I have written about the Internet in the past and how it has changed society. For example, some thoughts on the Internet of Things: https://www.ourownlittlecorner.com/2014/11/21/health-it-mobility-wearables-and-the-internet-of-things/ My searching for information as to whether our whole approach… All You Need To Know About the Internet In Two Rules
For close to two years now, I have been the Program Chair for the Information Systems Management, IFSM, major for the undergraduate school, cleverly called The Undergraduate School (TUS), at the University of Maryland University… What is Information Systems Management?
Ignoring for a moment that Standard Time remains standard less than 50% of the time, which is a metaphor in my opinion or today’s world, it occurs to me that if ‘falling backward’ is such… Daylight Savings Time
I guess the story today is that mostly old people use Facebook, though of course that puts me right in the Facebook main stream.
Having said that, it is clear that people, old or young, who do not use Facebook or at least one of the more popular social networks do not realize how much interaction goes on that has a reasonable amount of social meaning. While I recognize that in-person relationships are deeper and agree with the studies that most of us can only have a limited number of ‘true’ social friendships, the interactions on Facebook have meaning and allow us to interact with people we otherwise would not touch.
My recent example is a post I made recently about a book that was sent by a publisher to Ellen so she could potentially review it, the joy of leaving your sh*t all over the place. My post said: “I am not sure if I’m more surprised that we have this book to read or that we were not the author.”
Luckily for me, the future of technology remains exactly that, the future, so I can continue to update and present such presentations unless, or until, The Future is NOW, becomes reality and not just a slogan.
Last Friday, September 11, I was invited to give the keynote talk at a conference held by the Modern Technology and Management Institute (MTMI) in Virginia Beach, VA. MTMI is a non-profit which supports:
The presentation is here: MTMI Presentation.
My focus was to talk about what I think were broad trends in how technology is affecting society as opposed to trying to make a bunch of predictions about specific technologies.
A few days ago I moderated a panel at the ATARC sponsored Federal Cybersecurity Integration Summit. I discussed the panel here. The topic for the panel was a look at The Future of Cybersecurity, what… Interesting Takeaway From The Future of Cybersecurity Panel
Recently I was on the DorobekINSIDER LIVE show along with Sean Herron, Product Lead and Developer at 18F; and Richard Beutel, Senior Advisor and Counsel for Acquisition Policy House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
The link to the show is here.
The attitude to Cloud has changed dramatically since I was the CIO at the US Department of Transportation. Then, there was great reluctance from all stakeholders to even try moving applications to the Cloud. Now, there is general agreement that many applications are candidates for such a move, though there clearly are security and acquisition hurdles that need to be overcome.
Slightly over forty years ago, I received a B.S. in Information Systems Management from the University of Maryland College Park (the major had just been created). It started me off on a random walk through… It Turns Out You CAN Go Home Again – A New Job
In order to talk about Information Technology 3.0, it is necessary to explain what I mean by Information Technologies 1.0 and 2.0.
The first generation of Information Technology focused on replacing what was already in place by something more efficient and faster, but substantially the same in function. Thus computers initially, even though the beginnings of personnel computers effectively faster typewriters (word processing), faster calculators (spreadsheets) and bigger file cabinets (disk storage). The functions that were automated were in large part functions that were accomplished from combinations of those three things. While the result often, but not always, were improvements in the efficiency of performance of functions like payroll or accounting statements, and while the role of staff often were impacted by those changes, in general the new version of the functions looked a lot like the old version.
One of the things I learned during my time as the Chief Information Officer at the US Department of Transportation is that one of the core competencies of the Federal Government is looking over someone else’s shoulder, that is the provision of oversight.
The CIO has three major organizational best friends providing helpful advice. First there is the Office of Management & Budget (OMB) which has the added lever of having a big impact on how much money you will potentially get in your budget in coming years. Second if you are associated with a big program, and at DOT there was always something going on at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which was a big program, then the Government Accountability Office (GAO) got involved. Often, by the way how OMB rated programs and how GAO rated programs were slightly different so fixing for one did not always fix for the other, but that is another story for another post.
And finally there was the internal to the Department based Office of Inspector General (IG). IG’s investigate many things but one of their required areas of focus relates to how Information Technology is provisioned within an agency or department.
Oversight in the Federal Government – The Underutilized Part