Keynote Talks

Abstract:

Context is the most influential signal in analysing human behaviours. Effective and efficient techniques for analysing contexts inherent in the spatio-temporal sensor data from the urban environment are paramount. It is important to observe and learn the context from which the data is generated in, particularly when dealing with heterogenous high-dimensional data from individuals and groups of users, generated either from personal devices or sensors embedded in buildings, cities, and urban areas.

One main challenge in modelling user activities in urban areas is to discover meaningful correlations among the numerous sensor channels and other types of data from multiple domains. Data-driven models need to also reflect on the personalised behaviours of different users. On the other side of the coin, often data is generated by many companies without any information of individuals. However the analysis still needs to reflect different activity profiles.

I will present our generic temporal segmentation techniques that we have used for multiple applications. A new concept of cyber, physical, social contexts will be introduced, and how they translate in various domain applications of our research for analysing occupant behaviours, and for personalised intelligent assistants.

Finally, the data-driven models can be used as input for recommender systems for individuals and/or groups, and for optimising the routes and/or itineraries in multiple applications, from visitors in a shopping mall, to travelling parking inspectors and police officers.

Bio:

Flora Salim is an Associate Professor at the Computer Science and IT (CSIT) discipline, School of Science, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia, and a Deputy Director of the RMIT Centre for Information Discovery and Data Analytics (CIDDA). She leads the Context Recognition and Urban Intelligence group in CIDDA. A/Prof. Flora's research interests include context-aware situational intelligence and spatio-temporal analysis, specifically in human mobility tracking, context and behaviour modelling, time-series prediction, and cross-domain data fusion and learning. She obtained her PhD from Monash University in 2009.

She has received numerous awards for her work, including the Humboldt-Bayer Research Fellowship by Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and the Bayer Science & Education Foundation in 2019, Humboldt Fellowship for experienced researcher, Victoria Fellow 2018 (awarded by the Victorian government), the RMIT Vice-Chancellor's Award for Research Excellence – Early Career Researcher 2016; the RMIT Award for Research Impact - Technology 2018; Victorian iAwards (2014), Australian Research Council (ARC) Postdoctoral Research Industry Fellow (2012-2015); IBM Smarter Planet Industry Skills Innovation Award (2010); and a Google Anita Borg Scholar (2008).

Prior to her faculty appointment in CSIT, she was a postdoc in the Spatial Information Architecture Lab, part of the RMIT School of Architecture and Design, working on multiple design modelling and optimisation problems in architecture, engineering, and construction projects. Prior to her PhD, she was a Senior Software Engineer in mediaproxy, developing realtime signal and content monitoring solutions for TV & broadcasting companies.

She is an Associate Editor of the PACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies (IMWUT) and an Area Editor of Pervasive and Mobile Computing.

Abstract:

Is artificial intelligence (AI) taking over the world? Are humans losing out to AI in the work place?

We are at a point in history, where it seems feasible that we create technologies that could become smarter than humans. This raises the fundamental question of what roles humans play in a future world. I argue that by using these advances in technologies and in particular in sensing and AI we can amplify human perception and cognition to levels that we could never before in history even imagine.

We are at the beginning of this fundamental transformation: the use of digital tools to amplify the mind. Many products, ranging from mobile access to search engines, to wearable devices for lifelogging and augmented realty application give us first indications of this transition.

In our research we create novel digital technologies that systematically explore how to enhance human cognition and perception. Our experimental approach is to: first, understand the users in their context as well as the potential for enhancement. Second, we create innovative interventions that provide functionality that amplifies human capabilities. And third, we empirically evaluate and quantify the enhancement that is gained by these developments.

It is exciting to see how ultimately these new ubiquitous computing technologies have the potential for overcoming fundamental limitations in human perception and cognition and lead the way for creating cognitive and perceptual super powers. If we succeed to create technologies that seamlessly amplify human cognition and perception, humans augmented with these technologies will outsmart artificial intelligence.

Bio:

Albrecht Schmidt is a professor for User Centered Ubiquitous Media in the Computer Science Department at the Ludwig-Maximilians Universität München (LMU Munich). He studied computer science in Ulm, Germany and Manchester, UK and receive in 2003 a PhD from the Lancaster University in the UK. For the last 15 years Albrecht has been dedicated to creating usable interactive systems and he coined the term “implicit interaction”.

The focus of his current work is on novel user interfaces to enhance and amplify human cognition. He is working on interaction techniques and interactive applications in the context of mobile and ubiquitous computing.

He is co-founder of the ACM conference on Tangible and Embedded Interaction (TEI), initiated the ACM conference on Automotive User Interfaces and co-chaired the ACM SIGCHI program in 2014. He is on the editorial board of ACM ToCHI and edits a forum on interaction technologies in the ACM Interactions magazine.

In 2016 Albrecht Schmidt received a ERC Consolidator Grant to work on the Project “AMPLIFY: Amplifying Human Perception Through Interactive Digital Technologies”.

Abstract:

In this talk, we consider Collective Intelligence (CI) systems from an organizational perspective. CI systems offer a solution to problems that need cognitive skills, problem-solving capabilities, knowledge, know-how or experience at large scale. They help to facilitate and streamline large-scale problem-solving endeavours. The organizational perspective on CI systems offers us two strands of discussion. On the one hand, it can be about understanding the potential of CI systems for today's organizations. On the other hand, CI systems can be considered as organizations themselves and can be investigated as such.

We start by reviewing the state-of-the art of CI frameworks. What are the essential building blocks of a CI system? Who uses them? For what, how and why? We come up with a generalized framework that serves us as a basis for further investigations.

From a governance perspective, today's organizations are recursive-feedback control systems, usually expressed in the form of process-oriented management. A deeper look reveals a plethora of different styles of organizational culture. Still, viable organizations have in common certain essential sub systems, which are policy making, external and internal steering, the primary activities and an informational backbone. How can we exploit CI systems to support these organizational building blocks? Can CI systems be made an integral part of organizations to make them more stable towards distortions; more adaptive towards an ever changing environment; more agile towards the organization's innovative potential? Answers to such questions would free CI systems from being niche players in certain large-scale problem-solving initiatives.

Reflecting back from the potential of CI systems in today's organizations, we ask: what can be learned with respect to the design and implementation of future CI systems; and: how to break the silos, i.e., how to integrate them with latest computing resources such as big data and the data science toolkit?

Bio:

Dirk Draheim is full professor of information systems and head of the Information System Group at Tallinn University of Technology. Dirk holds a Diploma in computer science from Technische Universität Berlin, a PhD from Freie Universität Berlin and a habilitation from the University of Mannheim. Until 2006, he worked as a Researcher at Freie Universität Berlin. From 2006-2008, he was area manager for database systems at the Software Competence Center Hagenberg, Austria. From 2008-2016 he was head of the data center of the University of Innsbruck and, in parallel, Adjunct Reader at the Faculty of Information Systems of the University of Mannheim. Dirk is co-author of the Springer book "Form-Oriented Analysis" and author of the Springer books "Business Process Technology", "Semantics of the Probabilistic Typed Lambda Calculus" and "Generalized Jeffrey Conditionalization". His research interest is the design and implementation of large-scale information systems.