Hey guys, C’mon now! I thought we Medical Bloggers were a new voice, not just another vehicle for more of the same.
Letting Big Pharma sponsor your lunch organizing meeting at the Blogger Expo? You can’t afford a sandwich?
Congrats to the group on what sounds like a great meeting otherwise.
(Photo from Emergiblog)
LOL – do you know how expensive sandwiches are in Vegas? : D
I came to meet Rob through Johnson and Johnson's "Discover Nursing" campaign.
They have done an unbelievable job of outreach for nurses recruitment.
J & J is also wanting to carve a space in the health blogosphere , which is what Rob is helping to do. When he read of the meet-up, he offered to have an "official" lunch.
They get a chance to meet up with the medical/health blogosphere and we get a conference that would not have happened otherwise.
This is not a "buy our drug, have a pen". It's a company who is putting out health-related information on the blogosphere and working with bloggers (us) to do it.
Pretty forward thinking and their behalf.
One of the sessions actually looks at the the regulations surrounding just what pharma can and cannot do
The money required to get something like this off the ground (the track) is astronomical, but Rob was willing to use J & J to help make it happen.
Now, I owe YOU a sandwich in Vegas!
: D
When corporations like JNJ start getting interested in social media, I think it’s a good thing. The whole idea of companies using social media to reach out to customers will ultimately mean these companies will be encouraged to start using more authentic and transparent marketing methods.
Kim and lixelrn –
If we medical bloggers want our voice to be heard as representing docs and nurses who in turn represent the needs of the medical community and our patients, how will our voices be heard if we are seen as being funded by industry?
How, for instance, would you feel about reading an article in the NY times or WSJ on healthcare if it were written by a journalist whose activies were sponsored by Big Pharma?
The conflict of interest is enormous.
I think what we lose by these kinds of financial associations at the very inception of our litle group is much, much more than what we may gain from their sponsorship of our meetings.
Amen, TBTAM. I, for one, would think twice about medical bloggers if they were connected to the pharmaceutical industry. Just a step in the door or a sandwich in the belly…
THANK YOU SO MUCH for commenting on this picture. That photo made me sick, as has the entire turn that I've seen among health bloggers recently. I am greatly disheartened by the infiltration of political agendas and shilling for industry going on among growing numbers of bloggers. The number of pseudo-blogs that are turning out to be fronts for industry far outweigh truly independent bloggers anymore. If a blog has a corporate media marketing sponsor; posts industry ads and hawks their products and parrots their marketing information uncritically; and is unable to differentiate quality, neutral and sound medical information from industry marketing (eg. J&J Health Channel); they do NOT deserve to have the HC Blogger Code of Ethics on their site. They are no different from MSM, just allowing themselves to be used to market people via social marketing. Insidious. Appearing to be readers' friends and colleagues does not make the information trustworthy or unbiased.
Or, perhaps, I'm too hasty and it's more naivete on the part of these bloggers, but that is even less excusable. As medical professionals, our words are trusted by people and we have a responsibility to know what's going on and to be honest and ethical.
Of course "J&J is also wanting to carve a space in the health blogosphere" — the reasons are obvious. And these bloggers are falling right in line. Interesting, too, that they are all featured on editorials at Medscape, another industry marketing publication.
The medical industry actively works to shut out those medical bloggers who aren't giving the party line, too. [Watch how the various rating services have been changed to bring the medical blogs that industry supports to the top.] Can't anyone even notice the manipulation going on???
Have lurked since finding TBTAM on blogroll Unrated & Unfiltered.
As a very old feminist, I'd ask you to revisit the history of the birth control pill, among so many other industry-driven pharma notions promoted to "make life easier for women."
Disclaimer: not a medical blogger, simply consumer appalled by comment that the price of a sandwich is good enough reason to be handmaid to industry.
You should feel proud that the medical blogsphere has big pharma interested. Smart of them to be reading though…access to docs is difficut- more than ever. By encouraging you all to blog allows them to learn about medical community issues and trends. Remember change is good. The sandwich is uncalled for though.
If you consider JnJs history, they have contributed heavily to innovative medical products and care. I believe that in the end they want to contribute to improvement, and your collective blogs give them great insight.
Thanks to our defenders and detractors, for expressing your views. I’m actually proud of our association with Nurse bloggers, and other members of the healthcare social media space. And I think we’re neither naive nor nefarious for wanting to participate in it. I hope that if you look at the sites in question, http://www.youtube.com/JNJhealth, http://www.jnjbtw.com/ and http://kilmerhouse.com/ you’ll find that that our goal is to listen and engage, not to promote and sell, and that we look forward to carrying on this conversation.
Rob
jnjhealth