clinicalpractice

Wikis, blogs and podcasts: a new generation of Web-based tools for virtual collaborative clinical practice and education **Maged N Kamel Boulos**, **Inocencio Maramba** and **Steve Wheeler** http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6920/6/41

This is a preprint aricle about the OSS debate as it applies to clinical pratice. For the purposes of examination, I read the PDF preprint deposited at BioMed.

Generally, the article is simply a review of the tools used to open source information. Once idea struck me. The discussion is about open source tools:

//"Paradoxically,some of their disadvantages also relate to their openness and ease of use.// //With virtually anybody able to alter, edit or otherwise contribute to the// //collaborative Web pages, it can be problematic to gauge the reliability and// //accuracy of such resources. While arguably, the very process of// //collaboration leads to a Darwinian type ‘survival of the fittest’ content// //within a Web page, the veracity of these resources can be assured// //through careful monitoring, moderation, and operation of the// //collaborationware in a closed and secure digital environment. Empirical// //research is still needed to build our pedagogic evidence base about the// //different aspects of these tools in the context of medical/health education."//

I believe "reliability: is an issue for many scholars. How do we know what is good and what is bunk?

Basically, the article is meant for educators and notr researchers, but it does sort of spell out the fears of wiki and blog technology.