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First I must confess to some shameless plagiarism. The title of this post is an blatant rip off from my friend Dr. A, who used the phrase in a recent post in his blog**. [Update: Kevin, MD likes the name, now it's sure to become more popular]

Many thanks to Dr. A for putting a great sounding name for what we all do and for the shout-out about the Medical Microblog, which I guess is in it’s alpha/beta release stage. I created it on a whim when I saw the twitter-like Prologue theme at WordPress. Some of the stalwarts of New Media Medicine joined the experiment almost immediately. I sort of expected Berci, Walter, symtym or Dr.A to take over from there, because this sort of thing is right up their alley. In fact, Berci liked the idea so much that he blogged about it and used the same theme and created a Medicine 2.0 Microcarnival.

I guess the timing of the launch was wrong, what with Berci visiting the WHO HQ in Geneva; Dr.A appearing in his ABFP recertification exam; symtym appearing in his Bar exam and Walter preparing a major review article. Hopefully, they will have time to use the microblog after they finish the more important stuff in their lives.

There are a lot of medical bloggers who can already be described as microbloggers. By that I don’t mean the people who are on twitter, Pownce, Jaiku, friendfeed, Plurk, etc. I meant the medical bloggers who regularly post very short articles or provide links to other blogs or websites with interesting stuff. Prominent examples would include Kevin MD, Kidney Notes, Medical Quack and GruntDoc (of late).

Dr.A was being nice when he wrote “Vijay’s Medical Microblog,” but I don’t claim any ownership on the name or the microblog. It’s open to anyone who already writes about health related issues, i.e., the medical blogosphere as a whole. One issue with that blog is that it requires you to have an account at WordPress.com to become a co-author (you can opt to have only a username if you aren’t interested in having a WP blog). So if anyone is interested, please register at WP first and contact me or any of the other authors currently listed in the microblog so that we can get you in as a co-author.

** Incidentally, the post where Dr.A used ‘New Media Medicine‘ is a shout-out for the next episode (Show 42) of The Dr. Anonymous Show featuring my famous blog friend Theresa Chan as the guest (I am not being facetious when I say famous, you can see proof of her fame here, here & here).

Listen in live at 6:30 AM IST on Friday, August 1, 2008

(9 PM EST on Thursday, July 31 in Dr.A’s place in Ohio ).

Dr.A’s standard advice for first time Blog Talk Radio listeners:

Although it is not required to listen to the show, I encourage you to register on the BlogTalkRadio site prior to the show. I think it will make the process easier.

To get to my show site, click here (or on the button above). As show time gets closer, keep hitting “refresh” on your browser until you see the “Click to Listen” button. Then, of course, press the “Click to Listen” button.

You can also participate in the live chat room before, during, and after the show. Look for the “Chat Available” button in the upper right hand corner of the page. If you are registered with the BTR site, your registered name and picture will appear in the chat room.

You can also call into the show. The number is on my show site. I’ll be taking calls beginning at around the bottom of the hour. There is also a “Click To Talk” feature where you do not need a phone to call into the show - only a microphone headset. Hope these tips are helpful!

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