TIP = at various times Total (or Terrorism) Information Program (or Awareness), Poindexter's baby at DARPA. GIA is Government Information Awareness, an effort to keep an eye on the weasels.
From the FAQ:
"We were motivated by the Defense Advance Research Program Administration (DARPA) program, Total Information Awareness, which seeks to gather, consolidate, and analyze information about Americans and foreigners. We see such research as possibly helpful, and probably dangerous to the democratic process.
"The premise of GIA is that individual citizens have the right to know details about government, while government has the power to know details about citizens. Our goal is develop a technology which empowers citizens to form a sort of intelligence agency; gathering, sorting, and acting on information they gather about the government. Only by employing such technologies can we hope to have a government 'by the people, and for the people.'"
Found here:
http://www.opengov.uskinda neat