The article looks at "milbloggers" -- bloggers who also happen to be serving or have served in the military and write about the war and the service. In today's global conflict and the highly politicized atmosphere, milbloggers provide interesting, if sometimes controversial, perspectives. With today's blogging technology, "letters home" are far more immediate, and the "soldier's-eye view" is available to more people than ever before.
Here's an excerpt from the article:
Milbloggers constitute a rich subculture with a refreshing candor about the war, expressing views ranging from far right to far left. They also offer helpful tips about tearing down an M16, recipes for beef stew (hint: lots of red wine), reviews of the latest episode of 24, extremely technical discussions of Humvee armor configurations, and exceptionally raw accounts of field hospital chaos, gore, and heroism.
For now, the Pentagon officially tolerates this free-form online journalism and in-house peanut gallery, even as the brass takes cautious steps to control it. A new policy instituted this spring requires all military bloggers inside Iraq to register with their units. It directs commanders to conduct quarterly reviews to make sure bloggers aren't giving out casualty information or violating operational security or privacy rules. Commanding officers shut down a blog that reported on the medical response to a suicide bombing late last year in Mosul. The Army has also created the Army Web Risk Assessment Cell to monitor compliance. And Wired has learned that a Pentagon review is under way to better understand the overall implications of blogging and other Internet communications in combat zones.
"It's a new world out there," says Christopher Conway, a lieutenant colonel and DOD spokesperson.
You can read the entire article here.