Tales from the Technoverse

Commentary on social networking, technology, movies, society, and random musings

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This Year’s Passover Sedar

April 1st, 2012 · history, judaism

I have previously posted about the Passover Sedar we hold at our house each year:

https://www.ourownlittlecorner.com/2011/04/10/our-annual-passover-seder/

and

https://www.ourownlittlecorner.com/2011/04/11/our-passover-seder-quotes/

In 2008, one thing we focused on was “We think about from what, to what, and what we have to accomplish to initiate and complete the transition.” This year we want to expand a bit on that: thinking about what risks have to be taken in order to successfully achieve freedom and have to happen to enable people (or communities of people) to take those risks. Perhaps we can consider what implications this has for the current day.

[Read more →]

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Teaching vs Hosting a Party

March 12th, 2012 · government 2.0, social networking

In the February 1, 2012, Harvard Business Review, there was an analogy used to discuss the impact of social media on an organization which I thought was pretty useful.

Gerry Eberstadt, the CEO and founder of Turnto Networks,  compared the difference between teaching a class and hosting a party.

In both everyone is in the same room. But in the first the focus is all on the teacher as a brand. As Eberstadt put it, the flow is hub and spoke. At the party, the participants may or may not even interact directly with the host. Chances are the guests are going to be as positive about the host as the students were about the teacher, maybe more so. The issue isn’t what is the right approach, but that each has its own value and implications.

A further comment was that the challenge regarding the party analogy is how to ‘monetize’ the event. It is necessary for have the guests ‘do something’ in relation to the host and often that is one of the challenges.

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Thoughts On Teleworking

February 11th, 2012 · cloud computing, cyber-security, government 2.0, social networking, technology, telework

I teach a class at the University of Maryland University College (UMUC) about the future of Information Technology.

One of the great things about doing this is how much I learn each semester, I find I always gain much, much more than I bring to the class (pointed out to me by the observant students …).

In a recent discussion thread one of the students had some interesting things to say about telecommuting which I thought deserved a wider audience. So with a tip of the hat to Neelima Jampani … [Read more →]

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Today I Rode the Bus All By Myself

January 26th, 2012 · travel

So yesterday among other things I proved (once again) that I know literally nothing about cars.

As I was driving back from a customer meeting the alternator/battery light came on in my car. After a few moments I realized that steering had become more difficult, though possible. I called the place I take my car to be fixed which is over off New Hampshire Avenue. They said it was ‘the belt’, it probably snapped. I should bring it in. I said I would that evening.

SO last night I took the now convenient Intercounty Connector (ICC), Route 200, over to New Hampshire. While driving over there I learned, through experiential data, that when ‘the belt’ snaps, the batter is now being recharged so well. And when you have been driving for a while and your headlights are on (and your radio is on) your batter eventually goes dead. In this case about 1/10 of a mile from the New Hampshire Avenue exit. Luckily I was able to coast to the right shoulder and the emergency blinker worked (which meant I figured out what to push to turn the emergency blinker on). [Read more →]

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Why Is A Raven Like A Writing Desk or How I Literally Married the Internet

January 22nd, 2012 · cloud computing, history, life, social networking, technology

I find myself these days on a regular basis having discussions, for one reason or another, about the impact of Information Technology and inevitably the Internet on organizations, life, society, culture, and in general, the individuals having the conversation.

About a decade ago, the first time I remember having this discussion with a friend of mine, he remarked that he felt his parents had experienced greater dislocation due to technological change than he had. His parents had lived through the growth of radio, the invention of television, the ubiquitous growth of telephones, and the creation and expansion of commercial air travel.

All he and I could come up with, at the time, were faxes, cell phones, and perhaps email; which while significant seemed less amazing than the list he had for his parents. That was a sobering conversation since the common wisdom was that everything was changing so radically. Having said that, I suspect that if I repeated that conversation today we would both come to a different conclusion. [Read more →]

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Why FedRAMP Is Worth Caring About

December 12th, 2011 · CIO, cloud computing, cyber-security, government 2.0

Reposted from AOL Government, http://gov.aol.com/2011/12/12/why-fedramp-is-worth-caring-about/.

If you have been at a recent Washington Capitals hockey game when the opponent scores a goal, you know the crowd routinely shouts out “Who cares!”

Last week, Steven VanRoekel, Federal CIO, released the long awaited OMB plan for the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program, or FedRAMP; which reminds me to be thankful for pronounceable acronyms. The purpose of FedRAMP per the implementing OMB memorandum, is to “provide a cost-effective, risk-based approach for the adoption and use of cloud services”.

This blog entry is my attempt to answer the question “Who cares!”

[Read more →]

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I Once Was Young And Now …

November 12th, 2011 · history, joke, life, travel

On weekends I generally try and get things done that I do not get to during the week, both at work and in my on-line classes I teach. However, almost always I am able to avoid accomplishing too much by wandering over to youtube and getting side-tracked in watching video’s.

While I am wasting time with youtube, I often will update my various social media connections with a link to a video with a song that I am particularly struck by. A recent interaction that resulted from that caused me to think about the mid-west.

When I was growing up I was always a little bit unclear as to exactly where the mid-west started and stopped. [Read more →]

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Reflections At ELC: Why Klososky’s Keynote Missed The Mark

October 26th, 2011 · act-iac, cloud computing, cyber-security, government 2.0, presentations, technology

This last weekend I attended the Executive Leadership Conference (ELC) sponsored by ACT-IAC in Williamsburg.

The opening night keynote speaker Scott Klososky, presented some interesting points but I felt left out some key issues; probably a bit of an unfair feeling since he only had an hour to cover a lot of material.

I wrote up my summary of what I thought was missing at AOL Government where I am a contributing blogger:

http://gov.aol.com/2011/10/25/reflections-at-elc-why-klososkys-keynote-missed-the-mark/

The first, and as of now only, comment came from Scott Klososky himself who graciously said he agreed with most of my points.

 

 

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Moving Into the Cloud – Practical Experience

September 8th, 2011 · cloud computing, government 2.0, government business, presentations

For all those who are near the Washington Convention Center today and tomorrow there is an interesting conference on Cloud Computing and Virtualization, http://govcloudconference.com/Events/2011/Home.aspx,

Best of all, they reached back into ancient history, and asked me to moderate a panel Friday, September 9th, from 10:15 – 11:15, entitled Moving Into the Cloud – Practical Experience.

We will four great panel members:

  • Fred Whiteside, NIST; who will focus on the Government policy issues
  • Wolf Tombe, Customs and Border Protection, DHS; who will take the perspective of the Government implementor
  • Bob Hansmann, Blue Coat; who will discuss what it is like to be a commercial provider supporting cloud initiatives
  • Dmitry Sokolowski, BAH; who will talk about the issues in providing support as an internal to Government consultant
I am lucky to have asked, it should be an interesting discussion.

 

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Earthquakes, Emergency Training, and COOP

August 31st, 2011 · cyber-security, earthquakes, government 2.0, leadership, technology

When I was at the Department of Transportation …

It occurs to me that a lot of my writing starts with that phrase. I haven’t yet decided if I use it because I learned a lot there or because I think people will be more likely to listen if I start a discussion with it.

Regardless, when I was at the Department of Transportation we would do emergency training. What if there was another 9/11 attack, what if there was a cybersecurity attack, and so forth. Some of us got to go to semi-secret locations and stay underground, walk down long corridors with lights along the top casting shadows, lots of clacking of shoes on the floor, eating together in the cafeteria, periodically getting messages of incident updates, doing reports, watching the pretend (or real) Secretary, talking to the (always) pretend President, and so on. It was pretty cool, like getting to go back to camp for a day. Some of the exercises were pretty extensive involving multiple Government agencies including in some cases State and Local governments. [Read more →]

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