MedWorm provides a medical RSS filtering service. Over 6000 RSS medical sources are combined and output via different filters. This feed contains the latest medical blog items that have been tagged with 'browsers'. Sat, 03 Sep 2011 02:27:21 +0100 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4813681&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2011%2F05%2Fipad-launching-the-two-screen-tech-revolution.html I have been using "two-screen technology" frequently since I acquired my iPad. In my particular case, this use-case could be called "independent two-screen technology." When I am watching, say, a Netflix movie on my television, I will frequently search for more details about the film (e.g., reviews) on the web using my tablet device. However, the two-screen revolution involves a more integrated approach and was described in a recent article (see: Is the iPad Launching the Two-Screen Revolution?): iPad owners are starting to see more and more apps that encourage the use of the device in conjunction with other screens. I’m not talking about remote desktop apps that allow the iPad to act as a mirror of other machines; I specifically mean apps that allow the iPad to act a... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4813681 Wed, 11 May 2011 14:04:21 +0100 4813681 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4734680&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2011%2F04%2Fweb-search-algorithms-as-a-type-of-journalism.html Google executives have continuously emphasized that the company is in the search business and not in the content business. This assertion positions it as a neutral, valueless arbiter of efficient web search. However and with the growing sophistication of search algorithms, their role now appears to be much less neutral. The "values" mediated and executed by the invisible, Google search algorithms are commented on by Jonathan Stray in his blog (see: The editorial search engine). Below is an excerpt from his note. Read the whole thing it you have time -- it's worth the effort. It’s impossible to build a computer system that helps people find or filter information without at some point making editorial judgements. That’s because search and collaborative filtering algorithms ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4734680 Thu, 21 Apr 2011 11:35:27 +0100 4734680 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4704966&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2011%2F04%2Fpathologist-blogger-sought-to-maintain-pathtalkorg.html Dr. Kenneth Youens has emailed me that he is seeking a pathologist-blogger to take over responsibility for Pathtalk.org that he and colleagues developed as pathology residents. Below is his note. --BAF Pathtalk.org is a multiple-author pathology blog created in 2007 by a group of pathology residents for the purpose of providing an interesting, engaging and informative collection of posts on a variety of pathology-related topics.  The list of authors was expanded in 2009 to include several practicing pathologists.  Working together, we have been able to provide semi-regular posts to the site for several years, while distributing the work of creating content among the blog’s authors.  The readership of pathtalk.org has grown steadily, and several hundred readers follow up... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4704966 Tue, 12 Apr 2011 14:14:29 +0100 4704966 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4677125&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2011%2F04%2Ftumore-on-zite.html Last Thursday, I posted an enthusiastic note about an iPad app called Zite. It enables you to create a customized e-magazine to read on your device (see: Zite as an Example of the Future of E-Magazines). In response, Mike Lougee posted this comment: It appears that some of the big publishers, from whom Zite is using news content, are so unhappy that they're sending cease-and-desist letters to Zite. Presumably the smaller, non-commercial publishers that are described in this post are happy to be displayed via Zite. Mike's alert was helpful and timely. Here's an excerpt from an article that provides more information of this issue (see: Note to Media: Don’t Fight Zite, Learn From It): In an entirely too-predictable development, a group of media outlets has sent a cease-and-desis... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4677125 Tue, 05 Apr 2011 11:48:06 +0100 4677125 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4664487&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2011%2F04%2Ffthe-web-of-information-evolves-to-a-web-of-things.html A recent blog note contained a powerful idea. The current web (i.e., internet) is evolving into a larger network that will allow participation by "things" by which is meant inanimate objects such as roads, bridges, or even the door to your house (see: How the Internet of Things is Changing the Way We Work). Below is an excerpt from it: Several years ago, before the Web had become as ever-present as it is now, Wal-Mart was the shining example of a future where inanimate objects communicated, aka the Internet of Things. The company had a plan to implement RFID tags to better optimize its supply chain. The problem? The RFID technology could not be programmed to exchange data. In the past few years, we've seen the emergence of the application programming interface, or API. APIs h... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4664487 Fri, 01 Apr 2011 14:24:47 +0100 4664487 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4653612&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2011%2F03%2Ftugreater-clarity-on-the-googleandroid-business-model.html A recent blog note about the Google/Android business model was one of the best I have ever read on this topic (see: The Freight Train That Is Android). These ideas will have great relevance for medical and healthcare apps which currently are dominated by Apple under its mobile operating system, iOS. Below is an excerpt from the piece: Despite all that has been written about Android, as well as its unquestionable early success, the world at large still doesn’t fully appreciate the raw power of this juggernaut....One of Warren Buffet’s most famous quotes is that “In business, I look for economic castles protected by unbreachable ‘moats’.” An “economic castle” is a great business, and the “unbreachable moat” is the strategy or market dynamic that heightens the barriers-to-... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4653612 Tue, 29 Mar 2011 16:06:22 +0100 4653612 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4627026&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2011%2F03%2Ftuentrepreneurs-rescue-valuable-data-from-the-hidden-web.html The deep or hidden web can be defined in the following way: web content that is not part of the surface web which is indexed using standard search engines (see: Exploring the Deep or Hidden Web with WebMynd). Exposing and utilizing hidden web content has been a goal of computer scientists and entrepreneurs since web search using Google and other search engines became commonplace. A recent article explains a new facet of this quest (see: This Data Isn’t Dull. It Improves Lives). Below is an excerpt from it regarding previously hidden "governmental" information: Take data that you and I have already paid a government agency to collect, and post it online in a way that computer programmers can easily use. Then wait a few months. Voilà! The private sector gets busy, creating Web s... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4627026 Wed, 23 Mar 2011 15:58:50 +0100 4627026 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4575252&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2011%2F03%2Ffsituational-versus-ambient-information-overload.html Let me say at the outset that the condition of information overload has never been a problem for me personally except in my medical school years. It existed at that time for two reasons: I had no control over the information flow presented to me and I also understood that much of it (e.g., gross anatomy) was largely useless. Clay Shirky launched the idea in 2008 that there is no such thing as information overload but rather a situation that can be easily managed by the use of information filters. I agree with him. Nick Carr recently presented a new slant on this question (see: Situational overload and ambient overload). Below is an excerpt from his blog note: Information overload actually takes two forms, which I'll call situational overload and ambient overload, and they need to be tr... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4575252 Fri, 11 Mar 2011 18:47:15 +0100 4575252 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4517359&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2011%2F02%2Fsmart-dictators-dont-quash-the-internet.html I deviate from the normal topic matter of Lab Soft News because of the importance of this topic.  ---BAF Social media such as Facebook have been much in the news lately in connection with the revolution in Egypt, Libya, and other Middle Eastern countries. A recent op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal could serve as a playbook for dictators who want to use the social media to serve their own purposes (see: Smart Dictators Don't Quash the Internet; registration required). The author, Evgeny Morozov, makes some very important points and suggests that the IT-savvy young revolutionaries living under oppressive regimes may need to change some of their tactics. Below is an excerpt from it: The Egyptian experience suggests that social media can greatly accelerate the death of already d... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4517359 Thu, 24 Feb 2011 13:00:00 +0100 4517359 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4295006&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F12%2Ftwitter-valued-in-billions-according-to-new-study.html I have been fascinated by Twitter for at least a couple of years. The service can be defined as a free, one-to-many social networking system. Messages are confined to 140 characters but allow embedding in messages of links to web resources, thus expanding the information content of the tweets. Twitter provides value in different ways for its subscribers. I carefully select people and organizations to follow who then provide me rapid and easy access to breaking healthcare and medical science news. I "unfollow" those who post personal data that I find irrelevant and distracting. Many of my blog posts are based on ideas that I first discover on Twitter. Here's an extract of an article discussing the rapid growth of the growth and estimated value of the company (see: Twitter valu... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4295006 Mon, 27 Dec 2010 15:53:57 +0100 4295006 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4055963&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F10%2Fmfinally-an-insightful-review-of-the-new-movie-the-social-network.html I have been wanting to post a note about the new movie, The Social Network, a fictionalized account of the life of Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook. I have not seen it yet but do not consider most of the reviews I have seen thus far particularly insightful.  Many of the authors have used their reviews as an opportunity to discuss the general topic of social networking beyond Facebook. At long last, Fred Vogelstein of Wired has scored a home run (see: Why Mark Zuckerberg Should Like The Social Network). The question uppermost in my mind regarding this movie, aside from its entertainment value, is why does it matter in the larger scheme of things. Vogelstein, not surprisingly a tech writer, answers in the following way: To me, what’s important about The Social Network isn’t... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4055963 Mon, 11 Oct 2010 12:26:51 +0100 4055963 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3641341&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F06%2Fdigital-selfpublishing-promoted-by-amazon-and-its-kindle-ereader.html Information technology has caused large-scale disintermediation in a number of industries. The term refers to the process of elimination of middlemen previously interposed between buyers and sellers. Older readers may want to ponder for a moment their visits to record stores that have disappeared and been replaced by iTunes. Ditto many of the travel agents. Similarly, retail books stores are in serious trouble, having been slowly replaced by web-based booksellers like Amazon.com. This latter company also pioneered the first successful wireless reading device, the Kindle. We are now seeing the successful debut of a competitor to the Kindle in the form of Apple's iPad. A recent article discussed how the success of Kindle and iPad is changing the book publishing industry (see: Vanity'... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3641341 Tue, 08 Jun 2010 12:37:48 +0100 3641341 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3585862&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F05%2Ffour-addiction-to-digital-networks-and-social-media.html The word addiction is always used in the pejorative sense -- no one brags about their addiction to anything at cocktail parties. Nick Carr, who blogs over at RoughType, takes on the contrarians and social critics who bemoan the addiction of many/most of us to the web. social networks, blogs, on-line news, or on-line games (see: Not addiction; dependency). Here is an excerpt from his note:The problem with the addiction metaphor [to describe use of digital networks and social media]...is that it presents the normal as abnormal and hence makes it easy for us to distance ourselves from our own behavior and its consequences. By dismissing talk of "Internet addiction" as rhetorical overkill, which it is, we also avoid undertaking an honest examination of how deeply our media devices ha... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3585862 Fri, 21 May 2010 12:25:34 +0100 3585862 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3530044&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F05%2Fis-google-making-us-stupid-or-is-the-problem-a-broader-issue.html Nick Carr who blogs over at Rough Type created an intellectual firestorm when he published an article in the Atlantic magazine (July/August 2008) that subsequently appeared in the magazine's web site. He basically asked the question whether web search by Google was rewiring our brains and causing us to avoid reading lengthy printed books. The specific question he posed provocatively was whether Google was making us stupid. This same question interests me and I have commented on it at length in this blog. I have now come to personally believe that our attention/distraction problem today is far broader than merely a web-search issue and being driven by the host of new technologies now available to all of us. This point was driven home for me by a recent article discussing a fashion magaz... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3530044 Tue, 04 May 2010 12:00:00 +0100 3530044 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3420769&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F03%2Fgoogle-as-an-enabler-and-protector-of-global-information-exchange.html This article begins to address some of the key questions that we are facing in the internet era such as the following: What is a publisher? What is a virtual publisher? What is content? What is a media company? Should virtual publishers be required to pay for content? How does protecting content and providing access to it differ from publishing it? What is censorship? To what extent do western democracies practice censorship? Is content search on a global basis more important than the creation of the original information? To what extent does open internet search destabilize totalitarian countries like China?China is only a very small portion of Google's advertising business today. Europe, on the other hand, provides a major component of its revenue stream and can only grow in the futur... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3420769 Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:03:15 +0100 3420769 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3408646&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F03%2Fgoogles-longterm-china-strategy-a-couple-of-ideas.html By now, most people have heard that Google is disengaging from its search business in China, one of the largest markets in the world. The reasons for this action are, first, that China is requiring Google to censor web search for clients in the country. Secondly, Google is stewing about cyberattacks on its software originating in China that may have had government sponsorship. These points, plus others, were detailed in the recent news story focusing about Sergey Brinn, one of the founders of the company (see: Brin Drove Google to Pull Back in China; subscription required).Below is an excerpt from the story:       Google Inc. co-founder Sergey Brin pushed the Internet giant to take the risky step of abandoning its China-based search engine as that countr... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3408646 Fri, 26 Mar 2010 12:00:00 +0100 3408646 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3318681&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F03%2Fdid-google-change-its-search-algorithm-at-the-beginning-of-february.html I have a hunch that Google may have changed its search algorithm in early February in a way that is favorable for Lab Soft News. Here's what I have been seeing on the blog in terms of inbound traffic, which is to say readers who are referred by a Google search or who navigate directly to the site. This is in contrast to the majority of readers who subscribe to the blog or follow it on Twitter and then read the notes via email, with an RSS news consolidator, or in Twitter. Beginning on February 2, 2010, my total inbound traffic has increased by about 70% in a steeply ascending curve. In the more than four years that I have been blogging and for reasons unknown to me, the leading referring search engine has always been Yahoo with Bing a close second lately. Since early February, Google l... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3318681 Mon, 01 Mar 2010 12:38:24 +0100 3318681 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3276101&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F02%2Fthe-microsofting-of-apple.html Some interesting things are happening at Apple. I have refrained from commenting on the IPad launch because I couldn't find an interesting angle that was not already covered in depth. However, a recent article raised a couple of very interesting points and certainly had a provocative theme -- the "Microsofting" of Apple (see: The Microsofting of Apple?; subscription required). Below is an excerpt from it:Don't look now but this may be the year when Apple's market cap does the unthinkable and surpasses Microsoft's. Congratulations will be in order but so will condolences. For a company preoccupied with products is in danger of becoming a company preoccupied with strategy....Take the iPad....It's a blown-up iPod Touch, rolled out not to be insanely great but to ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3276101 Tue, 16 Feb 2010 12:19:04 +0100 3276101 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3267218&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2010%2F02%2Ffthe-rewiring-of-our-minds-brought-to-you-by-google.html Nick Carr who blogs over at Rough Type unleashed an intellectual storm with his Atlantic Monthly article of July/August 2008 entitled: Is Google Making Us Stupid?. I was a bit player in this drama in that he interviewed me for the article and I was briefly quoted in it. In an offhand way during the interview, I described for him my current inability to read long novels, citing War and Peace as an example. I  also described my new "staccato" and jumpy style of reading books and browsing the web. Both I and Carr attributed my new behavior, in part, to web-browsing and my access to increasingly sophisticated web search capabilities. Now, approximately thirty months later, The Atlantic Monthly ranks behind only Google, Yahoo, and Bing in terms of referring web sites, ranked by ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3267218 Fri, 12 Feb 2010 12:55:00 +0100 3267218 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2727446&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F08%2Fsearch-engine-use-versus-search-engine-penetration.html This article refers to the idea of search engine scale or network effect, speculating that the goal behind the Microsoft-Yahoo deal was to increase the number of users. The classic example of the power of scale and the network effect was the fax market -- faxing became more practical and useful as the number of owners of fax machines (i.e, the size of the network) increased. Another recent article speculated on a similar question (see: The Gap Between Google and Rivals May Be Smaller Than You Think) and raised the question of search engine users versus frequency of use:It’s no secret that even with their recently-announced alliance, Yahoo and Microsoft will lag well behind Google in the hugely profitable search and search advertising business. How far behind? With a combined 28 percent o... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2727446 Mon, 24 Aug 2009 11:22:53 +0100 2727446 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2399256&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F05%2Ftexting-google-for-various-types-of-information.html It's possible to text short queries to Google to acquire various types of information. A response comes back very quickly. This can be an efficient way to acquire important information when you are on the run such as whether a particular airplane flight is on-time or the weather in a city to which you are traveling.Text your search query to 466453 ('GOOGLE' on most devices) and Google will send back your results. The sample queries below are self-explanatory. As one example, a "DTW airport" message corresponding to the airport code for the Detroit will elicit a reply with the weather at the airport and delay times, if any. A list of airline abbreviations can be found here. Below are a set of sample queries that you may find useful: sushi 48105 weather ann arbor define... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2399256 Thu, 07 May 2009 14:46:34 +0100 2399256 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2390465&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F05%2Fhorizontal-scrollng-and-medical-content-on-the-web.html I have the impression that a major technical shift is underway regarding how web pages are organized and formatted. I picked up this idea from a story published in the New York Times (see: Upstart Gossip Site Makes a Big Splash). Here's the passage that caught my eye:The breezy site [Wonderwall.com], which scrolls horizontally to emulate the feeling of flipping through a tabloid in the checkout lane, logged 6.4 million unique visitors during March, making it the fourth-ranked celebrity site, according to comScore.In a previous note, I discussed my current habit of reading the news on the web over my morning cup of coffee using my ultra-light nettop computer (see: Browsing My Morning (Electronic) Newspaper over Coffee). In this same note, I also made reference to the new display format ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2390465 Wed, 06 May 2009 13:52:09 +0100 2390465 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2376886&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F04%2Fbrowsing-my-morning-electronic-newspaper.html I have posted a number of previous posts about newspapers and their decline in the face of new media (see: Mainstream Media Begin to Adopt Link Journalism, A Strategy for Saving Our Hometown Newspapers). My hometown newspaper, the Ann Arbor News, will soon cease publishing and its decline has been sad for the town residents to watch. In my view, the key error that was made by the publisher of the newspaper was forgetting that the company was in the news business rather than in the newspaper business. I love newspapers and I have also loved reading them over my morning cup of coffee or after dinner. But stick with me as I explore some of the facets of these rituals. I confess that I bought the idea that a critical component of the ritual was connected to the tangible feel of the newsp... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2376886 Tue, 28 Apr 2009 12:07:42 +0100 2376886 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2302481&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F04%2Ftwitter-and-the-numbers-game-social-media-gone-astray.html I have come to the somewhat belated conclusion that each individual using Twitter may be operating with different goals in mind. This is in contrast to, say, Google where most people are using it in a roughly similar fashion, allowing for differences in the way that searches are conducted. As I have commented in previous notes (see: Extracting Value from Twitter Messages Using Filters, Micro-blogging, Twitter, and Social Networking), I use Twitter as a very efficient means for new knowledge discovery. I uncover many of the leads for the notes published in Lab Soft News on Twitter by following individuals who point me in new directions in lab medicine and new aspects of healthcare delivery with their short notes.So, what different goals are other Twitter users pursing? Well, for one, they m... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2302481 Wed, 01 Apr 2009 12:08:48 +0100 2302481 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2261625&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F03%2Fwill-twitter-provide-you-with-your-next-local-newspaper.html In a previous note, I discussed how journalists could mine Twitter for story leads (see: How Journalists Can Use Twitter to Develop Story Leads). Connect, if you will, this thought to another recent story in a German media outlet in which Evan Williams, Twitter CEO, drops the hint that the company has an interest in providing enhanced coverage of local news (see: Twitter to Start Serving Local News to Users). Below is an excerpt from that story with boldface emphasis mine:But Williams did share something worth noting at the end of the interview. When asked about possible future features for Twitter, he reportedly said that one of the things being considered is an extension that lets people know what’s happening in their immediate vicinity. That would basically mean that Twitter could act... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2261625 Fri, 13 Mar 2009 11:51:47 +0100 2261625 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2261631&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F03%2Fdeep-web.html A recent article in the New York Times goes a long way toward demystifying the so-called deep web or hidden web, which is an extremely important topic (see Exploring a ‘Deep Web’ That Google Can’t Grasp). Below is an excerpt from the article with boldface emphasis mine:One day last summer, Google’s search engine trundled quietly past a milestone. It added the one trillionth address to the list of Web pages it knows about. But as impossibly big as that number may seem, it represents only a fraction of the entire Web. Beyond those trillion pages lies an even vaster Web of hidden data: financial information, shopping catalogs, flight schedules, medical research and all kinds of other material stored in databases that remain largely invisible to search engines. The challenges that the ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2261631 Tue, 10 Mar 2009 12:16:31 +0100 2261631 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2261635&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F03%2Fhow-medical-journalists-can-use-twitter.html I have posted previous notes about how newspapers and journalists need to adapt to the blogosphere and to social media (see, for example: Mainstream Media Begin to Adopt Link Journalism). I myself am a relatively recent convert to microblogging and Twitter. A recent article on the web provides advice about how journalists can use the social media to develop story leads and improve their job performance (see: How Journalists Can Use Social Media To Monitor Their Beats Or Communities). Below is an excerpt from it focusing specifically on Twitter with boldface emphasis mine:1. Twitter: Journalists have a hard time getting their heads wrapped around Twitter, as do many users when first confronted with the service. But if you think of Twitter for what it is — a big room full of people having ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2261635 Mon, 09 Mar 2009 11:56:50 +0100 2261635 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2232435&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F03%2Fmost-popular-cameras-in-the-flickr-community.html Here's what I consider to be a fascinating statistic: iPhone is now ranked as the fifth most popular camera in the Flickr community (see: Most Popular Cameras in the Flickr Community). For readers who have never heard of it. Flickr is the preeminent photo-storing and sharing web site and passed the three billion mark for stored images last November. In this survey and preceding iPhone in the ranking were three Canon digital cameras and one Nikon model. So what are we to make of these data regarding "camera" preferences? Below are some of my initial observations: As with many examples of emerging information technology, camera functionality was initially integrated into cell phones in order to appeal to buyers and because it did not add excessively to the product price point. ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2232435 Tue, 03 Mar 2009 13:13:17 +0100 2232435 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2210296&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F02%2Fsome-hints-on-search-engine-optimization-and-the-google-crawlers.html In a previous note, I raised the topic of Google juice (see: Snap Google Quiz on a Tuesday Morning), which is a term for describing influence with the Google crawler. It can be assessed by the ranking of you or your blog on the Google search engine retrieval page (SERP). The topic of personal search engine optimization arose in a recent article in the Wall Street Journal by a reporter named Julia Angwin (see: It's a New Me (As Seen on Google). Below is an excerpt from it with boldface emphasis mine:For years, I winced at what popped up when I Googled my name. The top result of a search on "Julia Angwin" was an article I wrote for The Wall Street Journal in 2005 after I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby was indicted for leaking the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame....I hated... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2210296 Tue, 24 Feb 2009 14:18:56 +0100 2210296 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2190439&cid=t_97602_86_f&fid=34461&url=http%3A%2F%2Fdigicmb.blogspot.com%2F2009%2F02%2Fpubmed-toolbar-screencast-part-1.html This first part of the PubMed Toolbar Screencast explains the many options users have to adjust the Toolbar Settings to their own liking. Some options are: shrink/unshrink toolbar. This leaves only the icons with mouse-over text and saves space add gadgets (widgets): for business or pleasureclear your search historyThe Toolbar Options has 4 tabs with loads of settings:Personal Components: email notifyer, privacy, weather, radio(podcasts)Predefined Components: here you can choose which items of the toolbar you want to toggle on/off. If you do not like the News Ticker, just de-select it here.Useful Components: Add your own apps buttons on the Toolbar for fast access: All Microsoft Office apps, Paint, MSN, Registry editor etcAdditional Settings: Very useful to set the functionality of the sea... DigiCMB blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2190439 Sun, 15 Feb 2009 21:57:00 +0100 2190439 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2086838&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2009%2F01%2Fintroducing-cloud-as-a-service-integrated-with-pc-applications.html I keep thinking that, at some point, I will cease to be astonished as new information technology products become available. However, this has not happened for me in more than two decades. Nick Carr, a very astute observer of the IT scene who blogs over at Rough Type, has described a new phenomenon that he calls cloud as a feature  (see: Cloud as a feature). I have blogged about cloud computing in previous notes if you want some background information about this topic. Simply put, the "cloud" is a global network of computers that can be accessed via the web and that can be "rented" for large-scale computer processing applications or major data storage. Below is an excerpt from Nick's 's note with boldface emphasis mine:Microsoft has been touting its "s... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2086838 Wed, 07 Jan 2009 13:07:35 +0100 2086838 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2073847&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F12%2Fgoogle-abandons-concept-of-net-neutrality.html For the uninitiated, net neutrality refers to the idea that content providers on the web should not be allowed to pay the cable and phone carrier companies, pipe providers, for an Internet fast lane to deliver information to customers. Google is one of the most prominent and successful content providers, delivering its search-engine results to users and, in the process, its revenue-generating advertisements. Google has been a strong advocate for net neutrality in the past but now seems to be cutting deals with the carriers for preferential fast-lane access. Below is an excerpt from the story from the Wall Street Journal (see: Google Wants Its Own Fast Track on the Web) with boldface emphasis mine:Google...has approached major cable and phone companies that carry Internet traffic with a pro... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2073847 Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:42:34 +0100 2073847 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2033009&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F12%2Fdr--anthony-killeen-a-former-colleague-in-the-department-of-pathology-and--now-emailed-me-about-a-web-site-that-he-h.html Dr. Anthony KIlleen, a former colleague of mine at the University of Michigan and now a Professor of Pathology at the University of Minnesota, emailed me about a web site that he had set up to support a lab medicine course that he was teaching. He was requesting permission for an RSS feed of this blog into the web site. I asked him if he would develop a blog note on this topic and he graciously accepted my offer. Boldface emphasis is mine. Arguably the most exciting trend in higher education is the migration from content delivery in a classroom at a fixed time to web-based content delivery that is independent of the physical location of the instructor, the students and independent of time. An essential tool to facilitate this kind of new content delivery is course management software, whic... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2033009 Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:29:42 +0100 2033009 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2033010&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F12%2Fgoogle-advanced-search.html Because I seek both inspiration and content for Lab Soft News only on the web, I have been forced to become a bit of a web search connoisseur with my favorite search engine being Google. I was therefore interested to learn that Google Search now includes selected magazines (see: Google updates search index with old magazines). Below is an excerpt from the story with boldface emphasis mine:Google has added a magazine rack to its Internet search engine. As part of its quest to corral more content published on paper, Google... has made digital copies of more than 1 million articles from magazines that hit the newsstands decades ago. For now, the old magazine articles can be found only through Google's search service for finding digital copies of books. But the Mountain View, Calif.-based ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2033010 Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:56:05 +0100 2033010 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1901339&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F10%2Fmainstream-medi.html I, for one, have gotten totally fed up with the complaints from mainstream journalists about how the newspaper industry is in a tailspin, in part because their business model is no longer working. One facet of this problem is that online classified advertising web sites like Craig's List are offering gratis what the newspapers provide for a fee. Another complaint is that the bloggers are "stealing" the journalists' good material. Also, bloggers are calling themselves "citizen journalists" but are not really card-carrying members of the fraternity. Get over it! Times change. Business models become obsolete. The issue that now needs to be addressed is how the mainstream media is going to adapt to these new realities. Well, it appears that this may now be h... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1901339 Thu, 23 Oct 2008 10:47:41 +0100 1901339 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1894831&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F10%2Fnew-business-mo.html As a blogger for nearly three years, I have a special interest in the manner in which medical text book and journal publishers are responding to the competiton of medical content on the web. This is a variant on the similar challenge facing newspapers. I posted a previous note about this topic (see: Some Ideas About the Future of Medical Textbooks). In my mind, this issue reduces to this key issue: how can print publications with their higher production and distribution costs compete with electronic publications. Relevant to this topic, I  posted a blog note last May about a specialized medical search engine, SearchMedica (see: Search Engine for Healthcare Professionals). This specialized search engine has now added some very interesting and useful features. For example, you can limi... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1894831 Wed, 22 Oct 2008 11:47:43 +0100 1894831 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1891919&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F10%2Fincreasing-your.html If you normally browse the web keeping, say, half a dozen or more tabs open on your browser simultaneously, you can stop reading now. If not, I suggest that you continue reading. If you do not use tabs in your web browser, I can save you a lot of time. Tabs are better than bookmarks for connecting to your favorite web sites each day and are very easy to set up. I first recommend that you use a browser such as Mozilla Firefox 3.0 and my instructions are based on this browser. Below is a brief set of instructions about how to set up tabbed browsing: First of all, copy the URLs of the web sites that you visit frequently each day on a piece of paper. Launch Mozilla and enter the URL of your first favorite site in the browser address bar. Now type Ctrl+T to create a new tab. Enter the URL... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1891919 Mon, 20 Oct 2008 12:00:00 +0100 1891919 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1879773&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F10%2Fpost.html It can be awe-inspiring to occasionally look at the growth of web search and, in particular, the continuing success of Google. This topic was addressed in a recent article (see; Speaking Of Competition, Google’s Search Market Share Just Went Up Again In August To 63%). At the end of this note is a chart from the article. The following are some of my observations about these data: Total U.S. searches (i.e., queries) in August, 2008, were nearly 12 billion, a year-to-year increase of 19.6%. It's hard for me to envision a scenario in the near future in which search volume will decline. The percentage of total web searches attributable to Google continues to rise, amounting to 63.0% of all searches in August. This is a 4.5% gain in market share for the year. Yahoo has a 19.6% market share... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1879773 Wed, 15 Oct 2008 11:28:09 +0100 1879773 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1802627&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F09%2Fleadership-and.html Nick Carr's recent provocative piece in the Atlantic Monthly (see: Is Google Making Us Stupid?) has spawned an ocean of comment and controversy. His basic idea is that web-browsing and web-searching, often using Google, has modified the power of concentration for many of us. I have covered his ideas in previous notes (see: How Google is Changing Our Information-Seeking Behavior; Is Google Making Us Stupid?). My marginal relationship to Nick's article has resulted in referrals from Nick's blog, Rough Type, and Atlantic now running at 5.5% of the total per month, nearly as much as from Yahoo and Google. A recent blog note (see: Are We Becoming Pancake Leaders?), reacting to some of Carr's ideas, touched on the topic of how we now work in "minute-segments" in a way that I found in... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1802627 Wed, 17 Sep 2008 11:30:17 +0100 1802627 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1779134&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F09%2Faudio-reminder.html If you are at all like me, you need to maintain a running "do-list" containing the various tasks that you need to accomplish during the day. There is always a certain satisfaction in deleting items from such a list, however trivial they may be. Such a list can be maintained in a number of places such as a gadget installed on your computer desktop or on a web site.  If you are addicted to such a do-list, there is always the challenge of converting one of your transient thoughts to writing when you are driving or otherwise occupied. If you don't record such a thought quickly, it may not return to you for days. Many cell  phones have an integrated digital recording device for audio memos but then there is the bother of listening to such recordings later and transcribing... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1779134 Tue, 09 Sep 2008 11:41:54 +0100 1779134 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1763848&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F09%2Fdoctors-should.html Given the ability of the web to both educate and slander, it is important to monitor opinions that are circulating on the web about a physician's professional reputation and performance. This point was emphasized in a recent note in The Health Care Blog (see: Keep tabs on your digital footprint). Below is an excerpt from it with boldface emphasis mine: Is it "disordered" behavior to Google your doctor? An article in JAMA suggests that doctors should be on their guard. The Journal of the American Medical Association recently published an article about how doctors should be aware of how they are portrayed online and consider taking steps to manage their digital identities....And the advice given is also familiar: create your own Web page to be sure correct information is a... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1763848 Thu, 04 Sep 2008 11:49:54 +0100 1763848 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1759785&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F09%2Fa-new-definitio.html I have posted a number of previous notes about cloud computing (see: Finally, A Clear Definition for Cloud; Computing; The Webtop as a Computing Tool for the Cybernomad Tribe).The term has been used in the past to refer to a network of servers in scattered locations that can function as a single virtual system with the ability to ingest content from anywhere and move content to popular places depending on traffic and interest. The obvious appeal of such an architecture is that one can take advantage of the unused capacity of these widely distributed servers at commodity pricing and also that this approach provides flexibility in the face of unanticipated demand for additional computing capacity. Assuming that a general consensus had been arrived at for cloud computing, I was therefore mil... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1759785 Wed, 03 Sep 2008 12:19:40 +0100 1759785 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1738969&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F08%2Fcognitive-surpl.html Clay Shirky, mentioned in a previous blog note (see: A New Model for Medical Conferences: Broad Choices and No Waiting), has hatched a new concept about the allocation of brain power by individuals. He calls it the cognitive surplus (see: GIN, TELEVISION, AND COGNITIVE SURPLUS). Scroll halfway down the page at this link to watch the short entertaining video of his lecture on this topic. Here's the basis of his idea in brief. He asserts that the industrial revolution forced a large portion of the population from the farms into cites, leaving many of them bewildered and disoriented. Initially, they turned to gin  to provide solace for their despair. Fast forward to the latter half of the 20th century with shorter work weeks and many people with time on their hands. The population then ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1738969 Thu, 28 Aug 2008 12:25:53 +0100 1738969 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1637692&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F07%2Fweb-search-meet.html In my search for new ideas for blog posts, I frequently turn to the list of search terms that visitors to Lab Soft News have entered into their search engines to find the blog. If I click on any of these search terms, SiteMeter, the service that I use to monitor my blog usage, displays the same search engine retrieval page (SERP) that was shown to the visitor. One such visitor recently entered the search term "cardiac ultrasound laboratory project budget costs" into the beta version of a search engine called Hakia and was shown this SERP. I was not familiar with Hakia but was surprised to see the following announcement in the top right portion of the page: MEET OTHERS who asked the same query. After clicking on this link, you are invited to START A CONVERSATION ROOM relating to ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1637692 Fri, 18 Jul 2008 12:22:39 +0100 1637692 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1560683&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F07%2Fis-google-makin.html Nick Carr, with his usual skill and insight, has highlighted a problem (see: Is Google Making Us Stupid?) that is now facing those of us who spend a lot of time searching and acquiring information on the web. His thesis is that Google, to overstate the case, may be making us stupid. On this same topic, I have nothing to hide because I am quoted in the article as agreeing with Nick's basic hypothesis that the web and search engines such as Google are altering our ability to concentrate and read long articles. Below is an excerpt from his article (boldface emphasis mine).For me, as for others, the Net is becoming a universal medium, the conduit for most of the information that flows through my eyes and ears and into my mind. The advantages of having immediate access to such an incredibly ric... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1560683 Tue, 01 Jul 2008 12:00:00 +0100 1560683 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1399107&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F04%2Fdiseases-and-be.html AOL’s Advertising.com and Google’s Doubleclick are responsible for placing advertising on other companies’ web sites. They, with other similar companies, belong to a trade organization called the Network Advertising Initiative. The group recently published its proposed guidelines to be adhered to by its members when engaging in behavioral targeting. These companies keep track of the behavior of individuals when browsing the web in order to show them ads at some later time for products that they may want or need (see: Ad Industry Bans Targeting People With Cancer; Ads to Widows and Orphans Allowed). These guidelines make interesting reading. Below is an excerpt from the article about them with boldface emphasis mine: If you’ve got AIDS, cancer or erectile dysfunction a group of big... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1399107 Fri, 25 Apr 2008 12:11:50 +0100 1399107 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1286142&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F03%2Fthe-emergence-o.html In a recent post on Rough Type (see: Devices for the deviceless), Nick Carr raises the fascinating topic of the webtop, a virtual desktop that will be managed in the cloud. He suggests that the webtop will provide personalized computing for cybernomads around the world who do not own a PC and thus need to patronize cybercafes. I have posted previous notes about the cloud which is merely a fancy term for a linked set of servers around the world working in concert to provide powerful computer and data storage services. Below is an excerpt from his note (boldface emphasis mine): There are an estimated half of a billion people in the world who surf the Net every day yet don't own a computer...Cloud computing is ideally suited to these so-called cybernomads, as it can provide them with, in ess... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1286142 Fri, 07 Mar 2008 12:57:56 +0100 1286142 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1212000&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2008%2F02%2Fhow-google-is-c.html Nicholas Carr at RoughType cites some new research about how Google and other search engines are changing the way we search for and process information. We are leaving the linear print model far behind and moving to an approach on the web that emphasizes speed, scanning, and skimming (see: Rewiring the mind). Below is an excerpt from his blog note: The research documents a "new form of information seeking behaviour" that "can be characterised as being horizontal, bouncing, checking and viewing in nature. Users are promiscuous, diverse and volatile."...By breaking the linear print model that has dominated the transmission of information for the past five centuries, the hyperlinked web seems to be instilling a hyperactive approach to gathering and digesting information, ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1212000 Wed, 06 Feb 2008 12:30:32 +0100 1212000 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1119202&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F12%2Ffuture-bright-f.html I am bullish about the future of on-line professional medical web sites and the medical journalists who write for them, or at least those that are well executed. By my use of the term professional here, I refer to web sites designed specifically for physicians and not for healthcare consumers. My interest in medical web sites was piqued by a recent article in the New York Times about sports web sites and their companion cable channels (see: The Top Player in This League? It May Be the Sports Reporter). Below is an excerpt from the article (boldface emphasis mine): ESPN and Yahoo Sports are on a furious hiring binge, offering [sports] reporters and columnists more than they ever imagined they could make in journalism. And ESPN, in particular, has gone after the biggest stars at newspapers ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1119202 Thu, 27 Dec 2007 13:48:11 +0100 1119202 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1109772&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F12%2Fthe-personal-he.html In a recent blog note (see: Personal Health Records: Sharing Information vs. Seeking Information), I speculated that the personal health record (PHR) can serve not only as a tool for organizing health information but also as means to search the web for additional resources. New information that is acquired via such a web search can then be used to annotate one's health record, converting it into a more useful asset. The PACS Designer responded to my note with the following very interesting comment and novel idea (boldface emphasis mine):You hit the nail on the head when you stated that the PHR can be more than just a patient health record. It can be an entire health history including links to information on various subjects on the web which would educate anyone you give permission to acces... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1109772 Fri, 21 Dec 2007 12:59:21 +0100 1109772 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1101345&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F12%2Fpersonal-health.html I have posted a number of notes about personal health records (PHRs). I personally find this type of application very intriguing. However I also readily admit that most healthcare consumers seems to be either unwilling or unable to adopt this web-based approach to storing and maintaining their personal health records. I think that more work needs to be done experimenting with this software before it enjoys wider appeal. Below is an article focusing on the Microsoft HealthVault PHR that makes a number of important points with boldface emphasis mine (see: Microsoft's Health Push Faces Obstacles).: The {HealthVault product] throws Microsoft into a crowd of insurance companies, employers, Internet companies, start-ups and tech companies trying to provide digital-health records to patients and... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1101345 Tue, 18 Dec 2007 13:39:19 +0100 1101345 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1088659&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F12%2Fsocial-networki.html Sometimes my predictions about the success of some types of software goes awry. For example, I believed a couple of years ago that instant messaging might gain popularity as a rapid communication tool within the corporate world. It turned out that I was wrong about this, probably because most there is little need in the workplace for a new tool to communicate with colleagues with urgency or keep them up-to-date. Email, the telephone, and face-time are sufficient for this purpose. Nicholas Carr of RoughType recently opined about the likelihood of social networking software like Facebook taking hold within corporations (see: My (Work) Space). Below is an excerpt from his blog note:If you scratch the surface of any business, you’ll find two very different organizations. There’s the formal... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1088659 Wed, 12 Dec 2007 13:18:01 +0100 1088659 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1068637&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F12%2Flab-soft-news-t.html Today marks the second birthday of Lab Soft News. The first blog note was launched on December 4, 2005. During this two-year period, a total of 739 notes have been posted. The blog has experienced steady readership growth over these two years. Currently, the average number of incoming visitors per day is 119. In addition, the daily number of subscribers who read the blog via RSS and email feeds is 208. So the daily number of readers is 327 and the number per week is currently about 2,300. The number of incoming readers from the U.S. has held steady for many months at just over 80%. Most of the readers from abroad come from English-speaking countries: Canada, U.K. India, Brazil, and Australia top the list. What I have learned about blogging and the blogosphere during these two years can't ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1068637 Tue, 04 Dec 2007 12:48:42 +0100 1068637 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=962476&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F10%2Fsermo-a-social-.html Sermo, a web-based social networking site for physicians, should not be confused with Facebook. Here's the first really big clue about Sermo that is displayed to physician members on the home page when they sign on to the site:Invite your colleagues to join Sermo. You get $200, they get a $15 Amazon gift card.What! The site pays $200 for new recruits? Welcome to the world of Big Pharma and the monetary value that these companies place on physician eyeballs. Below is an excerpt from a recent note in the Health Care Blog that goes into more detail about a recently announced deal between Sermo and Pfizer (boldface emphasis mine):     This is the latest version of Big Pharma’s experiment to figure out how to replace the incredibly inefficient way it researches, sells to and co... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=962476 Fri, 19 Oct 2007 11:56:30 +0100 962476 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=821914&cid=t_97602_86_f&fid=34464&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2F%7Er%2FDavidrothmannet%2F%7E3%2F148080306%2F It isn’t any secret that I’m a big fan of Google Reader, but Firefox and Greasemonkey can make it even better as they tailor it precisely for your preferences and needs. Mashable has posted a list of 50+ Google Reader Extensions & Scripts for Firefox that is worth checking out. There are several here that I use and enjoy: Because my list of feeds and folders is large, I really like Google Reader Optimized because it makes better use of screen space than the default display. (Requires Stylish or Greasemonkey) Smart Google Reader Subscribe is awesome. A small button in the corner of the screen notes that a page has a feed and will subscribe to that feed in your Google Reader account if you click on it. Even better, it indicates visually whether or not you’ve already su... davidrothman.net blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=821914 Sat, 25 Aug 2007 13:14:18 +0100 821914 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=695006&cid=t_97602_86_f&fid=34464&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2F%7Er%2FDavidrothmannet%2F%7E3%2F127826240%2F I might’ve mentioned before that I have geek pedigree. My father was a geek before it cool and programmed for IBM for 30 years. He printed my birth announcements on IBM computer punchcards (Yes, really). He’s in Wikipedia. One of my brothers, Andrew, has been a greater recipient of that geek DNA. Just recently, he decided to start playing with Firefox Greasemonkey scripts and told me that he’d code one for me if the idea struck him as “sufficiently easy and sufficiently interesting.” Here’s the first thing that came to mind: Sometimes, PubMed doesn’t have the link to free, full-text articles that ARE available. In these circumstances, I turn to PubMed Gold. To make this easier, I wanted a link from PubMed that would run a search for the selected ar... davidrothman.net blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=695006 Mon, 25 Jun 2007 18:21:43 +0100 695006 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=674337&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F06%2Fmore_on_dailyst.html I mentioned the social networking site Daily Strength in a previous note (see: Survey of Health 2.0 Oriented Web Sites) as part of my discussion about Health 2.0 web sites that engage the interest and enthusiasm of healthcare consumers concerning their own health issues. I recently came across an article on the web (see: DailyStrength: Online Support Groups and Aggregate Treatment Info) that discusses DailyStrength in more detail. Below is an excerpt from this article:DailyStrength is a new social network that provides a space for people with a wide variety of medical, psychological and life conditions to discuss their struggles and the treatments they are undergoing....The site was founded by Doug Hirsch, one of the first employees at Yahoo! and most recently at Facebook....DailyStrength ... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=674337 Mon, 11 Jun 2007 12:13:09 +0100 674337 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=658561&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F06%2Fgrowing_up_cybe.html Jason Fry of the Wall Street Journal has some interesting ideas about the long-term consequences, or lack thereof, of disclosing personal details about oneself on social networking sites such as MySpace (see: Growing Up in Public)The conventional wisdom is that as those who grew up with the Net get older, they'll pay the price for their youthful indiscretions -- starting when they're trying to get that first job and get Googled by the HR guy. And it'll get worse from there....Will the kids who grew up with the Net (let's call them After Netters) become more like their elders (let's call them Before Netters) as they take on full-time jobs, relationships, children and the other stuff of adult life? Having once craved attention, will they now shun it? Or will they continue to live their lives... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=658561 Tue, 05 Jun 2007 11:58:06 +0100 658561 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=631447&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F05%2Fa_new_advertisi.html The April 23, 2007, issue of the New York Times contained a full-page advertisement for About.com, a web search engine. The advertisement contained an image of three attractive young women and featured this headline: If it's about health information with a human touch, it's About.com. This ad definitely caught my attention for the following reasons: The young women are identified as "professional guides" (i.e., About.com employees) at the service of those using this search engine. This search engine was emphasizing its "soft" human values rather than its "hard" technical attributes (i.e., the code under the hood). About.com was also highlighting its health content, which can be linked to from the home page as a subsection. The manner in which About.com ha... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=631447 Wed, 23 May 2007 12:00:00 +0100 631447 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=570757&cid=t_97602_155_f&fid=34629&url=http%3A%2F%2Flabsoftnews.typepad.com%2Flab_soft_news%2F2007%2F04%2Fintroducing_clu.html An occasional visitor to Lab Soft News has been referred to Lab Soft News recently by Clusty, a search engine that was previously unfamiliar to me. I decided to investigate, thinking that a new search engine may have some value for the readers of this blog (boldface emphasis mine):Clusty got its start in Pittsburgh, PA in 2004 when the search software company Vivísimo decided to take its award-winning search technology to the web. Vivísimo was founded in 2000 by three Carnegie Mellon University scientists who decided to tackle the problem of information overload in web search. Rather than focusing just on search engine result ranking, we realized that grouping results into topics, or "clustering," made for better search and discovery. As search became a necessity for web users,... Lab Soft News blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=570757 Thu, 26 Apr 2007 12:00:00 +0100 570757 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=500370&cid=t_97602_115_f&fid=34678&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.catscanman.net%2Fblog%2F%3Fp%3D154 Call me masochistic, but after two people said that my blog looks awful when viewed on Internet Explorer, I just had to check. I hunted for and found the ‘Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.2 for Mac’ hidden deep in my applications folder. I knew I had it somewhere as it was bundled along with the ‘MS Office 2004 for Mac.’ Here is what I found today morning. The first screen shot is what I got after my blog had loaded completely on IE. I had to scroll down a bit to get to the first post… Echoing what Moof said “I knew that IE was sheer trash, but I had no idea that it could mess things up quite that badly.” I have not tried out nor am I going to try to see what the Windows version of IE does to my blog’s theme. If someone sends me screen shots,... scan man's notes blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=500370 Mon, 26 Mar 2007 03:56:53 +0100 500370 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=499848&cid=t_97602_115_f&fid=34678&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.catscanman.net%2Fblog%2F%3Fp%3D153 I got an email from a friend commiserating Team India’s premature (but wholly justified) exit from the ongoing Cricket World Cup. She also added… I’m on the desktop, not my laptop, using Internet Explorer (not Firefox, as I usually do) and your site is totally wrecked. The posts are just one word per line going on and on down the page. Are you changing your template? I just hopped downstairs and it’s fine on Firefox. Check it out. The one thing that I’m definitely not going to do is ‘check it out.’ I refuse to use Internet Explorer. I am struck by a question… Would anyone who usually uses Firefox, ever use IE? and another… What possible advantage (if any) could IE offer over Firefox? I know this is akin to the ‘Windows versus... scan man's notes blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=499848 Sun, 25 Mar 2007 04:50:58 +0100 499848 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=482297&cid=t_97602_86_f&fid=34464&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2F%7Er%2FDavidrothmannet%2F%7E3%2F102715937%2F Here are some Internet Explorer 7 add-ons that mimic some useful features from Firefox that aren’t available in Microsoft’s browser (and sometimes add more features). Inline search - search the current page as you type. It only works with Ctrl+F. ieSpell - spell checker. Unlike the spell checker from Firefox, you need to press a button before seeing the misspellings. IE7Pro - adds many features available in popular Firefox extensions. You get crash recovery, ads filter (with a dumb predefined list), mouse gestures, an option to change the user agent plus some tweaks like moving the menu on top and removing the search box. Feed Folder - similar to the Live Bookmarks from Firefox. Developer toolbar - explore the DOM of a web page, locate and outline some elements in a page. [via]... davidrothman.net blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=482297 Mon, 19 Mar 2007 04:23:42 +0100 482297 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=412719&cid=t_97602_86_f&fid=34464&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2F%7Er%2FDavidrothmannet%2F%7E3%2F90253602%2F Not new, but new to me. If you use CiteULike or Connotea and do research on PubMed, you may find this Firefox Greasemonkey User Script handy. What is Pubmed2Connotea / Pubmed2CiteULike and how can I use it ? Connotea or/and CiteULike are a free online reference management service. It allows you to save links to all your favourite articles, references, websites and other online resources with one click. Connotea is also a social bookmarking tool, so you can view other people’s collections to discover new, interesting content. Pubmed2connotea/Pubmed2CiteULike is a Greasemonkey user script which alters the content web page when browsing your bibliography on NCBI pubmed by inserting a hyperlink. This new link adds a new bookmark into connotea with the current selected paper. Get it he... davidrothman.net blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=412719 Tue, 13 Feb 2007 14:46:14 +0100 412719