Bad Cells

I normally keep my personal life private, but this post is going to give you a glimpse into some circumstances that have recently come into my sphere of experience, as well as show you a way that technology is being used in order to change the game of medical diagnoses and treatment scheduling with typical new media and transmedia flair.

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While visiting my typical Florida spot this past December over Holiday break, I received a phone call from my Grandmother that I definitely never wanted to receive. Her husband of 62 years, my Grandfather/Adopted Father was diagnosed with stage 3b small cell lung cancer. A mass was discovered and was rapidly spreading towards his lymph nodes (highways for the disease to spread towards his brain and various other bodily locations).

<<<REWIND

In June of 2012, having graduated with my Bachelor of Science degree in early spring, I thought I should stop in and visit my Grandparents in the Cleveland, OH area for a month or so before making my way back to Denver, CO in order to be near my son who was about to turn 8.

GoTo: REAL-TIME

That stay, which was to be one month, has turned into eight months due to various health issues that my elderly Grandparents/adopted parents have exhibited…they needed me, and I have always been the type of person to help whenever and wherever I can.

Being a Masters student, research is something that has been programmed into my DNA over the course of my education, so upon receiving that phone call from my Grandmother research was first on my to-do list.

As an Internet adept, this is of course the first place I turned. In fact, when the time came for the first round of chemotherapy for my Grandfather, the RN giving the “class” asked me how I was so knowledgeable on the topic of cancer. My answer? Digital resources that are at everyone’s fingertips, over a week to study up, and a sponge-like brain that tends to remember facts and information very easily.

I found so much information online, from YouTube videos posted by actual cancer survivors as well as family members that lost their loved ones, lung cancer medical conference presentations from the University of Pennsylvania, Mayo Clinic resources and support groups, and much…MUCH more.

Open Source Cure art 

Interestingly enough, I also found the story of a man named Salvatore Iaconesi a 39-year-old Italian robotics engineer recently diagnosed with brain cancer.  The story was doubly interesting to me due to being a speech delivered at TEDx Transmedia 2012 in Rome, Italy. Salvatore’s presentation, titled “My Open Source Cure”, shows how he decided to take matters into his own hands and make his medical records public information in order to leverage his chances for a cure to his disease while simultaneously moving away from the impersonal systematic approach to treatment provided by the western medical community. His unique and transparent approach to facing his disease has had staggering results thus far that can be seen at the end of the 10-minute presentation (I STRONGLY encourage you to take the time to listen).

While Salvatore’s path is still littered with mountains, molehills, trials, and tribulations, the poignant fact that the disease of cancer affects millions of people around the world every year, Salvatore’s innovative approach offers the light of hope that a far more personal and tailored treatment plan to face this disease can be developed through the use of our networks, technology, and collective intelligence. Please take ten minutes to enjoy the video presentation below. If you have any questions or even a story of your own to share regarding your own or a loved ones battle with cancer of any type, please don't hesitate to reach out.  

Until next time, 
~Chris, out 

Novel Engagement

Every content producer wants as many people as possible to be aware of their content. In order to hold people’s attention in this age of information overload and gnat-like attention spans, content producers have needed to create novel ways to keep bringing people back. Sometimes that’s smaller bites of content delivered on YouTube, such as the case with the SyFyNetworks opting to deliver a new Battlestar Galactica (BSG) spinoff series “Blood and Chrome” strictly online once per week in 12-18 minute episodes, prior to a full run on the cable network and DVD sales set to begin in February 2013.

This serves a great purpose for fans of the BSG franchise and allows the network to test the potential impact and audience reception of the newly expanded franchise universe.

--Machinima Prime---Battlestar Galactica Blood & Chrome +7 million total views

Episode 1- 2.8 million

Episode 2- 946k

Episode 3 & 4- 974k

Episode 5 & 6- 975k

Episode 7 & 8- 625k

Episode Finale- 663k

Syfy programming president Mark Stern touted the multi-platform concept as a great way to grow the fan-favorite franchise:

"With its top-notch storytelling, pulse-pounding action, and cutting-edge visual effects, Blood & Chrome is the perfect extension of the Battlestar Galactica universe. We are thrilled to see this hotly-anticipated event premiere on Machinima, an online network that is unparalleled in its delivery of high-class digital content to millions of viewers."

….uhh, yeah; over 7 million to date actually. That’s a pretty amazing amount of consumer impressions prior to the official start of the series on cable. Perhaps a bit more risky due to production costs, but the webseries was very well done and really the producers of BSG: B&C at Syfy couldn’t lose because they historically have launched the Battlestar Galactica franchise spinoffs with a 2-hour special to kick things off. This grouping of webisodes equal a 2-hour special, and it’s the one that they’ll be releasing in early February. So all they have really done is begin to stoke the flames of attention that surrounds the BSG franchise a few months earlier, thus building audience attention for an all-in run for as many seasons as possible.

The act of building consumer engagement and controlling audience attention is changing, and has had to continually evolve at pace with the growth of the Internet platform as the functionality is becoming more capable everyday at handling various functions that were once reserved strictly for TV or Print.