Through the bravery and efforts of people such as our good friend Drew Olanoff and the LIVESTRONG campaign, many social media users are much more aware of cancer and what this disease does to the body, mind, soul and community. Today, on World AIDS Day, we'd like to direct your attention to a few folks on the social web who are facing lives with HIV/AIDS and have made the same brave choice to share that experience with the rest of us. Read on for bits and pieces of their stories as well as feeds and lists that will keep their struggles and triumphs in your thoughts. Sponsor Shawn Decker's ShawnandGwenn.com Decker, who is a public speaker educator and advocate, blogs with girlfriend Gwenn Barringer about his own struggles with the virus and the challenges of being in an HIV-asymmetrical couple. With the success I've had keeping my numbers stable, I broached the topic of trying one week on, two weeks off meds... My reason for wanting a longer break has been absent-mindedness and lethargy... It's especially frustrating on the days when things just aren't clicking in the old nugget; like when I wake up feeling exhausted instead of rested or, in the middle of a shower, I wonder if I've already washed my hair or not. This tends to happen after a couple of days on meds. Steve Schalchlin's Bonus Round Schalchlin is one of the first HIV/AIDS bloggers, beginning his blog in 1996. Also a songwriter, Schalchlin put his story into music that his partner, playwright Jim Brochu, turned into The Last Session , a musical about a man's struggle with AIDS. In Flash Forward, some of the characters are saying, "The future saved me." I remember when I could see my future. And like this character, there was a certain comfort in knowing I had only just so much time and no more. I'm reminded of the old Chinese saying about how a child who dies has the longest life and an old man, the shortest. I know that that state of mind, of perfect freedom, is available. I know it is because it's only a state of mind. Having gone there, I know what it feels and tastes and smells like. The question is whether I have to know when I'm gonna die to get there again. Kenn Chaplin's My Journey With AIDS Chaplin is a blogger who faces AIDS and is a survivor of childhood and adult trauma and adult-diagnosed mental illness. When diagnosed with HIV in 1989, and AIDS a few years later, it was suggested that I probably had a maximum of ten years to live. In fact I did nearly die of cryptospoidiosis which my doctor still talks about with a sense of marvel. It only seemed logical that I should accept the reality, with countless friends dying around me, and try to live into death with as much grace as I could muster. What I asserted was realism some friends took to be pessimism. One I think of in particular eventually drifted away as, it seems to me, she could neither tolerate what I believed to be reasonable thoughts of dying nor the fact that my health was, to her, no longer of imminent concern. James McLarty-Lopez's Still Arriving McLarty-Lopez is a young, recently married gay man. His blog references medications he takes, side effects he experiences and his general feelings about this part of his life. Chad and I last night were discussing Justin's passing. While very sad it was only a matter of time... I have been tired many times. I have been weak many times. However, through the times in the valley I have always said "I want to live." In comparison, Justin too said he wanted to live, the difference being, he waited far too late to make that decision. He was only 24 and ravaged with HIV and AIDS defining illnesses. Who knows why Justin never really sought treatment? Perhaps the stigma of having HIV stopped him. Perhaps he just didn't want to have to acknowledge the fact he had it. The only person who could have answered that is gone. Speculation will neither ease the pain nor bring him back. Now it's about remembering his smile and moving on with the lesson of I want to live. To subscribe to a 12-blog feed of blogs from folks living with and writing about HIV/AIDS, click here . Also, we've put together a Twitter list of people who live with HIV/AIDS and people who medically treat, advocate for and work with HIV/AIDS sufferers. What better way to observe World AIDS Day than by actually reading the words and understanding the challenges of those who actually live with AIDS or HIV and are unashamed and courageous enough to share those stories with us? Discuss

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Positively Social: Blogging & Tweeting with AIDS/HIV

In a recent post on Twitter's new geolocation feature and the kinds of apps it would allow developers to create, we received a comment from Bob Hitching telling us to check out GeoMeme . GeoMeme is Hitching's side project , a real-time web app and also a location-aware mobile web app for iPhone and Android phones. It allows users to see and compare trends in specific locations; for example, you could see the most tweeted-about musicians performing at an award show or the most-tweeted political buzzwords in a given state or town. Sponsor Here's how it works: Users choose a location on the map (powered by Google Maps), and they select from the list of current trending Twitter topics or type in two search terms to compare. GeoMeme then measures and compares the number of matching tweets within the stated geographical area based on public data from a number of geotagged tweets from mobile Twitter apps. For example, on this Sunday evening, we can see that the Vikings are beating the Bears... in Twitter mentions in Minneapolis, at least: The app might also be interesting for brands. We can see here that legendary local burger chain In N Out wins over Carl's Jr. in Twitter mentions in Los Angeles: We can also use the app to check the pulse of holiday revelers in New York City: It would be even cooler to see a sentiment-measuring feature; i.e., I'd like to compare tweets of the terms "liberal" and "conservative" in Virginia, then see what percent of those tweets were negative or favorable. Not all mentions of a given term are going to be good ones, after all. Take GeoMeme for a test drive in your town to see what your neighbors are tweeting about, and let us know your thoughts in the comments! Do you think that with more development, GeoMeme could be a useful tool? Discuss

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See Twitter Trends Around Your Neighborhood with GeoMeme

Between Skype, chat, texts, push news notifications and three screens of scrolling feeds, it's easy to get distracted while writing an email or post. If you've misspelled names, forgotten words or hit send prematurely on numerous occasions, then you probably just need to slow down. Rather than resorting to a life in the woods of hermit-like solitude, you could just take a few moments to think with Ommwriter . Sponsor Built by Barcelona-based design agency Herraiz Soto & Co. , Ommwriter is a gorgeous Mac download that allows users to block out other applications and focus on their writing. The company originally created Ommwriter for their own internal use but quickly realized the service's consumer appeal. Ommwriter from Herraiz Soto on Vimeo . Similar to WriteRoom , users download the writing tool and install it on their desktop. Upon opening it, you receive a distraction-free environment with just a few spartan font choices and an export feature. While WriteRoom offers a CRT monitor-style interface, Ommwriter offers a white Zen-like experience. Keystroke sounds can be replaced by plinking water or what sound like soft footsteps in snow and users can choose to play ambient music or keep their writing space dead silent. If you're the type of person who is married to iPhone editing and a large feature set for word processors, then this is not your tool. But if you just want a few moments to collect your thoughts, then this is a great way to do it. To register for this free service visit ommwriter.com . Discuss

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Ommwriter: Be Alone with Your Thoughts

Google has announced today that, just in time for holiday shopping, they are enabling local retailers to display coupons for in-store use on mobile devices of Google-searching users. Any business using Google Local Business Center can upload mobile coupon offers, and any user searching on Google.com using a mobile device can find the coupons on the businesses' Place Pages - a feature that also debuted relatively recently. Altogether, the direction the company is taking seems better for users and for local businesses, as well. Sponsor Printable coupons have long been available on Google Maps, but - let's face it - more and more consumers have abandoned the desktop/printer paradigm for a more mobile/digital approach to search, on-the-go directions, and local business research. Product manager Alex Gawley wrote on the Google Mobile blog, "With more of you going mobile to search for this information, it makes sense for coupons to go mobile too... We hope you find these mobile coupons useful and that they help you save money, trees (fewer printed coupons), and your hands (from paper cuts) when you're on the go." Place Pages for the desktop have also been revamped to ensure that mobile and printed coupons will share a common look and feel, regardless of the device, the OS, or the browser in which they originated. It will be interesting to hear and read post-holiday metrics and success (or "opportunity for improvement") stories about these new mobile coupons. While we certainly hope the setup will allow users to quickly and conveniently engage with the world around them - and we likewise hope local retailers can reach out to customers wherever they are - we wonder how many quickly the coupons will take off and how much users will be inclined to use them. Would you redeem a mobile coupon you found through Google search, and under what circumstances or conditions? Let us know your thoughts in the comments. Discuss

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Google Brings Local Business Coupons to U.S. Mobile Users

Once the service for those serious enough to pay for the privilege to post, TypePad recently released a free "Micro" service. The company made the decision to offer a free product realizing the demand for a platform more formal than Twitter and less formal than WordPress or Typepad's original product . ReadWriteWeb compared TypePad's Micro against 2 other leading light blogging tools. Below are our thoughts: Sponsor TypePad Micro : In addition to being able to blog via email, iPhone app , "Blog It" bookmarklet and the general WYSIWYG dashboard, this tool also allows users to cross post to Twitter, Friendfeed and Facebook. My only complaint with TypePad is that there are only 2 design themes to choose from. For someone like me with very little design sense, it's a long process to find something right. As well, if you'd like to add another blog or add new design themes you are required to pay for a monthly subscription service. Tumblr : This service offers users publishing via iPhone app , desktop widget, the Tumblr bookmarklet, text message, email, AIM and even via audio call-in. Tumblr's theme gallery offers hundreds of options for design . Users can also add their posts to Facebook and Twitter via the free customization. Tumblr allows users to create more than one blog and add more than one contributor for free; however, all edits show up in the same dashboard in chronological order. This means you may have to dig to revise an older post. Posterous : Posterous is the original email publishing microblog. Users can email posts, publish them via the web editor or upload them from the PicPosterous iPhone app . The service allows users to set up auto posting to Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Picasa, YouTube, Vimeo, Tumblr, Blogger, WordPress and Xanga. You can also choose to post to just one service in addition to your Posterous account by emailing flickr@posterous.com to specify Flickr or twitter@posterous.com to post to Twitter. Of the three services, Posterous offers an advantage in its ease-of-use and while it's lacked design abilities in the past, the company recently launched themes and theme import from Tumblr . Other notable light blogging services include Soup.io , Vox and Noovo . If we've missed your favorite service let us know in the comments below. Discuss

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Three Great Light Blogging Tools Compared

Our own Marshall Kirkpatrick's dreaded brain chip for controlling computers and mobile devices may be closer than even he suspected. Intel researchers in Pittsburgh told journalists today that brain implants are harnessing human brain waves to surf the Internet, manipulate documents, and much more. And just as we told you two years ago, the lucky recipients of these implants will be willing volunteers, not government-controlled guinea pigs. Some of us are now researching cheap flights to Pittsburgh. Sponsor Just think of how far we've come since the early days of portable tech. "If you told people 20 years ago that they would be carrying computers all the time," said Intel research VP Andrew Chien, "they would have said, 'I don't want that. I don't need that.' Now you can't get them to stop." Indeed, mobility, transparency, and accessibility are all the terms of the hour; and their advocates are popular laureates. The forefront of the user interface has revolved around concepts such as intuition, organics, and biology. Gesture technology is removing one barrier that lies between human-to-machine communication; think about that the next time you twirl your iPhone around like an Etch-A-Sketch. Isn't removing the need for physical contact the next rational step? Chien tells us that, although there are many challenges yet to solve, the day of brain-controlled computing isn't so far off. Dean Pomerleau works for Intel on matters of cognitive neuroscience, machine learning, computer vision, robotics, man-machine interfaces, brain processing of semantic information, and various brain-scanning technologies, such as fMRI, MEG, EEG and ECoG. He and his cohorts are solving the mechanisms of brain waves. While there's no doubt the use cases are fascinating, Pomerleau also brushes off user concerns about implants, saying, "Eventually people may be willing to be more committed... to brain implants. Imagine being able to surf the Web with the power of your thoughts." This is the precise line of thinking that Kirkpatrick debates so heatedly - perhaps as much now as he did in his editorial almost two years ago. Are concerns around user privacy abated since then? Hardly, with Facebook and location-based-tech developers struggling to maintain balance for their users and constant struggles and inquisitions over corporate storage of user data. Has the issue of information overload lessened? If it had, would so many startups be staking their claim on the issue of firehose filtration? And is mobile tech obsolete enough to require even more portable access to the apps we love and - dare I say it? - need? Are end users ready for brain implants? You tell us. Discuss

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The Brain Chip Cometh, & It Cometh from Intel

A subject of interest to us ReadWriteWeb folks this year has been smart grids - a method of delivering electricity to users' homes in a way that has been the cause of many green technologists for some time. Smart grid tech uses digital means to control appliances at users' homes to save energy, cut costs, and increase reliability. However, some experts are beginning to wonder how safe and anonymous this data is and how much end-user privacy could be compromised. Sponsor And as the concept of "anonymized" user data is continuously being poked full of holes by everyone from hackers to academics, we must wonder just how much smart grids "know" about individuals. For example, the energy fluctuations of home appliances are so unique that a smart grid can tell the make and model of a user's refrigerator. A recently released report from the Future of Privacy Foundation states that although more modernized approaches to energy consumption are absolutely necessary, uninformed enthusiasm about smart grid technology might lead to privacy breaches for end users. "The infrastructure that will support the future Smart Grid," the report reads, "will be capable of informing consumers of their day-to-day energy use, even at the appliance level. While this is beneficial and supports valuable efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions and reduce consumers' energy bills, it introduces the possibility of collecting detailed information on individual energy consumption use and patterns within the most private of places - our homes. "We must take great care not to sacrifice consumer privacy amidst an atmosphere of unbridled enthusiasm for electricity reform. Information proliferation, lax controls and insufficient oversight of this information could lead to unprecedented invasions of consumer privacy." Another report from the National Institute of Standards and Technology states that, because of the lack of standards and procedures on data collection and storage, "Distributed energy resources and smart meters will reveal information about residential consumers and activities within the house." The Foundation's co-chair, Jules Polonetsky, stated in a Washington Post interview today, "We're a little worried that without some serious planning now, there's going to be quite a challenge in a couple of years when people start realizing that maybe should think about developing some solid data retention policies that address what's going to be done with all of this data." Valid concerns, all, especially for users who would rather keep themselves, their families, and their homes "off the grid," under the radar, and largely unmonitored by corporate and governmental entities. Will user privacy be the factor that undermines cleaner, smarter energy for all? Or will smart grid companies find better ways to protect user data, just as social networks and marketing firms have had to struggle to do? Let us know your thoughts in the comments. Discuss

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Are Smart Grids Undermining User Privacy?