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Thanks to the kind invitation of S. Anthony Iannarino, I have been on the much vaunted, often coveted,  Google Wave beta app ( I do not have any invites yet, sorry ) which mashes up email, realtime transparent instant messaging, other embedded web 2.0 apps and a wiki-like functionality. The interface looks like this ( from O’Reilly Radar – who can explain Google Wave far better than I can:

What is it like?

First, for me, it’s a small handful of my blogcircle ( most of who are techies) milling about chatting, trying to figure out the functionality. The champ so far is Sean Meade, who is Tom Barnett’s webmaster and also the web editor for ARES; Sean assembled a tutorial “wave” for the rest of us that I have just begun to plod through. It is not easy to find other googlewavers which is why people are posting calls on Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites.

Secondly, this is a very unfinished symphony of a beta – at least compared to prior beta experiences I’ve had. Sliderocket, by comparison was very smooth and probably 95 % ready when I received a beta account while with Google Wave I’d anticipate significant differences before it becomes generally available. As it is going to be open source, the potential creativity for future apps is vast.

Cool, interesting, not entirely sure how I will eventually use it on a regular basis yet.

More fodder for the digital vs. dead tree debate:

UCLA Study: The Internet Is Altering Our Brains

….After the initial brain scan, subjects went home and conducted Internet searches for one hour a day for a total of seven days over a two-week period. These practice searches involved using the web to answer questions about various topics by exploring different websites and reading information. Participants then received a second brain scan using the same Internet simulation task, but with different topics.

The first scan of participants with little Internet experience showed brain activity in the regions controlling language, reading, memory and visual abilities. The second brain scan of these participants, conducted after the home practice searches, demonstrated activation of these same regions, but there was also activity in the middle frontal gyrus and inferior frontal gyrus – areas of the brain known to be important in working memory and decision-making.

….The results suggest that searching online may be a simple form of brain exercise that might be employed to enhance cognition in older adults,” Teena D. Moody, the study’s first author and UCLA researcher, said in a statement.

When performing an online search, the ability to hold important information in working memory and to take away the important points from competing graphics and words is essential, Moody noted.

I will be interested in seeing brain scan comparisons between digital natives who were on computers from the time they were toddlers, and the digital immigrants.  My son, for example, learned to read on his own long before pre-school from looking at words on a computer screen ( less “learned” than spontaneously “realized” the symbol-sound-conceptual connection ) while his sister, who had a more traditional exposure to reading, learned later ( more “taught”).

Another difference, while they are both equally skilled at reading, adjusted for an age, she is an avid reader who devours large books (mostly fiction) while her brother reads instrumentally, for knowledge or expository explanations (mostly natural science subjects. Only “Clone Wars” attracted him to read fiction).

At Chicago Boyz:

Marching Upcountry with Xenophon

…..Xenophon the Socratic soldier and admirer of Sparta would never have written a book like On War because the character of war would have been of less interest to him than the character of men who waged it. Or at least the character of the Greeks who waged war and that of the leaders of the barbarian armies, Cyrus, Tissaphernes and Artaxerxes (ordinary, individual, barbarians are of no consequence to Xenophon except insofar as they are instrumental in carrying out the designs of their leaders). And their character at war and in peace were inseparable and constant, though having different effects, as Xenophon explained in his passages on Clearchus and his captains and his paean to Cyrus the Younger. It has been remarked in this roundtable by Joseph Fouche that Xenophon was thoroughly Greek in his attitude toward the barbarians which Joseph Fouche called a “mirror image” to the attitude of Herodotus toward the Others of the East. I agree, to an extent. The countervailing example though is Cyrus, on whom Xenophon lavished praise with so heavy a hand that it must have struck Athenian eyes as bordering on sycophancy toward a would-be basileus. Few Greek writers, other than Herodotus, were ever so generous with their pen to a barbarian.

Decided to beef up the diplo section here to balance out all the COIN/strategic studies blogs on the roll.

Karaka Pend 

John Brown’s Public Diplomacy Press and Blog Review, Version 2.0 

Consul-at-Arms II

Diplopundit

Check them out!

More blogging later today…..

My post below, with minor alterations, has just been re-published at the Atlantic Council on their blog, courtesy of managing editor, Dr. James Joyner.

State Department Must Reform or Die

Much appreciated, Dr. Joyner!

ADDENDUM:

Karaka Pend ties related posts on the inadequacy of the State Department together:

The State Department has a mission, if they choose to accept it.

Karaka also points to this TNR op-ed by Dr. Steve Metz of SSI:

The Civilian Surge Myth

….No one welcomes this more than the military. In the absence of civilian capacity, soldiers end up managing public services like trash collection, or trying to teach democracy and good governance. At a major conference on irregular conflicts last month, I listened as a decorated Marine colonel heading for command in Afghanistan talked of how that conflict would unfold when the civilian surge was in place. As a Pentagon official heard this, he told me, “The military is looking to off-load nation building; they are so desperate to do that–and so eager to enshrine the lessons from the Iraq counterinsurgency–that they have convinced themselves of the necessity and plausibility of a civilian surge.”

ADDENDUM II. – COURTESY OF SCHMEDLAP: