The most recent update to the SM-i marks its move from BoringEM to ALiEM and expansion to 60 websites (up from 45 in August and 25 in June). I felt the move was necessary because ALiEM’s mission is more consistent with and appropriate for the SM-i’s purpose than BoringEM. I plan to continue its expansion with every iteration and will focus on adding websites that post open-access emergency medicine (pediatric and adult) and critical care content. Updates will occur every 2-3 months.
SM-i Details
The SM-i is a comparative index derived from easily obtainable measures including: Google PageRank, Alexa Rank, Twitter Followers (of the most prominent regular contributor), Facebook Likes (site-specific) and Google+ Followers (site-specific). The formula used for the derivation of the index is on the SM-i Page.
The most prominent criticism that I have heard of the index is that “just because something is popular, does not mean it is good – and this is measuring popularity.”
The Update
The Top of the Chart
The top of the chart is still dominated by “The Big 3” (LITFL, EMCrit and ALiEM). The SM-i gain by ALiEM (#3) appears fairly dramatic, but it is almost entirely due to the correction of their Alexa rank (their previous rank was lost when they changed domain names). ALiEM passing EMCrit (#2) on this indicator is what caused EMCrit’s 28 point drop. Interestingly, the PageRank crown was taken by two established websites (The NNT (#10) and BestBETs (#11)) that were indexed for the first time.
Exciting new sites
There were some huge debuts! Specifically, REBEL EM (#21) and Don’t Forget the Bubbles (#25) came out with a bang jumping into the top half of the SM-i. REBEL EM has done an impressive job of engaging users across Facebook, Twitter and Google+ in a very short period of time. Don’t Forget the Bubbles is must be getting themselves traffic with good search engine optimization (SEO) – their Alexa ranking reached the top 4 only a couple months after launch. Both of these sites were held back by the slow-poke of the online world, PageRank. Neither of them have been ranked yet so they received the undeserved score of zero. Had the Index been calculated using only the 4 faster indicators REBEL EM would have moved to #15 and Don’t Forget the Bubbles to #17. Expect to see them there or higher next edition.
Overall downward trend
The problem with adding additional sites every iteration of the SM-i is that sites already on the index often see their rankings drop. Fortunately, that will become less apparent as more sites are added. Eventually I hope any drops in ranking result from other sites raising the bar and not simply because more were added.
Moving Forward
I look forward to seeing greater discussion about the SM-i, its usefulness (or lack of usefulness) and how it can be improved.
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