UK Royal Navy soft-launches a blog

Discovered this from the Wordpress publisher's blog:

The UK Royal Navy recently soft launched their blog using WordPress. The new blog, called Jack Speak (a term for UK Navy slang), provides Royal Navy personnel with the opportunity to share their experiences with a wide audience.

At the blog, it says:

This blog offers an unlimited view of the Royal Navy, because it’s written by the people who truly understand what it means to be a part of this exceptional service – the Royal Navy personnel themselves. We are delighted to be the only one of the Armed Forces to have created a blog and hope you’ll enjoy sharing our Life Without Limits.

Hmm... unlimited view?

Their first post was on 2 Sept 2008. Looking at the initial posts, it's clear the blog started off as an online publicity tool for the few UK Navy personnel who were taking part in the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

It's a group blog (i.e. one blog with multiple authors).

Two things impressed me.

#1 - The fact that a military service has a blog!
It sure kills some sacred cows where organisational blogging is concerned :)

#2 - The blog is endorsed by a high ranking UK Navy personnel
Their About Page has an introduction by Admiral Sir Jonathon Band GCB ADC, the First Sea Lord and Chief of the Naval Staff. Woot. The title of the office holder is solid enough already (btw, is the title the highest ranking naval officer in the UK Navy?)

Admiral Sir Jonathon Band is listed as an author for the blog. I won't be surprised if someone does the writing for him, but to be fair, it might be him posting stuff. Anyway, it impressed the heck out of me that the UK Royal Navy has their chief as part of the blog.

#3 - "Unconstrained views"
Again, from the About Page, it says the blog offers "an unconstrained view of the Royal Navy". Does this mean the posts are not censored, or rather, they rely on self-censorship and for the contributing staff to exercise common sense?

I wonder what are their blogging guidelines etc.

Anyway, we shall see but right their approach impresses the heck out of me!

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There's a consistent look-and-feel between the blog (on the left) and the official UK Navy website (on the right).

The blog design looks professional, I think with consideration for the overall organisation image and brand.

Would be interesting to follow the subsequent posts.