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Paul Offit explains the money side of the rotavirus vaccine he worked on

14 Sep

Misinformationists love a vacuum. Unfortunately, Dr. Paul Offit left them a big opening by not disclosing how much his hospital, the Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP), paid him as his share of the royalties from the sale of the rights to his rotavirus vaccine invention.

Dr. Offit invented a rotavirus vaccine, together with CHOP faculty members Dr. Stanley Plotkin and Dr. Fred Clark. This vaccine was commercialized as RotaTeq. CHOP is reported to have been paid $182M, with a net income of $153M.

From that, Doctors Offit, Plotkin and Clark would have been paid an inventor’s share.

In my opinion, it was sufficient for Dr. Offit to acknowledge that it was a significant amount of money.

Mr. Mark Blaxill and Mr. Dan Olmsted of the Age of Autism blog felt differently. They felt it necessary to put an number to Dr. Offit’s royalty payment from CHOP.

Dr. Offit and CHOP declined to respond to their request for information on this subject.

As a point of interest: CHOP didn’t respond to my request, made at that time, either.

In this information vacuum, Misters Blaxill and Olmsted used public information from a scattering of sources to estimate that Dr. Offit was payed between $29M and $55M.

They were off by about a factor of 10.

As noted in a recent post, I showed how one could easily make an accurate estimate of the royalty payment from that sale, and it was about $6M. Misters Olmsted and Blaxill, who spent a considerable amount of time scouring information from the University of Arkansas to the University of California missed the easily obtainable public information on the CHOP website.

Before I wrote that piece, I contacted Misters Blaxill and Olmsted with the correct information, even including a statement that Dr. Offit had acknowledged that the estimate I came up with was accurate. I was informed that a public statement was necessary by Dr. Offit.

I found this odd because on Sept. 9, a statement by Dr. Offit was reported.

This was originally run on the blog “Countering the Age of Autism” as Paul Offit explains the money side of the rotavirus vaccine he worked on, by David N. Brown, frequent poster to this site and owner of the Evil Possum website.

In an email correspondence with David Brown August 18, 2009, Dr. Paul Offit writes:

David,

CHOP sold its patent for $182 million. This information was made publicly available and was published in the Philadelphia Inquirer at the time. The inventors, Fred Clark, Stan Plotkin, and me split 10 percent of that three ways. This means that we each received about $6 million. It was a ridiculous amont of money and certainly far more than any of us needs, but it is also a far cry from what has been claimed.

But the part that hurts the most is the continued claim that we did this for the money. I don’t know any scientist who does it for the money (you certainly don’t make much in salary). You do it because it’s fun and because you think you can contribute. And the reward for creating a vaccine was also never financial. The reward was watching this vaccine dramatically reduce the incidence of rotavirus hospitalizations in the US and now getting to watch the vaccine enter the developing world in countries like Mali, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Ghana, and Nicaragua. That’s why we did it.

It hurts to watch people slander me the way they do. They just don’t know me. Or any of us that work so hard to get a technology like the rotavirus vaccine to the countries where it will save the most lives.

Paul

Reprinted with permission from David Brown and Dr. Paul Offit.

Paul Offit responds to the press release by NAA (and carried by AoA)

14 Sep

The National Autism Association put out a press release last week that was an amazing piece of work. Just not in a good way.

I was not the first to comment on it. Below is a post from the Countering Age of Autism blog that I asked to rerun here.

So, with permission:

On the 8th, NAA sent out a press release rehashing the same misinformation that AoA habitually runs (it’s almost like they got it right from them and Wakefield. They probably did). AoA picked it up and ran with it, and I spent a fair portion of my day trying to figure out who NAA was as well as mount an adequate rebuttal. I don’t know that it’s an adequate rebuttal, but it is what I can do.

I appreciate the researchers who work tirelessly in labs trying to figure out ways to save lives. I admire the diligence and commitment it takes to work for over two decades on one vaccine because you believe in it that strongly. Now, I don’t reach the level of adoring fan like Wakefield’s groupies apparently do (if you saw the Friday morning piece on the Today show before the Sunday Dateline, you know what I’m talking about), but I’m not a groupie kind of gal. Maybe those women are. My point is, this isn’t blind adoration speaking. I’ve read Dr. Offit’s books, all of them, because I wanted to know more about vaccines (read those first), and I read Autism’s False Prophets, as well, because I wanted to see what he’d found out.

For most of my son’s (who will be 20 this year) life, I have been focused on HIM. I homeschooled him for ten years, I spent the years before that often all day in the school system with him. He was the center of my world as I worked with him to help him. I didn’t join support groups; I didn’t talk to a lot of parents with autistic children. My husband and I labored alone for the most part. I wasn’t desperate; I was determined. I read everything I could on autism, mostly the science because I am so not into the woo. If it was woo, I stayed away from it. Until March of this year when I realized how much was out there.

Why did I start looking, now, after all these years? My daughters are on the spectrum as well. They are 12 and 14 years younger than their brother and it seemed like I needed to see what was out there. Especially since I have students who ask about vaccines and autism. I delved deep into the science of it, and then into the woo. Not all the woo, mostly the easy access free stuff at Huff and AoA and like autism organizations. Gods, but there is a frakload of woo out there. And really nasty behavior on the part of the woo-ites. Like the threats that Dr. Offit receives. Not acceptable behavior period.

So, when this stuff hit, I emailed Dr Offit to ask if he’d like to rebut this latest round of trash talk. And, thankfully, he did.

And here is the email that Countering Age of Autism posted:

Run with the permission of Dr. Offit:

Dear Kim,

Thanks for the support. At some point those who believe that vaccines cause autism will realize that I’m not their problem. The data are their problem. But I guess, absent supportive data, it’s easier and more satifying to attack me (I would also like to point out that I didn’t do any of these studies that exonerated vaccines as a cause of autism; I just explain them to the media).

Although it might sound crazy, I take some solace in the fact that those who oppose vaccines continue to get the facts wrong. It’s somewhat reassuring to know that they hate me for the wrong reasons. And the Huffington Post blog by James Moore, a well-respected journalist, is completely off the mark. I would have expected more.

1) I am not a paid consultant to Merck.

2) I never “voted myself rich” while I was on the ACIP. RotaTeq came up for a vote in 2006, three years after I was no longer a voting member. And even if I were a member, I wouldn’t have been allowed to vote. Further, I consistently declared my potential conflict. Although some people may find this hard to believe, I’m actually proud to be the co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine and was more than happy to declare this at the beginning of every meeting.

3) What (the hell) does being the co-inventor of a vaccine have to do with standing up for the science of vaccine safety. It certainly doesn’t affect my financial position one way or the other. I do it because I think that children are getting hurt by all of this (the same reason I went into pediatrics and worked on vaccines). The logic of the anti-vaccine folks escapes me here. Let me see if I’ve got this right; I invent a vaccine that can save as many as 2,000 lives a day so that I can make money so that I can lie about vaccine safety so I can hurt children.

4) I do not receive salary support or laboratory support from the Hilleman endowed chair. Five percent of that endowment does go to support members of our division, but not me.

5) I never received one penny of the $350,000 claimed in the Burton report. All of that money went to Dr. Fred Clark. I was totally supported by grants to NIH.

I really do appreciate your support, Kim. Few seem to be willing to stand up for me. And it does occasionally get me down. But mostly it just makes me angrier and more determined to hang in there.

Best,

Paul

ASA-York billboard to come down

20 Aug

Just got this story in my inbox: After objections, autism billboard coming down.

As has been discussed here and elsewhere, ASA-York had a billboard that, well, was offensive to many autistics.

“It seems to send a message that we aren’t fully present in our own bodies,” said Ari Ne’eman, president of the Autistic Self Advocacy Network. Autism York might have been shooting for an “edgy” message, but its billboard was eerily reminiscent of the NYU Child Study Center’s ransom-note-style advertising campaign in 2007, Ne’eman said.

ASA-York has agreed to remove the billboard:

Autism York has agreed to take down a controversial billboard on Route 30 after disability rights advocates said the sign unfairly compares autistic people to kidnapping victims.

I appreciate them pulling the billboard.

Working together to advance respect for autistics

17 Aug

It was over before I knew it had happened. And it ended well.

Joe over at the Club 166 blog spotted a billboard that was, well, rather reminiscent of the “Ransom Notes” campaign billboards that caused a great stir in the autism communities. It appears that Joe spotted this billboard in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania:

York ASA Billboard

York ASA Billboard

Well, Joe blogged it as Could We Have A Little Originality, Please. That was Friday. He then sent the following letter on Sunday.

Dear Sirs/Madams:

As the father of a child on the autism spectrum, I am writing to express concern about the York, PA ASA chapter’s billboard campaign that associates autism with being kidnapped. I happened to notice one of your billboards while taking a vacation in Pennsylvania. This campaign is reminiscent of the 2007 Ransom Notes campaign that was undertaken (and subsequently removed) by the NYU Child Study Center in New York City.

Comparing people with autism to those who are kidnapped is not only factually wrong (my son hasn’t been kidnapped, he’s right here in front of me), but is demeaning and offensive to those who are autistic. Rather than “creating awareness”, I can only see the logical end result of such an ad campaign be one of creating fear, misunderstanding, and disrespect towards those who are autistic.

In Medieval folklore the image of a changeling was used to describe children with then misunderstood medical disorders or developmental disabilities. Fairies or trolls were thought to have kidnapped the “normal child” and left the changeling in its place. One would think that in the 21st century we could get past such folklore, and deal with reality.

Putting up ads that show such disrespect towards autistics will certainly not result in greater acceptance and integration in either the school environment or the community. As an organization that ostensibly has been set up to serve the needs of the autistic community, I urge you to immediately remove the ads. Furthermore, I strongly encourage you to consult with autistic self advocates before formulating future ad campaigns.

Thank you for your time, and I hope to hear from you soon.

Sincerely,

And this led to a “Quick Resolution“.

Along the way, Joe had help from abfh, including her “end of week stupid roundup” post.

Also, ASAN got involved. Here is Ari Ne’eman’s letter discussing what happened:

Hello,

Only a few hours after our letter and thanks to the hard work of bloggers like Joe at Club 166, Abfh, Cracked Mirror in Shalott and others who wrote in and called about the billboard campaign, ASA-York has agreed to pull the billboards. This is a sign of the importance of working together as a community to address issues like this. A year and a half ago, it took the combined strength of 21 disability organizations from across the country to have our voices be heard on a billboard campaign not dissimilar to this one. Today, our community’s reputation for action and ethics has grown to the point where we can bring about change much more rapidly. This should serve as a reminder of the importance of a strong, united Autistic community with a clear moral vision of a better future for Autistic people. Small victories like this remind us of what we can accomplish by working as one community on issues of every kind and size. Thank you to everyone who took action and in particular to the members of the blogosphere who first rallied the community around this. I encourage people to write to ASA-York’s President Amy Wallace at Amy Wallace amywallace3@gmail.com to express your appreciation for their swift action to remove unethical advertising and to encourage them to work with the Autistic community in the future.

Regards,
Ari Ne’eman
President
The Autistic Self Advocacy Network
http://www.autisticadvocacy.org
info@autisticadvocacy.org
732.763.5530

I’m glad to see this advocacy effort pay off so amicably and so quickly.

More non-autism blogs critical of the vaccine-autism story

23 Jul

There is a substantial public relations push to get the vaccines-cause-autism idea in front of the public’s eye. High end, expensive PR firms have been hired, and, let’s face it, they got a big free boost from Jenny McCarthy and Oprah.

The cost to public health is obvious. Declining vaccination rates have already had a big impact in the UK, and the US has also seen a resurgence of measles and other diseases.

But, there is another cost. As noted recently on this blog, Jenny McCarthy has already become the butt of comic strip jokes for her position on vaccines. Many people are likely to not realize that Jenny McCarthy speaks for a minority (loud though they may be) of the autism community. My kid relies on on the public’s perception of “the autism community”. When people like Ms. McCarthy damage that perception, there is a very real cost to my kid, my family.

It isn’t new for bloggers outside of autism to be critical of Jenny McCarthy and others in the vaccines-cause-autism groups. Most notably, Orac has taken Ms. McCarthy to task a number of times in what is one of the most well read medical blogs, “Respectful Insolence“. Likewise, Science Based Medicine has had a number of bloggers take on the pseudoscience and dangerous opinions of the vaccines-cause-autism crowd. But, one could argue that they are medical blogs and, thus, more connected to vaccines, public health and autism than your general blogger.

But, the past week has seen a couple more prominent blogs

Discover Magazine’s Bad Astronomy has come out against the dangerous pseudoscience with Jenny McCarthy: spreading more dangerous misinformation. If the title isn’t clear enough, here’s the first paragraph:

If you haven’t had your quota of shockingly wrong medical advice for the year yet, try watching this video by Dr. Jenny McCarthy, as she manages to squeeze about a metric ton of misinformation into a two-ounce package.

Note: “try watching this video” is a link in the Bad Astronomy blog piece. A link to the video hosted by Generation Rescue. For some reason (bad publicity? Too much bandwidth?) GR has pulled the video from their site.

While I cringe at yet more damage to the public perception of the “autism community”, I applaud Bad Astronomy for taking on Ms. McCarthy. It isn’t Bad Astronomy’s fault if “the community” looks bad. It is squarely at the feet of Jenny McCarthy.

Interestingly, Mr. Kent Heckenlively of the “Age of Autism” blog decided to comment at Bad Astronomy. Even more interesting, Mr. Heckenlively was forced to retreat to his own blog to continue the discussion where his claims wouldn’t be exposed to actual criticism.

But, once again, one could say it is expected that a science blog like Bad Astronomy would take on Jenny McCarthy. The do-vaccines-cause-autism question is a science question after all.

Enter Mother Jones. MJ blogger Sonja Sharp posted, Breaking: Vaccines Still Don’t Cause Autism.

Mother Jones is not a science or medicine based publication. In fact, as Ms. Sharp states:

We love a good conspiracy as much as the next investigative magazine—especially one that involves Big Pharma, the FDA, and the CDC. But as we’ve extensively reported here, the vaccines = autism meme might just be the most damaging medical myth of the decade. Not only is it based on false “science” that’s tearing apart the families of sick children, it’s unintentionally sickening thousands of others.

While the vaccine/autism story isn’t completely new to Mother Jones (for example, see Arthur Allen’s piece, Vaccine Skeptics vs. Your Kids)), Jenny McCarthy et al. should take a big hint when they can’t even get sympathy from MJ.

This blog piece obviously hit a nerve. Take a look at the comments. Second comment: David Kirby. David Kirby is, for better or worse, one of the most read bloggers talking about autism. I can already feel the heat from those who will (with good cause) tell me that David Kirby doesn’t really talk about autism. Point well taken. That said, Mr. Kirby doesn’t even participate in the comments of his own blog. Why suddenly break the tradition with Mother Jones?

I expect Mr. Kirby to actually partake in the discussion beyond his one comment. I may be forced to take a page from Mr. Heckenlively’s book and take the conversation here.

Autism Science Foundation are blogging

28 May

Just a quickie. Autism Science Foundation are now blogging. So far there’s only one post up but already our very own Sullivan has got in there to comment. I’d love to see some autie opinion making a splash on there!

ASF also have their own Facebook Group for those who like to get their social media on. Oh yeah, lets not forget the website whilst I’m giving out link love.

Bravo Huffington Post

28 May

Yep, you read correctly. I’m not even sarcastic.

Guess who the new Huffington Post blogger is? Ari Ne’eman of the Autistic Self Advocacy Network.

Ari’s first post is a good one, Health Care Reform and the Disability Community. Ari has done an excellent job of keeping focus on the real issues facing the disability community in general and the autism community in specific. Ari recognizes that we in the autism community are a part of a greater whole–the disability community.

Ari’s post is quite thorough, quite well thought out. He is factual and logical.

Take a moment and leave a comment–let him (and the Huffington Post) know how much we appreciate him fighting for our communities.

Lessons from the Vaccine–Autism Wars

27 May

A very interesting (and long) read from Public Library of Science (PLoS) entitiled A Broken Trust: Lessons from the Vaccine–Autism Wars was published today. It takes apart the history of the vaccine/autism wars and tries to involve scientists on why they think – or what their particular discipline leads them to conclude – the autism/vaccine wars have become so protracted and bitter.

I’ve mentioned before – its always a bit of a strange, unreal sensation to see events in which you’ve been involved with – even as remotely as blogging about them – talked about as history. They say history is always written by the winning side. I hope articles like this don’t lead scientists to think that the war is over, the history is being written and they can go back to academia with no more comment necessary.

The PLoS article ends thusly:

Personal stories resonate most with those who see trust in experts as a risk in itself—a possibility whenever people must grapple with science-based decisions that affect them, whether they’re asked to make sacrifices to help curb global warming or vaccinate their kids for public health. Researchers might consider taking a page out of the hero’s handbook by embracing the power of stories—that is, adding a bit of drama—to show that even though scientists can’t say just what causes autism or how to prevent it, the evidence tells us not to blame vaccines. As news of epidemics spreads along with newly unfettered infectious diseases, those clinging to doubt about vaccines may come to realize that several potentially deadly diseases are just a plane ride, or playground, away—and that vaccines really do save lives.

I don’t disagree with any of that but I’ll now directly quote comment No.2 left after the PLoS article. A comment posted by a user called ‘bensmyson’ (and already I’m sure the battle hardened amongst us have recognised the type of person with a username like that).

Not that anything I say matters, but vaccines are not safe. My son at 12 months received ProQuad, a MMRV, later that month Merck pulled it from the market. My normally developed child with superior language skills developed encephalitis and as a result lost all those skills and developmental milestones and regressed into what has been diagnosed as autism. I know they aren’t safe because my son suffered a brain injury as a result. According to VAERS, 8 people have died because of ProQuad, Merck filed two of those reports themselves.

I’m not a scientist, just a parent of a child that got lost immediately after his 12 month vaccines.

With all due respect to the PLoS article which I really did enjoy reading and made very good points, I think the main point they either missed or that they are too polite to state out loud is that quite a lot of people _really don’t want_ to think it wasn’t vaccines.

The quoted comment demonstrates a lot of the hallmarks of what I think of as a sub-genre of anti-vaccine ideology – the autism antivaxer.

1) The immediate portrayal of themselves (not their child you’ll note) in the role of victim (‘Not that anything I say matters…’)
2) A coincidental regression into autism following vaccination with overtones of fault on the behalf of a vaccine maker/doctor/scientist
3) A statement that they _know_ (not think, not believe, not ‘are sure’) vaccines aren’t safe because their child _was_ damaged ) _as a result_ (‘I know they aren’t safe because…’) of having one. Note the lack of any sort of logic or requirement for evidence.
5) A reliance on a ‘sciency’ sounding method of backup which in reality offers no such thing (‘According to VAERS…’)
6) An emotive sign off with an appeal to false knowledge (‘I’m not a scientist, just a parent…’)

These are people who have spent a long time online and offline sharing time with other people of a like mind. They have stopped thinking critically and have started thinking communally. Stepping away from the voice of the community would be dangerous for both their continuing friendships and also for their own state of mind, therefore it is easier all round to simply lock out everything that presents any sort of difficulty or challenge to their belief system. If PLoS or anyone else thinks that these people (those clinging to doubt about vaccines) ‘may come to realize that several potentially deadly diseases are just a plane ride, or playground, away—and that vaccines really do save lives.’ then I’m afraid they are deluding themselves. I’ve had conversations with people just like ‘bensmyson’. Here’s a choice quote from one such debate from Twitter:

kids without #vaccinations more likely to get whooping cough. isn’t that better than getting shot up with #antifreeze ?

Doesn’t that make your head hurt just reading it? This person is happy to announce that:

1) There is anti-freeze in vaccines, which there most definitely is not.
2) Its better to get whooping cough than a DTP jab. I wonder if the poor parents of Dana McCaffery feel that way?
3) The reason its better to get whooping cough (a potentially fatal illness) is that the vaccine has antifreeze in it (which it doesn’t).

The level of arrogance, conspiracy mongering, self-pity and anger amongst too many of these people is so very much more than the PLoS article accounts for. Good as the article is, I fear its far too early to begin the dissection of this stage of the recent past.

Edited for typos via email by Sully. Ta 😉

Dr Jay Gordon, HIPAA violation? Really?

23 Apr

We’re back to the Huffington Post again and this time rather than Jenny McCarthy’s boyfriend, we’re talking about Jenny McCarthy’s son’s doctor Dr Jay Gordon.

He recently blogged about an LA Times piece by fellow medical man Dr Rahul Parikh. In his piece Parikh said:

One night, we admitted a 9-month-old girl who was having trouble breathing. She arrived with her parents — Mom in tears and Dad tense with worry. Her parents were movie stars from a Hollywood borough who…needed nothing. In a way, they had chosen “nothing” for their daughter from the time she was born — refusing all vaccines for her.

From this information alone Dr Gordon decided that Dr Parikh:

…commits ethics and HIPAA violations so egregious that the Medical Board must take him to task

Interesting, I thought as I read on…

Dr. Parikh is a well-published medical author and blogger and he speaks of a patient he saw as an intern in the year 2000 at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. (His bio on many sites lets you know that year.) He identifies the parents, their unique profession and their child’s age and illness. This family can be identified by anyone who can use Google.

I was confused by now – Parikh hadn’t mentioned the year (in fact *Gordon himself* did!), he hadn’t identified the parents and as for their ‘unique profession’…how is being a movie star from Hollywood in any way unique? Surely Hollywood is full of movie stars? I mean, I’m a Brit so maybe I’m just buying into a cliché – are there really not many movie stars in Hollywood? And as for identifying the child’s age and illness – a 9 month old with a repository infection? Is that massively uncommon? I don’t think it is.

I stopped reading at that point as I have never been Dr Gordon’s biggest fan. He lacks the balls to tell Jenny McCarthy she’s wrong about there being anti-freeze in vaccines (silliness repeated by Jim Carrey yesterday) amongst other things. I was now more interested in this ‘ethics and HIPAA violation’.

False modesty aside I’m pretty good at digging at information on search engines and try as I could (and I really did try), based on the info in Parikh’s piece, I could not for the life of me identify who the movie stars were whos daughter was ill. I still can’t.

However, finding out what constitutes a HIPAA violation in terms of identifiable data was very much easier. I hit gold on my first search. According to the site ‘Lawyers and HIPAA‘ a violation occurs when health information is made public – here’s the paragraph on health information and its public release:

Individually identifiable health information is information that is a subset of health information, including demographic information collected from an individual, and:

(1) Is created or received by a health care provider, health plan, employer, or health care clearinghouse; and

(2) Relates to the past, present, or future physical or mental health or condition of an individual; the provision of health care to an individual; or the past, present, or future payment for the provision of health care to an individual; and

(i) That identifies the individual; or

(ii) With respect to which there is a reasonable basis to believe the information can be used to identify the individual.

I simply cannot see how Jay Gordon realistically believes that the information in Rahul Parikh’s LA Times piece meets that criteria.

Update: I see Autism News Beat has covered this also. In the comments Dr Gordon appears and says:

Good points. I’ve removed the nastier comments in the HuffPo piece. The Internet lends itself to false bravado and unpleasant ad hominem attacks [please see above 🙂 ] and I have to work on not being part of that problem.

I stand by my original unhappiness at the inaccurate proclamation of whooping cough

Yet when I return to Dr Gordon’s Huffington Post entry, I still see the references to HIPAA violations. Does Dr Gordon really believe that Dr Parikh’s article is full of HIPAA violations? Yes, I’m a Brit and no, I’m not a lawyer but my common sense tells me that Dr Gordon is playing with fire here. Lets hope for Dr Gordon’s sake that Dr Parikh is not going to sue for defamation. According to Autism News Beat that would be distinctly on the cards.

All change

9 Apr

A new design (more a realign than a redesign really) for LBRB and the alteration of some functionality.

The biggest change in functionality is that from now on you’ll be offered the chance to sign in to comment. In order to make this as easy as possible I’ve signed up with the RPX service which allows LB/RB to offer you several easy passwordless ways to comment. If you have a Facebook, GMail, Yahoo, Flickr etc etc account then you no longer need to do anything but click. This does not store your passwords anywhere, its simply an easy way for technology to talk to each other to make life easier for you the user. If you’re still not happy with that you can still elect to sign in anonymously. The biggest advantage for LB/RB for doing this is making the site harder to spam.

The biggest change in interface is I guess the ad placeholders. LB/RB has to bow to the inevitable and do all it can to get some money through the door. But please rest assured the ads will be vetted and will not feature anything contrary to the editorial direction of this site. Its the first time in its nigh on 6 years online adverts have been placed. A necessary evil I guess.

If you have a Gravatar your goods will be displayed 🙂 If you don’t – go get one!

Its been made easy for you to add LB/RB to various Social Networking apps and sites. If we’ve missed one out your want to see please contact us.

Efforts have been made to make the site work primarily on Firefox, IE6, 7 and 8, Opera, Chrome and Safari. There are still some very minor niggles in IE6 but mainly we’re good to go. I’m also aware that Archives aren’t available right now.

You might also note that there is no search box. There’s a reason for this 🙂 keep watching the top right column just above the block of four ads.

Go and play with it, you won’t break it and if you do or you find a bug please contact us.

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