World Cup fever pushed the Internet to a new record on Friday, according to measurements from Akamai. Traffic to news sites globally started a steady climb about 6 a.m. Eastern time and peaked six hours later at noon, reaching nearly 12.1 million visitors per minute. The traffic dipped going into the afternoon but stayed well above normal. The figures suggest that the Internet was most active during the Mexico-South Africa game and stayed heavy through the France-Uruguay game. The day’s traffic far exceeded the previous record of 8.5 million visitors per minute, which was set when Barack Obama won the U.S. presidential election in 2008.

While Internet access has become pervasive across the American landscape, high-speed Internet access (i.e., broadband) is still absent from many homes in the United States. According to a new survey just released by the Federal Communications Commission, affordability, lack of digital skills and “relevance” are combining to slow the pace of broadband adoption. For more, click:
http://bit.ly/asqOFY

I moderated a panel discussion this week that drew the largest crowd ever at a BIOCOM* Medical Device Quarterly Event. My esteemed panel included a hospital CIO, a nurse executive, a bioengineer and a sales executive for a not-yet-approved wireless patient monitoring device.

Many of the wireless health discussions that I have attended have focused on the technical side of the equation. This discussion looked at wireless health from the commercialization point of view, which is where a company can shine or fail in the success of its product.

Evaluation and adoption of a wireless device within the hospital adds another level of complexity to the traditional decision-making process. Previously, clinical teams decided the majority of medical device purchases. With wireless devices, the IT department within the hospital facilitates the product selection with strong influence from the clinical team. In today’s world, new wireless health applications must meet their clinical claims AND integrate with other systems in the hospital, including the electronic health records.

The clear message for the evening was wireless health must place clinical information at the fingertips of the clinicians, thus facilitating timely, lifesaving interventions, as well as enhance mobility (either physical or remote) of the healthcare worker. Certainly a very tangible benefit of wireless health long term will be the ability to deliver quality healthcare to remote locations.

Looking at the practical side, the panel expressed a concern regarding a clinician’s faith and trust in connectivity and stability of devices. If a system fails or is not stable, it will be circumvented by the clinical team and, thus, not trusted or fully embraced in the future. This is a sobering thought for a manufacturer, especially a new entrant to the market. Companies must balance the desire to get to market with the absolute need to have a safe product that delivers a true benefit to its users.

*BIOCOM is the largest regional life science association in the world, representing more than 550 member companies in Southern California.

As a huge advocate for sustainability I was intrigued by a February 21 episode of CBS’ 60 Minutes on the Bloom Box. The creation of Bloom Energy, a Sunnyvale, California-based company that is promising to revolutionize energy with its “power plant in a box,” Bloom Box is a collection of fuel cells (i.e., “skinny batteries”) that use oxygen and fuel to create electricity with no emissions.

Bloom Energy already has 20 customers, several you’ve heard of, including FedEx, Wal-Mart and Google. The fuel cell stacks are housed in a refrigerator-sized unit, “the Bloom Box.” Oxygen is drawn into one side of the unit, and fuel (fossil-fuel, bio-fuel, or solar power) is fed into the other side. The two combine within the cell and produce a chemical reaction that creates energy with no burning, no combustion, and no power lines. According to Bloom Energy CEO K.R. Sridhar, about 64 stacks of fuel cells could power a small business like a Starbucks franchise. The corporate-sized cells cost $700,000 to $800,000.

Google was the first to use Bloom Boxes to power its data center. Ebay has installed its boxes and estimates it receives almost 15% of its energy needs from Bloom, saving about $100,000 since installing its five boxes 9 months ago.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/02/18/60minutes/main6221135.shtml

Several weekends ago, I was looking at the Fuji apple tree in our back yard. It’s on the hillside and had lost all of its leaves. Just a bundle of sticks, really. The tree was getting lots of sun and patiently waiting for a little water. Meanwhile, our old dog and tabby cat were taking turns using it for shade in the heat of the day. The tree had no awareness of time or problems or what’s really important in life. At least, it didn’t let on, if it did.

Nowadays, it’s amazing how quickly things require our attention and then, just as quickly, fade away. With the advent of up-to-the-minute news online and the explosively expanding use of cell phones, text messaging and now Twitter, everyone knows a little bit about everything instantly, from the color of your daughter’s toenails to the latest news from Afghanistan.

Just a few weeks ago, we were in the midst of the Swine Flu epidemic. One day, there were reports of a few people sick in San Diego’s East County and then all hell broke loose. Would this be like 1918? People were afraid to go to public places, fearing infection. My daughter had an end-of-year Girl Scout overnighter and 2 parents kept their girls away, absolutely convinced that their daughters would somehow attract the dreaded killer virus. And then it was gone, old news. We barely had time to panic. On to the Miss California debacle, the frenzied excitement over the latest American Idol contestants, and the rapid decline of the Padres after an early successful start. Then fire season hit early.

My mom and sister both live in Santa Barbara. Mom is 82 and lives in a rapidly aging house in the foothills. Her 2 miniature dachshunds rule the roost. My sister lives in a condo near the freeway, closer to UCSB, miles away. Mom had to evacuate in last November’s fire, so when I first heard about SB’s latest fire as a breaking story online, I felt a twinge of worry.  All seemed o.k. at first. Then overnight, the fire grew to a raging inferno, and I alternated checking online for the latest updates and calling cell phones to see how they were doing. Mom evacuated to my sister’s house and one day later at 2 am, they had to evacuate again, dogs and all. They found someone to stay with, and relief finally came when the wind shifted and moist air drifted in from the sea, along with a lot of work from the firefighters. Both the house and condo were spared and Mom and sis went home.

At most, the whole thing lasted just a few days and nights, but at one point, I thought they would both lose their homes and all that they owned. We were mentally preparing to bring Mom down to San Diego to live with us. Possible big life changes, all within a week.

How quickly things happen. How quickly what is important at a certain moment can shift from the mundane (what does Miss California think?) to what’s really important (family safety) and back again.

Yesterday, I looked at the back yard again and the apple tree had burst into bloom overnight. Was it celebrating the way things had turned out? No swine flu. Lives spared in the SB fire. Miss California even got to keep her crown.

Our dog crawled under the tree and slept in the shade. For a fleeting moment, all is right with the world. . . is that my cell phone? Let it ring.