranking in Google when you just search for OSINT. I do not mean to make the problem worse, but it seems to be a better introductory article. And he does have one footnote attributing you. Let me know if swapping in that one instead is a problem - I am not doing it to appease Mr. Steele, I just think it is a better introduction. -- 67.116.255.18 04:07, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

A few comments about links

I am going to do some link sorting. My input: the most useful links should go first. My view: HTML web pages are more useful than Word or PowerPower documents. Links to web site home pages are more useful than individual articles within web sites. Google ranking, to some degree, matters. This article has recently gotten a lot of input from Robert Steele, the webmaster of oss.net and clearly a notable real-life expert on the subject, but our ethos is to ensure a wide variety of sources. I will try to preserve the conceptual organization but what we want is a variety of sources and easy access via a web browser.. -- 67.116.255.18 03:39, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Alan Simpson

I am assuming that the "OSINT pioneer" description on the Alan Simpson disambiguation page is correct. Pls let me know if otherwise or disputed. He does seem to be more about tourism (more of a State Dept. thing) than about military defense. I am assuming that the OSINT term is broad enough to both. -- 67.116.255.18 05:32, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Apologies and comment on Simpson

Apologies on Mercado. I am however being loyal to the idea of bringing up stuff in discussion and not posting myself. The First Monday article, the Mercado article, and "The OSINT Story" are all summary pieces.

I disagree that the findings of the commissions, posted by a CIA person, are "value" or advertising. I believe that is a very effective summary of the why.

I disagree with the deletion of the Quincy Wreight article as the first known modern reference. I can agree with the deletion of the several books other than World Brain, but in that case recommend that See Also point to Collective Intelligence.

Deletion and Appreciation for Don't Bite the Newcomer

Deleted gratuitously offensive language and read WP:BTE with appreciation. I am completely committed to abiding by the culture of Misplaced Pages and completely committed to seeing OSINT and Collective Intelligence fleshed out here rather than anywhere else. I am also glad to see that this page now out-ranks my own home page on Google, that was my intent. 68.100.27.210 12:22, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Alan Simpson is not only a vendor, he is the single most unprofessional gad-fly I have ever encountered. I believe he is the "OSINT" person that was destroying this page until all of you got interested and I backed out to the discussion page. Recommend that he be deleted from this page. 68.100.27.210 12:18, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

That is the tricky part about Misplaced Pages: It is an encyclopedia, but it has also touted itself as "the Internet as it should be". What does that mean? Pretty much that if I search for the term OSINT on, say, Google, and I am likely to encounter Simpson, then it is better to talk about him and characterize what he has to offer - which I agree is kinda flakey but not content-free. He is a vendor, but he is not merely presenting his product; he writes articles that are chatty but on-topic. I noticed at least at , and that he has a different opinion about the nature of OSINT. Your POV is Department of Defense, military, etc. and his POV is Department of State and U.S. tourists abroad, etc. Clearly, the OMB defines OSINT in the DoD context and Simpson's view is more general and oriented towards direct consumption by the averge private citizen. In the end, I think that both points of view will get some space in the article - just to sort it out for the benefit of the reader. Misplaced Pages is more like a dictionary: we simply try to identify how the OSINT term is currently in use. If Simpson has watered down the term, then we should just make a note of that. I will also add a note that he is a vendor. Again: is it unfair to call him an "OSINT pioneer?". FYI: There are several prominent Wikipedians who might also be considered Usenet gad-flys and such who continue to struggle with supressing their POV. We are amateurs here: we do this for free. -- 75.26.1.44 18:13, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, hold up. So WAS is Mercado? Is there some history here or does everyone who publishes anything about OSINT have to cite Steele? I don't get it. 72.192.241.170 02:44, 9 July 2006 (UTC) Oh yeah, and Steele is a vendor. He may have some good ideas (and some bad) but in the end it is all about cash. I'd definitely be wary of anyone who runs any contracts for the government, and specifically the DoD. The respectable ones (if there are any) should recuse themselves from editing this page. 72.192.241.170 02:47, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

WAS_4.250 (talk · contribs) has been around Misplaced Pages for at least a year and has a broad range of interests. WAS did make a lot of little edits and add a link to a Stephen Mercado article, but I think that this newcomer was simply jumping to conclusions. No big deal. Stephen Mercado is an analyst in the Directorate of Science and Technology of the CIA and almost certainly would never directly have anything to do with anything so public and controversial as Misplaced Pages. I am going to go ahead and replace that link with because I think that this "Sailing the Sea" article is more general-purpose. I do not think we need to get into this deep history of FBIS. Some history is fine but we should try to focus on the current state of the art. It is confusing because this OSINT term means slightly different things to different people. -- 67.121.112.5 06:03, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

OSIS

OSIS is a U.S. government VPN. It requires registration. Personally, I get irritated when we point to New York Times articles that require registration. Mostly, we link to web pages with no strings attached and we often just remove links that become dead-end 404 links or whatever. I will leave an informative link to a .mil site that attemtps to describe it. The fas.org site page is looking fairly out-of-date. -- 67.121.112.5 07:06, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

WP:NOT

Please review Misplaced Pages:What Misplaced Pages is not#Misplaced Pages is not a mirror or a repository of links, images, or media files. I am paring down the "further reading" section to mostly just the titles because, in my experience, some editors will just come along and delete any link that they think that can get away with deleting. I would like the current list to survive mostly intact, but if some other editor comes and starts whacking, I am not going to fight any fights about it. -- 67.121.112.5 07:15, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Appreciation and Comment from Steele

First, I want to thank the person that blocked me for a day. It was exactly the right thing to do and gave time to reflect. Apologies to WAS for jumping to conclusions, and appreciation for his even-handedness.

Second, this has been a fascinating exercise that has confirmed my sense of the enomous value of the Wiki concept, and the total futility for trying to get it right when you have people constantly deleting stuff just because they don't like me. Simpson is completely wrong to say that my listing of the Aspin-Brown results is fiction. He was not there, the results are a matter of public record for which each of those companies got a Golden Candle Award (see Honors at OSS.net), and whether you want to call it a win or not, it is a hard fact that the Aspin-Brown Commission, as a result of that exercise, concluded that our access to OSINT was "severely deficient" and should be a "top priority for funding" and a "top priority for DCI attention." Their words, not mine. I also find it astonishing that the group allows the CIA to delete the link to my website which is the sole repository on the planet for 30,000 pages from over 600 highly qualified individuals, and at the same link to a government website that requires registration and that none of you will ever be allowed to join. So I am going to withdraw--this is, as my European friends warned me--a time sink, and I cannot chase the twits around the page.

Third, my gratitude to those of you that made a serious effort to get this page going. I was quite thrilled with the new stuff starting to come in, and until Simpson and the CIA got destructive, thought we might have passed a point where I could get Europe, South Africa, and Singapore to play. What a pity. Not wasted, however. I have learned a lot. Most importantly, I have learned that when we do the USG, the pages will have to have "owners" at the branch level, and we will need three levels of editing privilege: entry (can nominate and discuss), journeyman (can fix and expand) and masters (can approve new content). Ideal would be a living page with color codes so that people could nominate stuff on the page and then have it confirmed by a master. I learned that we have to sharply reduce the ability of fools who delete for the wrong reasons. Finally, and my thanks for the offline education from several of you, I learned that we have to plan for cross-Wiki links in the form. I will be going to Boston a much more alert and appreciative individual as a result of all of this.

A bid you all farewell. If my web site is added back in and the Aspin Brown history is added back in, I will be glad to return. We will create our own Wiki, and we will offer CIA, but not Simpson, an opportunity to contribute. If anyone has any insights into how 30,000 pages can be turned into an instant cross-referenced Wiki I would love to hear them, I will be spending two hours with the innovation director of a major company in San Jose on 2 August discussing this. You can reach me via the contact information at my web site.

Sushi on me in Boston.

Warmest regards, Robert Steele 11:54, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Coming Tomorrow: Sortable Table of Archives with Links

One of the things I have realized from this exercise is that people don't do a lot of browsing. I've spent a few hours creating a single deconflicted list of all of the information in the archives sortable by year, citizenship, focus, speaker or author, and searchable by topic. Perhaps tomorrow, perhaps later in the week, but once you have that, no one has any excuse for not being fully familiar with the diversity of views that I have captured in the past eight years. That will be final contribution. Peace. Robert Steele 20:03, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

You say That will be final contribution. No it won't. Please read Meatball:Goodbye. WAS 4.250 20:50, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

I read it. Suit yourself. You can look for the table on my web page, which is going to be restructured. It really is a shame so few can be so obtructionist. I marvel that you all, as a community, don't see the relevance of 30,000 pages on OSINT meriting a link, and don't see the harm of CIA editing out critical comments that put the history in perspective. Will delete link to this page tomorrow. Hasta la vista. Robert Steele 22:34, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Just a warning

Just a warning, User:Robert Steele is discussing this subject at a hacker conference and implied he is being censored by the CIA. Expect heavy traffic on this article. - unsigned

I think he may be right! Why wouldn't the CIA edit[REDACTED] if it was revealing details they would prefer kept secret. Mr Steeles work seems to go completely against their belief that what's best for the US is to keep the important stuff secret from its citizens. Mostly Zen 00:33, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Well now that you've let them know we are onto them they will just do the opposite and throw us off the track. Otherwise we would know exactly what they were hiding by what they chose to delete as opposed to what they let stay. WAS 4.250 02:11, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

real experts ignoring this

I honest to got did try, including an international press release that your president promptly objected to, and a broadcast to my network, to focus on this page as a center for excellence that could be expanded. I did discuss this experience at Hackers, and I specifically mentioned those who cannot deal with the fact that modern OSINT is something they have fought since 1988 and now they try to pretend that it started on 5 December when Sergeant Eliot Jardines was made ADDNI/OS after everyone else of substance, including the Librarian of Congress, refused the job. Warning is totally unnecessary. This page is being ignored by real experts, but as a courtesy, I am going to show up at Misplaced Pages and see if I can understand how to create consensus while avoiding destructive morons. One possible solution: ANYONE can post, anyone can NOMINATE something for destruction, but only accredited editors with proven knowledge can actually delete. I have quite enjoyed and appreciated the surge in attention to OSINT. The table of contents to my web site, the sole international repository for 30,000 pages from about 75% of the people that matter in OSINT, is now at 80% and should be at 100% by the end of the week. I truly respect the intent of Misplaced Pages, but any system that can be so polluted in so short a time by people who refuse to acknowledge documented reality, is destined to remain a playground for children. Robert Steele 23:44, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Nice one Steele: "5 December when Sergeant Eliot Jardines was made ADDNI/OS after everyone else of substance, including the Librarian of Congress, refused the job." So you are degrading the ADDNIOS because he was once an enlisted man? Any true military man should be proud of that. It is hardly as though he went straight from Junior NCO to ADDNIOS, he owned a successful and respected OSINT business in the 10 year interim (ahem, unlike some). Tell the truth, you would have jumped at the job. Do you even know why it was never offered to you? I think I do, and so does anyone else following this discussion. 214.3.138.234 10:17, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Merging

I have discovered a string of stub articles on the different communities of interest, all of which were created by Steele and are linked to from his biography. It seems poor to have articles that are about terminology defined by one person's book. It seems better to talk about the topics in a more general sense, or to just have an article about the book. Since there is not very much content in those articles yet, and they may not slice up the same way when considered generally, I'm merging them all here. The coverage will need to be cleaned up and will probably shrink at first. As more content is added later, it may expand into subarticles again. -- Beland 21:52, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Good idea. Please also look into the idea that OSI is simply "overt intelligence". I have serious questions about how much this is simply hype to promote stuff. WAS 4.250 23:54, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Sortable Table of Contents for 30,000 pages at OSS.Net, Comments

I was pointed back here and am very glad to see both the vastly improved reference to the varied kinds of sources that CIA, Open Source Center and Foreign Broadcast Information Service continue to REFUSE to acknowledge, as well as the restoration of the varied communities of interest that someone moved to the page someone else created on me.

I am not going to try to keep up with this page, but if anyone wants coaching on where to look for something or how to evaluate something, I will gladly help our. What I have done to help the group access the vast range of material on OSINT by over 600 authorities, is create a Word Table that is sortable by year, country, focus, speaker or author surname, and title. This is now posted at www.oss.net, it takes exactly 21 seconds to open (33 pages of hot links), and is very easy to use. This will among many other things help establish that OSINT is not about me, not about "promoting something", and that there is an enormous amount of substance that CIA would rather not have the world know about because it continues to make them look seriously stupid. It is a FACT that CIA killed FBIS twice in the past ten years, killed the Community Open Source Program Office, refused to have a line for OSINT in the National Foreign Intelligence Budget four years running, etc.

I would be very pleased to talk this over with anyone who takes the time to look at the sortable table of contents and examines the wealth of materials accumulated over the past 18 years against the active resistance of CIA and its minions. The CIA culture is totally unsuited to dealing with the real world, one reason why there is a strong and growing body of influential people that oppose the Open Source Agency a) being within the US Intelligence Community and under the direction of the DNI (who realizes he has some real second-stringers working for him), and b) built around FBIS/OSC--that is the equivalent of trying to drive a Mercedez with a lawn mower engine.

As for Jardines. I am reluctant to say too much, but I will say this: he has consistently taken credit over the years for things others have done, he has consistently pretended to have reinvented the wheel himself, never giving credit to any of the hundreds of people whose work he has drawn upon, and in my case specifically, he has broken the agreement we made when he called on me to ask for my support, and I agreed to give it. Jardines has exactly one qualification for the shit job that he is in: he is subordinate and accepting of his chains. I tried very hard to encourage him, giving him a personal Golden Candle Award for his Open Source quarterly in the early 1990's (which self-destructed fairly quickly, as did my OSS Notices--the market was not ready), but the other two Golden Candles that he can claim to be associated with--one given to Congressman Simmons as a LtCol where I wrote over 75% of the document, the other to Col Barbara Fast in Germany where Jardines carefully hid from me the fact that he was behind the nomination, I do not consider him to have done anything worthy of note other than to be there. I would be quite amused to see someone try to create a Misplaced Pages page on Jardines. By Misplaced Pages standards, he does not exist. He has published nothing of note. He has done nothing to further the field. He is, to his credit, a bland inoffensive young man who can fit in to a pathologically dysfunctional environment, and smile while eating crap with no budget, no permanent staff, and no significant authority. Make of it what you will. Best wishes to all Robert Steele 20:15, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Seeking Funded WikiMaster and Editor for This Page

With the explicit approval of Wiki Foundation folks, I am seeking to identify a funded editor for this page. I think it was unreasonable of "Talk" to delete my offer since those of you that have labored on this page should have first shot at earning $250 a week for developing this page and ten others pages (on the ten high level threats). I will post the job offer to the WikiList next week. If you want to see my comments on the Wikimania conference, they are at www.oss.net under OSINT Hub.Robert Steele 18:26, 8 August 2006 (UTC)