"In addition to patient, healthcare professional, and provider voices on the social web," says Spong, "I can identify at least four other groups of participants: pundits, prognosticators, philosophers and practitioners."
Since I consider myself a pundit and I'm a "voice on the social web," I am primarily interested in what Spong has to say about us pundits.
"The pundit's stock-in-trade is opinion, of which they have an inexhaustible supply," says Spong, who himself has an inexhaustible supply of opinions such as this one.
"Pundits are invariably self-employed on the basis that nobody wants to pay to be subjected to an interminable stream of passive-aggressive jibes, yet no-one knows how pundits make a living. It's one of the great mysteries of the health conversation on the social web."
I don't know about other pundits, but I sometimes get paid to subject people to "an interminable stream of passive-aggressive jibes" or truth-to-power opinions as I like to call them.
STweM obviously thinks "practitioners" stand out from the crowd. "The practitioner is comfortable with the idea that the reception and ultimate success of any activity will be determined by how well it serves the needs of the user, not the needs of the publisher," says Spong.
I think I'm a practitioner too when it comes to social media. But I like the title "pundit" better. With apologies to Chicago, I wrote this little song about pharma pundits (sung to the tune "I'm a Man"):
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