Medical Device Link.

Time for Urban Planning on the Web: Information and Community Are Back

The Internet is first and foremost designed to connect people. Since its inception, the Internet has fostered technology and community. Initially, it was mainly used as a research tool for file sharing and basic collaboration. But the Internet has evolved to meet personal, client-server, peer-to-peer, and network computing needs. Innovations such as instant messaging, multiplayer games, auction sites, MP3 exchanges, and chat rooms, to name a few, connect people.

There's no doubt the Internet will continue to evolve to accommodate emerging technologies. Each person who participates adds something on both an individual and social level, whether it's telling a story, building a virtual neighborhood, sharing ideas, or asking questions. Consequently, successful Web sites require media that bring people together for these interactive community experiences. This means urban planning for the Web.

The proliferation of communities over the Web led Deja.com (acquired by Google.com on February 12, 2001) to create one of the most comprehensive sites for discussion forums. Users have the power to "discuss, decide, and purchase" (Deja's old tag line) as they search for threads on every conceivable topic from the philosophy of objectivism to kites. On Epinions.com, a self-proclaimed marketplace for content, users find advice, recommendations, and comparative shopping features to aid in purchase decisions. TheGlobe.com contributes to the spread of discussion-type communities by helping users find and communicate with people of similar interests.

The aim of these Web sites is not only to create a community experience, but also a strong sense of user loyalty (without which users will simply not come back). TheGlobe's intentions correspond with those of other popular sites designed to create and foster communities like Yahoo (who absorbed Geocities.com) and NBCi.com (who absorbed Xoom.com). Of course, there's a distinction between talking about fostering community and actually doing so.

The steady commercialization of the Internet combined with the growth of on-line communities led to the formation of urban planner–type sites like the Internet Society in 1991 and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3) in 1994. The Internet Society's mission is "to assure the open development, evolution, and use of the Internet for the benefit of all people throughout the world,"¹ thereby aiding in global coordination and cooperation on the Web. The ISOC hopes to be the unifying force between the various communities with distinct goals and purposes on the Web. The W3 similarly aims to make the Web a forum for the global exchange of information, commerce, and communication. By contributing to the evolution of the Web's organizational structures and relevant software, W3 is an essential resource for the entire Internet community.

The volume of discussion areas on the Web is no surprise. Community and the Internet are co-dependent—communities need the Internet to provide an interactive forum, while the Internet needs community to push forward the evolution of the Web by demanding an ever-more sophisticated interface. The sense of community on the Web grows through "e-mail, instant messaging, eBay, Napster, open-source software, genealogy sites, massive multiplayer games, fantasy sports leagues, electronic greeting cards, gossip clearinghouses, Yahoo News' 'most e-mailed' list, chain letters, and online stock trading."² People share interests and ideas in diverse forums. After all, "a small picture of a clover shape is meaningless. The same picture, with 51 other pictures and four people around a table, is the ace that wins the game."³

What does this mean for medical device industry sites? Ultimately, it means that engendering communities is a must. Forums that invite discussion on emerging medical devices, FDA proposals and policies, regulations, design and packaging issues, diagnostic procedures, current industry trends, careers, and the role of the healthcare industry on the Web are just some of the many topics open for debate. We at DeviceLink invite you to participate and share your opinions in our discussion forums, where you can add threads to current discussions or let us know if you would like to see new topics added. Register for free if you are not already a member, then proceed to the discussion area to contribute to our community on the Web.

Questions? Comments? Contact Lisa Durrant.

¹http://www.isoc.org/isoc/mission/

^2,3http://www.thestandard.com/article/display/0,1151,22187,00.html