By David H. Kirkwood
I want to let you in on a little secret. While the blog Hearinghealthmatters.org (HHM) has been published for nearly 11 months, the team that makes it happen is more virtual than real.
Sure, the dozen of us editors who post weekly on The Blogs @ Hearing Health & Technology Matters are flesh-and-blood people. Or, at least I think we all are, though I can’t swear to it, since there are a few of my colleagues whom I have never actually met.
But what I’m getting at here is that we’ve all been functioning since last April from our own separate offices scattered across the United States and Canada. So, the collective entity responsible for the blog exists not in any geographical place, but really only in cyberspace. In fact, since we established HHM, I don’t think that more than three members of our group have ever been in the same place at the same time.
DEBUTING IN BOSTON, MARCH 30
This state of affairs is going to change very soon. Thanks to the American Academy of Audiology’s gracious willingness to let us make an educational presentation at AudiologyNOW! 2012, our blog team will make its live and in-person debut on Friday, March 30, from 2 to 3 pm in Room 257B of the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center.
Not all the HHM editors will be at the session, but most of us will, either participating in the presentation or offering moral support from the sidelines.
As I’ve explained, even though you have obviously discovered our blog—and, I hope, are now faithful readers—you’ve never actually seen the HHM team. However, I’m sure that many of you, especially those coming to AudiologyNOW!, have run across some of the distinguished people from our group who will be presenting at the session, “Best of the Blogs @ Hearing Health and Technology Matters.”
Among these is Dr. Robert Traynor, who is organizing the presentation at AAA. Bob, who is editor of our Hearing International blog, is known throughout the audiology profession as a leading clinician, practice manager, academic, author (including of the book Strategic Practice Management), and speaker, who has lectured in over 40 countries.
While I don’t want to give away too much about the session, I know that Bob and his four co-presenters will serve up a lively and informative introduction to our blog. What’s more, you can pick up continuing education credit for attending!
SO HERE ARE MY VIEWS
Since this is a Hearing Views post, let me express some of mine. First, it’s extremely gratifying that after less than a year in existence, Hearinghealthmatters.org has already been recognized by AAA as a subject worthy of an educational session at AudiologyNOW!, the largest gathering of audiologists in the world. My colleagues and I are grateful to the academy.
Second—and I realize this is blatantly self-serving—I really hope that all of you who are headed to Boston for AudiologyNOW will carve out time on your schedule for our session. Not only do I think you’ll enjoy the presentation, but it will also be an opportunity for you to let us know what we can do to make the blog more valuable to you.
I’m also very curious to see just who has been reading Hearinghealthmatters.org. Unlike some sites, we don’t collect information about our visitors’ favorite breakfast cereal or where they went on their last vacation. So, we really don’t know all that much about you. What we do know is that since launching our blog last April we’ve had more than 31,000 separate visitors from 143 countries.
I don’t suppose they’ll all come to our session, and if they do we’ll probably have to move it to Fenway Park! But it will be fun to meet at least a sampling of our readers.
Finally, whatever else happens in Boston, I look forward to getting together in person with the talented folks whom it is my pleasure to work with at Hearinghealthmatters.org.
