THE NAVAL INTELLIGENCE PROFESSIONALS QUARTERLY CEASES PUBLICATION AS A BOUND MAGAZINE AND MOVES TO CYBER SPACE
NIP stands for The Naval Intelligence Professionals Association an organization that at least two of our staff and several regular contributors belong to. We often make note of the fact in print that we are not a news organization per se. Yet as many of our longer term readers have noted we have occasionally been the first to break important maritime news stories before the general media and even before the English language news services. The NIP MAIL and the NIP QUARTERLY were often the reason. On the internet the NIP MAIL carries daily postings by NIP members of unclassified observations and opinions about naval and maritime developments around the world. Some of those posts are by folks who are reading certain area foreign newspapers and maritime/naval/military trade journals in the official language of the area. You may recall that we were at least three days ahead of any English language source when a Japanese and a Taiwanese set of Coast Guard vessels had a go at each other with water cannons.
It was big news in Japan, and it had serious ramifications for the tense situations in the South and East China Seas. But our major media missed it. We didn't because the observers of NIP didn't miss it, we followed their links to original sources relying on their initial interpretations until we found Japanese owned and managed English language publications following the story. We were then able to link our readers to the professional journalistic coverage and analysis in English before our national media seemed to become aware of the story.
The NIP mail is a source we check daily. The NIP QUARTERLY was a bound magazine that we received every three months. It had longer more in depth articles and more analysis, plus a whole lot of club like info on who was going where to do what within the Naval Intelligence Community. Well the Naval Intelligence Community was recently expanded into the Naval Information Dominance Corps to include some communities that weren't previously thought of as "Intelligence" like the Naval Meteorological Organization. The NIP QUARTERLY published every quarter since 1985. The honor of being the last editor of the NIP QUARTERLY goes to retired Navy Captain J.R. Reddig. On the back cover of the final issue he is photographed raising a glass in toast and reminding us its isn't over yet.
Indeed it is not, the QUARTERLY like so many forms of information committed to paper is being launched into cyber space. We predict that in electronic format it will contain just as much, if not more information coupled with the potential for daily updating. Yet something important has been lost. We like books and magazines. Where else can you pack so much information into a format that can be folded, stapled, mildly mutilated, bent, and still be read by flashlight if need be, or while you are stretched out across an engine hatch in hostile territory taking a break. The book or magazine just keeps pumping out the information or infotainment, or just plain entertainment without noise and no batteries needed. The new tablets really can't replace the printed word on paper but they will displace it. Click here to learn more about the Naval Intelligence Professionals organization http://navintpro.net/. Its growing, it's getting bigger and better and those of us who are dues paying members are very proud of what it has become since 1985. But it still busts our chops that the QUARTERLY is no more as a bound paper creation. We are all for forests, one of us even owns a tree farm, but to our mind still the highest use of a tree is to be converted to paper for publishing on....and we even own a blog...???? REST IN PEACE NIP QUARTERLY WE WILL SORELY MISS YOU.
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