ORB Visualization
(soon)
1/30/2004 8:00 AM
Ms Kelcy Allwein,
NIMA Program manager for Glass Box (NIMA)
As you know I, and others, have felt that funding should have been found for the 2002 (SAIC/Ontologystream) proposal:
Synthetic Perception System for Detecting Novel Intelligence.
After the NIMA review (and acceptance as fundable but unfunded) I made the following comments:
http://www.ontologystream.com/beads/frameworks/NIMAreview.htm
Since September 2002, significant progress has been made on the objectives of our Glass Box proposal - even without funding. This progress is partially reflected in a currently under evaluation submission from SAIC/OntologyStream to the DARPA REAL program. The REAL submission was made September 3 2003.
The office at SAIC has had no word on the DARPA funding judgments for this program.
These two proposals have been reviewed by a number of leading scientists, who are willing to make recommendations on behalf of the work proposed.
Several scientists are making the argument that the IT evaluation process is the primary cause of the mal-performance of intelligence information processing.
http://www.bcngroup.org/python3/fortyseven.htm
http://www.bcngroup.org/python3/fortysix.htm
Reform in the procurement process is needed.
Specifically we have been critical of specific past awards and have evidence that program evaluations have NOT been based on the best scientific foundation. But the problem is larger than single instances.
We continue to call for a Congressional Hearing.
Recent experiences suggest that some sort of external pressure has to be applied in order to fix once and for all the problem related to control over the IT funding mechanisms at DARPA.
We understand that this communication is exactly such an instance of external pressure.
However, we also understand that the two proposals (one already having been peer reviewed by NIMA and deemed "fundable") are exactly the type of technology deployment that our intelligence community has a desperate need for.
My team is ready to participate and to lend our assistant to DARPA or to publicly challenge the process if reform is not made.
At one point, the controlling issue has to be about the protection of the public interest.
Dr. Paul S. Prueitt