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Source: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/google-revamps-flu-trends-after-it-overestimated-illness/
CBS NewsNovember 3, 2014, 1:49 PM
Google revamps Flu Trends after it overestimated illness
Google says it is revamping its online flu tracking system after it vastly overestimated the number of U.S. flu cases in recent seasons...
..."We hypothesized that concerned people were reacting to heightened media coverage," Google researchers wrote. The algorithm was designed to take into account short-term spikes in search traffic based on media coverage, but Google wasn't expecting the effect to last all season.
This prompted them to revise the algorithm last year "to insulate the model from this type of media influence." The 2013-2014 Flu Trends data proved somewhat better, the company said without releasing specific figures, but it still saw room for improvement.
So for the upcoming flu season, Google now says it will incorporate CDC data on confirmed flu cases into its calculations as the season progresses, to try to get more valid results and counteract the effect of too many "worried well" people doing flu searches...
CBS NewsNovember 3, 2014, 1:49 PM
Google revamps Flu Trends after it overestimated illness
Google says it is revamping its online flu tracking system after it vastly overestimated the number of U.S. flu cases in recent seasons...
..."We hypothesized that concerned people were reacting to heightened media coverage," Google researchers wrote. The algorithm was designed to take into account short-term spikes in search traffic based on media coverage, but Google wasn't expecting the effect to last all season.
This prompted them to revise the algorithm last year "to insulate the model from this type of media influence." The 2013-2014 Flu Trends data proved somewhat better, the company said without releasing specific figures, but it still saw room for improvement.
So for the upcoming flu season, Google now says it will incorporate CDC data on confirmed flu cases into its calculations as the season progresses, to try to get more valid results and counteract the effect of too many "worried well" people doing flu searches...