STUTTGART – AFRICOM Commander, Gen. William "Kip" Ward, officially unveiled US Africa Command’s newest web page, The LYnC, which stands for "Linking You and the Command," at an All Hands staff engagement held in the Kelley Barracks gymnasium 27 March.

"As we continue to mature as a combatant command," Ward said, "we continue to do things that cause us, those whom we work with, those whom we serve to be better informed with better understanding and to cause us as a team to be better linked together through our efforts."

Command information, the means by which the commander reaches out to his key internal audiences, is a focal point for any commander and AFRICOM is making use of the internet and Social Media sites to maximize the their reach in a timely fashion.

According to Ward, social media "brings home the importance of the work that we do to such a wide audience all around the world."

"Our team is on all the major social media sites like Facebook, Wordpress and Flickr on a daily basis," according to Maj. Steven Lamb. "These sites can reach not just our internal audiences but those around the world. They offer friends and critics alike the opportunity to not just learn about who AFRICOM is and what we do but also to engage us in open and frank discussion."

Lamb, who is the chief of the Social Media Team in the Public Affairs office, reports that the command has over 1,600 "likes" on Facebook and their Flickr site has more than 50,000 views.

AFRICOM has staff members on the African continent, in Europe and in the United States. "Around six months ago Ms. Lubin [Valerie Lubin, AFRICOM Quality of Life Chief] and Juanita Harvin [AFRICOM Educational Liaison Specialist] and the Quality of Life folks came to us and said 'your website is great for public information but what we really need is information for the family members,'" according to AFRICOM Public Affairs Officer Col. Franklin Childress. This conversation was the genesis of The LYnC.

The LYnC's design "bridges the public information into the command information into the social media and allows everyone in the command to be linked together," Childress says.

To learn more or to "Get LYnC'd" you can access the new site at www.africom.mil/lync or by clicking The LYnC ion in the social media area of the www.AFRICOM.MIL website.

For more information contact the AFRICOM Public Affairs office at AFRICOM-PAO-LYnC@africom.mil or by commercial phone at +49 (0) 711-729-4714 or 4710, DSN (314) 421-4714 or 4710.