Thanks for your comments. I agree that privacy is in general rapidly fading away. We stand much more to gain from the collective sharing of ideas. I'm simply suggesting that when one has significant niche knowledge they can either 1) freely disseminate that knowledge with others or 2) charge money. I'm all for free, but it stinks to be the only one doing so…

Thanks for your comments. I agree that privacy is in general rapidly fading away. We stand much more to gain from the collective sharing of ideas. I'm simply suggesting that when one has significant niche knowledge they can either 1) freely disseminate that knowledge with others or 2) charge money. I'm all for free, but it stinks to be the only one doing so…

In health care, “personal IP” issue has long existed but expresses itself differently.

Data mining companies, often without doctors’ consent, gather massive prescription data (of doctors, and their patients) from pharmacies, and offer analysis results to big pharmas for marketing. Many doctors were shocked when pharma sales showed their detail prescription records and ask them to “improve” their prescription practice. Here we are talking about business of billions of dollars. However, doctors gain nothing, except shocks, from this business. Neither do the patients, who are for sure kept out of the loop.

In HealthLat (http://www.healthlat.com), we believe personal health experience or knowledge is worth something. So we empower patients and medical professionals to share experience, and make money. We also believe a consumer-driven approach will bypass existing bureaucracies in medical community and offer better data for better health care as a whole.

So, I think “personal IP” should not be diminished, and there is a fine line between it and “social commons”.