iMedix - Health belongs to the people

I can't think of more crucial topics that require knowledge sharing than health and medicine. This is definitely a space where many people have many questions and fears. Naturally, they are seeking answers from the community.
iMedix are soon launching a medical search engine based on user generated content.

Iri Amirav tells me today about iMedix (formally Remedix). Iri Amirav and Amir Leitersdorf, founders of iMedix are both experienced entrepreneurs. Iri previously served as Marketing Director at Metacafe and Amir as CTO at Movota which was acquired by Arvato mobile and prior to that as CTO at Tapuz search engine.
He says they plan on revealing a new user experience to medical search. The search engines dynamic learning algorithm provides the user with information relevant to him/herself and this is determined by the users ranking.

Two types of results are provided:

1. Reliable health information from the top sources across the web
   
2. Information from people who share health experiences similar to the person searching

Iri explains that currently only 16-18% of users searching for medical information are satisfied with the results and that their solution will increase these results by creating a social network that enables people to share health issues.

In the future I think leveraging these strong capabilities by allowing users to recommend and rank doctors specializing in a related medical area would provide the users with an added value in the real world. This way users would benefit from the community's medical treatment experience.

iMedix is in alpha and is soon to launch. Sign up for their launch alert.

Technorati Tags: health imedix medical israel web 2.0 search engine social knowledge social network

Join SupportSpace Supporters' Cafe

SupportSpace open their beta program and the supporters' cafe to tech support pros.
SupportSpace is planned to go live in mid 2007 offering an easy-to-use online tech support platform.
If you're a tech pro and like to help people solve technology problems, if you want to network with other pros go join the supporters cafe.

Think of the Supporters' Café as a social network for tech support pros. A place you can go to learn and expand your knowledge base. Where you can meet other people like you and share ideas. And where you can actively participate in building and making the SupportSpace platform, services and supporter community the very best that it can be.

Beshutaf brings social networking to life

Beshutaf is another local Israeli social network that's seems to be in stealth mode. Unfortunately I don't have an invitation but this is what their login page says after translating it from Hebrew.

Sharing starts at childhood, sharing cards, sharing cloth, sharing bicycles.Thats the all time childhood wisdom. The simple wisdom that says, sharing talent, energy and resources eases life and connects between people. The wisdom that most of us abandon later when growing up.

We want to create a real human community that will gather groups of friends and individuals that will enable them to collaborate on day to day basis while having fun and in a trusted atmosphere, not only virtually but significantly in our daily reality.

Sounds good but how do we do this? Someone signs up and creates his profile, invites his friends that create their profiles and so on, in no time all your groups of friends can be members on the site.

and then what? Friends easily communicate within the community, group or individually. The site is our "home" and anyone can be invited. Parties and events can be organized, want to look for an apartment, want to buy an old couch, get recommendation for trustworthy professionals, to screen a movie, to play a song, write a column,fight for justified purposes, volunteer, ask for a ride or just take a peek at some photos from a trip you took together.
We really believe that a big part of things you want to do can be done in a more fun way, efficient,wiser - beshutaf (shared, together)

Bringing the online social networking out to the real world is a great idea. I really think this could succeed in a place like Israel where everyone is relatively close and where distance isn't an obstacle.
Sources say Beshutaf are about to launch in the near future with a big event. So stay tuned!

Bona - Social network for high school students

Lately I'm seeing first signs of how local social networks are emerging and are penetrating Israel's web sphere. One of them is bona. Bona is the first verified social network in Israel for high school students. There are two ways of joining, one is by invitation and the other a bit strange is by a hidden code located in the high school student phone book supplied to each student by the school. Bona are aiming at making their network more intimate and safer by this precaution. The approach is a bit naive in my opinion considering the high school phone books to be accessible by any person.
Bona is a kind of MySpace Facebook combo focusing only on high schools, my estimation is a population of 200 thousand in Israel.
The bona user profile page reminds me of the MySpace layout. You've got your photos, tags, friends, classmates and of course you can play around with the page layout and background.
I'm not sure if the Israeli internet users are ready for the online socializing yet but who knows it might catch fire.

Oh ya, bona in Hebrew means 'come on'.