Saw a tweet today that was pretty exciting.  It was referencing a "comparison" between SharePoint and Documentum.  I was initially excited.  I’d love to see CenterStage  and SharePoint compared.  I compared SharePoint to eRoom a couple of years back and wasn’t planning on a comparison with CenterStage until the database/list functionality was ported over.
My excitement [...]

Here is an interesting idea. Marc Andersen, my former Renaissance colleague, posted recently on his blog on applying "product service
systems" to corporate environments.  He was inspired by a Boston Globe article, The Leased
Life, on how people should share products across their communities. Many people
purchased tools and other things they rarely use, causing an unnecessary strain
on their budgets and the environment.   The globe reported that this has been recognized and
Web sites have started to facilitate these transactions.  This is another example of the
potential of Web 2.0.

Marc
wrote about how this practice makes sense for more efficient use of services
inside the enterprise and I agree. He also noted that today’s collaborative
tool sets can facilitate these internal marketplaces.  Enterprises would have to modify their cost structure and
accounting to facilitate these exchanges but that should not be too hard.

However,
making people aware of the services and arranging for micro-efforts and the
associated micro-accounting would have potentially difficult with older
technologies. However, just as on the Web with Web 2.0 sites, the transparency
within enterprise 2.0 platforms can also make these internal micro-markets for
service exchange more accessible. 

Now
that the right tools are available the remaining factor to make this work is
the ability to understand the value of these exchanges and the vision to
implement them. In a market where employees are asked to continuously do more
with less, an internal services market for under-utilized resources should
appeal to most executives.  Thanks
to Marc for making the suggestion. You should check out his blog as there are a lot of other good ideas there. 

According to the Guardian (see BBC tells news staff to embrace social media).  BBC news journalists have been advised to use social media as a primary source
of information by Peter Horrocks, the new director of BBC Global News. He took
over last week and said it was important for editorial staff to make better use
of social media and become more collaborative in producing stories. They quote
him, "This isn't just a kind of fad from someone who's an enthusiast of
technology. I'm afraid you're not doing your job if you can't do those things.
It's not discretionary."

I would agree. Getting material for
articles is one of several ways that traditional television news media needs to
make use of social media to survive the social media onslaught. For BBC news
editors, Twitter and RSS readers have now become essential tools and aggregating
and curating content with attribution are essential skills. In addition, BBC's
journalists have to integrate and listen to feedback for a better understanding
of how the audience is relating to the BBC brand.

At Darwin, we have been talking with
a number of major traditional media organizations about using the Darwin
Awareness Engine™ to help with their news harvesting efforts. It allows you to
see what is going on around a topic and find the unexpected, as well as the
news breaking in real time.

The BBC also created a social media
editor post in October. This is another related trend I have reported on here
(see Mainstream News Take on Social Media Directors.  The Guardian concludes by noting that as technology is
changing the nature of journalism, the BBC is trying to keeping up with the
pace. Horrocks is quoted again, "If you don't like it, if you think that
level of change or that different way of working isn't right for me, then go
and do something else, because it's going to happen. You're not going to be
able to stop it."

Here is a 18" x
24" acrylic painting of an American breakfast with two english muffins,
bacon, breakfast fries, and two eggs over easy. It was served at the Copper Beech
Inn in Ivoryton, CT and was delicious. This is the seventh
in a series of breakfast paintings in various countires. More to follow.

The focus of this session is on use cases in using Social Networking in the Health IT world.  I thought I would attend to see how these tools are being used here.

• Patients want to feel connected
• Recruitment is an ongoing challenge, the next generation is connected
• Promote discovery, better treatments and efficiencies
• Large gap between seeing the value and using the tech in Healthcare (90%  to 35%)
• Some Risks
  • Public domain when using common tools
  • HIPAA violations
  • Health professionals “friending” patients (Thinking that practices would have fan pages)
  • Value vs Time Wasting (People have always found ways to goof-off and waste time)
• Like phone conversations, communications through Social Media need a policy around them.
• (Social Media Policies are under discussion. I added to the conversation that the policy should address communication with external entities and not focus on the tech.)
• You have to be out there monitoring because people are talking about you out there.
• Enterprise 2.0 came up in conversation. It was noted that it isn’t a slam-dunk deployment, but worth investigating.
• Another risk is medical advice. “This is not Medical Advice, you have to pay for Medical Advice.”
• A warning against hiring Social Media “Experts” without researching to be sure that they actually know what they are doing. (Check references. If they don’t have them, maybe they aren’t worth the money.)

One more session left and then heading home.  Heading to see the Military Health Portal.

Disclaimer

All information in this post was gathered from the presenters and presentation. It does not reflect my opinion unless clearly indicated (Italics in parenthesis). Any errors are most likely from my misunderstanding a statement or imperfectly recording the information. Updates to correct information are reflected in red, but will not be otherwise indicated.

This is a rant. I rarely write rants, but here is one. It is based on one of my largest pet peeves in the technology industry.  It is about a commonly accepted term and not about the people who use it.

It is about “CMS”.  This is a term that for many is synonymous with Web Content Management. This just gives me the screaming heebie jeebies.  Let me illustrate.

An Example of the Problem

I was at a meeting in DC called the Web Content Mavens recently.  The topics of discussion should be obvious.  I made a comment to a group there that there is content that isn’t web content.  This person, an experienced “CMS” implementer did not believe that any such “content” existed.  I used the easy examples of Word and Excel files.  She immediately jumped to the conclusion that if it wasn’t web content, it was documents.  I then fired some examples at her:

• Medical X-Rays
• Raw news footage
• Voicemails
• Scanned images
• Faxes
• Emails
• XML

Her eyes lit up as if I had just revealed a whole new world of content to her.  I didn’t.  I revealed the world of content, not a new one.  She hadn’t been living in the world of content.  She had been in the world of web content.

There is more to Content Management than managing Web Content!!!

Being able to publish or host a website does not make something a CMS!!!

The Growing Itch

I first noticed the problem several years ago.  I went to an event focused on Content Management Systems and noticed that everything focused on publishing a website. Ah, Web Content Management, I know a little on this topic, I thought to myself.

The problem is that people don’t think of it as WCM, or any similar terms.  They think of it as CMS.  This drives me NUTS! There are systems out there that manage content, quite well, but don’t publish to the web.  They don’t get considered a CMS by many people.

I hate the term.  It is a term that has such potential, but so many people use it in such a limited fashion.  Qualify the thing with “Web CMS” or create a new friggin term.

Let’s look at some of the people using the term (keep in mind I like and respect most, if not all, of the people behind these sites)

• CMS Wire: They cover the broad spectrum.  They have a heavy focus on the Web CMS products, but they cover others and use the term “Web CMS”. No issues.
• CMS Watch: Part of The Real Story Group, the focus is Web Content Management, Analytics, and Collaboration & Community technologies.  Sounds like they could talk their way out of this until you realize that IN PARALLEL they have Enterprise Information Watch.  That includes both ECM and DAM, among other technologies.  Really? Is Artesia not a CMS?  What about Documentum’s CenterStage?  They aren’t Web CMS solutions, but it isn’t called Web CMS Watch.  Tony, you are brilliant and I love the stuff that you guys do over there, but ARGH!
• CMS Report: Prime example of my frustration.  Check the list of covered CMS applications, current and past.  I quote, “CMS Focus is meant to include today’s web content management systems thus this list does change over time to stay relevant.” [Original formatting shown] There is no Documentum, FileNet, Livelink, eDOCS, OnBase, or any other number of systems that I have worked with in the past.

There is a big world out there.  All you Web CMS people need to give the term CMS back!  It doesn’t belong to you.  A long time ago you took it while the broader content community was trying to futz with the term ECM.  By the time we realized what was happening, you had taken the term.

To whome does the term belong? That is a topic for another day.

A Quick Breath

This isn’t personal.  Far from it.  I read the websites listed above and find them valuable.

Pretty much everybody who reads this will have entered the industry with the term CMS firmly entrenched, incorrectly, into daily use.  That is life.  I had to get this off of my chest so that when I occasionally twitch when the topic of “What is a CMS” comes up in conversation, you know why.

I’m also going to not respond to comments.  I’ll allow them and read them, but I’m not going to get sucked into an argument over a rant.  This is a rant and there is a lot of irrational emotion that fuels it.

There has been a lot of debate of late on Twitter about whether or not WordPress is a CMS (ignoring the “WCM v CMS v ???” issue for now).  Peter Monks is an proponent against the concept [Edit: He isn't, see comments], as is Irina Guseva, a senior editor for CMS Wire.  Ron Miller over at Fierce Content Management says that WordPress is a CMS and Tony Byrne at CMS Watch says it is for a simple reason: Many organizations are using WordPress as a CMS. That makes it a CMS.

That is a fallacious argument.  I’ll explain why in a second, but some important facts.  This blog, Word of Pie, is hosted by WordPress.com and I love it.  If I decided to host the blog personally, I would use WordPress.  For my blogging needs, it is perfect.

So do not read into any of this as an indictment against WordPress.

Why the Argument is Flawed

Let’s look at the statement.  If people use it as an X, it is an X.  I can tell you right now, through my years of creating fun solutions while out camping, traveling, and owning a house, that is not a valid argument.

• I once used a towel to fix my car.  That doesn’t make it a car part, even though without it I wouldn’t have gotten home that day.
• I recently bought some instant oatmeal to eat in my hotel room. I didn’t have a bowl, so I made it in one of the glasses provided by the hotel.  That doesn’t mean that the glass is a bowl. Don’t ask me what I used as a spoon.
• I can’t tell you how many times a mouse (mostly the older mechanical models) didn’t work on a table until I put a piece of paper under it.  That didn’t make that piece of paper a mouse pad.

Those are a few examples that I had on the tip of my tongue.  The point is that using something to solve a problem doesn’t make it designed to solve the problem.

Quick Thoughts

Looking at all of the comments, here is one that sums up my opinion.

From Irina: WP is a publishing/blogging tool. It is not a #CMS, people…

To prove to me that WordPress is a CMS, the community needs to finish working on all of the definitions out there and get terms with which people agree.  Then classify the systems because they vary quite a bit.

The fact that there is debate just reinforces that there is a lack of clarity.

Aneesh Chopra is talking so why wouldn’t I attend?  Need I say any more?  Even before he starts, you can tell he is an energetic speaker.

• Innovations in Health IT would be good for the economy.
• We are coming from “There’s a form for that.” to “There’s an app for that.”  Government reality doesn’t reflect public reality.
• The US is 15th in Higher Education, 22nd in E-Government, and 40th on the Innovation Trends.  This was out of 40 countries.  The US had 2.7% growth.  Obama wants to return to number 1 by 2020. (Reasonable, but challenging) 
• Perceives Healthcare and Energy as the growth areas for the economy.
• Stimulus act called for an increase in health It R&D.
• Broadband is important.  If patients don’t have broadband, how do they access their records remotely.  Same for doctors at home.  (Suspect that doctors have a higher percentage of broadband than patients)
• Trying to bring the R&D side of the house with IT procurement (CIO Vivek Kundra).
• Told story of how in Virginia it took 1.5 years to procure a 150K, 6-week, web application.
• Text4baby is a partnership with the wireless carriers, who are waving fees, to send SMS updates to expecting mothers based upon the due date.
• (Trying to sell how things are changing in Washington. Haven’t seen it yet.)
• Prioritization, transparency, engagement, and rapid results (90-day measurements) are the Core Principles on how they are trying to get Washington to work.
• Releasing next week, guidance to federal agencies on prizes and rewards for innovation.
• Open Government plans will be published April 7th.
• NHIN: A set of policies, standards, and services that enable the Internet to be used for secure and meaningful exchange of health information to improve health and health care”
• NHIN Direct: Open transparent collaborative process to evolve the NHIN.  An Gov20 initiative that was launched today.
• Don’t abandon 5 9s reliability for core systems, but look for the innovation for new ways to serve.

Say what you want about the president, the CTO has a good vision and the enthusiasm to push towards it.  That is a very good thing.

Time for the exhibit hall until close.  Always interesting as the vendors are tired and giving everything away.

Disclaimer

All information in this post was gathered from the presenters and presentation. It does not reflect my opinion unless clearly indicated (Italics in parenthesis). Any errors are most likely from my misunderstanding a statement or imperfectly recording the information. Updates to correct information are reflected in red, but will not be otherwise indicated.

Here to hear Capt Michael Weiner talk about the Defense Health Information Management System (DHIMS) and the lessons that the DOD have learned.  I have a personal interest as I grew-up in the military health system and my parents and a large number of family members are in it now.  I haven’t been posting a lot of notes as I’ve just been absorbing, but this session should has lots of good information.

• This isn’t a technical issue.  It is a “cultural, paradigm, shift”.
• Don’t  be HIPAA compliant for the sake of compliance.  Be compliant because it will protect your patient’s information.
• Challenges to be faced when implementing:
  • Development of functional requirements
  • Maintainability/Interoperability
  • Acquisition Process
  • Enterprise Architecture
  • Theater Communications and Bandwidth
• Steady and reliable network is critical
• Buy-in from the team, physicians and support staff, is critical
• EHR will not fix a broken process. Take time to document the workflow and understand How You Do It. Used a great analogy for that by talking about Starbucks’s great workflow and a hotel coffee shop’s poor workflow. (I had a similar bad experience at a coffee shop at the airport. Had to find the spot with the lids and crossed paths twice.)
• Try it out first.  Pilot it and include it everyone in the office from day one.
• New and Shiny May Not Be Best.  Test the ergonomics of the hardware.  Different participants may need different hardware options.  A tablet has to be carried, so they put a computer on wheels that let them move other things as well.
• System needs to be intuitive.  IT guys aren’t always around.  The system needs to make it easy for the physicians that may not be technical.  Needs visual feedback mechanisms.
• See One, Do One, Teach One: hybrid education efforts.  Classrooms, 1-on-1, over-the-shoulder, and computer-based resources for training.
• Use the Web: Look at web hosting and virtualized solutions, especially for smaller clinical offices. (Talk of using the cloud without the term “Cloud”. Awesome.)
• Wireless networking and no mice.  Wires are bad and cause problems.
• Use multiple methods to input clinical healthcare data.  Use templates, auto fillers, macros, scribe, speech recognition (not everyone can type), dropdown menus.  It should support Workflow.
• Change is not always accepted, so empowering staff to get their “buy in” will help with adoption.  The team has to be involved, though that doesn’t diminish the need for a champion.
• Make it Personal: Patient centric care and patient portals is a shift for the patient community.  It will be a generation+ transition for the patients.
• Sharing is Caring. The Nationwide Health Information Network (NHIN) is the “dial-tone” for the future.  Every EHR is going to have to fit in.

Captain Weiner was a great presenter.  Loved the presentation.  Lot’s of good lessons that apply to large and small facilities.  Now off to catch-up with my colleagues.

Disclaimer

All information in this post was gathered from the presenters and presentation. It does not reflect my opinion unless clearly indicated (Italics in parenthesis). Any errors are most likely from my misunderstanding a statement or imperfectly recording the information. Updates to correct information are reflected in red, but will not be otherwise indicated.

Here is a 18" x 24" acrylic painting of an American breakfast. It includes an egg over easy, bacon, and a roll. It is the sixth in a series on breakfast in various countries. This is the first one that I cooked. I ate all of them except a few that my friend Don Lesser ate with me in Ashfield, MA