John Green's latest novel covers the topic of cancer with humor and emotionI picked up the Feb. 6 Time Magazine (another recent issue of Time provided a nice summary of YouTube recently), and what did I find? A review by Lev Grossman of John Green’s new book titled “The Fault in Our Stars.”
It’s nice to see a YouTube weblebrity get some coverage in a national magazine, and the review was quite favorable. “In fact it is damn near genius,” Grossman writes. “It has been years since this jaded critic has shed tears over a novel, but I will cop to crying over this one.” The young-adult story is about two teenagers who have cancer, and their battle.
The title is based on the twist of Shakespeare reference, “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars.” That’s now effectively doubled my Brutus quotes. Et tu?
I’ve seen YouTube’s power as a community, and occasionally it rallies on behalf of an individual or cause related to health. However I’ve yet to see a health community that’s truly powered by images and video (and involves patient-to-patient peer support leveraging webcams and the Internets).
In general, I like when the power of new-technology marketing is put toward a health cause.
Some of the graphics are a bit more compelling than others
Like imagine the video campaigns that can come out of the FDA’s imagery for cigarette packs! Graphic cigarette labels: Will they work? You damned straight they will… at least compared to text. The proof is in other countries.
They challenge, of course, will be to use these negative reinforcements the drive urgency, then positive-reinforcement and behavior change to help people. A scary imagine alone can have moderate effect, but people are generally more eager to change when you tell them how and try to go beyond scaring them into change.
Now on a happier but related note:
PatientsLikeMe is a health site where you can specify your illness(es), see how other people rated various treatments, and (if you wish) engage with other patients. The site jumped on my radar when it launched years ago, and I wrote the founder. It surfaced again when it surprisingly was able to publish findings on co-morbidities (if you have x illness, you may likely have y).
