One of the things I learned last year at the Digital Pharma conference, is that I was not alone in my frustrations and impatience with the pharma industry to adopt Web 2.0 platforms, such as blogging, podcasts, etc.

Some of the biggest barriers holding the industry back are the regulatory and legal implications of having “open conversations” with consumer/professional audiences — the very thing that empowers other industries that are not held to the same regulations.

Blogging-specific issues include: libelous content, privacy issues, IP, fair balanced statements, editorial control, and of course the biggest one on the list, adverse event reporting.

So, when Johnson & Johnson (J&J) first launched their corporate blog — JNJBTW.com — in June 2007, it was heralded as “pioneering” and created a buzz as an industry-first foray into the Web 2.0 world of blogging, even though blogs have been around for a long time.

As shared by Marc Monseau (blog editor, JNJBTW.com) at the Digital Pharma conference, part of the success/benefits they found with starting the blog included the ability to tell their own story, to join-in the “real conversation” that their audiences were having, and even to help them navigate through tough situations.

So, building on the success of the their first blog, Centocor — a J&J subsidiary — has now launched their own corporate blog, called CNTO411.com. Here’s what they say about their blog:

Welcome to CNTO411, the Centocor corporate blog.

We have started this blog because there are so many interesting things happening at our company, in our industry, and around immunology. Although you can read about these things in the news or on other blogs, we want to join the conversation because we have much to say on the matter.

On this blog there will be discussion about Centocor – what we are doing, how we are doing it, and why. There will be comments on the news about our company and the industry – we may need to correct mistakes or put news into context. We will try to talk about these things as they relate to Centocor business. But bear in mind, the comments will be based on my and other guest authors’ personal opinions and points of view, not necessarily that of the entire company.

Because our industry is highly regulated, there are many things we won’t be able to talk about, but we will try to tell you what those are and why we can’t comment. We will not comment on Centocor product-specific news or issues. Nor will we comment on information that is not consistent with the FDA approval for our products. If company news is not yet public or falls within confidentiality obligations, we won’t discuss it. Neither competitor products nor issues will be discussed.

The references and links we post will be those that the editor and authors select, and do not imply any endorsement. We will include links and references to our postings to help bring in the various viewpoints and voices to add to our own.

This blog will be professional, it will be fair, and above all else, it will engage us in conversations about what’s important in our business of healthcare, biotechnology, and immunology.

PharmExec.com has a pretty good write up about the blog and here’s some comments from their article:

“This is not going to be a marketing blog,” [Michael Parks, vice president of corporate communications at Centocor] said. “This is not going to be a site where we predominantly talk about our products. It’s something we want to use to talk about Centocor, but really to talk about the company in the context of the industry that we find ourselves in.”

That conversation is going to be a two-way one thanks to the inclusion of a comments section—a feature that can cause more harm than good if a conversation turns heated. Or even worse—off-label.

“That is the biggest challenge for us,” Parks said. “I really do not want to censor. This blog really should be the voice and personality of Centocor. To that end, we want to make sure that we are posting and voicing the opinions of the people who have an interest in the industry and Centocor. Whether it’s good or bad, we are going to post it.”

Or maybe not. The blog’s comments policy states that comments relating to Centocor products will not be posted. Neither will comments on topics other than those originally posted about, comments about legal and regulatory matters, nor anything that falls outside of mainstream science.

On the design side, the team found an interesting way of incorporating fair balance into the site. In the inaugural post, a mention of Remicade—the companies top biologics drug—features a pop-up Web component. Hover over the name of the drug for a second and a tiny window featuring the drug’s fair balance information appears.

“We don’t want to overburden the blog, aesthetically, with all of the safety information, but we make sure that it meets all the appropriate legal and regulatory rules that we have,” Parks said.

I hope to cover this blog in more detail soon, but in the mean time, feel free to visit CNTO411.com or subscribe to their RSS Feed.