Forum Moderators: Robert Charlton & goodroi
Google is attempting to find out how much of a role Internet searches play in the self-diagnosis process.The company plans later Wednesday to start rolling out a subtle question at the bottom of pages with search results for a few common ailments, such as "Did you search because you or someone you know may have an ear infection?" That question will only appear for a very small number of users who search for terms such as "ear infection," but it will help Google start to understand how many people are searching on such terms looking for treatment remedies or options as opposed to doing research, said Dr. Roni Ziegler...
Google wants to know if you're sick [news.cnet.com]
They don't know quite what they'll do with the data, but we know: They'll save it. Forever!
As the CNET article mentions in passing, Google.org has been working with the Center for Disease Control, looking into searches for flu symptoms as a possible predictor for flu activity... hoping to help catch pandemics before they happen.
There was a May 12 interview re the swine flu on NPR's Talk of the Nation with an acting director of the CDC, and a fascinating point was made... that the Google search data becomes clouded and the system breaks down as outbreaks are publicized and more people search for background information out of general concern rather than in response to symptoms.
With the benefit of hindsight, an April 29 article in "Wired Science" notes...
Google Could Have Caught Swine Flu Early [wired.com]
Last week, at the request of the Centers for Disease Control, Google took a retroactive look at its search data from Mexico. And there the team found a pre-media bump in telltale flu-related search terms (you know, "influenza + phlegm + coughing") that was inconsistent with standard, seasonal flu trends.......But the Google Flu Trends team, which aggregates and analyzes search queries to estimate how many people are sick, wasn’t watching Mexican flu data until after the outbreak had already begun.
The article then touches on the possibility of a worldwide warning system, which would require human analysis of the data.
Clearly, Google is trying to develop a system that would best scale human resources for analysis. Knowing the reasons for a search would greatly help in this area.
Other references...
Google.org Flu Trends [google.org]
Detecting influenza epidemics using search engine query data [nature.com]
Letter to Nature.com
19 February 2009
[edited by: Robert_Charlton at 7:22 am (utc) on May 14, 2009]
In thinking "What use that?" I can only perceive of its commercial value.
And the G paranoiacs, will you be wanting to look up those embarrassing symptoms knowing that potentially your search data is being aggregated and analysed?
Syzygy
The W.H.O. won't like it, nor the A.M.A.
If you live in the UK it's probably the quickest way to get a diagnosis these days...sad but true!
