CENTCOM "blog team" fights info war on terror

[rocco322]

<br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>With all respect due the brave young men and women who volunteered to serve in our nation’s military, this is PSYOPS. — PID</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br>By Capt. Steve Alvarez, USA - American Forces Press Service<br>March 2, 2006<br><br>MACDILL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. — The widespread use of Web logs, or “blogs,” by online writers has proliferated information on topics as varied as the authors.<br><br>Blogs, in essence, are online journals or forums for their authors, known as “bloggers.” Public affairs officials here said thousands of blogs are created each day, and they estimate that more than 21 million blogs are posted on the World Wide Web today.<br><br>Blogs sometimes include information — accurate and otherwise — about the U.S. military’s global war on terror. U.S. Central Command officials here took notice and created a team to engage these writers and their electronic information forums.<br><br>“The main interest is to drive their readers to our site,” Army Reserve Maj. Richard J. McNorton said. McNorton is CENTCOM’s chief of engagement operations.<br><br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.watchermagazine.com/?p=3882">LINK</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--> <p></p><i></i>

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<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>The team engages bloggers who are posting inaccurate or untrue information, as well as bloggers who are posting incomplete information. They extend a <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>friendly invitation</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> to all bloggers to visit the command’s Web site.<br><br>Many bloggers appreciate the team’s contact, blog team officials said, and most post CENTCOM’s Web site as a link on their blog sites. This, McNorton said, has a “viral effect” that drives Internet news consumers to CENTCOM’s Web site.<br><br>“Now (online readers) have the opportunity to read positive stories. At least the public can go there and see the whole story. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>The public wants to hear these good stories,” he said, adding that the news stories the military generates are “very factual</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->.”<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br> <p></p><i></i>