A new study by Microsoft researchers has revealed that users searching for medical information online can often lead to more anxiety, as they tend to misdiagnose themselves.

Ryen White and Eric Horvitz from Microsoft Research conducted the study by looking at the effect of medical information on Internet users. The found people tend to believe they are sicker than they actually are after reading information about symptoms.

“The web has the potential to increase the anxieties of people who have little or no medical training, especially when web search is employed as a diagnostic procedure,” the researchers wrote.

“We use the term ‘cyberchondria’ to refer to the unfounded escalation of concerns about common symptomatology, based on the review of search results and literature on the web.”

Examples included people with headaches diagnosing themselves with brain tumors and chest pains as a heart attack.

The researchers focused on the results of searches on health related Web sites and also examined more than 500 Microsoft employees about the results of their health searches.

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers has announced that Internet advertising revenues reached almost $5.9 billion for the third quarter of 2008, representing an 11 percent increase over the same period in 2007.

The Q3 2008 figures are 2 percent higher than the Q2 results. Set against economic challenges in the U.S. economy, Q3’s $5.9 billion represents the second highest quarter results ever, which is encouraging for online advertising.

For the first nine months of 2008, revenues totaled $17.3 billion, up from the $15.2 billion in the same period a year ago and surpassing the record set in the first nine months of 2007 by nearly 14 percent.

“The growth of interactive advertising that we’ve been experiencing over the past few years has stabilized due in large part to the difficult current economic climate,” said Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO of the IAB.

“Interactive advertising continues to be the most measurable and cost-effective way to reach consumers, and we see more and more marketers seeking to harness its power.”

David Silverman, a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, added that, “a weakening economy will continue to be a challenge to all forms of advertising-supported media. However, the Internet should be better poised to withstand the storm given its ability to combine performance-based advertising along with broad-based branding.”

Online visits to U.K., French and German financial news sites in September during the height of the global financial crisis saw a significant increase in traffic, according to comScore World Metrix.

“Because of the immediacy in reporting real-time fluctuations in the financial markets, Europeans have become increasingly reliant on financial news Web sites for the most up-to-the minute information,” said Herve Le Jouan, Managing Director, comScore Europe.

“With European and world markets exhibiting such volatility, the Internet has proven itself to be the go-to resource for those with a vested interest in the markets, as well as concerned consumers generally.”

The financial news category grew 10 percent to 8.8 million visitors in September 2008 from the previous month. The fastest gaining site, Guardian Business, had a 141 percent increase to 374,000 visitors, followed by Sky Money (up 122%), CNN Money (up 103%) and Bloomberg.com (up 60%). BBC News, the largest site in the category, grew 51 percent to 2.5 million visitors, a net increase of 800,000 visitors compared to the previous month.

In France, the financial news category grew 9 percent to 6.4 million visitors in September versus August and is up 7 percent compared to a year ago. The fastest gaining site was Boursier.com, which had a 107 percent increase over August with 526,000 unique visitors, followed by Lexpansion.com (up 97%), Capital Magazin (up 96%) and Lemoneymag.fr (up 90%).

In Germany, the financial news category grew at a slightly slower rate of 3 percent to 4.9 million visitors in September. The fastest gaining site was Manager-Magazin.de, which saw its audience increase 39 percent to 471,000 visitors, followed by AOL Money & Finance (up35%), Finanztreff.de (up34%) and T-Online.de Finance (up 29%).

AOL has launched a new hyper-local online event guide called when.com that allows users to search and browse for a variety of activities in their local area, including kids and family events, community activities, live performances, sporting events and others.

Each event listing includes detailed information, reviews, maps and directions from MapQuest, along with links to purchase tickets when applicable. Users can also bookmark events or add them to Their AOL, Google, Outlook or Yahoo Calendar.

“Whether you’re looking for events that are suitable for the whole family, something to do on a Friday night or ways to entertain out of town guests, when.com makes it easy for users to find where to go and what to do in their community or places they are traveling to,” said Chris Spanos, General Manager of AOL Local and Search Verticals.

“When.com is also a powerful way for event organizers and advertisers to reach and connect with a targeted audience by providing them the ability to quickly and easily submit their events right from the when.com homepage.”

Events on when.com are searchable by time (today, tomorrow, next seven days), type (Arts & Crafts, Community) and by geographic area. Users can browse through events by using navigation tabs along the top and left-hand side of the page, or search for events by using the search box at the top of the page.

Event organizers can list their events for free when they create a when.com account.

AOL says in the coming weeks new features will be rolled out to when.com, including a widget that can be added to any social networking page. “MyWhen” feature will allow users to save events to their own when.com calendar and receive alerts and reminders about upcoming events.