Goodbye IR Watch?

Goodbye IRW. That’s right. After few years, IR Watch – The Newsletter has come to an end. Thank you for the memories.

Well, not exactly.

Welcome to the new version of IR Watch.

As mentioned in previous issues of IRW, we have redesigned the newsletter to conform to our changing times and needs. Instead of a single, long article about an IR topic, the new version consists of short sections. The main section is reserved for a two-page article about a topic at the interface of IR, data mining, and intelligence.

The other sections are intended to be powered by readers. This means that readers of IRW, IR Thoughts, and Mi Islita.com can submit material for inclusion in the newsletter. Three type of submissions are available:

One-page articles
Nominations and Recommendations
Event Announcements

The following sections are available

Featuring Article – Main article on IR and data mining. Submit one.
Who is Who in IR – Nominate your favorite IR scientists with a short bio.
CS Departments – Feature your favorite Computer Science department.
Theses – For students, by students. Recommend a graduate thesis on IR or Data Mining.
Calls and Events – This section is reserved for call for papers and event announcements.
Blogs – For bloggers, by bloggers. Recommend an IR or DM blog for inclusion in the following categories: blog directories, organization blogs, researcher blogs, student blogs.

All these informational services are free.

We might be testing other sections as well. As its predecessor, subscriptions are free of charge, at least for the time being. The first issue of the new IRW goes out in October 1, 2008.

Over the years, readers have requested back issues. To cover operational costs, we have been forced to institute a $20 fee for any back issue request. Back issues of the old IRW are also available for the same price.

Another feature of the newsletter is the announcement of illustrated tutorials on IR and DM in …(shocking!) EXCEL. The spreadsheet templates do all the math, so tutorial users won’t have to.

Stay tuned for additional details, because there are more reasons for subscribing to IRW.

IPAM Upcoming Workshops

IPAM (Institute of Pure and Applied Mathematics at UCLA) sent us the current schedule for the upcoming workshop seminars. Back in January, 2006 we attended the now famous Document Space Workshop and the experience there was a real nirvana. We had the opportunity of meeting its then director, Dr. Mark Green and few other world class researchers like Dr. Michael Berry, an expert in LSI.

IPAM now has a new director and associate director. According to them:

“Dr. Russel Caflisch, UCLA professor of mathematics, was appointed as IPAM Director on July 1, 2008. Dr. Jichun Li, an associate professor of mathematics at University of Nevada Las Vegas, joined the IPAM scientific staff in August; he will serve a two-year term as one of IPAM’s Associate Directors, along with Dr. Christian Ratsch.  Please help us welcome Dr. Caflisch and Dr. Li to IPAM!”

We highly recommend our readers that can to attend the IPAM workshops. For those interested in attending, the current schedule of events is given below.

Upcoming IPAM Long Programs:

 Each IPAM long program will involve a community of senior and junior researchers. The intent is for long-term participants to have an opportunity to learn about the topic of the program from the perspectives of many different fields and to meet a diverse group of people and have an opportunity to form new collaborations. In addition to these activities, there will be opening tutorials, four workshops (each one is listed under “upcoming workshops”), and a culminating workshop at Lake Arrowhead. Funding is available both to attend our entire 3-month program and to attend individual workshops; those interested are encouraged to apply through the website of the program that interests them.  Applications received at least six weeks in advance of the long program will receive fullest consideration.

 Internet Multi-Resolution Analysis

September 8 – December 12, 2008

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/mra2008/

 Quantum and Kinetic Transport Equations: Analysis, Computations, and New Applications

March 9 – June 12, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/kt2009/

Combinatorics: Methods and Applications in Mathematics and Computer Science

September 8 – December 11, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/cma2009/

Model and Data Hierarchies for Simulating and Understanding Climate

March 8 – June 11, 2010

Webpage will be posted soon.

Upcoming IPAM Workshops (through December 2009):

A registration form and an application for funding are available on each program’s webpage.  Applications received six weeks in advance of the workshop will receive fullest consideration.

Internet MRA Tutorials

September 9 – 12, 2008

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/mratut/

Multiscale Representation, Analysis and Modeling of Internet Data and Measurements

September 22 – 26, 2008

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/mraws1/

Applications of Internet MRA to Cyber-Security

October 13 – 17, 2008

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/mraws2/

Beyond Internet MRA: Networks of Networks

November 3 – 7, 2008

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/mraws3/

New Mathematical Frontiers in Network Multi-Resolution Analysis

November 17 – 21, 2008

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/mraws4/

Quantitative and Computational Aspects of Metric Geometry

January 12 – 16, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/mg2009/

Numerical Approaches to Quantum Many-Body Systems

January 22 – 30, 2009

(Three-day tutorials followed by five-day workshop)

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/qs2009/

Laplacian Eigenvalues and Eigenfunctions: Theory, Computation, Application

February 9 – 13, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/le2009/

Rare Events in High-Dimensional Systems

February 23 – 27, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/re2009/

Quantum and Kinetic Transport Equations: Tutorials

March 10 – 13, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/kttut/

Computational Kinetic Transport and Hybrid Methods

March 30 – April 3, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/ktws1/

The Boltzmann Equation: DiPerna-Lions Plus 20 Years

April 15 – 17, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/ktws2/

Flows and Networks in Complex Media

April 27 – May 1, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/ktws3/

Asymptotic Methods for Dissipative Particle Systems

May 18 – 22, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/ktws4/

Combinatorics Tutorials

September 9 – 16, 2009

Webpage will be posted soon.

Probabilistic Techniques and Applications

October 5 – 9, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/cmaws1/

Combinatorial Geometry

October 19 – 23, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/cmaws2/

Topics in Graphs and Hypergraphs

November 2 – 6, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/cmaws3/

Analytical Methods in Combinatorics, Additive Number Theory and Computer Science

November 16 – 20, 2009

http://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/cmaws4/

More Good Reasons for Learning JavaScript

If you are one of those folks that dislike JavaScript and do the impossible to avoid it, you probably are living in oblivious and denial. If you are one of those that think the language is just client-side, I have some news for you:

Good reasons for start learning JavaScript are:

1. JAXER

This is the first AJAX Server. HTML, JavaScript, CSS, XMLHTTPRequests, JSON, DOM, scripting, etc are native to JAXER. It has access to databases, files, networking, logging, process management, scalability, security, integration API, PHP, Rubi, etc.

Check http://www.aptana.com/jaxer

2. GOOGLE CHROME BROWSER

Built on JavaScript and other technologies, this is the long awaiting Google’s Browser to rival IE and Firefox’s dominance. How does running native code sound to you?

Check http://www.google.com/googlebooks/chrome/

Also check http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/09/fresh-take-on-browser.html

3. ADOBE AIR

Adobe’s Integrated Runtime applications can be developed with AJAX and HTML.

Check http://livedocs.adobe.com/labs/air/1/jslr/

Direct-to-Consumer Drug Advertising: A Waste?

According to these news articles.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/29/AR2008082902646.html

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5iQtDzzee581Ixc7sEbUjWFvcMwjg

direct-to-consumer advertising (DTC ads) of drugs through TV, Internet, and other media channels is an about $5B big waste of money. DTC ads, the study finds out, is based on scant data that has a small effect on the sales of drugs.

Prescription drugs are not like selling aspirin, cereal, or popcorn.

Stephen Soumerai, head of the research group that worked on the study thinks DTC advertising has failed because the process of buying prescription drugs is not like buying over-the-counter medication.

According to Soumerai, a person has to see an ad, get motivated, contact their doctor, show up for an appointment, communicate both the condition and the drug, convince the doctor to prescribe it, and then actually fill the prescription, which is also likely to carry an out-of-pocket cost.

It is certainly not a waste for modern snakeoil sellers (marketers, spammers, and scammers) that eat from the $5B pie. Same pattern as usual: theories made out of thin air and scant data.

I will not be surprise if they soon send a paid researcher or someone with vested interests to write a rebuttal.