Proteus Consortium

Purpose: Better option development and decision choice in a complex, multi-faction setting. From 2002 to date, the complex setting used is the conflict in contemporary Iraq.

Platform: Protean Media. This is a real-time, computer-assisted, genetic algorithm that allows players to game the “complex, multi-faction setting” without reality limiting rules. To prevent the game from getting out of hand, each faction has a facilitator to apply “common sense.”

Performance to date

·     The U.S.–Canada consortium began with a December 2002 meeting between two Canadians and a group of U.S. analysts, gaming specialists, cryptographers, CIA staff and DoD officials at the National Reconnaissance Office, near Washington.

·     The first full test of Protean Media took place in June 2003, at the Canadian Embassy in Washington. Eight teams “gamed;” seven representing factions carrying out and or supporting (legal and or illegal) violence and one — “others” — representing the UN, business, NGO, media and civil society. The “others” team won conclusively.

·     The Proteus Consortium has received funding from a strategy directorate in the CIA to hire a full-time “secretary.” S/he will be housed and resourced at the Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and be the point of contact and manager for day-to-day Proteus Consortium operations and administration.

·     The next test of a second generation Protean Media will be at the University of Maryland in mid-August, sponsored by the U.S. National Cryptology Center, among others. The one-day game will be the centerpiece of three days of discussion on the future of the Proteus Consortium and preparation and evaluation of the test itself. Special attention will be given to the role of bias in decision-making and how Protean Media might be used to improve security in its broadest sense.

·     The test after the August one is being planned for Ottawa in October 2005. The Office of the National Science Advisor will be the host organization. It is hoped the Canadian Defense Academy will sponsor a team for the first test in Canada.