The present invention relates generally to the field of computerized on-line games. More specifically the present invention relates to an on-line photo identification game for game participants including photo submitting participants and photo identification participants. The game operates on the principle that collective intelligence, such as that provided by a several photo identification participants, will most likely provide a highly reliable identification of what is shown in the image in the photo, referred to herein simply as photo identification. The identification is in most instances simply a name of what is in the photo, but in some instances may be a fuller description of what is in the photo, as long as the description lends itself to ready comparison with other submitted photo identifications so that the concurrence with other photo identification participants can be determined readily such as by the website program.
The subject shown in the photo is considered within a subject matter category, such as a type of bird or plant is in the photo, a city, a street, a building, a river or a mountain range anywhere in the world or a region of the world, an astronomical object, a heavenly body or a phenomenon, an agricultural disease in a crop, an insect or an animal, a dental condition of the oral cavity, a condition a type of historical a artifact, a antique or a fossil, or a postage stamp, a work of art, or a collectable coin.
Numerous front end interfaces are suitable for leveraging the back-end logic and data defining this game. Therefore, the word “interface” is used hereinafter to represent any and all suitable front end interfaces, including but not limited to a website or an App such as iOS App, a Web App, an Android App or other app.
The game includes the method steps of creating an interface such as a for the on-line game having an interface program; receiving photos from on-line submitting participants relating to a certain topic or subject matter; the interface copying the photos to on-line photo identification participants for identification; each photo identification participant submitting through the interface his or her best evaluation and resulting identification of what is shown in the photo; the interface determining the most common identification and optionally in addition determining the second most common identification of what is in the photo from the identifications submitted by the participating photo evaluation participants; and the interface sending to the submitting participant of the given photo the most common and optionally in addition the second most common photo content identification. Game participants, particularly photo identification participants, may be required to be professionals in a given field who are credentialed by the interface for game participation, or may be anyone believing they have knowledge of the given field or who simply wish to participate.
Another step is storing the photo and its identification(s) in a photo and text interface database which for example may be called a wikiphotoatlas for future reference for educational and other uses. Further additional steps include matching explanatory text to the most or second most submitted identification for the given photo, the text preferably being drawn from the interface database, and sending this matched text to the photo submitting participant who supplied the given photo to further educate him or her about what is in their photo.
The submitting participants and the photo identification participants may be the same people, and all participants receive points for their participation so that a winner can be determined or compensation optionally can be awarded, or both. Points may be granted for submitting a photo for identification, for participating in a photo identification and for submitting an identification of a photo that the interface determines is among the most common for the given and optionally receiving points for submitting an identification of a photo that the interface determines is among the second most common for the given photo, since concurrence with a majority is considered an indication of a correct or well considered identification. Points may also be granted for editing text stored in the photo and text data base.
Where the photo is of part of a human body appearing to show a condition, the identification of which is in the photo. It is not a medical diagnosis because diagnosis requires a history of the photo and other related details which are used in the judgment of a doctor. It is not practicing medicine because there is no definitive diagnosis, there is no physician patient relationship and there are no pharmaceutical or surgical treatments being prescribed. Therefore this remains solely a game of photo identification. Therefore this remains an identification game, and never represents or substitutes for the judgment of a doctor in relation to a given patient and as a result does not constitute the practice of medicine.
More specifically, the method includes the steps of providing information on an interface executed by a computer program interacting with at least three and preferably several more lay interface visitors or members of the general public, which upon joining the website or other interface are referred to herein simply as members, or as a submitting member who has provided the photographic image (hereinafter photo) for identification, or as a identifying member who views and submits an identification of what is shown in the photo, which in most instances would be a digital image or picture of something, to identify what specifically beyond the category of the subject matter is shown in the photo. It is understood that there may be members who at any given moment are not submitting or identifying, and therefore may be merely viewing members. At any given time a member may be any one, two or all of: a viewing member, a submitting member and an identifying member. Non-members may or may not also be permitted to view identifications. The something requiring specific identification may fall into and one or a combination of the following categories, or into other categories such as coins, stamps, birds, cars, geographic features, guns, buildings, architecture, insects, people, plants, animals, rocks, trees, horticulture, artwork, logos, and a variety of photos captured images associated with a variety of amateur and professionals hobbies, passions, pursuits and professions.
The method includes the essential steps of: an interface visitor accessing the program on a computer; the interface visitor becoming a member of text match service to gain further access to the program; the member automatically being subscribed to a queue henceforth known as the textmatch or photoidentification queue; the customer generating or acquiring at least one photo of something; the member entering an identification of the content of the image of which the photo was taken; the submitting member uploading to the program the photo(s); the program assembling the photo(s) into a collection known henceforth as a photobook; the program publishing the photobook to the photo queue; the program assigning a unique identifier to the photobook, the program making the photobook anonymous by secreting the unique identifier which connects the photobook to the submitting member; the program making the photobook readable on the photo queue; several identifying members subscribed to the photo queue retrieving the photobook from the queue; several identifying members viewing the photobook and identifying what is in the images(s) shown in the photo(s); the identifying members matching the photobook to stored texts identifying or describing the identified photo or the members simply naming what is in the photobook photos; the program storing all matches associated to the photobook; the program determining the two leading text matches or names of what is shown in the photo as selected most frequently by the identifying members; the program publishing the photobook in combination with the two leading matched texts to the textmatch queue; the program notifying the submitting member that the match is complete via one of: app notification badge, account notification badge on the program driven website or other interface, cell phone text, short message service, apple imessage, email, postal mail and telefax; submitting member viewing the identifications and textmatches associated to their photobook from the textmatch queue; the program conveying photobooks to a wiki based photo atlas for the continuing education of users of the service as well as for potential research; the program calculating identifying member standings based on concurrence with the majority; the program identifying top rated identifying members in multiple categories to be rewarded for participation and concurrence with the majority.
Becoming a Member
The basic method, including additional preferred steps, is as follows: an interface visitor such as a website visitor (visitor) accessing the program; the visitor requesting membership; the program displaying user terms and conditions and a disclaimer; the visitor entering a decision of whether he or she accepts the terms and conditions and disclaimer; if the visitor rejects the terms and conditions and disclaimer, the program rejecting the visitor and ending his or her use of the program; and if the visitor accepts the terms and conditions and disclaimer; and the program creating a member profile and the visitor becoming a member.
Submitting Photos
The steps further include an interface visitor such as a website visitor accessing the program; the program prompting the interface visitor to submit identifying information to determine whether the interface visitor is a member; if the program determines that the website visitor is not a member, the program directing the interface visitor to the prompt to become a member; if the program determines that the interface visitor is a member, the program prompting the member to upload at least one photo of something to be identified and thereby becoming a submitting member; the submitting member uploading to the program the photo(s); the program assembling the photo(s) into a photobook; the program publishing the photobook to the photo queue; the program assigning a unique identifier to the photobook, the program making the photobook anonymous by secreting the unique identifier which connects the photobook to the submitting member; the program making the photobook readable on the photo queue; If the photo is rejected by the majority of identifying members, the program notifying the submitting member that a photo resubmission is required; the submitting member uploading a replacement photo; if the replacement photo is acceptable, the program anonomizing and publishing the photo the ID queue; the program providing the submitting member with an image ID or textmatch; and the program proceeding to photo ID and textmatch.
Photo Textmatch
For purposes of this application, a photo is described as “good” if the image it displays is sufficiently clear that the content of or subject shown in the image can be identified by a photo identifying member or photo identifying interface visitor (photo identifying visitor). If the photo identifying member is not logged in, the steps further include the identifying member logging in; if the identifying member is logged in, the program presenting photobooks to the identifying member and the identifying member reading photobooks from the photo queue; if no more photos are to have their images identified, the member logging out, or the member logging in to read another photo; if more photos are to be identified, the identifying member determining whether the photos are good; if the identifying member determines that the photos are not good, the identifying member and program recommending how to improve the photos; the program determining whether the majority of identifying members say that the photos are good; if the majority of identifying members say that the photos are not good, the program rejecting the photo with recommendations for technical improvements; if the individual identifying member says that the photo is good, the identifying members matching the photobook to stored texts identifying or describing the identified photo or the members simply naming what is in the photobook photos; the program storing all al names and matches associated to the photobook; the program determining the two leading names and possibly text matches of what is shown in the photo as selected most frequently by the identifying members; the program publishing the named photobook in combination with the two leading matched texts to the textmatch queue; the program notifying the submitting member that the match is complete via one of: app notification badge, account notification badge on the program driven website or other interface, cell phone text, short message service, apple imessage, email, postal mail and telefax; the program recording participation and concurrence in their profiles for statistical analysis; the program determining quality control and optionally determining and providing reward compensation; the program placing the identified photos in the wiki based photo atlas for interface users further discussion and education.
Return Textmatch
Proceeding from the photo atlas textmatch, the program performs the steps of: targeting advertising based on photo identification, associated textmatches, affiliations, account type and geography; the program determining whether to send photos to the wiki based photo atlas, or in other words storing the photo in a permanent depository; if yes persist photos to wikphotoatlas repository, the program sending a photo to wiki; if no do not persist photos to repository, the program discarding user data from the online database and not conveying to a repository such as wiki based photo atlas.
Quality Control and Compensation
Data from member profiles; the program rating identifying members on frequency of participation, concurrence with the majority of identifying member votes, number of photograph submissions and referrals, and wiki based photo atlas text entries; the program optionally compensating the top identifying members or affiliates based on their ratings thereby creating a competition; the program updating identifying member profiles with rating / quality control results (concurrence with majority); the member viewing quality control and compensation results; the member logging out; the program ending his or her use of the subprogram; a viewing member logging in; the viewing member viewing quality control and any competition reward compensation results; the member logs out; the program ending his or her use of the subprogram. For the above version, any member can be a submitting member, a identifying member or both.
Variation of Method
A variation of this method is provided, which is identical to the method described above, with the following exceptions. First, in place of unrestricted lay-public members as broadly defined above competing in this game by submitting photos for identification, concurrence with the majority and entering content into the wikiphotoatlas, only credentialed professionals will be accepted as identifying members and thus be provided access to the interface/program submit, view and identify images. The term “professionals” can mean anyone with credentials supporting professional knowledge of the photo subject matter to be identified, such as researchers in the field and university professors. To distinguish the professionals who are provided access to the program to identify submitted images for evaluation an advisory board will form with these professional only credentialed members. That is, as previously noted, professionals on the advisory board, or advisory board members, or otherwise facilitating the operation of the photo identification program such as an accessing health care professional is referred to in the claims as an photo submitting health care professional and shall be credentialed accordingly by the program. It is further preferred that the photo submitting health care professionals may be identified according to those who are invited or referred, and or subsequently credentialed by the interface operators and the program to access or join this professionals-only submitting version of the website or other interface, such an invitation and credentialing being a method step and the new accessing professional shall identify the board member who referred him or her in order to reward the board member. Second, for professional members only, the advisory board members provide identification of what is shown in the submitted photo which will be subsequently matched to corresponding text. The term “identification” as used here and in the claims is understood to mean the name of the object or condition in the photo as identified by a highest number of votes of the professional advisory board competing in the game. This is preferred because, when presented with a name of a condition represented on a photo, a photo submitting professional will understand what the name means and what the associated condition or subject of the photo is and normally will not require an associated explanatory text along with the results of the identification vote. In addition, submitting professionals are educated in performing associated subject matter text searches, unlike the lay public and therefore may only receive the results of the board vote, without an associated text match from the wikiphotoatlas. Applicant does, however, contemplate the option of providing specialized matching text for the submitting professional in addition to the identification of the image in the photo. This specialized matching text preferably originates from the wiki based photo atlas long term repository constructed in crowd sourced manner via the wiki web interface. The emergence of the Internet and the recent developments in online collaborative technologies has provided new tools with which to find, use, share and expand knowledge. Wiki technologies challenge the traditional notions of authorship, editing and publishing and have the inherent potential to change how we construct knowledge repositories and collaborate on the Web. Despite the extraordinary success of Wikipedia and the potential of wiki publishing, its adoption in the academic community and within the field of education of professionals and non-professionals has been limited and almost non-existent. Therefore, our wiki based photo atlas is a novel educational tool.
In contrast to conventional static publications, dynamic publications in the wiki model have no final version, no definite date of publication and continuously integrate and synthesize new findings and insights. We will also develop a dynamic collaborative knowledgebase using wiki technology that combines a continuous stream of submitted photos and merges it with referenced content created by authors from our credentialed (in the case of professions) and non-credentialed (in the case of hobbies, pursuits and passions and interests) board of advisors, with due credit given and rewarded for ongoing revisions and integration of more traditional peer review models into a rigorous clinical, educational and research tool. Our online method will integrate a wiki based photo atlas into both our professional only and lay public accessed websites or other interfaces. The wiki based photo atlas will receive the photographs identified by the Board of Advisors or the lay users registered on the site which have been submitted to the website or other interface. Professional's only and non-professionals who are registered to participate on either the Professional Board of Advisors or as lay photo subject matter identifiers will be able to access and edit the wikiphotoatlas text content in order to publish and continuously construct a real time, up to date collaborative dermatology knowledge repository on the web. Board members and lay users who contribute to the wikiphotoatlas will be rewarded for their efforts and therefore a competition or game for participation in the education information process will be created.
An example of the game where the subject matter requires a professional is skin photo identification is as follows. The subject matter of the photo contents may be, for example, the skin, hair, mucosa or nail of either the submitting member him or herself or another person, in which the image appears to containing an anomaly requiring identification. In this instance it is required that the identifying member is a health care professional such as a doctor, physician's assistant, nurse, nurse practitioner or in some instances a medical technician, and these credentialed identifying members become part of the advisory board competing by identifying photos. For this example, the wikiphotoatlas is a wikiskinatlas.
There previously have been games or non-game related mechanisms involving storing and displaying photographic images. Examples of these known to applicant include Sigle, U.S. Pat. No. 5,056,793, issued on Oct. 15, 1991, which discloses a picture identification game for several players. The Sigle game involves providing a picture such as a photo containing an image and entirely covering the image with cover pieces, and then removing the cover pieces one by one until a player correctly identifies the image in the picture. Identification is not done through multiple people submitting their own identifications and using this collective intelligence to arrive at the most reliable answer. Rather, the correct answer is already known with certainty in advance, but not to the players. The players are not evaluating an entire image, but instead a partially obscured image, so that the challenge is not in recognizing the image itself but rather in trying to discern what remains hidden.
Wolff, et al, U.S. Pat. No. 6,833,848, issued on Dec. 21, 2004, teaches a game console based digital photo album. This game does not involve using collective intelligence to identify the content of a photo. Wolff, et al., includes steps of storing and displaying photo images in a track and navigating through the stored images, displaying authored stories in second and third tracks, one of the stories in the third track being a story being created, enabling the user to edit the story and selecting background music to accompany the story and image using a game controller with a joystick.
Pilu, U.S. Patent Application Publication Numbers U.S. 2002/0126159 and U.S. 2002/0128062, both published on Sep. 12, 2002, reveal what are titled digital image viewings I and II. Pilu is a system in which a personal digitalized photo supplied by a user is displayed, a gaming console fro playing a video game is provide, and domestic television set for displaying the video game and the personal digitalized photo, which permits simultaneous viewing of the photo at remote locations. Means for altering or enhancing the photo are provided, and well as means for storing the photo permanently. Photo image identification apparently is not provided.
Golden, et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication Number U.S. 2004/0208343, published on Oct. 21, 2004, discloses an apparatus and method for creating a record using biometric information. Golden, et al. is not a game, but simply involves creating an identification record of specific, individual animals which may include a photo of one or more identifying features of the animal to aid in identification.
Wallach, U.S. Patent Application Number 2002/0145253, published on Oct. 10, 2002, teaches a family or household chore system game. The Wallach game is a household chore doing competition, in which the member of the household who does the most and most difficult chores wins and gains recognition as the “Family Member of the Month”. No photo identification appears to be involved.
Pearlman, U.S. Patent Application Number 2004/0014524, published on Jan. 22, 2004, reveals a trivia and memory game using multimedia clips having visual and audio components. Each multimedia clip is associated with several potential questions, and a clip is randomly selected for presentation to several players. A question for each clip is also randomly selected for presentation to all of the players, and players gain points depending on whether they answer each such question correctly and on how rapidly they give their answers. The questions are provided with multiple choice answers. The clips may be taken from movie, television, sports and news videos. Since there are several questions from which only one is randomly selected for each clip, the question in most instances and possibly all instances will not be that of simply asking for identifying the image in the photo. Furthermore, collective intelligence apparently is not brought to bear to identify what is shown in a photo.
Odake, U.S. Patent Application Publication Number 2002/0004419, published on Jan. 10, 2002, discloses a photographing game machine and game processing method and information storage medium. A camera-type input device permits a subject included in a photo shooting range to be seen through a window. A game screen including a target to be photographed is displayed. The camera-type input device includes a shutter switch through which the player provides instructions to take a photograph. Thus Odake appears to be a photographing game rather than a photo identification game.
What is absent in the prior art is a game in which an image not previously identified is identified, and further where this is done through the application of collective intelligence.
It is thus an object of the present invention to provide an interface such as a website and an interface program such as a website program in which a photo identification game can be played, which for one example of the game involves a computer program in which photos and information are conveyed by at least one submitting member to several identifying members, which for one version of the game are lay persons or members of the public in general which may mix lay or professional people, and for another version are professionals referred to herein as advisory board members, from a submitting member who has provided the submitted photo(s) for the purpose of seeking information from the identifying members about the image or content depicted in the photo(s), and thus one version is the first professionally guided search engine using collective or group intelligence.
It is another object of the present invention to provide such a computer program in which the exchange of information is not in any way limited by the ability of the lay person or member to recognize, describe and match his or her photo with that of a website or other interface image.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide such a computer program which encompasses most if not all published information on a given game photobook, such as descriptions and corresponding names of birds, insects, trees and plants or skin problems or anomalies.
It is yet 1 another object of the present invention to facilitate discussion for the open exchange of information and to promote education and academics.
It is a still another object of the present invention to provide such a computer program which allows for the publication of a real time wikiphotoatlas using the photographs identified by the board of advisors and pertinent text written by either subject matter identifiers or the credentialed board of professional advisors.
It is finally an object of the present invention to provide such a computer program which is easy to use and of maximum reliability via several different electronic media portal
The present invention accomplishes the above-stated objectives, as well as others, as may be determined by a fair reading and interpretation of the entire specification.
A method is provided of participating in an identification game, including the steps of providing information on an interface executed by a computer program interacting with at least one and preferably several lay website visitors or other interface visitors or members of the general public, which upon joining the website or other interface are referred to herein simply as lay subject matter identifiers members, or as a lay subject submitting member who has provided the photographic image (hereinafter photo) for identification, or as an identifying member who views and submits an identification of what is shown in the photo, which in most instances would be a digital image or picture of something, to identify what specifically beyond the category of the subject matter is shown in the photo. The something in the photo requiring specific identification may fall into the any of the following categories, or into other categories one or a combination of the following categories, or into other categories such as coins, stamps, birds, cars, geographic features, guns, buildings, architecture, insects, people, plants, animals, rocks, trees, horticulture, artwork, logos, and a variety of photos captured images associated with a variety of other amateur and professionals hobbies, passions, pursuits and professions.
The method includes the essential steps of: a website or other interface visitor accessing the program on a computer; the interface visitor becoming a member of photo and text match service to gain further access to the program; the member automatically being subscribed to a photo identification queue henceforth known as the photo textmatch queue; the member generating or acquiring at least one photo of something; the member entering an identification of the content of the image of which the photo was taken; the submitting member uploading to the program the photo(s); the program assembling the photo(s) into a collection known henceforth as a photobook; the program publishing the photobook to the photo queue; the program assigning a unique identifier to the photobook, the program making the photobook anonymous by secreting the unique identifier which connects the photobook to the submitting member; the program making the photobook readable on the photo identification queue; several viewing subject matter identifier members subscribed to the photo queue retrieving the photobook from the queue; several identifying members viewing the photobook and identifying what is in the images(s) shown in the photo(s); the viewing subject matter identifier members matching identifying the photobook and therefore matching the photobook to stored texts identifying or describing the identified photo or the members simply naming what is in the photobook photos and thereby identifying or describing the identified photo image; the program storing all identified photos and associated text matches associated to the photobook; the program determining the two leading text matches or names identifying identifying names and associated text matches of what is shown in the photo as selected most frequently by the identifying members; the program publishing the photobook in combination with the two leading matched text names of the photos and associated text matches to the textmatch queue; the program notifying the submitting member that the photoidentification photoidentification and text match is complete via one of: app notification badge, account notification badge on the program driven interface, cell phone text, short message service, apple imessage, email, postal mail and telefax; submitting member viewing the identifications and textmatches associated to their photobook from the textmatch queue; the program conveying photobooks to a wiki based photo atlas for the continuing education of users, and for users to update content for points in the competition of the service as well as for potential research; the program calculating identifying member standings based on concurrence with the majority; number of photos submitted, numbers of photos identified, and for providing wiki text entries; the program identifying top rated identifying members in multiple user categories to be rewarded for participation and concurrence with the majority.
Various other objects, advantages, and features of the invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art from the following discussion taken in conjunction with the following drawings, in which:
As required, detailed embodiments of the present invention are disclosed herein; however, it is to be understood that the disclosed embodiments are merely exemplary of the invention which may be embodied in various forms. Therefore, specific structural and functional details disclosed herein are not to be interpreted as limiting, but merely as a basis for the claims and as a representative basis for teaching one skilled in the art to variously employ the present invention in virtually any appropriately detailed structure.
Reference is now made to the drawings, wherein like characteristics and features of the present invention shown in the various FIGURES are designated by the same reference numerals.
Referring to
The method includes the essential steps of: an interface visitor accessing the program on a computer; the interface visitor becoming a member of photo and text match service to gain further access to the program; the member automatically being subscribed to a queue henceforth known as the photo textmatch queue; the member generating or acquiring at least one photo of something; the member entering an identification of the content of the image of which the photo was taken; the submitting member uploading to the program the photo(s); the program assembling the photo(s) into a collection known henceforth as a photobook; the program publishing the photobook to the photo queue; the program assigning a unique identifier to the photobook, the program making the photobook anonymous by secreting the unique identifier which connects the photobook to the submitting member; the program making the photobook readable on the photo queue; several viewing subject matter identifier members subscribed to the photo queue retrieving the photobook from the queue; several identifying members viewing the photobook and identifying what is in the images(s) shown in the photo(s); the viewing subject matter identifier members identifying the photobook and therefore matching the photobook to stored texts identifying or describing the identified photo or the members simply naming what is in the photobook photos and thereby identifying or describing the identified photo image; the program storing all identified photos and associated text matches associated to the photobook; the program determining the two leading identifying names and associated text matches of what is shown in the photo as selected most frequently by the identifying members; the program publishing the photobook in combination with the two leading names of the photos and associated text matches to the textmatch queue; the program notifying the submitting member that the photoidentification and text match is complete via one of: app notification badge, account notification badge on the program driven interface , cell phone text, short message service, apple imessage, email, postal mail and telefax; submitting member viewing the identifications and textmatches associated to their photobook from the textmatch queue; the program conveying photobooks to a wiki based photo atlas for the continuing education of users, and for users to update content for points in the competition of the service as well as for potential research; the program calculating identifying member standings based on concurrence with the majority, number of photos submitted, numbers of photos identified, and for providing wiki text entries; the program identifying top rated identifying members in multiple user categories to be rewarded for participation and concurrence with the majority.
Referring to
the visitor entering a decision of whether he or she accepts the terms and conditions and disclaimer; if the visitor rejects the terms and conditions and disclaimer, the program rejecting the visitor and ending his or her use of the program; and if the visitor accepts the terms and conditions and disclaimer; and the program creating a member profile and the visitor becoming a member.
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A variation of this method is provided, which is identical to the method described above, with the following exceptions. First, in place of unrestricted lay-public members as broadly defined above submitting photos for identification and text matching, only credentialed professionals will be accepted as identifying members and thus be provided access to the interface/program to submit images. The term “professionals” can mean anyone with credentials supporting professional knowledge of the subject matter, such as researchers in the field and university professors, doctors, dentists, rocket scientists, etc. To distinguish the professionals who are provided access to the program to submit images for evaluation by the advisory board members, that is, as previously noted, professionals on the advisory board, or advisory board members, or otherwise facilitating the operation of the photo identification program, an accessing health care professional is referred to in the claims as an photo submitting health care professional and shall be credentialed accordingly by the program. It is further preferred that the photo submitting health care professionals may be identified according to those who are invited or referred, and or subsequently credentialed by the interface operators and the program to access or join this professionals-only submitting version of the website or other interface, such an invitation and credentialing being a method step and the new accessing professional shall identify the board member who referred him or her in order to reward the board member . For professional members only, the advisory board members preferably may only provide identification of what is shown in the submitted photo and optionally provide a text match. The term “identification” as used here and in the claims is understood to mean the name of the object or condition in the photo as identified by a highest number of votes of the advisory board. This is preferred because, when presented with a name of a condition represented on a photo, a photo submitting professional will understand what the name means and what the associated condition is and normally will not require an explanatory text. In addition, submitting professionals are educated in performing associated subject matter text searches related to the identified photo, unlike the lay public. Applicant does, however, contemplate the option of providing specialized matching text for the submitting professional in addition to the identification of the image or the photo. This specialized matching text preferably originates from the wiki based photo atlas long term repository constructed in croup sourced manner via the wiki web interface. The emergence of the Internet and the recent developments in online collaborative technologies has provided new tools with which to find, use, share and expand knowledge. Wiki technologies challenge the traditional notions of authorship, editing and publishing and have the inherent potential to change how we construct knowledge repositories and collaborate on the Web. Despite the extraordinary success of Wikipedia and the potential of wiki publishing, its adoption in the academic community and within the field of medical education such as in dermatology has been limited and almost non-existent. Therefore, our wiki based photo atlas is a novel educational tool.
In contrast to conventional static publications, dynamic publications in the wiki model have no final version, no definite date of publication and continuously integrate and synthesize new findings and insights. We will also develop a dynamic collaborative dermatologic knowledgebase using wiki technology that combines a continuous stream of submitted photos and merges it with referenced content created by authors from our credentialed board of advisors, with due credit given and rewarded for ongoing revisions and integration of more traditional peer review models into a rigorous clinical, educational and research tool.
Our online method will integrate a wiki based photo atlas into both our professional only and public accessed websites or other interfaces. The wiki based photo atlas will receive the photographs identified by the Board of Advisors which have been submitted to the website or other interface. Professional's only who have credentialed to participate on the Professional Board of Advisors will be able to access and edit the wikiphotoatlas text content in order to publish and continuously construct a real time, up to date collaborative dermatology or other medical specialty knowledge repository on the web. Board members who contribute to the wikiphotoatlas will be rewarded for their efforts and therefore a competition game for participation in the education information process will be created.
The subject matter of the photo contents may be, for example, the skin, hair, mucosa or nail of either the submitting member him or herself or another person, in which the image appears to containing an anomaly requiring identification. In this instance it is preferred that the identifying member by a health care professional such as a doctor, physician's assistant, nurse, nurse practitioner or in some instances a medical technician, and these credentialed identifying members become part of the advisory board. For this example, the wikiphotoatlas is a wikiskinatlas.
While the invention has been described, disclosed, illustrated and shown in various terms or certain embodiments or modifications which it has assumed in practice, the scope of the invention is not intended to be, nor should it be deemed to be, limited thereby and such other modifications or embodiments as may be suggested by the teachings herein are particularly reserved especially as they fall within the breadth and scope of the claims here appended.
This application continues from provisional patent application Ser. No. 61/944,534, filed on Feb. 25, 2014.
Number | Date | Country | |
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61944534 | Feb 2014 | US |