2017 EVENTS:
April 2017:
April 26-27, 2017:
Social Media & Web Analytics Summit
San Francisco
Social media and web analytics was organized by innovation enterprise. The participants from a variety of industries gathered together to discuss analytics in small and big data, mining data, targeting users effectively based on analyzing clean data, Machine learning, digital storytelling, social media listening and charting collections of connections in social media. Sturm talked about integrating into the digital analytic landscape. He emphasized on consistent training to get people involved in the process and driving people to the website and creating website traffic. He explained the ways of driving social media traffic to the fennel. He pointed out that Social media plays an important role and with an organic team the valuable data can be extracted. He explained MTA sprinkle implementation and training team for the future. Then the panel discussed driving action with analytics.
Marc Smith talked about social media research foundation. He explained NodeXL (Network Overview Discovery and Exploration for Excel) and the ways it helps in collecting, analyzing and visualizing complex social networks from YouTube, Twitter and Facebook. He added: “Academics, market strategists and social media managers from around the world use this tool for making a network map.”He discussed the Predictive analytics and emphasized the shift from just advertising into advertising with connectivity. About the top people tweeting about a topic, the top ten people in the list he said that they are in the middle of things and their centrality is important not the number of their tweets or number of their followers. “Influencing and influencers is not defined just by number of followers on social media.” He also pointed out that Network diagram showing negative and positive integrators that effects the stock price. “We are constantly testing and algorithms continually change.” By making many maps you can locate your brands and your competitors.” He explained the ways we could use networking and the Insight we need from social media. “If it doesn’t make network, it is not social media. Internet is human connecting machine.”
Fetters discussed Social listening strategy, Social media monitoring and Listening to all the people who say something about the specific brand. She mentioned that Social media listening is data driven. She gave the example of 17 banks that signed off on $2.5 billion loan to help the controversial oil pipeline project. The participating banks such as Citigroup, Wells Fargo, TD bank of Canada and Mizuho of Japan are under fire from the environmental groups. She insisted that First Republic bank hasn’t participated in the project but in the social media, it has been included too. The speaker mentioned that her job was to protect the reputation of her company. And she searched all the data in all websites, blogs and social media about her brand. She explained how she had contacted many of them and asked them to revise the content. She emphasized that the goal should be improving the brand reputation and she added: ” social media’s changes make the world change. The contents must be evaluated constantly.” About publishing testimonials on the website she pointed out that an extensive research on each client, their political views and their brand is necessary before publishing them on the website. “Damage control is very important.” Observepoint representative showed a video about a company in the U.K. that changed the image of their product from a square shape into the diamond shape without making any changes in the ingredients. When the participants in testing the product were asked about the difference. Most of them believed that the diamond shape had a better taste! Also he explained how the consumer groups protested and accused the company of cheating. And finally they printed both images on the packages. He pointed out that accurate data collection facing many problems. He discussed monetization opportunities on each platform and emphasized that different platforms create different social patterns. About the process of data evaluation he mentioned: “Manual evaluation takes lots of time and is not consistent.” SDL representative talked about the industry’s first cloud based machine translation platform for real time global communications. CTR Press
April 25-26, 2017:
OPEN TALK Summit 2017
San Francisco
Open Talk summit was organized by Talkdesk and its goal was discussing and reshaping ” the current trends in customer communication.” A variety of professionals from customer service and customer experience departments, business managers and center agents gathered to discuss the superior customer experience and real time communication. Using bots, Omni channel and multiple channel supports, how to improve CSAT, increasing revenue as the result of customer loyalty, turning big data into big decisions, the latest methods of agents training, empowerment of customers and the ways of establishing customers’ trust were discussed. Tunguz explained how data can be crucial in the process of decision making. He discussed the ways of managing the bad reviews in the social media. He pointed out that choosing the appropriate metrics help to boost revenue. He explained the beer game theory , impact of latency and Bullet effect. He discussed the benefits of proxy metrics: “easy to measure and correlated and predictive.” He mentioned that each customer providing huge amount of data and he added: ” not all data is valuable; companies must decide which data is valuable. And their decisions helps them to know customers behaviors.” He explained the process of providing products, marketing, sales and finally support in startups. The next panel discussed using trends for creating processes that guarantee customer success. William explained the ways of delivering better consumer services, dirty data, testing and machine learning and understanding the metrics. He emphasized: “Make sure data is put clearly and correctly and data cleansing is very important.” Another speaker from a dating website and online matchmaking explained leveraging the data and how their customers breaking their own rules all the time. She mentioned: “what they say and how they behave are quite opposite. 80% of customers have more meaningful conversations with those who doesn’t match their criteria .” She also mentioned some of them deactivating their accounts three times a week and again activating it. “But in the past they only deactivate when they found their ideal partner.” She also said: ” Some of our competitors use bots and taking human elements out and as the result people dating bots.” The panel discussed the ways of approaching the notion of data and extracting data in every step, Machine learning and its applications and obstacles in a various companies and Collecting the right data. The speaker explained Machine learning initiatives and users’ behaviors and their ways of searching and added: “machine learning speeds the process, but not everything needs AI.”
The panel discussing agents training emphasized on teaching the agent to feel empathy for customers and learners. They discussed the importance of looking for the relevancy of the program and metrics and pointed out that the training should be continuous in order to achieve the desired result. The speaker said: “We are human beings and behaving like robots is not positive.” Tobal mentioned that using the right approach to training increases customers’ loyalty and satisfaction and as the result the revenue increase. The next speaker talked about reaching customers through social media. He emphasized on being a differentiator and competing with the giants in the industry. He pointed out that meeting face to face with customers build trust. “The relationship and trust and scaling the relationship is the key. Trust is tied up with the brand.” He pointed out that in the past filling out surveys was the main way of receiving customers feedbacks, but nowadays social media and online reviews have made a huge changes. He mentioned that automation without the real human interaction cannot be effective or even useful. ” A platform cannot replace a customer service agent. And personal approach is essential for building the trust.”
In the exhibition hall, Unbabel representative explained that they remove language barriers with providing seamless and scalable translations that always involves human reviews and approval. Outreach increases connect rate by 30% and help representatives connect with the right leads at the right time. Also Front exhibitor explained: “it is the shared inbox that brings all your external communications into one place.” Fonolo founder mentioned: ” its easy to use and customer portal allows the users manage all aspects of their experience without involving the IT department.” CTR Press
April 21-23, 2017:
SILICON VALLEY Comic Con
San Jose
Silicon Valley Comic Con was about the future of humanity and discussing space exploration, robotics, science fiction, game industry, green technology and VR/AR. The exhibition halls was filled with the people with costumes and the comics, games and anime enthusiasts.There were a variety of participants: artists, actors & actresses, writers, science and tech professionals and people from entertainment industry. In the exhibition halls, some people taking virtual walks on Mars, engaging with the robots and taking part in the digital activities. Also there were different panel sessions and Q&A with professionals in science, tech and entertainment. Panels of experts discussed the ways robotics industry getting closer to making “C-3P0 less of a fantasy, and more of a reality.” Researchers and scientists from NASA discussed new and innovative technologies such as ADEPT umbrella heat shield, quantum computing and aviation. In the last decade NASA has improved heat pipes that have been adapted to medical use such as bipolar forceps that are used in brain surgery. Also rechargeable hearing aid batteries draw from NASA research. Laser based remote sensing equipment is called lidar and has so many usages such as helping archeologists ” hints of the fossils and bones hidden beneath the earth’s surface.” Also it offers free softwares in the variety of subjects including business systems and project management, system testing, structures and mechanisms, autonomous systems and data & image processing.
John Cusack, the actor of the movies: Raven, High Fidelity and Sixteen Candles took part in the interesting Q&A with his fans. He mentioned that sometimes they make dark movies and added : ” I don’t watch my own works.” About music he pointed out: ” Older music is better and it is still human; nowadays everything goes digital and lifeless.” When he was asked about the best and the worst advices he had ever been given, he said:” the best advice was: “risk as much as you can” and the worst one was ” be worried”. He also mentioned his role as a board member of Freedom of Press Foundation. He pointed out that his favorite movie was Dr Strange love. He also said:”It is better to beg for forgiveness than ask for permission.” Dr Buzz Aldrin was ” one of the first two men walked on the moon” and he mentioned he had PhD from MIT. He pointed out: ” this time we should go to Mars. He said: “The U.S. led international team should occupy the Mars.” He was an exceptionally energetic speaker at the age of 87. He showed the photo of himself on the moon and added that it was the first selfie ever. He described the 60s and how President Kennedy insisted on sending human to the space specially after the Russians had done it. ( The first woman into the space was Valentina Tereshkova in 1963). He added: “We accompanied the impossible in 1969. He repeated several times that landing and staying on Mars should be the aim.
In the exhibition hall the comic artist, Sam Coaass was busy drawing her ideas. Displaying her latest works she mentioned that her favorite one was the drawing called “the masked one”. The panel discussing the future of humanity in entertainment, talked about the movie Extinct that take place 400 years in the future. Science fiction writer mentioned that he wrote about iPad long years ago before it was made. The speaker pointed out: “Art challenges technology and technology inspires art.” There was a costume contest and one of the winners was the elegant costume of Roosevelt. Future of the brain was discussed by the neurologists. They discussed what happens when the neural implants can modulate the behaviors and thoughts. And in the case of becoming “cyborgs” “what does it really mean to be human?” CTR Press
April 19-20, 2017:
Data Visualization Summit
San Francisco
Data Visualization summit was organized by a business media company that specialized in enterprise innovations and aims to provide companies with the necessary insights for growth. Its focus is on big data, analytics, innovation, digital and finance. The designers, artists and data scientists gathered to discuss the latest innovations in data visualization. The focus was on where the art meets science. The highlight of the conference was the presentation by Irvin Almonte. He talked about Delivering data as insight through design. He started his speech by showing a graphic design of the movements of French army led by Napoleon and how that single picture could tell the viewers thousands of words in history. He explained that the concept of using images for understanding data has existed since centuries ago: from graphs in 17th century and the creation of the pie chart in early 19th century. And a perfect example is when Minard mapped Napoleon’s movements in Russia. The graph shows the size of the army and the path of Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow. This unique map helped the deep understanding of the event and is more effective and expressive than thousands of words. He mentioned a quotation by Tufte that describing it as the best statistical graphic ever drawn. He showed many magnificent examples of paintings from Da Vinci, Monet, Matisse, Pissarro and many others and explained how each picture tells us a story of the time it was painted and how they can be considered the best examples of data visualization. He discussed the concept of thinking fast and slow by Daniel Kahneman. He explained how data graphics like words can be used for deception, knowledge and manipulation. He analyzed the famous paintings and the characters’ expressions and how their expressions tells us stories. Mona Lisa expression and dynamic expression of the smile was discussed. A huge amount of data can be summarized in a meaningful way in a picture. There are many tools for data visualization. Using colors, lines and styles to create graphics that tell us stories. The charts can be used for demonstrating live data streams and providing a consistent visual output.
Jason Lockkesmoe discussed the ways of transforming education by data visualization. He explained the power of data visualization in education and Textbooks. He talked about assessment and development of new products and getting qualitative and quantitive data. He showed a picture by Rembrandt and pointed out that the same things with unstructured data and analyzing the behaviors of data can be done. He emphasized on delivering the content and finding out how effective can be. He mentioned that learning is the goal and assessment and survey are the means of measuring how effective they have been. He talked about the Product analysis of millions of learners. ” We began to do data visualization and bringing all the data together and creating the charts to understand digital footprints.” He explained that the dark data is those information that no one using it.
Humanizing data design products and how audience perceive the data was discussed by da Silva from Data story Lab. He talked about underwater mapping and how we visualize data: from static innovation design to interactive one and Service design from artist to audience. He discussed the translation of data and how everything is data and the goal should be designing and visualizing it in order to reach the audience and be understood. He pointed out that many tools available for displaying information and emphasized on the creative process of thinking, analyzing and planning. He mentioned that effective storytelling and engaging the audience and finally involving a good market is an art. According to the analytic service report by Harvard Business Review sponsored by TIBCO, discussing deployment of self service and data visualization for faster decisions, the main reason for the importance of analytics is the explosion of available data. “In many industries, external data, from analyst reports or social media, has become as important as internal data.” According to he recent surveys, 70 percent of the respondents believed having access and integrating both internal and external data can be crucial for the process of making decisions. Appen develops human annotated datasets for machine learning and artificial intelligence. It covers over 180 languages and dialects and transforms speech or image data into text. It uses human moderation of data to ensure quality control. The machine learning models need continuously optimizing algorithms. Human-generated data is high quality data. ” Humans are simply better than computers at managing subjectivity, understanding intent and coping with ambiguity.” CTR Press
April 13, 2017:
SPLUNK Live
San Francisco
The 10th annual splunk live was an educational and interactive event on data insight. Splunk educational sessions discussed splunk overview, using splunk for APM, the power of SPL, splunk enterprise for IT troubleshooting, building an analytics driven security operation center using splunk enterprise security, machine learning, end to end approach via SIEM and ransomware investigation and prevention strategies. Billy Beane talked about his experience with the strategic methodology, known as “moneyball”. This philosophy has been adopted by a variety of organizations in order to manage their assets and resources more efficiently and increasing the revenue. He explained how he managed to shape this business view and leverage big data and use analytics for achieving more effective results. He showed a video of the film that was made based on his story and played by Brad Pitt.He described how his family was excited and overdressed when they had Brad Pitt as their guest. He mentioned that people like sports because of the intensity of the emotion and they can behave irrationally and it lessens the pressure of being rational and businesslike when working. He emphasized on the data collection and data advantage and added: “it is all about skills,not just sports and athletes.” He pointed out that they made decisions based on those data and analytics and they followed the lessons learned from the data analysis.
Splunk Overview session discussed the features of Splunk Cloud and Splunk enterprise: machine learning, data analysis, Power user productivity and platform management. The speaker talked about driving operational intelligence and Digital revolution and he discussed the extent of change in the recent decade in the zweb, music, telecommunications and all aspects of technology. He discussed disruptive approach to unstructured data and compared traditional approach with splunk approach: ” in traditional approach, it is schema at write, but in splunk, it is schema at read.” He emphasized on turning machine data into business value. He explained Fully integrated enterprise platform and Searching at the real time all the machine data. The next speaker discussed data visualization. It involves creating a visual representation of data. Its primary goal is communicating information more efficiently via graphics. It helps users to analyze data and makes data more understandable. Processing and analyzing the data involving analytical challenges for the process of visualization of data.
The next speaker discussed IT service intelligence : data driven service monitoring and analytics and when the machine learning is added to it and Machine learning capabilities. He explained data augmenting and how it adds value to the data and makes it meaningful. He pointed out that data augmentation reduces human intervention and increases the quality of data. The speaker talking about Building an analytics driven security operation center using Splunk enterprise security discussed an analytics enabled SOC. He mentioned that 44% of enterprises don’t have a SOC; 51% of organizations initiated investigations one hour after threat was detected and 42% of organizations claim that they never had any significant threats. He emphasized Technology exists to serve people and processes and a big challenge is cost, especially the opportunity cost. Discussing Threat hunting he said: “lots of organizations are compromised and they don’t know it.” He said: “Tier1 people are difficult to find and retain.” He explained Automation in the SOC and emphasized: “Do more with less.” “A system makes changes in the arrangement and makes alert in IP addresses.” He added: “Security engineers are becoming programmers.” The next speaker discussed user behavior analytics that assists enterprises with detecting insider threats and targeted attacks. UBA as defined by Gartner is a cybersecurity process about detecting threats and financial frauds. Analytics tools help understanding the data that SIEM and system logs gathered. UBA was initially used in the field of marketing in order to predict consumer buying patterns, then it was found that it can be useful in the security context too. The next speaker discussed how splunk solves email phishing problem: it isolates compromised systems, disables compromised AD users, blocks phishing IP and URL, blocks phishing sender email address, eradicates malware on affected systems, forces AD password reset, recovers users and finally updates SIEM status and closes the alert. CTR Press
April 10-11, 2017:
Flink Forward 2017
San Francisco
Flink Forward was the premier conference on Apache Flink. Apache Flink is a popular system for stream data processing and it is a big data project in Apache Software Foundation. The speakers discussed the ways Enterprises use Flink, Flink system internals, ecosystem integration with Flink and future of the platform. The participants joined a variety of presentations such as stream processing with Flink, running Flink at very large scale, Flink and DC/OS, using Flink and Queryable state for high frequency time series data, Apache Beam, Flink Tensorflow, non-Flink machine learning on Flink, dynamically configured stream processing using Flink and Kafka and machine learning algorithms. The event was organized by data Artisans. Celebi from data Artisans talked about building online applications directly on streams. He showed a demo and explained the architecture, queryable state enablers and implementing and Performance of Queryable state. Keynote speaker discussed the real time analytics in the real world challenges and lessons at Uber. He explained Memsql, intelligent catching and query language and mentioned: “The system is scalable, fast and accurate, but the cost of storing data is high; but in the long run, it will be cost efficient using KAFKA.” He also discussed the situation when data explosion happened. Elizabeth Joseph talked about Flink & DC/OS and deploying Flink at scale. She mentioned: “Marathon is a default scheduler for using Mesos cluster and Introducing DC/OS solve common problems.” She added that Mesos is good for resource management and explained Communication among containers, Full stack logging. She showed a demo of Universe packages and selection of software to install and Its architecture and how it orchestrates running applications. She discussed Jason editor, Interaction with DC/OS and Flink on Apache Mesos and DC/OS. She said: “Remote container shell makes running applications easier.” She explained Unified metrics for tracking and addd: “you know when pinpointing things if anything goes wrong.” Configuration updates and upgrading that’s what her company is currently doing.
Olson from PhysIQ, Chicago talked about Using Flink and Queryable state to buffer high frequency time series data. He explained his work for the medical company and collecting data from patients and Home monitoring for patients. He explained two types of states in Flink: Keyed state and operator state.”Value state can be updated every time data comes in and gets aggregated.” He said: “every time you modify data and setting up environment If you don’t clear the state you may go to the state zero.” Seth Wiesman emphasized Not a lambda architecture and explained Databases with APIS, Window Schema, append and upsert and how it is resulted in a larger state. He said: “S3 is not agile system” and explained what happened when Flink and S3 disagreed. He pointed out: “Treat S3 like a key value store and Copy to S3 once per checkpoint.” He mentioned that while handling data skew we need to reduce the number of elements moving across the network. Dunning discussed Non- Flink Machine learning on Flink. He explained the machine learning and added: ” it is 90% logistic not learning.” He explained Database and mentioned that People click on the title, not the content. “our model was wrong and we analyzed the performance then did modeling on what people watch and finally it was improvement.” He pointed out: “If it is in the containers, it is not in the Flink.” The next speaker explained Apache Kafka and mentioned that Kafka as a distributed streaming platform lets us publish, store and process streams of records as they occur. He mentioned that building real time streaming data pipelines and applications that transform the streams of data is very important. He added Apache Flink, a distributed streaming dataflow that is written in Java and Scala. ” Flink’s pipelined runtime system enables the execution of bulk and stream processing programs.” ” programs can be written in Java, Scala, python and SQL and are automatically optimized into data flow programs that are executed in a cluster or cloud environment.”
Dean Wampler discussed streaming deep learning with Flink. He explained Challenges using Flink for deep learning and Trading models in Finance that can restart the streaming. He pointed out that dual processing in Flink is an advantage and emphasized the need of updating the model periodically. He said: “Do interference with low latency using old model.” And then he explained Deep learning 4 J and Model training VS model serving. “Deep learning 4 J is the first commercial, open source, distributed deep learning library written for Java and Scala. DL4J is used in business environment on distributed GPU and CPU.” ” Java as one of the most popular programming languages for client server web applications derives much of its syntax from C, but it has fewer low level facilities.” Grant from IBM discussed online machine learning algorithms and showed a demo. CTR Press
April 10-11, 2017:
Android Makers Conference 2017
Paris, France
Android Makers Conference gathered together the android enthusiasts, academics, tech professionals and developers from around the world to discuss the latest developments of android in over 60 sessions in both French and English languages. They talked and shared their ideas and opinions in the educational sessions. Android is a mobile operating system that is based on the Linux kernel and developed by Google. It is primarily designed for smartphones and tablets. Giuliani from Toulouse, France and an Android developer and specialist in Java, JEE, AOP and distributed systems talked about Kotlin language. He mentioned that he developed Android Apps since 2013 and he considers himself as a Fullstack mobile developer. The browser fronted of the applications can be migrated to kotlin and continue using modern JavaScript development frameworks. Also he explained that coroutines as an expressive tool for implementing asynchronous behavior can be used for building users interfaces on all platforms. An Android retrospective was discussed by Guy, Android graphics manager at Google. He mentioned that his focus was on graphics and UI toolkit. Android is a single threaded UI system and because it is single threaded any action that may result in blocking the UI thread will have a considerable impact on performance and consistency. Dupuy from Microsoft’s France talked about industrialization of mobile development. Also he discussed Xamarin Test Cloud, Hockey App and visual studio mobile center.
Metias discussed the impact and benefits of the cloud computing applications. He also talked about DevOps and how it establishes a culture where building and testing a software can be faster and more reliable. Nakhimovich from NY times discussed the ways of loading and caching data. He mentioned that open source libraries cover network clients to UI frameworks, but a library that can load data from multiple sources is missing. He said that NY Times has open sourced a library built on RxJava, Guava that simplifies the task. He added that stores simplify data loading and caching when they are exposed through interfaces. He discussed streaming data from OKHTTP and creating a blazing file system and leveraging RxJava for combining multiple data sources. Dias talked about Google Home. Google home is a voice speaker that is powered by the Google assistant. She mentioned that it is always ready to help and you can ask question or telling it to do something. She demonstrated its main features and showed the ways of creating custom actions through Actions on Google.
Gouchet discussed merging in the future. He mentioned that any developer working in a team has experienced some sort of conflict while merging. He emphasized on the necessity of finding solutions for merging “smarter and not harder”. He mentioned that he had been dabbling in Android since the Cupcake days. The next speaker talked about App Inventor for Android. He explained that it is a web based visual development that is based on MIT’s open block Java library. It provides access to Android devices’ GPS. He also pointed out that in 2011, google released the source code and terminated its web service. Also in 2012, Google and MIT released a new version together. CTR Press
April 2-6, 2017:
American Chemical Society (ACS) 2017
San Francisco
American Chemical Society National Meeting was gathering academics and professionals in the field of chemistry. For the last 140 years, ACS has been active for advancement of “the broader chemistry enterprise and its practitioners.” It has more than 156,000 members who have access to its multiple databases; it does not conduct any research but publishes the latest scientific studies. The Conference attendees: chemists, chemical engineers and educators from around the world gathered together to discuss the latest research findings and solutions.
Dr Milasincic talked about brain and how brain is more than a computer. She discussed the Discovery of brain secret by chemistry. How the brain works and visualizing the individual neurons and understanding its structures and how neurons are communicating with each other were discussed. She mentioned that over 100 different substances and chemical signaling among neurons and regulating communication between cells and neurons.
“Each neuron of brain is connected to thousands of neurons. Neurons release chemical substances and unlike computers that use 0&1, brain uses many richly layered analogue.
The speaker explained how brain fundamentally works, neurotechnology, Chemical lift up artificial receptors research and Devices implanted in the brain research in UCLA. She talked about the recording chemical reactions in the brain in neuroscience in both healthy and ill brains and the process of drug development, Crystallizing memory proteins, Neurotransmitters and Mapping neural networks for chemical connections. Neurons have the amazing ability to gather and transmit electrochemical signals and human brain is made of 100 billion neurons. The small, branchlike cell makes connections to other cells and causes the neurons to talk with other cells. They can be located on one or both ends of a cell.
Researcher from McGill university, Nathalie Tufenkji presented her research on antimicrobial activity of Maple syrup. According to her ” the native populations in Canada have long used maple syrup to fight infections.” The researchers separated the sugar and water from the maple syrup’s phenolic compounds and also investigated whether the extract changes ” the permeability of bacterial cells”. Currently they are testing the syrup extract in mice and she mentioned that it would take years before it be available to the patients. Antibiotics does not only kill the infection-causing bacteria, but also they kill healthy cells. And the antibiotics are not able to destroy superbugs. Currently researchers are looking for the natural ways to fight infections and reduce the antibiotics use. Another research discussed was using hair strands in crime labs. According to the researcher, Jackson: ” who you are, where you have been, what you eat and what drug you take, all shows up in your hair.” Forensic hair analysis is using microscopic examination of hair color and thickness to identify suspects. Also there are many critics who believe the hair analysis is subjective. Currently researchers are using liquid chromatography and measure the ratio of isotopes and lots of works should be done before it can be used as an reliable technique in the crime labs. Another research project presented was the research on sniffing urine for detecting prostate cancer and how it could prevent biopsies that are not necessary. According to the main researcher, they had already been working ” on a sensor to sniff hypoglycemia on a person’s breath. Also the researchers from University of California presented their research on creating an “odor wheel”: ” it displays public friendly general descriptions of a range of smells on the outside and the chemical composition of the smelly agents on the inside.” The researchers uses this wheel to ask the public ” about the bothersome stench” and in order to capture odors, they use plastic bags and handheld devices. And once it is identified, the chemical and its aroma can be eliminated by using scrubbers. Currently researchers are working to standardize the tech to measure and control odors. The latest research on reducing waste and pollution that was discussed in the Conference according to the researcher, Sixta, was achieving the goal of not only recycling garments but producing the best possible textiles. As the result that recycled fiber would be even better than native ones. Currently researchers are trying to apply the same ionic liquid to cotton-polyester blends. Another research presented was “making a beeline past the blood brain barrier for drug delivery.” Dr Giralt from Barcelona explained that his team at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine have removed the positively anchor and checked to make sure the molecule can cross the BBB. And he mentioned that those who were allergic to bees may wouldn’t be allergic to Mini-Ap4 that do not trigger “a strong immune system response in animal models, an important factor in drug design.”
The ACS board of directors as the governing body of ACS talked about ACS activities. President-Elect,Peter Dorhout, a member of ACS since 1986, discussed Chemical and biological approaches, Safety of food, ACS core values and laboratory safety. Immediate past president, Donna Nelson, a member of ACS since 1975, discussed her experience with the cast and crew of TV show Breaking Bad. She mentioned that in season one there was science errors and they didn’t have the budget for hiring paid chemistry adviser. She explained her experience in visiting Breaking Bad office and talking to the writers and how she helped them to deliver more scientific screenplays. She teaches organic chemistry at the university and she pointed out she helped them as a community service and it was unpaid when she assisted them in choosing the proper terminology in the series. She mentioned the irony of being a conservative organic chemist and helping them about the details method of meths making in the TV series. She also mentioned that the series showed the dark world of drugs and there was no white washing and she wanted a scientifically correct TV show. Cail talked about the Relationship between brain and Hollywood. She showed clips from the movies Memento and Limitless and talked about the uselessness of the drugs and pointed out that there are many fake brains studies such as watching TV is good for the brain. The educational session on how to lead without authority was an interesting one day seminar for chemists and academics from around the world to learn how to influence and get something done through leading and negotiation and how to repair a damaged relationship. The focus of the study was on influencing others; but this question comes to mind that “influence ” can have negative connotations too and it may be somehow opposed to the independent minds so encouragement can be a good substitute for that.
In the exhibition halls, many universities, chemical companies and publishers presenting their latest products and projects. Dr Jean Jacques Vanden Eynde talked about MDPI, Academic Open Access Publishing that is a digital publishing institute established in 1996 and publishes over 170 open access journals in chemistry and material science, medicine, environmental science, engineering, public health and business & economics. Angelica Gonzalez talked about AK Scientific and its partners and APIs, Biocides and Analytical references. Tanriverdi from Turkey talked about Nanomagnetics in the field of scanning probe Microscopes and measurement system for various fields of science and technology. IKA representative explained that Algaemaster is a fully autonomous photo bioreactor that provides researchers with the equipments that are necessary for producing sensitive dinoflagellate microalgae. Dr Langerman talked about safety in academic chemistry labs and how to organize accident prevention.CTR Press
April 3-5, 2017:
Marketing Analytics and Data Science
San Francisco
Marketing Analytics and Data Science Conference was organized by Informa, a business intelligence, publishing and events business that works within “information economy”. It provides content and intelligence for the people and businesses. Informa provides products and services and connections to specialists for the individuals and businesses. It was established in 1998 by the merger of IBC Group and LIoyd’s of London Press. This event was chaired by David Boyle, BBC Worldwide. Boyle mentioned that England has the best Analytics in the world. Seth Reichlin talked about competitive pricing Analytics. He discussed McGrow poor sale experience in 2011 and how it raised the wholesale price. He explained Amazon example and how and why wholesale price changed. He pointed out that Amazon doesn’t have the restrictions so price could be whatever they want, but Campus book price facing many restrictions. He also compared Amazon price and Formal rental system of book in the campus and added that Amazon had the same service at the lower price. He said: “Data scientists in the Amazon that analyzes data in the market are those who determine the price. Amazon introduced the new plan in 2012 for renting books.” He mentioned that Amazon pricing affects students buying behaviors so students increasingly Rent from Amazon. Then he explained how to combine the retail tracking with consumer tracking. “According to the latest analytics real per capital spending for textbooks has been trending down since 2002.” said Reichlin. He analyzed how Pricing power has shifted to Amazon and Amazon has gained pricing power while publishers have lost that power.
“Can we automate competitive pricing analytics?” He pointed out that we need strong theory for the price change and it is not easily automated. “Analytics involves both human and machine.”
Weiss from LinkedIn talked about LinkedIn learning and Lynda and how the new era of just in time skills training has been working. He discussed Engineering LinkedIn learning and mentioned that LinkedIn was fundamentally a data company. He pointed out that 133 million in the U.S have LinkedIn profiles and 3 million jobs posted online on LinkedIn. He explained LinkedIn data points that connecting working professionals worldwide. Then he explained how Lynda was formed as the technical publishing in 1990s by Lynda Weinman. The speaker also discussed the opportunity for skills training and Serving the IT and business sectors. The he talked about the growth of data science and business analytics in LinkedIn. Finally he discussed using data science for finance and marketing and the courses provided by LinkedIn. Perkins discussed language analysis and how to unlock the power of words. He explained how it helps the institutions to understand a huge text in Media and finance involving AI and machine learning and Automated professional services.
The speaker said: “Our approach to machine learning should be intuitive.” Then he discussed the Overperforming and underperforming analysis and the platform BBC uses. He explained information aggregation: collecting, aggregating and analyzing data, Summarization technology and risk assessment analysis and review and Using AI in risk assessment. He pointed out that using the platforms leads to the strategic sale decisions. And he explained Pairing information and AB testing for the production side of the media company.
Gosier talked about the analysis of singers and audience involvement in the music industry. He mentioned that when there was a major news event, it caused an extreme activities about the persons involved. “Dynamic can be leveraged to promote a certain peoples such as famous singers.” Then he talked about Sequencing things in the future and the project in San Francisco: multi variate segmentation; he added the criteria for this project and how popular these singers were and how much they were selling. “Looking for similarities among the same singers was the project using predictive analytics and streaming music.The extreme activity is used as a proxy.” He explained how they were looking for optimal time to release a single song before releasing an album. “Public are enjoying the songs and streaming companies use it for monetizing.” Hillary Mason discussed the ways of leveraging the machine and data superpowers. She pointed out: “We are not in machine learning yet.” She emphasized that “AI is whatever computer cannot do today.” She talked about . “Google map is a great data product that we can make real time decisions, they integrate the data of the user’s location with data on traffic and guide the user.” She discussed data as a tech problem that needs finding a solution. “You need to own your data solutions.” She emphasized that deep learning is for analyzing the texts and image data. She pointed out that we should focus on experimental development process. Saulsbury talked about info graphics and how to use info graphics for sharing data. She pointed out that our goal is influencing, not following the exact rule. She said first take the information and then make them visual. Graphical should clearly show the data, avoid distorting the data, encourage the visitors to compare different pieces of data and serves a defining purpose. She explained how to engage the audience with the data. “Less is more: use limited font and color.”
Bahat talked about the Future of work and the profound affect of automation. He emphasized on Self automation; “if you don’t automate your job others would do it.” He emphasized that Social interactions is very time consuming and added the War between robots and human has been oversimplified; “there will be a massive unemployment”. He added: “Online forums are becoming more and more dangerous and now it is much more difficult to find the same minded people online than it used to be.” Rogier showed a clip of masterclass in screen writing and then he mentioned that some people make the horrible choices for education: “10,000 dollars for a 10 day coaching.” He said that when he was 12 years old, he sold a search engine for 800 dollars. He pointed out that he had troubles with authorities. Then he mentioned that people in the U.S. have different approaches compared to people from the U.K. He had worked on a project for the supermarket Tesco in the U.K. He said: ” when there is just one apple left on the shelf, in the U.K. people rush to buy it, but in the U.S. People walk away and say it should be something wrong with it.” Then he explained the Kaiser research on the patient experiments; the result was working on the ceilings that was recommended rather than working on the walls because patients lying on the beds and looks mainly at the ceiling.” Lewis, a former Google employee and a current Netflix research scientist discussed ghost Ads. He explained how advertising influence people’s behaviors and the ways advertisers struggle to measure Ads effectiveness. He discussed ” activity bias” and pointed out that correlation is not causation. Finally he explained the algorithms and how companies paying to make people buying their products to increase their revenue. CTR Press
March 2017:
March 28, 2017:
PBWC Conference 2017
San Francisco
PBWC ( Professional Business Women of California) was 28th annual conference for women in business. It attracted more than 6,000 attendees who were gathering together to discuss the latest challenges facing women in business and to strengthen their skills. The main topic for the seminars was inclusion: the emphasis was on inclusion that leads to the broader thinking and stronger business. Libby Schaaf, mayor of Oakland discussed the unique perspective of women and how the variety of experiences in their life has shaped this perspective. She said: “when I stand in front of camera and talking about loss, I show a unique perspective as a woman.”
Taraji Henson, the actress of Hidden Figures sincerely discussed her personal life. She was born in Washington in a broken family. She said: “Art saved me from the streets of Washington D.C.” She emphasized on changing the circumstances. She mentioned: “I learned to change what was around me.” She emphasized that drug use is a disease. She added: ” As a human being we have option to choose between good and bad.” Several times she emphasized faith and said: “Faith, Faith, Faith, did you get it?” She mentioned that believing in God, believing in higher purpose of life and art “Chang lives and it certainly saved mine.” She added that before her father passed away, he had told her the importance of faith and God. She pointed out that life is a constant challenge and we have to choose between faith and fear and emphasized that she always chooses faith over fear. She said that we all should respect the diversity and inclusion. The audience loved her speech for her sincerity. She emphasized on the breaking of the glass ceiling and making people think differently.
Lynne Twist, board of directors, Pachamama Alliance discussed “the soul of money” and transforming our relationship with money and life. Twenty years ago the elders of the Achuar people of the Ecuadorian Amazon recognizing how the oil development was destroying their land and culture reached out to the activists and Lynne Twist for help and as the result, the Pachamama Alliance was born. It works in partnership with indigenous people to protect the bio diverse area of the entire Amazon. Twist mentioned that she had learned a lot from” millionaire families”. She said: ” being rich and having lots of money, makes you to want more. Money is a huge amplifier for the dark side.” She pointed out that money in itself is innocent and its usage and greed make it dirty. She added: ” money has been distorted from its first invention.” She mentioned the consumer culture is constantly calling for “money”, “more”, “more is better” and ” there is not enough”. She mentioned there are lots of storages: “house for stuffs” while there so many homeless. She said: “People will kill for money. And it is completely out of line. We are born into money culture and that gives the financial gain the top priority. People do unbelievably horrible things for money. For them money is more important than human life and spirit.” She said that in the old days people used to go to the church, but now they go to the shopping centers: ” their new temples.” Then in the keynote session, Twist showed how skillful fundraiser she is! She said: ” I love asking people for money. Money is a currency, so it must move as it is current.” Interestingly she encouraged the audience to donate and she could raise more than $100,000 in less than five minutes! Finally she pointed out: ” Allocate, not accumulate.”
Beaton discussed how the top 4% of women leaders think. She mentioned that unfortunately these 4% don’t have time to share and educate other women. She pointed out that the biggest challenge is “unconscious bias”. She said the attitude of “playing small is safer” is not helpful. She said that 4% women leaders have the following ideas in their mind: ” they don’t ask for permission, they think of 1/3 work and 2/3 delivery, they do not just build networks, but leverage it and they always think of the strategies that work.” She emphasized on relationships and the presence and pointed out that the ecosystem is very important. She talked about how Madeleine Korbel Albright experienced when she started working as the U.S. Ambassador to the UN and how she maintained her strong presence. Hillary Rodham Clinton talked about women inclusion and empowerment. She emphasized on thinking beyond the corporate rooms and the necessity of having more women in the office. She said: ” we know for decades of data from across the world how women facing barriers. When a woman says something it is ignored, but when a man says the same thing it is praised.” She pointed out: “Resist hate and fear, insist on putting people first, persist, enlist, stand up and speak.” She added: ” I am fighting for a fair and inclusive America.” CTR Press
March 23-25, 2017:
Erlang and Elixir Factory Conference 2017
San Francisco
Erlang and Elixir Factory Conference gathered computer scientists, software and hardware engineers, developers and those enthusiasts who are eager to know the latest developments on Erlang and Elixir. Elixir is a dynamic and functional language for building maintainable applications. Elixir leveraging the Erlang VM that is known for running low latency and tolerant systems. Because it is lightweight it can be thousands of processes running concurrently in the same machine. Also the processes have the ability to communicate with other processes that are running on other machines in the same network. As the result the developers will be able to work across multiple nodes. In Elixir it is possible to gain huge momentum. Keynote speaker, Sarah Allen talked about language encoding wisdom. About education system she pointed out: “currently we are preparing the kids for the world that no longer exists. She emphasized the necessity of having the open source textbooks in the education system. ” in small or big ways, we have to make the open source happen.” She gave Brazil as an example and said that kids need to be connected to the open world.
Professor Carl Hewitt discussed concurrency and storage types for IoT. Hewitt is a computer scientist who designed the actor model of concurrent computing and planner programming language for automation. He mentioned: “There is a problem: we need to make money and make everything profitable.” And he explained that for achieving that we need to connect customers to the merchants. He discussed NIBOR: Nothing Is Beyond Our Reach; he explained the NIBOR Key: “A NIBOR public/ private key pair slice is created in Faraday cage by special hardware in such a way that the private key slice never leaves Faraday cage in which it was created except for hardware secured backup.” He added: ” Encryption/ decryption is performed in the Faraday cage invisibly. Public keys are distributed to authorized manufactures for installation in IoT devices.” He pointed out that NIBOR make auditing against foreign backdoors, and governments trade their data. He also mentioned that any IoT devices can become disconnected at any time. Then professor Hewitt explained Islets implementation, Message passing using types, Types including interfaces and Messaging, encryption and marshalling. He discussed the two aspects of Islets using to protect citizen sensitive information and using actor model and predicted that in the next decade the iPhones will be replaced. He also mentioned that psychologists and computer scientists from MIT and Stanford universities were the roots of IoT revolution
and US academy of science discussing and researching the backdoors. He emphasized that NIBOR has been invented but not implemented because it has ethical, social and political issues. The speaker pointed out that the artificial intelligence is still in “the collaboration with human” stage and we are very far from achieving the artificial intelligence in itself.
Cesarini talked about monitoring and pre emotive support: the road to five nines on the beam. He discussed two types of metrics: system metrics and business metrics. He explained Monitoring memory and when Message spike causing a restart. He talked about the slow recovery after a restart, Process termination and restart in logs, Error reports and crash reports and he pointed out that it then will be followed by supervisor reports and finally progress reports. The speaker emphasized that each message had a unique identifier. Larsson discussed tracing JIT compilers. He explained a registered based VM using direct threading for dispatch, the completed Fibonacci, Beam instructions and
Beam interpreter. Then he mentioned the advantages and disadvantages. The Advantages: predictable performances and simple implementation and disadvantage is that is slower. The speaker described JIT compiler: Just in time compilation and how at run time optimizes code for application. He mentioned the Requirements: Easy to maintain, Fast and
No user interaction is necessary. He also explained how it generates machine code from LLVM IR. He also explained tracing the execution flow when a trace is cancelled, An orddict type trace when pruned all branches, Users beam registers and stack when Beam code is constant and Benchmarking, Running the benchmarks and when Beam JIT has 80% speed increase. He concluded his speech with what will be done in the future: Cross trace optimizations, Lightweight compilation and finally more optimizing on the trace CFG.
Garrett Smith discussed how to build a web app in Erlang, not Elixir. He explained Building a web app from components: Framework VS Library. He also discussed Framework based web development:Installing the framework and dependencies; Library based web development: Generating an application/ system skeleton. He talked about Framework callbacks: Routes, controllers, models, views and middleware configuration; Library functions: HTTP server, request handler interface and utilities. And he demonstrated a live coding exercise. CTR Press
March 21-22, 2017:
IoT in Action with Microsoft 2017
San Jose
Internet of Things (IoT) is considered one of the most important trends for business improvement, according to Microsoft. The focus of the conference was the digital transformation and how IoT can help the enterprises reducing cost and creating “new lines of business”. The sessions and the discussions aimed at ecosystem of devices, generation of data, drawing insights and finally taking actions that are mainly based on the results of the data analysis. The Conference attendees were hardware manufacturers, distributors, software provides and system integrators. They discussed the opportunities and challenges facing IoT, IoT solutions, device-to-cloud security, the ways of monetizing IoT solutions, IoT business value and cloud economics and predictive maintenance using Machine Learning.
Carr discussed IoT business value and cloud economics. He talked about the practical approaches to calculating ROI for IoT solutions and the ways of evaluating investment decisions. He mentioned that by IoT you can increase your customers’ loyalty that means making more money and more revenue. He explained how to create this revenue increase. He pointed out that always start small: “once you build something you will learn how to bring it into a new scenario.” He discussed the ways that IoT strategies work. He emphasized on boosting the valuation through services then he discussed some cases of public companies and IoT. He said: ” in IoT we should say: Foundation, Foundation, Foundation.” He summarized that bringing digital world to physical world is IoT. Senner, IoT solution specialist talked about measuring IoT ROI and solution costs. She discussed the ways of increasing revenue and how business insight can help making the better decisions. She mentioned that optimizing the decisions would lead to making more money. She pointed out that a remote monitoring in the long term can bring a huge savings for the businesses. She explained gross margin and operating margin and emphasized the process of predicting the consumers’ minds. The speaker mentioned: “experience is your highest ROI”.
The next speaker discussed device to cloud security. He explained the security architect and data integrity. He mentioned: ” IT specialists and hardware device specialists should be brought together.” He pointed out the necessity of booting malware resistance with UEFI secure boot. He discussed IoT reference architecture and security across the stack and he showed a live demo. Imbruce, Data Solutions Architect talked about predictive maintenance using Machine Learning. He discussed the process of leveraging machine learning for predicting the future and finally shifting the strategy from reactive to proactive. He explained six steps in order to enable machine learning. He emphasized on understanding the way machine learning fits an IoT solution. He said: “predictive maintenance is predicting and resolving problems before operational impact.” He emphasized that machine learning needs data: “the more the better and when we have lots of data we can find a pattern.”
In the exhibition area, the Microsoft’s partners discussed the process of migration to Office 365, its challenges and solution, Microsoft On-Demand that includes unlimited access to the entire collection of Microsoft’s Official courses, Microsoft’s BI QuickStart program and chatbot development that delivers conversational UX to the customers and employees with smart chatbots. CTR Press
March 15-19, 2017:
ACA 2017 Conference
San Francisco
The ACA 2017 Conference & Expo was organized by American Counseling Association and co-sponsored by California Counseling Association and Tennessee Counseling Association and it was the 65th annual conference. The goal was protecting the integrity of the counseling profession and celebrating the role counselors play in communities. There are more than 56,000 members of ACA. The educators, professionals, academic and counselors gathered together to discuss the latest in counseling research and education, social action in counseling and psychology, counseling and development, creativity in mental health, multicultural counseling, ACA codes of ethics and school counseling.
Dr Yalom, the professor of psychiatry at the Stanford University School of Medicine was the opening keynote speaker; he talked about his views on counseling and his experiences and what he has learned through his practice and research. He started his speech by emphasizing that his wife has been the most important thing in his life for so many years. Then he talked about a confidential group of councilors, psychologists, psychotherapists and academics that he created twenty years ago and he was the chairman of the group. He pointed out that the goal was talking about the issues with their patients and sharing their views on the solution and he emphasized that it was a “confidential group”. Later he urged the audience to gather and create groups like that. He said: ” It was a major source of self care for me.” He was asked whether he crossed a line by revealing unnecessary things about himself; he replied: “I am an open book.” Then he talked about the process and his past. He mentioned:” We had only three choices: Becoming a doctor, going to business with father or being a failure.” He said that there is a saying in the university: “Publish or Perish.” He mentioned Dickens and Jane Austin as his favorite writers.
The session: “Trauma treatment techniques go mainstream.You can’t treat the mind without the body” was about Big T: Rape, abuse, earthquake and Little t: Anxiety, fear, shame and how brains experience them and then re experience ” the perceived threats” even when there is no danger anymore. Mascari mentioned that Talk is not enough; there is a Need for verbal ability, logic and reason. He discussed the process of Reconnecting, remembering and mourning then safety and stabilization for trauma therapy. Then Webber discussed Subjective Units of Distress SUD: 0-10. She mentioned the process of recognizing when the brain gets “hijacked”. They discussed mind- body techniques such as: smoke detectors, snooze alarm, tapping, exhalation and finally tongue touch. She said that in the time of anger the tongue touch technique: touching the back of the teeth by the tongue would stop the yelling. Mascari pointed out that the pause button must be pressed at the time of stress. The speaker discussed Traumatic stress in the brain and Sensitization from the previous trauma, and then he showed “Reign over me” video. He pointed out that Dissociation in some cases can be a survival mechanism. He discussed Fight, Flight and Freeze as sympathetic responses of body to the stress. Webber discussed Relaxation techniques, Uncontrollable visuals and flashbacks and Blocking formation of memory.
The panel in wellness through nature discussed the ways the nature promotes mental health. They explained eco therapy , Horticultural therapy and How gardening benefits the mental patients. The speaker emphasized that gardening decreases stress and she described the benefits of Green exercise: exercising outside and how it improves the self esteem. “Transformation physically and mentally is enormous.” She said that Muir Woods and no cell phone reception would be a pure interaction with nature. Having natural light in the workplaces, how more people around us resulting the less connection with nature, Echo therapy with children, using natural objects in indoor spaces, the way being close to the nature influences the senses, Counseling in nature and Art based nature activities were discussed. Bloom discussed how to avoid following the distorted models of behavior. He said : “Monkey see, monkey do!” He discussed Addiction to new stimulus and how the viewers comparing themselves with the people in the movies. He also discussed Objectification of women and increasing the verbal and physical aggression.
The experienced writers discussed the joys, self doubts and struggles the writers experience in writing. They discussed the process of starting to write, working effectively with the publishers and making future revisions. The speaker said: ” There is a saying in the military: To win, bring the gun and bring your all friends with the gun. For the writers we should say Bring your pen and bring your friends with the pen.” Young mentioned: “You can be a writer and be other things too. Start a blog and write a little piece each day. Become a person that you have already been anyway.” CTR Press
March 14-16, 2017:
The London Book Fair 2017
London, UK
The London Book Fair is an international marketplace for the negotiating rights and the distributing contents across print, film and digital channels. Its focus was exploring innovative measures in the publishing industry and its future. London international Book Fair was the 46th Fair and attendees from 100 countries participated and visited the exhibition. Reed Exhibitions books and publishing attracted the attention of the visitors who were interested in trading intellectual property rights, buying and selling the titles and discovering the latest in publishing industry. The sessions of meetings with the new authors attracted the attention of the visitors who gathered to discuss the latest titles. The Market Focus of this year was Poland and the aspiring writers. Its focus was the contemporary polish writers but during the sessions, the attendees were interested in discussing the works of great writers such as Joseph Conrad. The Wellcome Book Prize was for the exceptional works, both fictions and non- fiction that engaging with the “topics of health and medicine.” Polish poets: Dehnel and Kielar discussed the contemporary polish poems. Dehnel discussed the last eight years poetry in Poland.
Brexit and the consequences on the publishing industry was one popular topic to discuss. Independent authors discussed the independent publishing experiences. At the Author HQ, that was the hub for the participating writers, they discussed the knowledge and insight the aspiring writers need to make decisions about publishing their works. Comedian, Wax opened the Frazzled Café which was a place for sharing the stories. The awards for international excellence in the book industry, publishing and innovation of this years wen to different recipients from a variety of countries. The Bookstore of the Year Award that was sponsored by Gardners went to Shakespeare and Company based in Paris, France because of its endeavors to become “a 21st century bookseller”, opening an intellectual café, expanding its children’s section and renewing its website. The Literary Agent Award went to Mollaglu from Turkey and Accessible Books Consortium International Excellence Award went to Tiflonexos from Argentina. Poland was the market focus for 2017 and many author talks sessions were discussing the translation of polish literature. Morpurgo was chosen as the children’s author of the day and Sapkowski was chosen as cross-media author of day. A variety of seminars discussing the challenges the aspiring writers facing today in different countries. This year’s judging panel was chaired by the famous writer, McDermid.
In the exhibition hall, publishers from more than 100 countries were exhibiting including: 245 publishers from the USA, 76 publishers from France such as: Alain Ducasse Edition that was the first publishing company to specialize solely in the culinary field; it was created in 1999. Astier Pécher Agency is based in Paris and is representing French speaking authors both fiction and non-fiction. 35 publishers from Italy were exhibiting their latest publications; Atlantyca Entertainment develops properties for children’s publishing. Also 20 publishers from Spain were present in the exhibition halls and their representatives were discussing the publication of Spanish books and their translations into a variety of languages worldwide. CTR Press
March 8-9, 2017:
California’s Distributed Energy Future Conference 2017
San Francisco
California’s Distributed Energy Future Conference 2017 was organized by Greentech Media (GTM ). GTM, recently a part of Wood Mackenzie, is the leading information service provider that provides market analysis and insight for global clean energy market. Different workshops and speeches discussing the rapid expansion of distributed energy and data analysis for utilities and how they are reshaping the distribution and consumption of energy. Challenges and opportunities for the future of utilities were discussed. Lorenzo Kristov, from California Independent System Operator discussed distributed energy resources as the grid assets. He explained the development of aggregation model and discussed the whole system approach by creating model. He pointed out that redefining the rules and creating visibility of what’s going on and forecasting are essential. The panel also discussed DER integration and resource planning. They emphasized that utilities need a reliable and accurate analysis of the value of assets on their grid. The speaker explained modeling and forecasting analysis for smart planning that considers different types of DER. The next speaker pointed out that the rising costs of electric power and carbon cost risk have made public entities seek sustainability for energy supply. Mike Fife, CTO, Demand Energy discussed the challenges in the process of control and management. He explained distributed energy network optimization system. He discussed the challenges in optimizing the integration of multiple value streams and DERs into solutions. “DEN.OS is an intelligent software controls platform that enables real time optimization of energy management and was architected to facilitate the design, integration and operations of energy assets and services.”
Glavaski discussed the differences between California and New York in distribution system and solutions. She talked about the control and management in different architectures, the lack of tools in the industry and how to influence the policies. Gallagher talked about the role of rate design in a distributed energy market and discussed the methodology of implementing the peak hours rate. He emphasized on maximizing the value. The next speaker talked about the integrated resource planning that determines the resource needs and establishes a plan for fulfilling the needs. Also he talked about automation and protection applications. He emphasized on the effective planning and managing transmission and distribution grid operations. Energy Storage Association and GTM research, “the “market analysis and advisory arm of Greentech Media”, provide data and insights on the U.S. Energy storage market; they provide insight on the business model for the electricity sector. The Grid Edge Executive Council define the future of the electric grid. Other panels discussed the community choice aggregation, crowd sourced market insight, electric vehicles as a grid resource and financing California’s distributed energy future. CTR Press
March 1-3, 2017:
SETECEC 2017
Venice, Italy
The 6th International Conference on “Software and Emerging Technologies for
Education, Culture, Entertainment, and Commerce event was attended by the
academics and experts from around the world. They discussed the latest advances in the computer sciences and technologies for cultural heritage. Multimedia computing, human- computer interaction, brain-computer interfaces, business intelligence technology, cloud computing, computer aided design, computer in emergent economy, dynamic and static media or interactive systems, e-culture, e-tourism, cyber culture, green computing, cyberattacks and cyber bullying, and digital divide were among the variety of subjects discussed in the conference.
There was special workshops to promote dialogues between
professors and graduate students and active participants in these workshops
were mainly from France universities, New York University from the USA,
Università degli Studi di Genova from Italy, and Universidad de Sevilla from Spain. Annamaria Poli from department of human sciences and education talked about cinematography and accessibility, digital technology and education and
visual technology softwares. The next speaker discussed the specific aspects
of human-computer interactions and he mentioned that it involves all the
human activities when using the computer. It creates a dialogue by the command and data input. Usually the interaction take place at the interface that made up of hardware devices and software tools in computer side and cognitive processes from human side. The special design of the human computer interface requires specific methods. “Command languages require the users knowing the syntax of command statements and it requires generating statements and algorithms for complex programming.
The panel discussing interactive technology and education explained that it refers to all forms of digital technology and the approach is human centered. They emphasized that innovative use of educational technologies is very important and it should be in line with the pedagogical strategies of the educators. The speaker discussing compression and decompression technology of digital image mentioned that digital images are target of playback and standard systems can do compression and decompression with standard components. And he discussed the processing of the digital image, graphic subsystems and softwares. The next speaker discussed the emerging technologies in education and the learning processes. She emphasized the role of human interactions: learners and educators facing the new challenges and creating innovation. She mentioned different case studies in the
interactive learning. On the subject of brain-machine interface the scientist from Université de Genève have provided an “artificial sensation of a prosthetic movement in the brain. ” A prosthetic limb controlled by brain activity can partially recover the lost motor function.” Neuroscientists have discovered how to create the artificial sensations of “neuroprosthetic movements”. CTR Press
February 2017:
February 26, 2017:
Lynn Hershman Lesson:
CIVIC RADAR
YBCA
San Francisco
Civic Radar is an interesting and original exhibition by the talented artist, Lynn Hershman Leeson in Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. The exhibition is about the relationship between human and technology and its focus is on the issue of identity. The age that we currently live in is the cyber and digital age with all its complexity and Hershman has used her artistic ability and her comprehensive vision to explain and clarify this relationship to the viewers and no doubt it is a must see exhibition. Ms Hershman has described art in her life as an equivalent to breathing and in an amazing interview with the artistic director of Museo nazionale delle arti del XXI secolo, Rome, she mentioned that looking at the great collection in a museum has been a way of breathing for her. And all inspired her to create something new in the media art. She explained that during 1960s that she started her work, people didn’t have computers and it was advertising that “imposed identities based on commercially driven and idealized archetypes.” She mentioned that Media Lab at the MIT and its Aspen project were precedents for Google Maps and the current social media.
Since 1960, Lynn Hershman has created a variety of interesting works of art. Her approach to questioning the role of technology in altering human identity created Roberta Breimore character. Unlike Duchamp, Breton and Beuys who did it theatrically, Ms Hershman went further and created it for a lived experience. Roberta encountered with the real life for six years. Lynn Hershman describes what happened in Roberta’s life as a mirror of culture. She described this experience as totally political. She said: “Roberta’s life was eventually archived as a testament to a history of censorship, repression.”
Lynn Hershman Lesson has always pointed out that she has never been part of any group. She said: “I worked outside of every system. It is easier to be a witness as an outsider.” She is always trying to be objective and fair. She sees both positive and negative aspects of technology. In her art, she shows that it is almost impossible to distance oneself and people participate in culture automatically without realizing the process. Hershman mentioned: “I am aware that as much as technology contributes to society, it also penetrates all aspects of life, robbing individual freedom and identity in a perverse and terrorizing manner.” She also emphasized that it is not that “we” use technology and as a matter of fact, technology also uses us. She mentioned: ” The most perverse type of surveillance is the biological tracking of our bodies. We will be watched not only externally but also internally- from the inside out.” CTR Press
February 12-17, 2017:
RSA Conference 2017
San Francisco
RSA Conference as the world’s leading cybersecurity event was an interesting gathering of cybersecurity professionals, developers, experts and innovators to discuss the latest in the industry during different sessions and tracks. RSA mission is safeguarding the information in the digital world by combating cyber threats. It attracted 46,000 attendees from around the world to attend the sessions and seminars and exchange ideas and the latest trends in safeguarding the information. The future of encryption, hacking back, protecting the data, cybersecurity offerings,the insider threat, finding the risky devices, proactive threat hunting, threat detection, technological approach to privacy, building strategic plans for security awareness for app infrastructure and advanced analytics in action were some of the different topics were discussed during the sessions.
Tomorrow’s cyber risk analysis was discussed by Jack Jones, the creator of Factor Analysis of Information Risk (FAIR) framework. He mentioned that risk assessment is gathering information but risk analysis is finding the solution. He discussed the top ten risks and how to identify them. Investing in the security technology and process, the most common cyber risk model in use and Mental Models were discussed. He said that 70 to 90 percent of high risk issues aren’t high risk and because changes in technology are happening faster and the budgets are tightening, we need to learn to focus on the high risk issues. “We need to be able to prioritize extremely well and We need to be cost effective.” He also discussed the Risk management industry and Changes in cyber security Regulations. He emphasized on the importance of critical and analytical thinking and mentioned a quotation from Saadi that applies to doing analyses: ” Have patience. Everything is difficult before it is easy.” And then he added that recently San Jose university is preparing the economic majors to learn forensic and technology risk analysis. The new technological approach to privacy was discussed by Schwartz. He discussed Data breach reporting and Identify management matters for privacy and security. He pointed out that raw data and analysis have different privacy concerns. He said that sharing cyber threats information with other companies and the government are standards. He explained how the privacy rules are decided and mentioned that Hack back has real privacy issues. According to Raywood, in November 2016, the UK government announced the launch of the second national cybersecurity strategy with the official hacking back. Then Brown talked about the purpose of data collection and privacy. He mentioned that in some countries the concept of privacy doesn’t exist. He pointed out that Data becomes information after processing. He said that when we use the physical key for locking the door is different when we just use app. He explained the difference between Data protection and privacy and added that Data in context becomes information:for example, 23 is data but 23 degree is information. He discussed PMRM: privacy management reference model. According to Rotenberg, technology has been viewed as the source of many privacy concerns. “Technology takes on certain forms and may lead to the adoption of new systems for surveillance.” ” The limitations of law have renewed the focus on technical methods to protect privacy. But it remains unclear whether technology to provide a comprehensive solution. Privacy Enhancing Technologies (PET) are generally understood as those that limit or eliminate the collection of personally identifiable information. Such methods include techniques for anonymous and pseudo-anonymous payment, communication, and web access.” The next speaker talked about Ransomware business statistics. He mentioned that ransomware in the form of encryption Trojans grew rapidly in 2016 and cyber criminals use it for profits: they usually request $50,000 from big companies and $500 from the small businesses. He discussed the complicated process of combating the cyber attackers. Keynote speaker, McCaul pointed out that what the government is facing is a 21st century cyber threat and in response it is using 20th century technology and 19th century bureaucracy.
The next speaker discussed the future of encryption. According to Winter, the data encryption standard is too weak for the current commercial applications today. He discussed honey encryption that was developed by Jules: it serves up a bunch of fake data whenever an attacker gets a password wrong. Because those fake data are close to the real data, the hackers are not able to tell if they are real or not. The speaker in the session women in cybersecurity talked about conformity in the workplace. Gupta said: “The silent army of people conform and do what they are asked to do in the workplace.” She emphasized that we should try to do things differently. She said: ” stand up! Sitting is the new smoking; when you sit, your thinking will be different.” She pointed out that when the brain conforms, it looses its ability to think.” She emphasized make your workplace meaningful and fun. And the speaker really did what she preached and instead of sitting or standing she was walking during her speech. She pointed out that we should learn from the children and be curious. Andrew Hoog talked about threats detections for Android and IOS. He discussed pros and cons of eliminating access to APIs and device data. Pros: end users’ privacy and data cannot be violated and it reduces complexity. Cons: defenders lack the most basic visibility into what’s happening on the device and continuous monitoring is impossible via an app. In the session security investigative journalists speak up, four security journalists discussed Cryptographer,Artificial intelligence scares and the stories of their lives. Andy Greenberg talked about hackers world and Digging to subculture, dark web. He is the author of the book: This machine kills secrets. Joseph Menn, investigative reporter talked about dot com bubble and looking for the negative stuffs.Nicole Perlroth who helped to identify two Chinese military units responsible for thousands of attacks on US institutions talked about Chinese cyberattacks on US businesses. Kevin Poulenc who used to work with Aaron Swartz to design and develop SecureDrop: an open source software platform for secure communications between journalists and sources talked about his investigations. He discussed Wikipedia and how to keep the sources anonymous. The next speaker talked about preventing, detecting and managing a cybersecurity attack. He mentioned that according to the latest survey, 88% of board members lack confidence in their companies cybersecurity. He pointed out that the greatest security return on investment is when the company prioritize the efforts and budgets. Then he talked about Bromium and Microsoft ROI. He mentioned that Bromium suggests a dual solution as a robust enterprise security strategy for endpoints. He added that companies of all sizes, across all industries are combating asymmetric cyber battles as they are encountering attacks from a wide range of adversaries and the solution is identifying the weakness in the security architecture and detecting those threats that usually evade traditional security controls such as advanced malware, lateral movement and advanced persistent threats (APTs).
In the exhibition halls, Cymmetria representative talked about Mazerunner as cymmetrica’s deception solution. He explained that cyber deception leverages the fact that attackers follow a predictable attack pattern. When attackers use tools like Responder.py when they are targeting sensitive business assets, deception technology creates a controlled path for them to follow and as the result, the attackers are diverted from business assets into the controlled environment. This process gives the companies an upper hand in detection and investigation. He also mentioned that it is difficult to control the security of the supply chain which consists of vendors and suppliers; and the solution is the companies need to cast a deception web over supply chain elements too. SecureAuth representative mentioned that two factor authentication is not enough and SecureAuth provides multiple silent risk checks without users knowing and evaluates the potential risk of every access request. Tripwire exhibitor explained that Axon is one platform for endpoint intelligence. Netsparker representative mentioned that web application security scanner identifies vulnerabilities. Invincea exhibitor talked about the Test Drive. He mentioned it allows you to access your own version of X in a virtual environment and you will have total control of what and how you want to test. He added that Invincea is the machine learning next generation antivirus company. Latini, Lieberman representative explained that it continuously discovers and track privileged accounts across the network and automatically provide each account with unique credentials. Mimecast, Qualys and Hillstone representatives were talking to the visitors and introducing their latest products. CTR Press
February 11-16, 2017:
Developer Week 2017
San Francisco
Developer Week Conference and Expo gathered developers and professionals from both Fortune 500 companies and small businesses to discuss the current DevTech innovations in FinTech, communications, Media Tech, gaming, household devices, E Commerce and big data. APIs and developer portals have had an enormous impact on a variety of industries. At Developer Conference, different topics such as artificial intelligence, virtual reality and augmented reality were discussed. The speaker on Internet of Things session mentioned that by 2020, there will be more than 28 million devices connected to the Internet. He added IoT may improve performance and create value but there will be vulnerabilities too. These vulnerabilities create new attack vectors for cyber attackers and hackers. So many low power IoT devices are insecure because security is not built into the low cost IoT devices’ design.
In the seminar sessions representatives from Cisco, IBM and DevNetwork talked about the ways of building a motivated and engaged development team, scaling a Technology Stack and machine learning. The representative of Kuzzle, a French company in Montpellier, France mentioned that they build real time applications in no time. He added that they deploy, scale, secure and move the backend and Data without dependencies. IBM exhibitor talked about Cloud development platform Bluemix, a platform to build, manage and run apps for all types in the cloud, web, mobile, and big data. QuickBase takes care of the mundane aspects of app development and the integration is simple. Unlike one-size- fits all solutions, it allows creating of custom cloud based business applications both with or without coding. Catchpoint delivers optimal performance with every line of code. It swiftly navigate a single UI designed for smart workflows and tap into advanced alerting, dashboards and virtualization with custom metrics for rapid insight. PubNub representative explained their data system network. It’s blocks make the network programmable, executing the application logic on data as it passes over the network and removing the need to deploy and scale app servers. Representative from Oracle talked about Oracle Solaris 11 that is an integrated and open platform engineered for secure enterprise cloud environments. He added that it combines the power of industry standard features and management tools for low risk applications and cloud infrastructure. Among the attendees, the presence of a respectable elderly couple attracting the attention of the visitors. They mentioned that they try to keep their minds active and from time to time they attend different events to learn about the latest technology and science. CTR Press
February 7-8, 2017:
The World Affordable Medicines Congress 2017
Barcelona, Spain
The World Affordable Medicine Congress Europe is the largest strategy and scientific event on generic and biosimilar medicines. The attendees of the work affordable medicines congress were mainly senior and board level executives who were interested in discussing business strategies for the affordable medicines from the leading organizations. In fact, this event was merging World Generic Medicines Congress and Biosimilar Drug Development World and the main topics discussed were: the latest updates of insights and policies, future market trends and innovations and opportunities for growth in provisions of commercial strategies for generic and bio similar drugs. The advocates of generics and biosimilars argue that it is an answer to the increasing healthcare costs. They seek to overcome different barriers such as the fluctuations in policies, pricing pressures, increasing competitions and the “pipeline crisis”. The main goal of the congress was finding and adopting the appropriate business strategies in generics and biosimilars.
Thomas discussed the ways of making the medicines accessible and affordable from sustainable and innovative perspective. Rodrigo discussed challenges and opportunities in Spanish generic market in 2017. Madsen, a specialist in internal medicine and cardiology who has been working with generic substitution from 2001 that was introduced in Norway. He discussed the ways to lower the costs of treatments in biosimilars and biogenerics. He mentioned several aspects on the regulation of generic substitution including biosimilars drugs in Norway. He emphasized on the safe use of drugs and avoiding the risks.
A biosimilar product is one that is “highly similar” to the pioneer product where there is no clinical difference in “safety, purity and potency”. A biological product is one to be biosimilar which means it is expected to produce the same clinical result as the pioneer in any patient and there is no greater risk of using the pioneer .The Biosimilars Act established two categories of generic biologics under a similar scheme: biosimilars and “interchangeable” biologic products. Just biological products required the clinical trials. The main difference between biosimilars and generics is in the generic medicines the active ingredients are identical to the molecule drug, but the biosimilars are not identical to the reference biological. The biologics and biosimilars are manufactured in living cells, and then they are extracted and purified. But the small molecule drugs and generics are manufactured purely through chemical synthesis. This is the most notable and complex difference between biosimilars and generics. Regulatory authorities require biosimilars manufacturers declare the risks of products. The biosimilars manufacturers claim that they generate data from lab testing that is not clinical testing and it shows that the biosimilars provide the “same therapeutic benefit and risks to patients as the reference product.”
According to Horton, there is a lot at stake and that is the “safety standards of “biosimilars”, copycat version of the original biologics.” When biologic drugs, like Ixiaro and Cervarix (to prevent cervical cancer) are first approved, they need to be certified by the FDA as safe. “But unlike chemical drugs, like Lipitor and Zoloft, exact “generic” versions cannot be made of biologic drugs (which is why they are called “biosimilars” and not “generic biologics”.)” The patient and safety communities are in favor of transparency, so that patients know which medication is being put into their bodies and be aware of the negative impacts too. CTR Press
January 28- February 2, 2017:
PHOTONICS WEST 2017
San Francisco
Phonetics West was the premier event for the photonics and laser industries. It was organized by SPIE that is an international society with an interdisciplinary approach to the science and application of light. “The not-for-profit society that advances emerging technologies through interdisciplinary information exchange, continuing education, publications, patent precedent, and career and professional growth.” A variety of training sessions discussing high power lasers for fusion research, nano optics and photonics x, synthesis and photonics of Nanoscale materials, nanoscale imaging, sensing for biomedical applications, colloidal nanoparticles for biomedical applications, optical biopsy, microfluidics and medical Microsystems, optical and electronic cooling of solids and complex light and optical forces attracting the attentions of the professionals and academics from around the world.
BRAIN 2017 discussed the papers describing development of innovative technologies for understanding of brain function. The sessions discussed neurophotonics, neural imaging and optical manipulation, laser tissue interactions, tissue engineering and nanobiophotonics. The speakers discussed the brain activities and the latest innovations in measuring it. Brain activity is measured through the rapid delivery of blood in order to activate neuronal tissues of the brain. Understanding the process of oxygen delivery to the brain through its dense network of micro vessels is essential for the neurological disease research. For imaging blood flow in the brain in real time laser is used; but these measurements are limited to superficial tissues with no depth resolution. Researchers at the university of Florence are using experimental data to produce instruments that can stimulate the functionality of mouse brains in the aspects related to rehabilitation after a stroke. Imaging the entire brain is still a challenge and one of the most difficult aspects in imaging is the quantifications of biological features. The latest research now involves new optics tools such as optogenetics to foster the functionality after a stroke by using light stimulation plasticity. More than 200 labs are involved in the BRAIN initiative and neurophotonics is the central approach to the BRAIN initiative. This approach of imaging the entire brain is opposed to a single neuron approach. The current brain imaging techniques rely on calcium indicator dyes to measure neuron activity. Researchers at the Columbia university using devices called SLMs, spatial light modulators to bend the light to image neurons in the brain, regardless of its location. SLMs can mimic many of the optical functions of a large microscope. Also the BRAIN initiative is investigating use of voltage indicators including nanoparticles that responds to the changes in the electrical fields. Also the speaker pointed out that the voltage indicators can damage and even kill brain cells when it is not used exactly in the right position or there has been long exposure and high concentrations. Despite all the advancements, imaging how the brain works is still “a highly demanding problem ” because the structure of brain is very complex and neurophotonics is crucial in understanding how the brain works.
Danzmann talked about gravitational wave astronomy. He explained black holes and how a new telescope by 2030 can be used for knowing more about black holes. He showed video of recorded signals and discussed advanced LIGO programs.Jean Lavoie the instructor, Coherent skillfully explained the basics of laser material processing for the audience. He showed many educational slides and videos on laser beams and applications. He discussed what happens when a laser beam hits a material and different laser applications.
Laser advancements are also challenging because of safety regarding laser radiations. Especially protecting eyes from artificial optical radiations is a challenge. Using eyewear, curtains and enclosures for laser protection. These barriers are designed to reduce speculation reflections; barriers can be made of tough galvanized Stella hardware, laser safety curtains and other protective devices can ensure no dangerous radiation can escape and harm eyes and skin. The curtains should have silica woven inner layers for increased temperature resistance and the panels are built from black aluminum hardware. Especially when the laser is Class 4, that is very hazardous to the eye and skin as the result of direct beam that can cause permanent eye and skin damage.
The word “laser” is an acronym for Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation that means the light is formed by stimulating a material’s electrons to give out the laser light or radiation.” The way a laser creates its radiation is by using a rod of made of a certain material. Laser has coherent light that is sent from its various parts in short bursts of energy and the waves randomly come off the filament. Beam does not spread out because it is coherent and focused and laser light can be focused to a very small point of light. When light is focused, the point of focus can become hot enough to burn the skin or human tissue. Focusing a very high-energy laser beam on a piece of metal can actually melt the metal. Equipment employing high-energy lasers is used in industry to accurately cut the metal. A straight beam from a laser can be bounced off items as far as the Moon to measure their distance. Very high-energy beams of laser light have been used o damage a target because the beam does not spread and lose its energy. Dealing with lasers is very important because they can injure eyes because a laser beam focuses to a point that can get very hot, a beam shined in eyes may damage the retina. Never let a laser pointer aimed at your eyes and in some cases people becoming partially blind from laser pointers; even avoid staring at the light from the scanners. A laser outputs light is coherent and in a highly parallel beam, Laser light can travel great distances without the beam spreading and can be focused to a very small point. This type of light has many modern applications and we should be cautious looking at laser beams.
In the exhibition halls, Douglas B. Rogers, president TEMPO from California plastic co explained that they started their technical innovations in 1960 and they specialized in components and insulators, robotic handling trays and health care packaging and they use patented dry molding process. Carles Oriach, director of strategy and development monocrom from Barcelona, Spain explained the distinguished features of the company. He mentioned that they use patented solder-free technology in diode bars stacks. He explained clamping= 2 heatsinks x bar+ no soldering. The result will be better cooling efficiency and when mechanical stress is not an issue, product life time increases significantly.The representative from Helia photonics from Scotland Explained that they provide the application of custom designed coating for semiconductor facets. They process more than 500,000 semiconductor devices every month for the international customers. DPSS laser in Santa Clara uses new techniques for marking, engraving and scribing wires, metals, diamonds and ceramics. Jia, sales manager, Zhaohong Tech explained they manufacture technical sapphire and ruby. Hef group company from France provides OPTAL coatings that are used in automotive. CTR Press
January 2017:
January 25-28, 2017:
AAC&U 2017 Annual Meeting
San Francisco
The Association of American Colleges & Universities Annual Meeting gathered educators, deans, researchers, administrators and academic professionals from campuses across the country together to discuss the purpose of higher education, the value of a college degree, challenges to liberal education, pursuing excellence in assessment, Improvement in admission and assessment processes, building a productive culture of learning, the ways college affect students, innovations in education and how colleges’ obsession with smartness shortchanged students. They also discussed the effective approaches to restore public trust in the higher education and how universities are improving student learning and how they prepare them for future work and life.
The panel discussing how college affects students talked about the ways colleges and universities have been critiqued for being ineffective in promoting student learning. Mayhew discussed the value of education and its economic benefits. He pointed out that good teaching really matters and feedbacks are essential. He also mentioned that the process of educating the educators has some shortcomings. The panel also discussed the risks of dropping out of colleges, and the positive and negative aspects of living in the campus. Kimberly Peterson discussed value of a college degree. She mentioned that we should define the meaning of value. She continued describing the meaning of value and mentioned that in the dictionary “value” has been described as “the amount of money that something is worth”, then “something that can be bought for a low price” and finally “usefulness or importance”. She pointed out that we should not looking for “dollar sign” and higher earnings in defining the value of higher education; “personal development” is far more valuable than obtaining the higher earnings. Casap, an education evangelist from Google discussed his personal life and how higher education helped him to achieve what he was looking for. He pointed out that our objective in education is helping the learners to obtain the abilities they need in the new environment. He emphasized on he importance of critical thinking in the education. He also mentioned that his 24 year old daughter doesn’t work traditionally and she works on different projects for herself and how advanced technology helped her to do so. He also talked about the stress and worries felt by the majority of students about finding jobs after graduating.
The highlight of the conference was the interesting lecture and Q&A by professor Alexander W. Astin. He is founding director of Higher Education Research Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr Astin discussed how the obsession with “being smart” leads to a higher education that shortchanges the students and the society’s need for an educated population. He pointed out that universities have two “very narrow definition of smartness” that are course grades and standardized tests. He emphasized the importance of changing “grade” system to “valuation” system: instead of ranking students for their smartness, to prepare them for life by developing the qualities such as leadership, responsibility, honesty and empathy. He pointed out that huge student dropout rate shows that they are not being prepared. “Grades do not say what the students have learned in college. And most faculties don’t have preparation plans for students.” Professor Astin emphasized that tests have not been a proper measurement for growth and improvement; instead of telling the students what they know and what they do not know and what they should do to improve, we just tell them their rank and how they stand comparing other students which is the result of the tests. He mentioned that faculty preoccupation with “smartness” and admission madness treat other student as the second class citizens. Dr Astin questioned the rationality of focusing on the most prepared students and ignoring the least prepared students. He emphasized that instead of “grading” we should use ” valuation”: the payoff will be huge because the valuation is much more better than grading system. Professor Astin showed his concern and care for improving the education system. Distinguished academic persons such as professor Astin is what we need to bring back the trust in education system and instead of just producing “people with college degree” invest in making the real, capable, reliable, responsible, independent and passionate people who are fully prepared for life and its challenges, people who feel obliged to give back to the community and make a better society.
In the roundtable discussions, Robin Selzer talked about TEL, Transformative Experiential Learning that is a social justice model of leadership and professional development for students. Sean Crossland from Salt Lake community college talked about learning and leading through community engagement. Also he talked about CA department of education and its Master Plan. Jelani Cobb, writer for the New Yorker discussed race and justice in America today. He talked about the new sectionalism of spirit and mind and of culture. He talked about the history of civil rights and emphasized that we should not think we have already achieved our goal and it would be the real obstacle of holding us back. He teaches journalism in Columbia university and he mentioned that more than 50% of journalism students are from abroad. In the exhibit hall, a variety of academic publishers exhibiting their books and products. The book: Are We Smart Enough? By Professor Alexander Astin attracting the attention of the visitors. Representative from the publication: Diverse talked about its latest issue about diversity in higher education. Exhibitor from Oxford University Press, Davis talked about epigeum and digital learning solutions for higher education. Dr Parnia, president EC Higher Education talked about the on-campus pathway programs. Representative of HigherEdJobs talked about the subscription models they use to advertise academic, administrative, executive and faculty vacancies in the higher education. CTR Press
January 24-25, 2017:
i Learning Forum 2017
Paris, France
i Learning Forum Paris, France is the premier event dedicated to the technologies of both individual and organizational learning. The event gathered professionals and academics from around the world to discuss the latest in digital learning, smart learning for business, international marketing innovations, digital learning management, international E-Learning, evolution in the age of digital transformation, content creation, collaborative digital learning, virtual reality, strategies in digital transformation, big data management and mobile and social learning.
Jérôme Bruet, VP Learning Talentsoft as the keynote speaker discussed the latest in digital learning. He mentioned that “Learning in 2017 is all about offering the right content to the right people at the right time, based on the best learning method.” He discussed the fully integrated solutions that tie competency management to career development programs. He explained that “e-learning” can no longer cover the multitude of digital tools in teaching. Digital technology as a tool is a normal part of any training service. He also pointed out that companies should be prepared for the advantages and challenges they will face when switching to the digital learning. Guralnik from Columbia University discussed international e-learning. He mentioned that learning experience will be successful when it is carefully designed around the goals of the target audience. Lasher discussed the risks involved in e-learning. He pointed out that each individual’s learning activities are an easy way for hackers to infiltrate and steal the data. He mentioned that even viewing a simple picture in the process of learning could give the hackers the opportunity to steal ideas and data in the learning program. He mentioned that according to the latest statistics, hackers have had illegal access to the data in 96% of companies. Vogas discussed fundamentals of virtual engagement in e-learning. He also discussed different elements that make e-learnings more interesting.
CTR Press
January 22-24, 2017:
Fancy Food Show 2017
San Francisco
Fancy Food Show was an interesting and productive event organized by The Speciality Food Association. The Association, established in 1952 in New York, is a not-for-profit trade association and has more than 3,000 members in the U.S. and abroad. It presents the Sofi Awards to honor excellence in speciality food. The event gathered 36,000 industry professionals and tastemakers together. There was a variety of educational sessions such as Cheese tasting session that the attendees tasted different cheeses made on both sides of the Atlantic, variety of cheeses including French Roquefort and Spanish Manchego. In another session there was a food service competition and the judging panel chose three finalists; each finalist introduced their products to the judges and the audience. Kafarakis, the president of the association expressed his hope for continuing growth of the industry. He mentioned that U.S. Specially food sale last year hit a record $ 121 billion.
In the exhibition halls, more than 86,000 products from 1,400 companies from around the world were on display. The creativity and innovation by different exhibitors attracted the attention of the visitors who are interested in healthy specialty foods. Swiss cheese companies exhibited new varieties of cheese beyond Gruyère and Appenzeller. Edmond Fallot producing mustards since 1840 in France exhibited different mustards: honey and balsamic Dijon mustard with the rich flavor is an ideal choice for the mixed salad. Olivavinagretas introducing 100% natural olive oil dressing that was sugar free and sweetened with stevia. Also Donoxti from Mexico presenting extra virgin avocado oil with no preservatives. Marketing director from Isigny-Ste-Mère mentioned that Isigny is a cooperative run company founded in 1923 and the distinctiveness of the Isigny area has been recognized by Appellation d’Origine Protégée(Protected Origin and established quality). The representative from agritalia mentioned that Bella Italia Regionali is a unique line of products that represent the ancient culinary traditions of Italy’s 20 regions. Exhibitor from Cyprus, Hallomi Cheese explained that the program, “Halloumi, a traditional European cheese” is an initiative by Panagrotikos Farmers Union. America’s Sea Salt company, SaltWorks, Inc offered a selection of premium gourmet salts from white crystals to exotic finishing salts. The classic and tasty decoration of its booth attracted the visitors attentions. WB Cheese exhibited persillé de Rambouillet blue cheese with a unique flavor. Grillies U.S. Presenting a variety of Mediterranean recipes. Green bag America representative was exhibiting customized bags with different logos; he mentioned that it can be considered one of the best way of marketing for each company and “the bags are your walking advertisement.” Dodoni from Greece was presenting certified organic Feta cheese with a unique taste. Arctic Zero introducing frozen desserts that are GMO free and natural. Its representative explained that they use the ingredients that customers can understand. Sassanian Caviar was presenting the best quality Persian caviars. Milk boy Swiss Chocolate representative explained that they still using the traditional methods passed down over generations. Valsana’s representative from Italy mentioned that they offer a wide assortment composed by 500 cheeses, 400 charcuterie and a variety of delicacies. The exhibitor from ECCO-F company explained that their Cheese are made in the village of Karabunar that has been registered as an ecologically clean region under N 13 in the EU and USA. Chiquilin from Spain was exhibiting its high quality Saffron. Paul Dischamp’s representative mentioned that they produce PDO cheeses from Auvergne : Saint-Nectaire, Cantal, Salers, Bleu D’Auvergne and Fourme d’Ambert. Also Bob Moore, founder of Bob’s Red Mill that produces natural, certified organic grain products was signing the book: 100 healthy whole grain recipes. CTR Press
January 6-10, 2017:
APAP 2017
New York City
APAP 2017 event was organized by the Association of Performing Arts Presenters. The attendees were from municipal and university performance facilities, nonprofit performing arts centers, culturally specific organizations, foreign governments, and artist agencies. About 3700 presenting organizations, artists, agents, support organizations, consultants, and arts leaders from the U.S. and 36 countries attended the event. APAP goal is through advocacy, professional development, resource sharing and civic engagement make changes in the art. In the Creative Mind session the speakers discussed different ways of nurturing creativity and innovation. The speaker explained the variety of factors involved in achieving success and how creativity and maintaining the focus help to reach the goal in today’s society. This session was about the special work of five talented individuals who “exemplified the key strands of the conference theme.” The role of the artist and producer as Makers of Culture (MCs) and catalysts for engaging the community and making the social changes were discussed. The speaker pointed out that the final goal is bringing artists and communities together.
Indigenous arts and culture, how to build bridges in arts and culture, arts in the crisis, the issue of art and identity, local, national and global approaches in cultural policies and connecting artists and the audience were among the main themes discussed by the speakers. How to think in an innovative way and find the solutions in the complex and challenging environments and being able to apply them in unexpected ways in the creative art was the subject that the audience were interested and were discussed by the speakers interactively. The speaker emphasized that the aim should be creating the meaningful changes by “disrupting the status quo of an organization’s programs and activities.”
Moving beyond the audience and engaging the public and supporting the artists by exchanging knowledge, ideas and visions both for the individual practitioners and the whole field was pointed out by the speaker. The audience asked some questions about the ways of activating space for the art and artists and the issue of management and leadership in the art world. The panel discussed the strategic, creative and technical processes through which work of art is developed, produced and sustained both in the national and international level. They discussed the variety of tools, resources and strategies are usually applied to the business side of the art industry. The ways of cultivating support for the art in communities that are struggling with issues were explained by the speaker. In the session “changing the flow”, description of the vision for the role of artists to positively transform our society and engage in defining the values and making a difference was discussed. The next speaker talked about the development and promotion of work in a collaborative way. He discussed the key factors that are changing the process of art work in order to connect with contemporary audiences more effectively while keeping the standards and objectives in the process. CTR Press
January 4-6, 2017:
Potato Expo & Conference
San Francisco
Potato Expo was an interesting Conference and trade show for the potato industry; it gathered farmers, professionals, specialists, key decision makers and international industry leaders from around the world to discuss farming, global food service, changing retail landscape, new potato technologies and the latest practical business solutions and innovations. Adam Steltzner, chief engineer from NASA was the keynote speaker and discussed his projects and the details about NASA Mars Rover. He discussed his initiatives, curiosity and how his skill in managing the team and seeking the positive aspect of each person’s character led the team to achieve success. The panel who discussed farming in Silicon Valley talked about the unique views of the future of farming inside Silicon Valley. Clay Mitchell, managing director, Fall Line Capital pointed out that they try to remain above the technology. He recommended the audience to read the Wall Street Journal article: “Automation Makes Us Dumb”. Nicholas Carr, the writer of the article argues that society would be better served if we deploy “human-centered automation,” in which “the talents of people take precedence. He emphasizes “If we let our own skills fade by relying too much on automation, we are going to render ourselves less capable, less resilient and more subservient to our machines. We will create a world more fit for robots than for us.” Mitchell mentioned that when everything is automated, there would be just one guy to push the bottom and how could we trust this guy. In Mitchellfarm.com, there is an interesting quote: “We agree with Abraham Cowley who wrote in his 1650 essay, “Of Agriculture,” that there is no other life so praiseworthy for “the utility of it, to a man’s self; the usefulness, or rather necessity, of it to all the rest of mankind; the innocence, the pleasure, the antiquity, the dignity.” The majority of people who have ever lived have farmed for a living, and in the hierarchy of these craftsmen, the best carry the culminated wisdom of this fellowship.” Another speaker, Halverson, CEO, Black Gold Farms also pointed out that we should not forget that we are farmers and should not be obsessed with fancy toys such as drones. Kendall mentioned that productivity index of land differs for each environment. He said: “selling software is like passing bill in congress.”
Shipley discussed the growing demand for potatoes in food service sector. She mentioned that potatoes are number one food at food service. She also discussed different innovations that are currently emerging in the sector. In the exhibit hall, the representative of SunRain mentioned that SunRain scouts the globe to bring the right varieties that meet the changing face of today’s consumers. SCS Global offers food safety training courses that provides the latest methods of reducing food safety risks. Potatoes USA in 2016 exported $16 million more potatoes than in the previous marketing year. University of Wisconsin potato breeding team work on potatoes research programs and their incentive for production including Oneida Gold potato that fills a unique niche in the yellow market. CTR Press
2016 Events:
December Events:
December 13-14, 2016:
APIDays Paris
Paris, France
APIDays Conference was about Automating IT, Business and the whole society with APIs. More than 1100 Developers, Architects and Innovation Managers from around the world gathered together in Paris to discuss the latest about API and Microservice revolution. An application-programming interface (API) is a set of programming instructions for accessing a Web-based software application. A software company releases its API to the public in order to enable other software developers design the type of products powered by its service. Lacobelli CEO of StamPlay discussed Automation of Business processes. He mentioned that both developer and non-developers can create powerful enterprise workflows with APIs and service such as Tropo. He pointed out that messaging apps are taking over and conversational interfaces are also in the process of being able to rely on channels like SMS and it is the task of Tropo to make it very easy. The next speaker explained that application programming interfaces make it easier for developers to use some technologies in building applications. She emphasized that developers need an API that reduces the cognitive load on a programmer. She mentioned that an API for file input and output gives the developer a possibility of copying a file from one location to another without the need for the developer to understand that file system operations behind the scenes.
Louvel from Restlet talked about the State of API Languages. He mentioned that
companies value API designers works and what API project managers do while we are in the digital economy era. “There are 5 traits of API project managers.” He pointed out that APIs have moved into financial services, government, healthcare and retail and during the recent years, lots of companies and government institutions publish APIs in their developers’ portals and making innovation. The next speaker explained that API usage vary depending on the type of programming language involved. An API for a language such as Lua would consist of basic routines to execute code and manipulate data, but an API for an object oriented language such as Java can ” provide a specification of classes”. She discussed Remote APIs that developers use for manipulating the remote resources through protocols. And “the Java Database Connectivity API allows developers to query many different types of databases with the same set of functions.”
Boni, Directeur Associé, Nexworld talked about using API Management for an Omni-Channel Retail Experience. He mentioned that the companies for competing they need to adapt to the continually changing market landscape and use omni-channel engagement across web, social and IoT. The next speaker discussed that An API is related to a software library and an API have multiple implementations in the form of different libraries that have the same programming interface. And the separation of the API from its implementation allows programs written in one language to use a library written in another one.
The future of Social Robots was discussed by the next speaker.
He mentioned that the social robots can recognize our voice and face and help us
planning our calendar, taking pictures of special moments, videoconference,
ordering food, reading recipes and play games. The next speaker discussed that API can specify the interface between an application and the operating system that aim to enable an application written for a specific operating system. She explained Linux as an operating systems that implement the POSIX APIs.
Build versus Buy was discussed by Boogar, Brand manager, Algolia. He explained that it is a privately held company working in algorithms, search engines and text mining. And they help users deliver the search-as-you-type experience on their websites and mobile apps. The speaker explained that the design of an API provides the tools a user expect and the design of programming interfaces is considered as an essential part of software architecture. He explained how Oracle sued Google for having distributed a new implementation of Java embedded in theAndroid operating system and Google didn’t acquire any permission to reproduce the Java API and the judge ruled in that APIs cannot be copyrighted in the U.S, and that widely expanded copyright protection and allowed the “copyrighting of simple software commands.” CTR Press
December 7-8, 2016:
U.S. Energy Storage Summit 2016
San Francisco
U.S. Energy Storage Summit 2016 was organized by GTM, Greentech Media. Greentech Media was founded in 2007 and since then it has expanded cleantech community of business and professionals through online news, market research and conferences. GTM Research provides timely market analysis in the form of market research reports and consulting services. Their analyst team have various backgrounds in the energy, technology, Investment banking and consulting. The speakers and panels discussed a variety aspects of energy storage. The panel discussed storage EPC perspective discussed Working in the storage projects, Solar system and the value of solar companies. The speaker in favor of EPC mentioned that PECs stations are turn key solutions for connecting to the battery containers. They discussed battery energy storage system and battery compatibility. The speaker mentioned that the PECs delivers power to the grid when there is high demand and as the result reduces the cost by minimizing the power demand. Also it can smooth the rate of charge of power because of cloud cover. And about the load leveling he mentioned that PEC stores energy by charging batteries when there is low demand. Leyden, director of EDF Renewables pointed out that there will be more renewable with storage in the future. The speaker mentioned that the Storage companies and each region has its own rules and regulations and we should think about flexibility.
The panel also discussed Creating value through software. They explained the latest projects, California capacity market and Human machine interface. The moderator asked the panel how AI affected storage. They discussed Virtual storage system and designing energy storage. The speaker from Enbala mentioned that it captures and aggregates energy storage and renewable energy to form a network of controlled energy resources. Loflin discussed the ways of putting the system into action and the software solutions for designing and automating. He mentioned that the suite of products creates an ecosystem where the developers can deploy advanced energy products.
In the exhibition area, the representative of Fronius explained that their primo hybrid is the storage solution for residential solar system and it can operate the PV array and the Tesla power Wall at the same time and ultimately reduces the system costs. The exhibitor from Stem explained that customer sited storage from Stem is a powerful networked resource that can deliver reliable services to the grid. NexTracker director of marketing explained that they have launched an innovative solar plus energy storage solution for USA and international markets. She mentioned that NexTracker is a solar and storage solution that integrates the latest solar tracker, battery and software technology to deliver better return to the owners of solar power plants. Mints Levin representative explained that they provide the strategic and legal guidance to the entrepreneurs, startups or large corporations. And since 2006 they have completed 300 transactions totaling $8 billion. Doosan exhibitor, Silvia, mentioned that Doosan GridTech delivers control system software and power system services that enable integration of distributed energy resources into grid. Power Electronics exhibitor explained that their PECS product line offers a modular design for energy storage projects. CTR Press
December 6, 2016:
Read My Pins
Legion of Honor
San Francisco
This interesting exhibition presents the Madeleine Korbel Albright collection of more than 200 pins and brooches. They are beautiful brooches that their value is not monetary but the roles they have had in conveying the social and political messages. “She used her pins as silent yet visually outspoken codes to foreign officials and the Press.” And it has been successful. The visitors loved the exhibition and there was lots of positive feedbacks. A unique humor is hidden in each pin and this is the task of the visitors to find out. Each caption tells a story for each brooch. One pin that looks like a missile has an interesting story: Russian diplomats used to check which brooch she was wearing and on the first day of a difficult diplomatic discussion involving nuclear arms, Ivanov looked at her pin and said: “Is that one of your interceptor missiles? She replied: “Yes, and as you can see, we know how to make them very small. So you’d better be ready to negotiate.” Each story has a unique wit and humor that brought smiles on the visitors’ face.
Some brooches are gold and some silver and many are made by anonymous designers in the USA and some of them are gifts from other countries especially France and Italy. They are in variety of shapes: vegetables, fruits, animals, flowers, human, sun, nature and different objects. One of them shows the glass ceiling “in its ideal condition: shattered.” Each pin has a purpose; a pin with the threes colors: green, white and violet signifying respectively hope, purity and dignity; its initials GWV conveying the message “give women the voice”. Even some visitors were inspired to wear their brooches that have not been used for a long time. CTR Press
December 2, 2016:
Frank Stella, A Retrospective
de Young
San Francisco
Frank Stella is the famous American minimalist painter. He lives in Greenwich Village, New York. Stella as a minimalist artist creates abstract works characterized “by the use of repeated geometric shapes that stripped of all thematic or emotional content.”
He is considered one of the most respected postwar American painters that is still
working. He is known as an abstract painter who creates “no political illusions or psychological or metaphysical references in 20th century painting. His paintings are exhibited at de Young, Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. The exhibition hall with Stella’s paintings on its Wall gives the visitors a tranquil and peaceful and at the same time meditative feelings. A retired professor of business was discussing one of Stella’s paintings with his wife and both found it very peaceful and beautiful.
Frank Stella in one of his lectures at Harvard University mentioned: ” what
paintings wants in the world more than anything else is working space: space to
grow and expand into, pictorial space that is capable of direction and movement,
pictorial space that encourages unlimited orientation and extension.” And this is the element the audience finds in his paintings. The visitors can feel the space and connect with it. This space is creating the tranquil feeling that connects the artist to the viewers of his art. Each of Stella’s paintings had a unique way of expressing the idea of abstraction that has also resemblance to outside world objects and is beautiful.
Once Stella argued: “There is nothing wrong with abstraction being like outside the art world.”
Stella’s paintings seem to be simple and minimal, but they have “far reaching
implications” and meaning. This is the job of the visitors to decide about the meaning and message of each paintings. Each visitor looks differently, from different point of view that has roots in his or her personal experiences and beliefs. But one thing they all have in common and it is the tranquil feeling and mild joy they feel while observing Frank Stella paintings. CTR Press
November 29- December 1 , 2016:
Open Mobile Summit
San Francisco
Open Mobile Summit was organized by Open Mobile Media. The Conference gathered App & Mobile Tech, Commerce & Brands and Media & Advertising professionals from the around the world to discuss the latest innovations in the industry. Pierce discussed the reasons people using mobile devices to watch TV. He mentioned that all the people on the earth like comedy. He said: “we help them to choose the program they like, we help them to choose the content clusters for the period time that they like.” He explained how to provide continuity of content and how to keep users engaged on different platforms and devices. About VR platform and VR app he pointed out that we are still waiting for the story telling elements of the VR. Bernard from USA Today Network discussed the approaches to the universal web. He explained the ways of creating positive experiences with the combination of local and national news. He discussed the ways people are engaging with the mobile device. He pointed out that Mobile web is where the audience is. He explained the new audience acquisition. He emphasized on finding what is right for each individual or each group and then building relationships with the users. “There are lots of opportunities on mobile web, but we have a very limited time to catch them.” He said:” Facebook and Google apps show the need for speed when you are experiencing user engagement.” He mentioned that we can make continual improvements by testing to find out what works. He discussed Universal web and leveraging the digital ecosystem, How to create content and how to be mindful of the ways of injecting the content to engage the users. “when they have good experiences with the website they will be a returning customer. Don’t forget the Flexibility in technical architecture of your website.” He mentioned that from design perspective create a better experience for the users and continue with interactions. “Different types of articles should be dealt differently: business content is different from entertainment articles and people who read them are very different too. People are at the center of this ecosystem.”
Hyman discussed the ways of keeping the audience engaged by using creative marketing messages. He explained the global leading marketing platforms and emphasized on Humanizing the technology. He said: “Most apps only retain 10% of their customers and an average cost per each engaged user is $68.” He discussed using technology to improve the user engagement. “Push notifications can be used for improvement of the engagement.” He emphasized on the necessity of investing heavily on the new users and ensuring that the customers are getting value. The panel discussed the fluid app experience and how to make sure that customers are engaged and keep coming back. They emphasized on combining the devices, location based marketing to deliver a customer centric approach. The speaker pointed out that understanding the users habits is key to creating more relevant messages and delivering targeted marketing. ” By creating authentic personalized messages you can engage the users.”
Diaz, VP Analytics from Washington Post discussed the declining of mobile apps. She said: “We want people become subscribers and we use app for the better engagement.” The panel discussed the chat bots and AI and how they will replace the apps. Vladimer emphasized that in IOT, it should not be replacement for human being , it should be enhancement and we should not taking human out of equations. Wilson introduced OfferUp. He emphasized that simplicity and trustworthiness are essential elements. He said: ” we have created the simplest way for people to buy and sell locally. If you want to be a successful company, you should start simple in the complicated world. Simplicity and trustworthiness are the main elements for the success in the market. He discussed how they were successful in reducing the friction in every part of the process. “The images are central in the advertising and we should focus on the pictures.”
Newton discussed bot platform. She mentioned that 2016 is the year of the bot and we are in the age of the bot by focusing on messaging and chat box. She pointed out that two third of users have not downloaded any app and Messaging apps are used more than other apps. ” bot is a software application that runs automated tasks; bots perform is simple and repetitive, at a much higher rate than would be possible for a human. “The success of bots may be due to the difficulty in identifying the difference between an online interaction with a bot and a human. There has been a controversy about the use of bots in an automated trading function: eBay has been to court in an attempt to suppress a third-party company from using bots to traverse their site looking for bargains.” Newton mentioned that advantages of bots are: No download, No new account and No new interface. “It is quick to set up and easy to use.” She mentioned that 2017 is the year of customers and in the future every brands will have a bot. Parfitt pointed out that AI helped human and it should not replace it. He mentioned that data and content are exploding.”We differentiate by shifting to automated support.” He explained Virtual concierge and how the consumer will be in charge. He emphasized on the process of Test & learn: when you fail you learn better. Gelfenbeyn asked the members of the audience to raise their hands if they use chat bots and only five people raised their hands. And he pointed out that for creating a good bot you need lots of data.
In the exhibition areas, representatives from different companies introducing their products and services. Segment exhibitor mentioned that they collect customers data with one API and send it to hundreds of tools for analytics, marketing and data warehousing. Blue Snap representative mentioned that they reach shoppers in 180 countries with 110 payment types, 100 currencies and 29 languages. Hyphenate exhibitor explained that their headquarter is in China and they have an office in San Francisco, it is a five month old company that powers chat in mobile apps. Apptimize representative mentioned that the Wall Street Journal is one of their customers and they help them to collect data and make rapid improvements to their app. CTR Press
November Events:
November 13-18, 2016:
AIChE 2016
San Francisco
AIChE is considered as a home for all chemical engineers ; it has over 50,000 members in more than 100 countries. In 1968, it recognized the importance of supporting female engineers and minority that is currently called: MAC, Minority Affaires Committee. The AIChE annual meeting hosted programming from more than 20 AIChE technical divisions and forums. More than 6,000 papers were presented. It was about catalysis engineering, process development, material engineering, particle technology, pharmaceutical engineering and energy processes. The focus was on both technical innovations and professional growth. The session on 3D printing, was about 3D printing and the way it is being employed in traditional chemical engineering processes.The food- energy- water nexus topical session was about sustainable solutions for transformative technical and political change. Perspective on the impact of environmental factors on performance of metal organic frameworks was discussed. Green discussed engendering political and economic sustainability for the transportation. Future directions in applied mathematics, perspective on predictive control for stochastic systems and modeling convergence of circadian clocks and metabolism were discussed. In the session on emerging energy applications of nanoscale engineering, the panel talked about challenges to commercializations of new energy tech and carbon nanotubes in real world applications. On bionanotechnology, Baneyx discussed controlling hybrid structure assembly and inorganic mineralization with solid binding proteins. For using regional resources and sustainability, researchers from Technical University discussed renewable regional resources that are “replenished by natural income and radiation as the main source of this natural income.” Also the factors such as economic and cultural parameters and the way they influence and convert renewable resources into useful products were discussed.
In MIT, engineers have developed a new device that involves mundane and inexpensive materials such as bubble wrap and the system has generated saturated steam at 100C at an efficiency of 63%. The new device relies on interfacial solar thermal conversion instead of concentrated solar thermal. Researchers from Stanford University have combined cotton and polyethylene “to create a textile that is both opaque to visible light and transparent to infrared. It could create clothing that keeps us cool on hot days and can be considered an interesting innovation for textile industry. Harvard University researchers have made the first robot that is made entirely of soft materials. It is an octopus shaped robot that is able to wave its legs. Usually robots are made of hard materials, but these robots that are called “octobot” use hydrogen peroxide as fuel and “a microfluidic logic circuit for movement control.” CTR Press
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November 18, 2016:
Brand Innovators Challenger Brands
San Francisco
This event was organized by Brand Innovators. It was an event for brand marketers to gather together and discuss the latest in the market and share data, their views and perspectives. Marino, CMO thredup in a conversation with Spika discussed the company strategies and innovations. He mentioned that they had attracted Macy’s customers to their website. They trade wardrobes clothes that are still in good condition and the clothes are for women and children. He pointed out that some customers send a bag full of cloths, then the following week they order a bag of clothes! “it shows they had to get rid of unwanted clothing in their wardrobes but they are still like shopping for more clothes.” One member of audience expressed his disappointment when he visited their website and mentioned that the signup message was a factor that discouraged him to continue. Donner, the director of SocialCode discussed the power of connecting owned data with social media. He explained the ways of improving sale rates. He pointed out that we need to identify the influences with the power to unify brands. He described brand data as the way the consumers engage with your brand and social data as the way consumers behave. He emphasized that social data should lead to social listening. Rubenstein, CMO Watermelon Water discussed the marketing strategies of the company. He started his speech with this sentence: ” One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. He said that the company turns the ugly fruits into beautiful juices. He mentioned that 800 million pounds of unused watermelons are thrown away each year and the mission of this company is to save them. They prevent the waste by creating watermelon water in plastic bottles. He explained the history of creating the company that makes Coconut water in the U.S.: the founders met two women from Brazil and asked them what they have missed the most; the reply was coconut water. And it was the start point of creating the company that makes coconut water. He mentioned that they used the power of celebrities to influence the buyers. They published Madonna pictures drinking the coconut water and then they brought Rihanna and athletes pictures drinking coconut water. Then he mentioned that they have used the same marketing strategies for Watermelon water. They encouraged Beyonce to invest in the company and appear in the media outlets advertising it. He said that they got 700 million media impressions and the handful stores presenting their products sharply increased after the advertisements into 1500 stores. Their motto was Fight Against Food Waste. He also pointed out that they have a new innovative method, but he did disclose it; he said: ” We have already had the queen, now we need a princess to advertise our products.” Fighting against food waste is good, but he did not mention anything about the damages that plastic bottles may have on the environment. And as one member of audience mentioned: “Why not to encourage people to eat fresh fruits.” CTR Press
November 11-13, 20016:
Green Festival Expo 2016
San Francisco
Green Festival celebrated its 15th anniversary with a series of talks and exhibitions about organic foods and products. Its goal was increasing awareness of the environmental benefits of adopting a natural and healthy lifestyle, encouraging people to buy good organic food, non- GMO food, to use sustainable products and avoiding artificial ingredients, preservatives, and unhealthy lifestyle. Green Festival mission was introducing the latest green products and services in the market, promoting sustainability in life choices and actions, encouraging companies to adopt green and fair trade principles and focusing on organic, non-GMO and local food as part of a healthy lifestyle.
The panel discussing plastic pollution mentioned that 3 million plastic bottles are thrown away every hour in the U.S. They described the present plastic pollution in the world’s oceans from the North Atlantic and North Pacific gyre as alarming. The speaker pointed out that even in the remotest places, the tiny pieces of plastic have been found in the fish. The filmmaker of “plastic Paradise” mentioned that big companies who are manufacturing plastic have sued the environmental activists for defamation. The speaker compared the polluted oceans to “bathtubs without drains”. One member of audience expressed her deep concern about plastic pollution and said:” I cannot understand why people keep using plastic bottles. Why do they continue to buy water in the plastic bottles? She showed her usable water bottle that she carries all the time and asked for a serious ban on plastic bottles. The speaker explained how some companies are creating building materials from trash. Then there was the screening of a movie about the massive environmental destruction and followed by questions and answers. In another session, how nutrition can affect the skin was discussed. The speaker pointed out that nutrition really matters especially to the skin. He emphasized we are what we eat: organic food with fresh and natural ingredients is essential for our wellbeing.
Cann talked about GMOs in the cosmetic products. She mentioned many ingredients in personal care come from agricultural sources. She discussed the ways to identify and avoid them. Ziff, founder of Made Safe discussed toxic elements in baby products, personal care and household products and how they cause human health harm. She mentioned that many people don’t use organic products because they are expensive. She emphasized: “Use less, buy high quality and organic products.” Owens pointed out that everyone should have some moments of self reflection and self care on daily basis. “We should examine our medicine cabinet and throw away the unhealthy products.” Fitzgerald, journalist talked about fighting to protect the environment from the oil industry. Kurzrock talked about food waste and mentioned that more than 40% of all food grown in goes uneaten that is waste of the resources and opportunities.
In the exhibition hall, American Wild Horse Preservation representative mentioned that wild horses are “living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West” ; and currently low flying helicopters drive them off public lands to make room for livestock grazing and other commercial interests. World Progress exhibitor mentioned that only 5% of plastic bottles are recycled worldwide and we should eliminate disposable plastic travel size containers. Representative of Bank Purely talked about an innovative way of banking for a better world. Environmental Voice exhibitor mentioned that nano sized aluminum compounds that are used in climate engineering are harmful to the brain and spinal cord. Representative from Caboo company was introducing their tree free products. He mentioned that unlike trees, bamboo regrow from its own roots. Harvest & Mill Organic Clothing company was exhibiting beautiful 100 % organic T shirts in natural color that were grown and sewn in the USA. CTR Press
November 8-9, 2016:
Structure Conference 2016
San Francisco
The Conference was all about discussing Cloud, how we are dealing with many clouds and the state of this multi-cloud world. According to the organizers of Structure Conference, current cloudscape not only comprises a handful of massively scaled public cloud options but also a large array of branded private clouds. Guthrie from Microsoft talked about the process of building a one-stop shop for business software in the cloud. He discussed container based applications and infrastructure capabilities. He also explained container based environment. The cloud vendors, use of hardware and software integration and more distributed investments were discussed. He mentioned that Amazon is number one and Microsoft, number two and Google is the third in cloud ranking. Then he gave the example of Societe Generale, one of Europe’s largest financial services groups, that has turned to the cloud software in order to enable employees work secondments overseas. It is a part of the special strategy to attract the best employees. “In the HR cloud space, US suppliers have often been led from the mid-market, but in Europe they are often focused more on enterprise-class organizations first.” That is going to challenge their ability to serve multinational customers with their complexities like multiple languages, multi-country regulations, regulatory reporting and finally local law. The speaker mentioned that the good thing about cloud is: being scalable and at the same time being easier to simplify. “High-end corporate functions can be switched off for the mid-market if it doesn’t need them.”
The rise of the artificially intelligent data center was discussed by the next panel. Evolution of analytics and deep learning were discussed. The speaker explained the Artificial Intelligence. He discussed deep learning and algorithms where abstract ideas are represented by multiple deep layers of graphs. Also he pointed out that classical machine learning uses algorithms that are based on statistical or other techniques for estimating functions from examples. He showed different slides and mentioned that 7% of the server market is AI severs. He emphasized that Deep learning is a method of extracting features at the multiple levels of abstraction. Deep belief Network demonstrated. He discussed Automating and biggest computational problem we are facing. He gave examples of Machine learning and Improving patient care in Penn medicine and how UPS had saved $50 million a year.
The highlight of the conference was the interesting talk by Devine from IBM. He discussed guide to the Perfect Digital Storm. He explained Growing up Lynx in data center, Watson and cognitive insight. Combining the power of cloud-based enterprise search, content analysis and cognitive solutions to connect and view data insights across silos, for better outcomes. He gave examples of different projects with international transportation where location and deed of users and the combination of data all matters. He also pointed out that
top focus of IBM is the cognitive element in utilizing cloud. He said: “we are still in the embryonic stage and the amount of data that exists today is treated like gold but it should be put in the use and its value is in its use.” He pointed out that in traditional university IT and engineering department are separate but now increasingly IT and engineering are connected. When Thomson asked him about the future, he replied: “more data, more connectivity and spontaneous eco system by faster technology.” Thompson mentioned that omitting human elements is really worrying but the positive element is the speed. The speaker mentioned that Cloud speed not only refers to the rate of technology advancement but also the way it is delivered. “In a continuous services delivery world, consumer expectations are moving towards cloud speed and business managers and developers should develop skills that allow them to optimize the quality of experience to the customer and delivery value to them. He talked about Vibrancy that is “pulsating with life and vigor” and by providing Data-as-a-Service, enterprises that allow an vigorous ecosystem to extend the value of the data to bring new services to life.” He discussed emerging IoT trend and how the IoT ecosystem is starting to leverage “Block Chaining” to provide secure commerce.
The next panel talked about how to find the next generation of cloud computing startups and it was moderated by Krazit. Explosion of data, data structure and IT operations were discussed. Wagner said that Facebook can be seen as a data center and it is its key asset that Facebook is monetizing so well. Micro services benefits and how it creates the business Refactoring and cloud applications were discussed. The speaker mentioned that SaaS model is almost uniquely suited to being able to hide complexity where it isn’t needed.” There is a risk that, as cloud suppliers grow, their ability to closely serve the needs of individual customers may diminish and the more successful the cloud suppliers become, the more trying to influence the roadmap. The next panel discussed the data security. The speaker mentioned that the customers want to know how secure the data is. She mentioned as we have recently seen in Yahoo case, the breach of security not necessarily result in financially going down. The speaker talked about trading the stolen data and he mentioned that the price of medical records in the black market is considerable whereas credit card information is not that expensive because it can be easily replaced. He pointed out that always make sure that all the information is encrypted. Forrester pointed out that the future of network would be less protocols and more intelligent. The speaker from Box in response to this question: “what makes a platform successful?” mentioned that your primary audience is the developer; “you can make money if you engage them in the app.” He mentioned the necessity of keeping the developers in the forefront. He emphasized that the most misunderstood thing about platform is thinking that people buy and then use, but in fact, people use, then buy! He said the customer owns the data. The speaker from Comcast asked the audience who uses Comcast and nearly half the audience raised their hands but his second question that how many of you like using it, raised only four hands. He explained the clouds that run home security systems and he discussed the future of connected home.
In the exhibition hall, representative from neo4j explained that everyone can go to neo4j.com/graphacademy and learn neo4j graph. Rackspace combines expertise, easy to use tools and customer service across AWS and OpenStack. VMware cloud Foundation is VMware’s unified SDDC platform for the hybrid cloud. Representatives from Node Pole were discussing the cloud frontier of Europe. The Node Pole is a European data center and cloud computing hub located in the north of Sweden where Facebook’s first data center outside ofU.S. is located. And this is the place that 1,400 MW green energy from hydro and wind power is turned into data networks, cloud services and cloud innovations. CTR Press
November 2-5, 2016:
ATA 57th Annual Conference
San Francisco
ATA 57th Annual Conference was organized by ATA, American Translators Association that is a professional association with the mission of advancing the Translation and Interpretation professions and developing the abilities of translators and interpreters. It has more than 10,000 members from 100 countries. It’s annual conference gathered together international translators, interpreters, language teachers, project managers and language company owners. There were a variety of meetings, workshops, educational sessions and exhibitions. In the annual meeting of all members, the director and the boards explained what the association has accomplished and what plans for the future they have. They mentioned that the last year revenue had been over 3.1 million dollars and the net income has increased 1000% and currently there is more than $700,000 in the Investment accounts. The members of audience who were attendees from 63 countries asked questions and made comments to board members and committee chairs. Also different plans such as School Outreach Plan that aims to promote Translation industry by visiting schools and talking about translation and interpretation. Mission of ATA, public relation community and importance of human translation were pointed out by the chairmanship.
Resolution Community and submissions of resolutions by the members were discussed.
Crisper gene editing session was an interesting topic discussed by Dr Ronni. He explained the tailored gene therapy to species engineering. Dr Ronni is a specialist in genetic engineering and for the last decade he has been working as a successful medical translator. He discussed human genome and Gene therapy. He skillfully explained the complicated medical phrases in the simple way that was understandable by non specialist audience. He explained how the genetic makeup makes large personal variation among people. He mentioned that by spending 10 thousand dollars anyone can sequence human genome. He explained how Particular mutations can be either beneficial or harmful. He also explained the Genetic disorders and how
Biotechnology has made proteins therapy possible. “The patient get purified form of protein that they are missing, but the cost would be 200,000 dollars a year.” He pointed out that correcting the underlying defect in patients is done in gene therapy by transduction of cells.
“How to do it? By tailoring viruses or nanoparticles. By genetic engineering we can create tailored viruses.” He mentioned that in 1999 a patient died in the process of gene therapy. He discussed how the Viruses have a natural ability to enter target cells and how they can be modified by genetic engineering. “All are targeting somatic cells.” Then he explained the Solid organs such as lungs and brain in in-vivo gene therapy procedures. Gene augmentation vs gene editing, Recently discovered Crisper-Cas system, Car-T cells in gene editing, Viruses injected to DNA and how It could cause cancer if any mistake happens were discussed. He explained that FDA has a special branch CBER for biological research and FDA is against commercial gene therapy products and in Europe too European medicine agency has many regulations. He also discussed the ethical issues of genetic engineering and emphasized that China has done human embryo editing but in the US and Europe it is illegal and forbidden because of the ethical issues. Then asked the member of audience who approves gene therapy and only one person, a translator from India, raised his hand. Other attendees expressed their concerns about its ethical issues.
On the Literary Translation session, the speaker who is the translator of Chekhov literary works talked about her experiences and how to approach classics and how to publish new translation of classics. She discussed Saint Petersburg festival in London Barbican center in 1999 and how people got interested in reading translations of Chekhov’s short stories. She mentioned that a huge donations to Pushkin house in London was made by a rich person who had discovered Chekhov stories and was fascinated with them. She talked about different money raising events for saving Chekhov House in Yalta. The most recent one was the fundraising event in the Hempstead theatre for restoring Chekhov House. She also discussed the project of building Chekhov healing garden in the U.K. Hospital. In another session, understanding financial jargon was discussed by the speaker. In the French Translation session, Benoit discussed Palms VS Oscars: compare and contrast. She mentioned many examples of English into French translations and French into English translations too. She pointed out that if the translation is not correct, an invitation can be interpreted as an order. She discussed Mobile apps and differences in the US and France. She gave many examples of Evasive superlatives in translating from English into French. She emphasized the process of doing research by translators and considering the differences in culture. She mentioned that in the US skiing is seen as a legendary activity but in France it is just fun.
In the exhibition hall, different language and translation companies were exhibiting. MCIS representative mentioned that their mission is using the power of languages to sustain prosperous communities. Boostlingo, a one-year company based in SF provides secured and scalable interpretation services with an internet connection or phone line. Translate.com representative inviting the visitors to sign up and get immediate access to the paid tasks in their Translation Portal. National language service corps inviting the volunteers to join and respond to national or worldwide emergencies and other language professionals. DS Interpretation inc provides interpretation services for the corporations. Transperfect representative mentioned that the company has $505 million annual revenue and is considered one of the world’s largest privately held language service provider. Carolina Association of Translators and Interpreters exhibitor inviting the visitors to join. And ATA representative pointed out that ATA membership connects members to other 11,000 experienced translators, interpreters and language services companies. CTR Press
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October 30 – November 2, 2016:
MGMA 2016 Annual Conference
San Francisco
MGMA 2016 annual conference was an interesting event that gathered the administrators, executives and physicians together. MGMA represents about “33,000 administrators and executives in 18,000 healthcare organizations in which 385,000 physicians practice.” It is considered as the leading association for medical practice administrators and executives since 1926. In 1926 the first conference of clinic managers was in Madison, Wis. and 2016 is it’s 90th anniversary. MGMA equips medical practice leaders with the information and tool they need; it provides the “essential education, legislative information, and data and career resources to help improve patient services and operational efficiencies.” Practices of every size, type and region were represented at the conference. Graffigan, an American stand-up comedian, actor, writer, voice actor, and author was one of the main speaker in the conference. His humor was around fatherhood, observations, and food. He regarded as a “clean” comic, because he uses little profanity in his performances. In his performance he said that something that we can control we don’t want anymore! He talked about his different experiences in various countries such as his sauna experience in Finland in February. He also made fun of the habit of so much watching. He said: “we miss reading!” He compared the relationship of watchers and the TV episodes to the relationships between two humans: sometimes “it is over! Not wanted anymore!” The speaker who introduced Graffian, also talked about the Unifying power of cake and mentioned: “Bacon is the most beautiful thing on earth.” She mentioned that in 2016 medical practice has been $3 Trillion practice. She explained the history of medical practice and she pointed out that Frank exchange of ideas is a necessity. She mentioned that the same problem is still remain and 90% of the physicians are unhappy with their career, and people are unhappy with the practice. She emphasized the necessity of leading a new movement in healthcare: “Bring medicine back to where it belongs.”
Wolf discussed different case studies where billing gone badly. He discussed the process of maximizing the benefits of third party relationships. He presented and examined a variety of court and investigative documents of physicians practice cases where billing gone badly. He pointed out that the Whistleblowers brought these cases: ” 20 % of whistleblowers go directly to government and 80 percent do it internally.” He mentioned that a Cardiologist in Florida received $18 million from Medicare in 2012 and investigations showed that he had done unnecessary tests and procedures just for his personal gain. One case was Ravi Sharma, a physician in Tampa, Florida who used to ask unqualified assistants or staff to perform the tests that were unnecessary and the physician prescribed the unnecessary medicines and received 25% in return. He described the billing for surgical closure procedures at higher levels. He explained how Corporate Integrity Agreement can help prevent the exclusion. He also discussed other cases of Unsupervised non physicians examined but billed as performed by physicians, Tests that were not medically necessary and finally Failure to return overpayments within 60 days that could be a false claim. He discussed the identification of overpayments and what constitute them. He pointed out that auditing and monitoring should be done by people with medical background. He also mentioned that currently the lines between the Business and the medical functions within a practice are blurred.
MGMA survey of operations in medical practices showed an increased focus on patient experience; increasingly patients have more choices such as improving wait times, appointments scheduling and financial management. The speaker discussed the ways to create a culture of patient safety and engaging staff in daily improvements and finally using patient experience to drive improvements. Then the next speaker discussed the ways to optimize the healthcare documentation process and eliminating the time consuming variables that leads to inaccurate documentation. She emphasized the necessity of creating a platform independent provider of transcription services: different platforms such as 3M Health Information System and Dolby. The panel discussed how patient experience in a consumer driven healthcare marker would be. The speaker discussed the strategic programs that can drive revenue and at the same time increasing patient satisfaction. He also emphasized the need for creating approach to priority setting and business building. The speaker discussed the complexity of procedures in the healthcare setting that created new challenges and risks. He pointed out that managing risks is necessary to maintain the wellbeing of patients and financial stability of the healthcare providers. In the session on CMS terms of payment reform, Ballou discussed 2017 innovative measures. She described population as the group defined as community that can be defined in many ways. She emphasized on finding who your population are. She also discussed patients satisfaction and patients engagement.
In the Exhibition hall a variety of companies in different sizes introduced their latest products and services. Experian introduced Passport e care that uses touchless workflow to create more productive workflows by automating manual processes; also Doug Shannon, the skillful cartoonist was busy drawing the visitors faces.Integrated healthcare strategies by analyzing the hospitals best service lines in order to achieve the desired growth. Todd Pitner introduced Medical group solutions that has created Rx savings card for patients. The card is branded with the logo of medical practice and provides savings of up to 75% on every FDA approved prescription medication. The representative explained that this new idea has already saved so many Americans over their prescription medications charges. Coverys risk management provided online continuing education library that is user- friendly and easy to access. Navicure solution reduces bad debt write offs with time of service charge authorizations and online patient payments. PCISgold booth had a special classic and dignified presentation and its representative introduced pcisgold as a single source solution that provides all clients with innovative software products. He described the patient portal for secure messages, appointment requests and lab/ test results. CTR Press
October Events:
October 21-25, 2016:
AAP Conference 2016
San Francisco
More than 10,000 pediatricians gathered together for the 2016 American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) national conference and symposium. “The mission of the American Academy of Pediatrics is to attain optimal physical, mental, and social health and well-being for all infants, children, adolescents and young adults.” The new policy recommendations and family resource tools and the most critical health issues facing today’s children were discussed in the conference. The AAP is an organization of more than 60,000 primary care pediatricians, pediatric medical subspecialists and pediatric surgical specialists. The speakers on Allergy and Immunology Program discussed asthma, food allergy, primary immunological disorders and drugs and bugs. The speaker discussed the latest ways of managing Nasal allergy symptoms that can be caused by a variety of environmental allergens including indoor allergens such as dust mites and pets and also the outdoor allergens such as pollens. She mentioned that Molds that can be found indoors and outdoors, can trigger nasal allergy symptoms. She pointed out that if the child has allergy symptoms and is allergic to a pet that lives in the home, the only way would be finding the pet a new home. The speaker emphasized that allergens can be found on the followings: Dust mites that are microscopic organisms found in bedding and carpet, furnitures, pets, pests, pollen, mold and finally food and Allergy testing should be performed to determine the cause of the allergy.
In the session on the long term effects of air pollution on brains and breathing, the speaker discussed the neurological injuries caused by exposure to air pollution. She emphasized that it starts during gestation and continues in the developing child and can cause structural brain abnormalities, neurocognitive deficit. The speaker pointed out that the early neurodegenerative changes are similar to those seen in Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases. She also emphasized on the preventive measures for indoor air pollution especially for the pregnant women. The next speaker discussed chronic cough and how to treat it. He discussed various clinical etiologies and presentations of chronic cough that indicates pulmonary disorders and ears, nose and throat anatomic issues. Dr Newman emphasized that we should not believe everything that we read. He discussed the history and physical exam of the research studies. He mentioned that method of presenting the research results can make the treatments look better than they are likely to be in the clinical practices.
The researcher on Infant Apps and electronic toys VS traditional toys discussed that researches have shown that infant educational Media are mostly passive and can be detrimental to the cognitive development of babies. He pointed out that multiple studies support the beneficial effects of traditional toys for the young children. Two female doctors discussed various visual diagnosis techniques and recognition of child abuse. They presented a series of cases outlining the child abuse. They discussed different cases of physically and emotionally abused children. In the most cases that were presented by them, mothers had left their small children in the care of their boyfriends and even some of them denied the abuses. The session was interactive and various questions about different cases were questioned and the pediatricians in the audience replied through their phones. According to the latest news release by AAP, visits to pediatric emergency departments for headache pain in children aged 4 to 20 are on the rise and females are more likely to be admitted for headache pain than male.
In the exhibition area, different companies presenting their latest products and services. Dr Hudspeth, the editor of the International journal of play therapy talked about the twenty fifth anniversary of the journal. “Play Therapy” as a powerful tool for addressing cognitive, behavioral and emotional challenges. The Vaccine Makers representative discussed the latest projects and supported the vaccines development program. But outside the exhibition hall, there were some protesters against vaccinations; they argued that vaccines contain toxic chemicals such as aluminum that can cause brain damage and formaldehyde that can cause cancer and they mentioned that sudden infant deaths spike after vaccines. Impact representative mentioned that they provide the only FDA cleared concussion evaluation tool for ages 5-11. Ubimed representative from Los Angles described their latest product, lifenest, as the baby mattress that improve airflow and breathability. Anthony, medical recruiting coordinator for Native Americans discussed multi state license hospital system. The national survival rate for lung transplant patients in 2015 has been 86.7% , but for Stanford children hospital has been 75.0%. Representative for designing a food pharmacy mentioned that IDEO is a global design company creating disproportionate impact through human centered design. She emphasized on helping families learn how to make meals that are nutritious. Their motto is “Food as Medicine”. CTR Press
October 16-19, 2016:
Cytokines 2016
San Francisco
Cytokines event that was the 4th Annual Meeting of the International Cytokine and Interferon Society was organized by ICIS (International Cytokine and Interferon Society). This society was formed 25 years ago to advance interferon and cytokine research by promoting the exchange of knowledge through meetings, seminars and publications. In order to accomplish this, it collaborates with leading companies that support research in the fields of “interferon, cytokine and chemokine cell biology, molecular biology, biochemistry and the clinical use of these biological response modifiers.” Its goal was promoting interactions between scientists performing studies of the molecular mechanisms of “cytokine and interferon function, signal transduction, and gene expression in the context of health and disease.” The International Cytokine and Interferon Society is a non-profit organization of 600 scientists researching in the fields of cytokine, interferon and chemokine cell biology, molecular biology, biochemistry and the clinical use of these biological response modifiers. Its mission is promoting an awareness with educational programs of the national and international health communities of the importance of these areas of biomedical research and for achieving these goals, the Society sponsor meetings, publications and other educational activities such as this event.
“Cytokines is a general term for a range of proteins of low molecular weight that exert a stimulating or inhibiting influence on the proliferation, differentiation and function of cells of the immune system.” Cytokines include interferons. Koch from UCL talked about Cytokines regulation of metabolism. Data from Maternal IgG experiment in mice was explained. Poffenberger from Canada, discussed LKB1 haploinsufficiency in T cells and mentioned that it is sufficient to drive the development of peutzjeghers syndrome. Rethinking the role of LKB1 in immunity and cancer was emphasized in her speech. In the poster exhibition, the topic allergic asthma was explained. The allergic asthma means allergens trigger the asthma symptoms and usually allergens cause an allergic reaction because the body immune system thinks they are harmful. As the result the immune system responds by releasing a substance called immunoglobulin E (or IgE). “Too much IgE can trigger inflammation (swelling) of the airways in the lungs.” This can make breathing difficult and can trigger an asthma attack. Mammalian respiratory chain in mice was discussed by the next speaker. Then the speaker discussed the potential of long term growth of T cells and other types including immature myeloid cells.
In the exhibition area, the exhibitors discussed a new pace for Alzheimer’s research: they introduced the new product that run 24 independent samples and get fully analyzed data in 3 hours. It uses 95% less tissue and antibody. Also a new product was introduced that pinpoints new brain injury biomarkers. When neuroinflammatory biomarkers are released from neurons post brain injury, their presence may negatively affect brain functions as the result of increasing cytokines level that results in neural damages. Also they presented another new product that is fully automated instrument for running immunoassay using the single molecule array. The exhibitors pointed out that these new products are not approved by FDA and they are still in the research level. CTR Press
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October 6, 2016:
New York Stock Exchange
New York
Investment perspectives, mutual funds, how the economic transition affect different sectors, tax efficiency, ETFs stack up, diversified portfolio, stock growth, investing strategies and investment goals were among those topics discussed by the experts in the events. The panel discussed the term “recency bias” that manifest itself in terms of momentum; it can convince the investors that a rising market or a stock will continue to appreciate or a declining market keeps falling. They pointed out that this bias can leads the investors to make emotional choices and subsequently to hold a stock for too long or pulling out too soon. The speaker discussed the situation that leads to dot-com bubble burst in 2000. He mentioned that rapidly appreciating stock prices made many investors to ride out the market. He concluded that by maintaining a long term investment plan the investors can stand against recency bias. The panel emphasized that the investors should have long term asset allocation targets that reflect the investment goals and risk tolerance.
Another panel discussed different ways of measuring the potential return on a bond. The speaker mentioned that yield to maturity measures the annual rate of returns that investors receive on a bond investment that is held to maturity. He also discussed the U.S. securitized bonds that include asset backed securities and collateralized mortgage backed securities. He pointed out that the investors receive payment from the interest and principal paid on the loans. The panel also discussed bond funds. The speaker mentioned that both bonds and bond funds provide income and diversification from stock. Usually the investors are drawn to the bonds because they can be a reliable source of income. She mentioned that the market value of the bond fluctuates throughout its life as the result of interest rates changes. She discussed different risks such as issuer might miss a payment or refusing to return the principal. The redeeming some bonds prior to maturity was discussed. They concluded that bond funds can help the investors to gain a steady income, face lower volatility and finally achieving greater portfolio diversification.
The next speaker discussed the tax efficiency of ETFs. He mentioned that ETFs shares usually change hands in the secondary market, from one investor to another. He pointed out that if the ETF owns bonds that pay interest, it should distribute the interest to the investors. The panel emphasized on consideration of the rating system before making any stock purchases. They pointed out that once the investor has identified a good stock to trade, he should use technical analysis to decide when to get in and what price to pay for it. The next speaker discussed the “stop order” that is an order to buy and sell a security when it reaches a set price. He pointed out that there is no guarantee that a stop order be executed at the stop price. It usually uses an algorithm that takes the market volatility into account. He mentioned that in general a trailing stop order is the best tool available to help selling at the most appropriate time. The panel concluded that because people don’t like taking losses, they usually hold a position for too long. “Loss aversion is a powerful force and it is the best way to fight is having a trade plan and sticking to it.”CTR Press
August & September Events:
American Marketing Association Conference 2016
Atlanta
The AMA conference was about reshaping marketing practice by study and research. The goal was finding “real world” problems in marketing and facilitate the understanding marketing practice. It focused on quality of research with practical outcome. The conference had special sessions on discussing the concerns of senior marketing executives. They pointed out the following problems: “Role of Marketing in the Firm and the C-Suite, the Digital Transformation of the Modern Corporation, Dealing with an Omni-Channel World, Generating and Using Insight to Shape Marketing Practice and finally Competing in Dynamic, Global Markets Balancing Incremental and Radical Innovation.” For each of these problems, there was a senior marketing executive that discussed the problem and challenges and the possible solutions. The concept of the Marketing Mix that was originally coined by Neil Borden was discussed. Borden for the first time presented the elements of the marketing mix. The elements that illustrate the different factors within the marketing mix. And marketers should consider them while marketing products to the different customers. A through consideration of every element creates a balanced and interesting offering to customers, in which all elements should contribute to the success of the product or service.
The senior marketing executives expressed their concerns about the existing marketing practices and emphasized on the innovative measures for marketing in the future. They pointed out that AMA “offers differentiated content that focuses on the tension between Best Versus Next Practices.” The speaker explained that any person online has been received an advertisement. Their behaviors are being tracked and ads deemed relevant to them are being published on the sites they visit and the apps they use. Consumers must know that they are being tracked. “The information that is being gathered by the invisible pixels painting the internet and how it is used is not as commonly understood. The oldest tracking technology is a cookie that is a script added to a URL to track visitor engagement with a webpage. Each visit to a website or any product browsing is tracked by a cookie, and when they leave that site or browsing session, subsequently an advertisement is served to them that related to the site or products they just viewed. Using cookies, advertisers are able to assign anonymous IDs to the consumers. ” The assumptions could be about the gender of the users, their purchase behavior or any number of characteristics to narrow segmentation.”
The panel discussed that when a visitor of a website provides them the personally identifying information such as a name, email or log in information, the site is able to assign a special ID to that person. “Actions that the visitor takes on that site can be tracked as first-party data.” ” when the customers visit a website and are logged in, the website owners can use a cookie to identify them and follow their purchase behavior. They emphasized that in the mobile world, cookies can be less useful to advertisers “because 90% of consumers’ time spent on mobile devices is in-app as opposed to the mobile web, and without a web address, there will be no cookies.” That explains why the advertisers use device IDs to track and target consumers. ” Device IDs differ from cookies because they don’t have to be placed by an app the way cookies are on a web page. In fact they are recorded from the device on which the user accesses an app and they are rarely reset, making them reliably consistent across many visits from the same user.” One of the senior executive discussed that acquiring marketing assets in the form of brands creates firm value. He emphasized that managers should consider the nature of the resources both internally and externally. They should consider the following conditions for achieving success: a strong target with considerable brand equity, strong organizational marketing management capability in the acquiring firm and a “low level of acquirer diversification.” CTR Press
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Casa Loma 2016
Toronto
Casa Loma is one of the most visited attractions in Toronto. This castle has an interesting history. In 1903, Pallatt, the financier bought 25 lots from developers Kertland and Rolf and commissioned a well known architect to design Casa Loma. Its construction began in 1911. The cost was over three million dollars and 300 works was working to build it in three years. It was “given to the city by its heavily debt-laden owner only a decade after it was put up.” 98 rooms covering 64,700 square feet was considered as the largest private residence in Canada. During World War II, Casa Loma was used to conceal a top secret research. According to some reports the research was on sonar and for construction of sonar devices. “Most of the work went on behind an area segregated with an “Under Repairs” sign, behind a simple sheet.” So different people visited the castle dressing as workmen and pretending working on the repair project.
Casa Loma has five acre of gardens with an underground tunnel that connecting Casa Loma to the Hunting Lodge and to the stables. It has a huge oven “large enough to cook an ox”. There are two secret passages. The most decorated room in the castle originally was called Napoleon Drawing Room and it was used for formal occasions. Its wood panels took three artisans three years to carve. The highly ornamented plaster ceiling was designed and made by Italian craftsmen. According to the well informed sources, the house was unoccupied for years while the city tried to decide whether to demolish it or turn it into a museum. “Finally, in 1937, the Kiwanis Club of West Toronto suggested turning Casa Loma into a tourist attraction.” Currently Casa Loma is owned by the City of Toronto and is operated by Liberty Entertainment Group and is one of Toronto’s top attractions.
Case Loma has a unique charm that attracts visitors and engage them in the pleasant challenge of discovering the secret passageways, picturesque towers, sweeping staircase, 800-foot tunnel, stables, five-acre garden and beautiful pool. The decorations and furniture add to its mysterious and pleasant beauty. CTR Press
July Events::
July 24-26, 2016:
Bernard Shaw Festival 2016
Niagara on the Lake
Each year in the beautiful town of Niagara on the Lake, Shaw festival attracts hundreds of Bernard Shaw, culture and theatre fans to gather together watching Shaw’s plays and some other plays by other great playwrights. This year there was a variety of interesting plays especially three amazing ones such as Uncle Vanya, Mrs Warren’s Profession and the adventures of the black girl in her search for God. BERNARD SHAW (1856-1950), the great playwright, free thinker, critic and social reformer, was born in Dublin, Ireland. He attended four schools, but left his formal schooling at the age of 15. Then he developed a vast knowledge of music, art and literature under the influence of his mother who was a singer and vocal music teacher. Shaw joined the Fabian Society in 1884 and “distinguished himself as a fluent and effective public speaker and an incisive and irreverent critic of music, art and drama.” He was a great admirer of Ibsen plays and “during World War I, Shaw’s anti-war pamphlets and speeches made him very unpopular as a public figure.” He was a real genius, and very original one and wrote a variety of great plays such ad Heartbreak House that” he exposed the spiritual bankruptcy of the generation responsible for the carnage”, Saint Joan for which led to his receiving the Nobel Prize for Literature for 1925. ” Widowers’ Houses, was produced privately in 1892 for the members of a progressive theatre club called the Independent Theatre Society.” The The Philanderer and Mrs Warren’s Profession, Unpleasant, Arms and The Man, Candida, The Man of Destiny and You Never Can Tell. “In 1897 Shaw attained his first commercial success with the American premiere of The Devil’s Disciple, which enabled him to quit his job as a drama critic and to make his living solely as a playwright.” John Bull’s Other Island , Man and Superman , Major Barbara, The Doctor’s Dilemma, Pygmalion and the Millionairess were other interesting plays written by Shaw. Shaw continued to write plays and essays until his death in 1950 at the age of 94. He was a real master of wit.
” In 1962, Brian Doherty of Niagara-on-the-Lake and Calvin G Rand of Buffalo created a summer festival dedicated to the work of playwright Bernard Shaw. That first season saw four performances each of Don Juan in Hell and Candida staged in the Assembly Room of Niagara-on-the-Lake’s historic Court House. In this singular act of passion for theatre, the Shaw Festival was born.” Also there was an event organized by so called international Shaw society that journalists were not allowed to attend! A brief conversation with its president revealed that their objectives are far from Bernard Shaw’s principles and if, just if Bernard Shaw could come back to life, no doubt he would shout at them and would strongly express his objections to them for using his name. “In the spirit of Bernard Shaw, the Shaw Festival provokes the mind and stirs the soul through a theatre experience so compelling that, year after year, ever broadening groups of artists, audiences and supporters are drawn to our work in Niagara-on-the-Lake and beyond.”
Mrs Warren’s Profession was directed by Holmes. According to the director it was demonstrating a conversation between a mother and her daughter about a woman’s worth. It was well directed and Nicole Underhay who played the role of Mrs Warren was very outstanding. They also added some modern elements such as taking selfie by the the players before the show that may appeal to some audience. The adventures of the black girl in her search for God was well directed by Jain. Mumba who played as the black girl was a competent player. The stage design was simple but interesting. The highlight of the festival was Uncle Vanya, adapted by American playwright, Annie Baker and very well directed by Jackie Maxwell. All the players were wonderful especially Neil Barclay who played the role of Vanya. The stage design was by Sue LePage and it was very faithful to the original play and the performances by the players were very skillful; as the result they all took the audience to the Anton Chekhov era. The audience forgot about the present time for two hours and followed the players journey to 1899 when Uncle Vanya was produced by Moscow Art Theatre. Maxwell, the director of 2016 performance of Uncle Vanya once mentioned that she chose directing Uncle Vanya as a test for her own mettle as a director. And no doubt it was a successful test and it had a deep and powerful impression on the audience.CTR Press
July 20-24, 2016:
AOFAS 2016
Toronto
AOFAS conference was organized by American Orthopaedic Foot & Ankle Society. The American Orthopaedic Foot & Ankle Society was founded in 1969. It is a medical specialty society that comprised of 2,200 Orthopaedic surgeons from the US and abroad who are specialized in caring patients with injuries, diseases of the foot and ankle. The main focus of the society is research and the main focus of the conference was on sport medicine, trauma and technology. The different process of diagnosis, medical and surgical treatment of disorders of the “musculoskeletal system of the foot and ankle, including bones, joints, ligaments, muscles, tendons, nerves and skin were discussed. The surgeons explained the reconstructive procedures, treating sports injuries, and treating the trauma of the foot and ankle. Dr. Anderson who is considered one of the most well-known foot and ankle doctor in the world of sports, was the keynote speaker and talked about disability from foot and ankle injury. The panel discussed Chronic turf toe injuries, Runner injuries, lisfranc injuries and stress fractures. A “Lisfranic is often mislabeled as a midfoot sprain. A sprain is basically a ligament injury in any part of the body, but in this situation it’s the midfoot. In most cases of athletes, it’s not necessarily a bone injury, but a ligament injury.”
They discussed the ways of preventing re injuries. According to the researchers, it’s multi-factorial. It could be the shoe or the position of the player. There are more Lisfranc injuries in defensive ends because” they are trying to get around the offensive tackle. Their front of the foot is embedded in the ground, their cleats are engaged and then they twist as they are trying to get around the offensive tackle. That twisting maneuver with the extra load can cause the joints to disrupt.”
The latest clinical and radiological findings was discussed by the speaker from Italy, Dr. Usuelli. Dr. Williams discussed Vitamin D levels and patients with metatarsal fractures. Vitamin D levels and patients with metatarsal fractures, Stress factor and the proper time for operating turf toe and how to fix it were discussed. The speaker pointed out that first the anatomy should be known. He explained surgical procedures and techniques and how to avoid the injury. The Vitamin D deficiency causes rickets in children and osteomalacia in adults any is characterized by impaired bone mineralization. Vitamin D “is produced endogenously when ultraviolet light triggers the production of vitamin D from cholesterol in the skin. Patients with dark pigmentation have a reduced ability to form vitamin D. Vitamin D must go through a two-step activation process.”
There were more than 100 paper presentations and 200 ePosters on the program about the latest research, technologies and approaches from the experts in orthopaedic foot and ankle treatment. One of the latest studies was about obesity impacts on the results of ankle replacement procedures. And five year study on the obese patients receiving total ankle arthroplasty shows that ” obesity negativity impacts the success of total ankle replacement.” Another study shows that ore than 500,000 ladder related injuries required medical treatment in 2014 and more than 20,000 people received emergency care for a foot or ankle injury as the result of falling from a ladder. Most of these injuries could be prevented by simply safety be at the” top of mind before” climbing the ladder. The emphasis should be on the prevention rather than treatment, not only in the foot and ankle injuries, but also in all the areas that involves medical interventions. CTR Press
Read more here:http://www.charlotteobserver.com/sports/nfl/carolina-panthers/article32762919.html#storylink=cpy
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July 10-13, 2016:
OmniShoppers Conference 2016
Chicago
The conference focused on discussing “how to translate shopper insights into dramatic growth opportunities for the business” and it was special emphasis on understanding of shopper behavior and their evolving expectations. The speakers discussed anticipation and prediction of the future, generating fresh insights, creating seamless and connected brand experiences along the complex shopper journey and increasing the growth in-store, mobile and online. Previously it was called the Shopper Insights in Action Conference. Kahneman discussed how people believe they make rational decisions, but the truth is that they are subject to many biases that affect the way they make decisions. He explained the two systems that drive our thinking: ” System 1 is fast, intuitive, and emotional; System 2 is slower, more deliberative, and more logical.” He pointed out that everything in our lives from personal happiness, making purchasing decisions, and other decisions can be understood by knowing how these two systems shape the way we judge and decide. He discussed his book: “Thinking Fast and Slow”. He emphasized on benefits of slow thinking. He mentioned that the problem is most of us and most of the time act automatically and without thinking and jump to conclusions. He mentioned that meetings are tremendously inefficient and emphasized on the importance of Independent thinking.
The panel discussed Technology integration and the idea of robots as buyers. The speaker pointed out that people like intuitive leaders, including those who don’t like to deliberate too much. Context and association were discussed: “Confidence is a feeling and mostly we are confident even when we are wrong.” One speaker from Informa talked about the Algorithm of marriage and pointed out that people increasingly are investing heavily in Silicon Valley on “not dying”. The next panel discussed the variety of choices the shoppers have especially in real estates. They emphasized on creating Omani channels. “The modern customers always hit the ground running. They are connected digitally, all the time. They know what is selling.” The speaker explained the process of providing seamless customer experience with true integration of all marketing channels. Seamless channels when Customer’s shave the convenience to start the purchase process in any channel and use any channels available. They emphasized on Partnership between shoppers and customers and importance of Data sharing. The speaker discussed tracking the eyes movement of consumers and EEG with eye tracking. He mentioned that by looking at the traffic pattern and analyze data that help us to know and understand the customers.
Olson from Horizon media talked about high/low tech: retail’s bi directional future. He emphasized on looking at the people and culture. He also mentioned the Privacy Implications of beacons and the feeling of constantly being watched. The beacons could turn on lights in a room as soon as someone with a smartphone has entered them, or open doors or window shades. Some “store retail and offline payments are in the first wave of beacon applications. Retail outlets are adopting beacons to provide customers with product information and to speed up the checkout process with a completely contactless payments system. Half of American adults already utilize their mobile devices in stores. The barriers to wide adoption of beacon technology are customers have to turn on Bluetooth, accept location services on the relevant app and “opt-in to receive in-store or indoor notifications.” He mentioned that according to the Pew analysis the reason of this obsession with social media is that people getting bored easily and go to social media. He also emphasized on Combatting the artificialness of social media. The next speaker discussed Open book story telling approach and the driving forces behind changes in shopper behavior. He discussed the way the rise of eCommerce / omnichannel mentality impacted traditional retail sales. Scott discussed the Big data interplay and how to use all these data sources and analytics. CTR Press
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June 26- July 1, 2016:
Red Hat Summit 2016
San Francisco
Red Hat Summit was organized by Red Hat, the world’s leading provider of open source enterprise IT products and services. A variety of tech professionals from around the world attended the summit and the main subjects discussed during the conference were as follows: New container scanning, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, open source softwares, JBoss Middleware, cloud computing, openshift, Red Hat storage, enterprise virtualization, and Red Hat training and certification. Red Hat Enterprise Linux starts with a stable foundation and adapts business changes. JBoss Middleware build connected systems bringing people, processes, and information together. Cloud Computing closes the gap between businesses needs and business deliverance. OpenShift is an open Platform-as-a-Service letting developers develop, host, scale, and deliver apps in the cloud. The storage modernizing datacenter with the open, software-defined storage. Enterprise Virtualization by streamline work flowing deliver applications quicker. In the Press conference, the speaker mentioned that the Container adoption is growing. He discussed the Stages of container adoption: adopt, expand, commit and transform. He explained the latest in the Container market evolution. He pointed out that Red Hat Enterprise Linux is “firmly established as the world’s most popular commercial distribution of Linux in the enterprise and supporting more than 1 million customers across the world. ” As the world moves to a container-based delivery model for software solutions, making decision isn’t difficult for commercial software vendors who look for a trusted platform partner with the introduction of Red Hat Enterprise Linux Atomic Host.”
Keynote speakers also discussed containers. Using Containers to run data center, Custom Linux distribution, The standardization drives, Red Hat container portfolio were discussed. The speaker emphasized on the Secure containers with new scanning capability, Security, portability, management and total solution. Fisher discussed the process of Building robots. “Today people generate data and in the future data will be generated by connected devices: connected cars, connected air planes, connected hospitals and connected factories.” Big data and data science are two of the “biggest business buzzwords”, and the largest companies around the globe are trying “to get ahead of the data curve.” Big data roots and future is in open source technologies. Companies are sharing what they know, and that’s the way it’s going to continue in the he future. Speakers from Intel and Dell talked about OpenStack software that controls “large pools of compute, storage, and networking resources throughout a datacenter, managed through a dashboard.” OpenStack normally works with popular enterprises and open source technologies “making it ideal for heterogeneous infrastructure.”
OpenNotes as a national initiative give patients access to the visit notes written by their doctors, nurses, or other clinicians. Physicians, nurses and two patients suffering from brain cancer were speaking and advocating “OpenNotes”. They mentioned that patients have the right to read the notes their doctor or clinician writes about them “during or after their appointment.” It helps the patients to have a better control of their health and health care. The physician pointed out the healthcare professionals can build better relationships with their patients and take better care of them when they share their visit notes. About the issue of privacy, he mentioned that healthy people do care about the privacy, but patients suffering from cancer don’t think that way and they want to try all the possibilities because they don’t have much option. “In 2010, more than 100 primary care doctors from three diverse medical institutions across the United States started to share notes online with their patients. Each site was part of a 12-month study to explore how sharing doctors’ notes may affect health care. The result from this study showed that opening up visit notes to patients may make care more efficient and improve communication.” It helps patients become more actively involved with their health and health care.
The patient suffering from brain cancer talked about his personal experience in MIT. He mentioned he was denied access to the information about genome of the tumor in his brain. He described how he pursued studying medicine in order to be able to have access to those information. The audience was impressed and applauded him warmly for his determination. He explained the process of starting a movement to enable patients easily read notes written about their care, and to bring more transparency to medical records.
The keynote speaker emphasized on creating rather than consuming. He mentioned: “If your idea is unique it will be easily copied. There is no such a thing as local market if your idea is good it will be sold globally. Ward discussed the open source networking. “Target assumption: simple to deploy apps and services and stack does the right thing to manage itself.” He explained VPP technology in a nutshell and he pointed out that workflow service impact analysis. He described Model driven orchestration and mentioned that Networking focused on limited dev community and applicability. He explained Cisco infrastructure and mentioned that Networking open source project partnership during the last two years had tremendous increase especially Project management with Red Hat. Loberg from Accenture talked about Power of open source innovation and Technology waves. ” The “wave” of technology is common parlance for describing the wide-scale dispersal of new automation, mechanics or applied science. Technological waves are hard to predict yet often leave an indelible impact on a particular aspect of culture, industry and medicine.” The next speaker mentioned that Traditional companies need help to establish open source offices and just less than %3 of companies doesn’t use open source. CTR Press
June Events:
June 22- 25, 2016:
ISSCR 2016
The International Society for Stem Cell Research annual meeting was a global stem cell event to discuss the latest findings in all areas of stem cell research and regenerative medicine. San Francisco Bay Area has been ” at the forefront of stem cell research and regenerative medicine.” Next Gen program is a $80 million program to investigate functional genetic variation in humans by assessing cellular profiles, the surrogates for disease phenotype. In order to achieve it, researchers have derived iPS cell lines from more than 1,600 individuals with different diseases that resulted in an extensive panel of cell lines with unprecedented diversity. The speakers in this session discussed the functional genomics and disorders related to heart, lung and blood as well as whole genome sequencing data. Stem cell biologists have analyzed single cell transcript and uncovered novel cell types that revolutionized our understanding of cell states and response to stimuli. Stem cell researchers discussed the latest discoveries using single-cell technologies. The speaker discussing the role of cancer stem cells in therapy failure mentioned that the functional heterogeneity of individual tumor cells can be due to genetic diversity. The evidence shows that genetic and hierarchy models are highly integrated. Jarriault from IGBMC talked about direct cellular reprogramming. She mentioned that postmitotic somatic cellular identity is a stable feature of multicellular organisms and natural inter conversions between distinct somatic cell types have been reported in species such as mice. She pointed out that direct programming can also be induced experimentally. She discussed the reasons that some cells change their identity. She emphasized that both the micro environment and the intrinsic cellular context combine to empower a cell with the competence to transdifferentiate.
Ethical implications of genome editing technologies were discussed by the panel. There are unknown risks to human health and well being and a current socio ethical debate about the other side of genome editing that is the moral acceptability of modifying the human genome. And there are different legislation and regulations in different countries. According to the researchers harvesting the embryonic stem cells results in the destruction of the embryos from which they are harvested : that means the expiration of the very beginnings of a possible human life. “This question comes to mind whether life for those already existing should be improved at the expense of a possible human life that has just come into being and how it can be morally justified.” The Prohibition of Human Cloning Bill 2002 and the public debate focused on ethical problems associated with the destruction of embryos and the creation of cloned human embryos . The embryonic stem cell researches have been controversial. The harvesting human embryonic stem cells violates the principle because it results in the destruction of human life. European Court of Justice verdict on the dispute of whether the origin of embryonic cell lines ,fertilized human eggs, means that patents cannot be granted for any techniques based on use of these and the clarification on how to interpret European biotechnology regulations. The European Court of Justice ruled that no patents can be granted for inventions based on embryonic stem cells, “even if the cell lines were established in the laboratory many years ago and the invention itself does not involve obtaining new embryonic stem cells.” This decision is based on the fact that even established embryonic stem cell lines were originally derived from fertilized eggs. The legal dispute began when Greenpeace challenged a patent granted in 1999 to Professor Bruestle for a method of producing neural progenitor cells from embryonic stem cell lines. They argued that human embryonic stem cell lines originate from fertilized eggs and the patent represented a forbidden use of human embryos.
The researchers believe that Stem cells can be contrasted with “differentiated” cells and the research offers hope for medical advancement because of their ability to grow into any kind of cell: neural cells in the brain and spinal cord that have been damaged can be replaced by stem cells or in the treatment of cancer, cells destroyed by radiation or chemotherapy can be replaced with new healthy stem cells that adapt to the affected area, whether it be part of the brain, heart, liver or lungs. Dead cells of almost any kind can be replaced with new healthy cells. “There are three main sources for obtaining stem cells: adult cells, cord cells, and embryonic cells. Adult stem cells can be extracted from bone marrow or from the peripheral system and some painful destruction of the bone marrow results from this procedure. Peripheral stem cells can be extracted without damage to bones, but the process takes more time.” Embryonic stem cells are extracted directly from an embryo before the embryo’s cells begin to differentiate. At this stage the embryo is referred to as a “blastocyst” and there are about 100 cells in a blastocyst. “A replicating set of stem cells from a single blastocyst is called a “stem cell line” because the genetic material all comes from the same fertilized human egg that started it.” Some scientists argue against such research on medical ground; they say that the embryonic stem cells stored over time create the type of chromosomal anomalies that create cancer cells. In many European countries such as France, Italy, Spain and Switzerland these researches are banned for ethical reasons. In the USA recently federal funding ban for embryonic stem cell research has been removed. In some countries there are some regulations: in the Uk, China and Japan there is no specific ban for these researches.
Brown talked about Treatment of cancer from blood to brain and discussing the Project in CAR- engineering, CAR T- Cell therapy mentioned that findings strongly suggest that CAR T-cell therapy is a useful bridge to bone marrow transplant for patients who are no longer responding to chemotherapy. Dr Biffi talked about hematopoietic stem cell based gene therapy for the treatment of lysosomal storage disorders. She discussed the enzyme delivery and brain enzyme production. Shapiro a patient suffering from sickle disease sincerely talked about her own experience and asked scientists and advocates to work together. Her speech impressed the audience. In the exhibition hall, companies such as macopharma, ixcells and bio rad were introducing their latest products. ixcells offered services for human genome editing such as DNA design and construction that starts from $1,000 and large fragment insertion that starts from $15,000. macopharma was presenting GMP products usable in clinical applications. CTR Press
June 21-23, 2016:
PCBC 2016
Pacific Coast Builders Conference gathered together 360 manufacturers, marketers, home designers, land developers and building industry professionals to discuss the latest modern architecture, operations and designs. There were various educational sessions, special workshops and exhibition. Keynote speakers talked about the digital age that we live in as “transformative as the industrial revolution.” They discussed different examples in business, science and technology. The workshops were about discussing the buying process and an overview of buying psychology and customers’ need for “cognitive ease in the process.” They discussed the ways modern home buyers respond to different new styles and how architecture planning can be successful. The speaker on the session rethinking the box explained market condition changes and the considerable change in vision and strategy. She emphasized the need for companies to be smarter if they want to be more profitable in the modern competitive world.
The session discussion on differentiating ones brand in the digital age focused on the businesses endeavors to find their place in increasing competitive world. ” Modern clients are well researched online before they reach out to a prospective professional.” And it was emphasized that the businesses should create a robust online presence in order to be able to attract the digitally aware clients. The panel who discussed the future, development trends talked about the latest patterns of development and the ways the architects involve affordability and mix of uses. California builders are faced with new challenges as more codes are adopted in the state of California to meet the Zero Net Energy goal for new home construction by 2020. Also California Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) is challenging builders to build more safe homes in the future.
In the exhibition area, different companies exhibited their latest products and talked about their initiatives and projects. Napoleon Fireplace exhibited their outdoor and indoor products. They use the advanced burner technology and innovative design sets so realistic that it would be hard to tell the difference from a real wood burning fire. Valor provides custom made fireplaces. Creative mines provides natural stones in different shapes and styles. Whalebone craft broken rubble model was exhibited and attracted the attention of the visitors. High performance home showcase in the exhibition hall was demonstrating the ways “innovation and technology are shaping the way we live.” CTR Press
June 21, 2016:
Bay Area Women’s Summit 2016
Bay Area Women’s Summit gathered more than 1000 attendees, mostly women, together to discuss the latest in Economic Empowerment, Workplace Benefits and Policies, Working Families and Childcare, Women in Leadership, Entrepreneurship, and Education. Schaaf, Mayer of Oakland started her speech with this sentence: ” It is an action summit.” She mentioned: “I am here to run a police department, not a frat house.” Later she mentioned that she does not want to jeopardize getting the “strongest punishment allowed” for the people involved. In her last speech in the summit she explained how a new website was created for “reporting Johns” and she added that they will receive a letter of warning that they are being watched. She mentioned that this initiative is for combatting the abuse of women. She also made some pledges for improving the the state of women in the region. The keynote speaker, Ann Marie Slaughter, talked about the Competitive side and also the caring and nurturing side of people. “The essence of humanity values both sides.” She mentioned: “How many women are at the top ? Very few. She emphasized that we should seek the policy that help women at the bottom not women at the top. “Because women at the top always buy their way through.” She said that she did what her dad did ; so she became a strong woman. Also she mentioned that her husband is the lead parent and caring for young children at home because she is a frequent traveler. She pointed out that they are called House husband, mr mom or etc when they are involved in caring side. She emphasized that We must combat our own sexist attitude. ” Paid leave is the first step.” We must invest in the first five years of our children when the brain of our children shaping and make sure that they receive the development they need in order to have a better society. Also she pointed out that Investing in the ability to care for elders is very important. ” I succeeded to learn how to act like a man and my father who was a lawyer taught me to be strong but I ignored the caring side; we should have balance of two.”
Then the panel discussed women and the workforce. They discussed the workforce policies that are critical to gender equality in the workplace. Reisch emphasized in the necessity of ending gender based segregation. “There is persistent gap between what men and women get in wages.” Blackwell, CEO PolicyLink discussed the reasons for the importance of driving policy decisions based on just and fair inclusion. She pointed out that by 2024 the majority of workforce will be people of color and it will be an extraordinary shift. She discussed Toxic inequality and emphasized on decreasing Inequality and achieving the growth. “Equity is a superior growth model.” The speaker who had carried out the Food Labor Research mentioned that women of color are segregated in the lower positions in SF area. She mentioned that most of their income is based on tips in restaurants and they are subject to the sexual harassment by the customers who tip and women do it in order to be able to feed their families. Then the researcher from Stanford University discussed the studies and experiments on gender inequality. She explained that they had sent the same CV but one with male name and the other with a female name to the potential employers and the result: the female received half call back. “We unconsciously use bias in our judgments. We can’t undo or eliminate bias but we can block them. Confident female are less likable and confident male are more likable.” Treasurer, Rios suggested Putting women images on currency and the idea of currency redesign.
The speakers emphasized on Inclusion , “closing the gap” Klein emphasized that it will be a win-win for tech companies. “Companies that focus on diversity will succeed because hiring women and minorities makes business sense. According to the scientific research, our brains are hardwired to be biased.” According to the demographic information provided of the female population in San Francisco, 150,634 or 36 percent were born outside the USA: 67 percent In Asia, 18 percent in Latin America, 11 percent in Europe and 4 percent in other countries. One third of the homeless in San Francisco are women. The Women’s Foundation of California invested over $1 million in organizations that support women’s economic mobility and job training in the health care industry. “Women and men continue to be segregated by occupation and women dominated fields continue to be paid less than their counterparts.” CTR Press
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June 4-9 , 2016:
BIO 2016
BIO as the largest trade association that represents biotechnology companies, academic institutions and biotech centers across the USA and more than 30 other countries gathered together researchers in “innovative healthcare, agricultural, industrial and environmental biotechnology products” in BIO conference. More than 35000 meetings one to one business meeting were held. Biotechnology harnesses cellular and bio molecular processes to develop technologies and products. One of the main topics discussed was the drug innovation ecosystem: new innovations, entrepreneurs and investors and how they involved in the high risk search for the medical breakthroughs. According to BIO, the bio pharmaceutical industry has the highest rate of R&D reinvestment of any industry, about 20%, for researching new cures and treatments. The focus was the health sector engineering biology to address oncology, ophthalmology, autoimmune and inflammatory disorders, neuroscience, rare genetic diseases, cardiovascular and metabolic diseases, gastroenterology and microbiome. The process involves programming cellular genetic code with the aim of driving new functionality for next-gen therapeutics.
Developing vaccines, Toxicology, Infectious diseases, Medical countermeasure in developing drugs and the technical and financial failures in the manufacturing processing were discussed. The panel explained how pathogens or infectious agents as the biological agents that cause diseases or illnesses to their hosts are used in the experiments. “The human body contains many natural defenses against some of common pathogens in the form of the human immune system.Some pathogens have been found to be responsible for massive amounts of casualties and have had numerous effects on afflicted groups; while many medical advances have been made to safeguard against infection by pathogens, through the use of vaccination, antibiotics and fungicide, pathogens continue to threaten human life.” Food safety, hygiene, and water treatment have considerably reduced the threat from some pathogens. AI and robotics, Modulating molecules and New modulation against resistant bacteria were discussed by the panel. In the session changing landscape for bio manufacturing, the processes of de risking by big pharmaceutical were explained. The speaker pointed out that the “biopharmaceutical market continues to grow at double the rate of the small molecule market.” He explained how new technologies, advances in cell line development and targeted therapeutics have created a challenging biopharmaceutical manufacturing environment. “The shift towards more targeted therapeutics has caused a shift in the required capacity for bio manufacturing.” Tax and IP strategies have driven changes on where biopharmaceutical companies manufacture their products.
The panel discussing Brain behavior mentioned that the root causes of conditions like obsessive-compulsive disorders, depression and many other neuropsychiatric illnesses is still unknown. The researchers have found ties between bacteria, viruses and these diseases. They discussed the latest findings on the microbial world and its relationship to brain and behavior. The speaker pointed out that the opportunities for the development of new therapeutics, diagnostics and other approaches should be aimed at helping the patients to manage their disease. The human micro iota is the aggregate of a microbiome that resides on the layers of skin, in saliva and conjunctiva. They include bacteria, fungi and archaea. The human microbiome refers to their genomes. Stanford university professor of psychiatry and Korlach who supported commercial development of the PacBio RS II system and researching for new applications for SMRT technology were talking in the panel. They emphasized on the importance of sequencing and sampling microbiome and finding the origin of these conditions. They also pointed out that the biggest issue is the acquisition of data.
Chief scientist from Johnson & Johnson talked about Alzheimer’s and mentioned that dementia can affect 45 million people in the world. “Still there is neither treatment nor cure for Alzheimer’s disease and clinical trials resulted in failure. He mentioned that currently there are many projects on different countries working by running adaptive clinical trials that is” a first in Alzheimer’s research.” “In adaptive trials, multiple treatments are tested at the same time and the results analyzed continuously.” He mentioned that the clinical trials of 110 drugs for Alzheimer’s during the last decades resulted in failure because of the lack of understanding of the disease. “Data sharing is very important for higher efficiency in trial conducts. Clinical trials in the US and Europe working more collaboratively.” The speaker from university of Oxford talked about European approach to Alzheimer’s. He mentioned that the cost of treating the Alzheimer’s disease is more than any other disease such as cancer and in the last four years the costs have been billion of dollars and most of the trials failed. “Secondary prevention of Alzheimer’s disease is the 20 years period trial.” He also pointed out that there are lots of volunteers in the clinical studies to find a prevention studies: 50000 research participants. He mentioned that the animals in the Oxford labs are kept in pathogens free environment, “so it is a good idea to keep the animal in pathogens filled environments as human live and see what is going to happen.” The experts believe that Alzheimer’s is a “result of complex interactions among multiple factors, including age, genetics, environment and lifestyle, and coexisting medical conditions.” Regular physical and mental exercise is beneficial strategy to lower the risk of Alzheimer’s and dementia. Researchers believe exercise can benefit brain cells by increasing blood and oxygen flow. Snyder from Alzheimer’s Association mentioned that there are more than 200 clinical trials in the US. She discussed Bio marker signature and challenges with dementia trials.
The next panel discussed Brain injury in sports especially in football. Ruiz , a journalist talked about her own experience sustaining a concussion as a collegiate football player. The panel mentioned that each year more than 300,000 sports( mainly football)related traumatic brain injuries (TBIs), especially concussions, and especially among people aged 15 – 24 years occur in the United States. They discussed the abnormalities in Brain functions as the result of head injuries. ” Symptoms of concussion can last for days, weeks, or longer. According to the new data from the nation’s largest brain bank focused on traumatic brain injury the evidence of a degenerative brain disease in 76 of the 79 former football players examined. The findings show a more than double increase in the number of cases of chronic traumatic encephalopathy or CTE. “Researchers examined the brain tissue of 128 football players who, before their deaths, played the game professionally, semi-professionally, in college or in high school. Of that sample, 101 players, or just under 80 percent, tested positive for CTE.” CTE is a progressive degenerative disease which afflicts the brain of people who have suffered repeated concussions and traumatic brain injuries. “The brain of an individual who suffers from chronic traumatic encephalopathy gradually deteriorates and will over time end up losing mass.” Symptoms of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy include “loss of memory, difficulty controlling impulsive or erratic behavior, impaired judgment, behavioral disturbances including aggression and depression and difficult with balance.”
Brain Injury Research Institute doctors Bennet I. Omalu, M.D. and Julian Bailes, M.D. were the first to diagnose CTE in a professional football player in 2002. ” The condition has so far only been diagnosable through the post-mortem examination of the brain of an individual suspected of suffering from CTE.” According to the reports the NFL initially attacked the claims that concussions suffered while playing football could cause CTE. The larger the number of concussions suffered, the greater are the chances that the individuals will develop chronic traumatic encephalopathy. When the brain tissue degenerates, a protein called tau protein begins to accumulate. The symptoms of CTE may take years or even decades to develop. With all these reports about serious damages to the brain in the process of playing football, people still continue playing; it can be somehow compared to the smoking, people know it cause cancer, but they still smoke and put their health and other people’ health at risk.
Keynote speakers talked about the pressures on bio technology from different parts of society and mentioned that profound misunderstanding and 90percent failure risk in drug research are their biggest challenges. Then Will Smith and Dr Bennet Omalu had interesting talks about their experiences. The audience really liked them. Will Smith talked about his movie, Concussion, and said: “I sat with Dr Bennet during the autopsy and they looked like a doctor with a patient in the transition to the next life.” Dr Bennet talked about life after football and numerous blows to the head and the psychiatric symptoms after football. He mentioned that for him Science and faith, Science and humanity cannot be separated. He emphasized that we as human are part of another; we all belong to the common humanity. He was the first scientist who identified CTE and mentioned football players forty times more suffer from CTE. He several times repeated the importance of enhancing the common humanity, faith and Purity of thought. He said the truth is empowering. He pointed out that Alzheimer’s may be is not a disease itself but the combination of different diseases. Will Smith also mentioned success is not about money or reaching at the top, but contributing to the humanity and to improve life is the success. Dr Bennet said the Bennet foundation helps those talented young that are not part of establishment to have the opportunity to grow. The audience erupted in applause.
A panel discussed Market and Political pressure on biopharma deal in 2016 and called it a challenging year. They talked about the pressure on “biopharma companies to recoup their investments and a volatile stock market.” The moderator of the panel mentioned that the result of presidential election doesn’t affect bio market and mentioned that deals are very hard to get and market is down. There is also the other side to bio technology and it is the opponents of biotech. “Not all critics want to stop biotechnology; some just want to increase testing and regulations. But the opponents believe that no benefit could outweigh the risk of genetic pollution from transferring genes between species.” The critics say that biotechnology won’t decrease hunger in the world because it “already produces enough food but the poor can’t afford to buy it.” And the farmers “have to buy expensive biotech seeds every year, making them dependent on multinational companies or driving them off their land if they cannot afford the costs.” According to Schofield, police from the public prosecutor’s office in Paris searched ANSM premises as part of the judicial investigation into the phase I trial that resulted in the death of a volunteer and the hospitalization of several more with neurological damage in the clinical trials.
In the exhibition area, biotech companies and academic research institutions from different parts of the world presenting their products. Swiss Biotech was organizing networking events during the Show. Spain bio presented its products in health biotechnology, Agrifood biotechnology and industrial biotechnology. Italian Pavilion introducing the Italian biotech sector with 490 companies active in biotech field. Bio lab from Brazil that is one of 10 largest pharmaceutical companies in Brazil and is active in global markets was exhibiting. French companies from different regions of France exhibited: Lyon and Provenance Alpes côté d’Azur were the most active ones. 300 public research institutes attached to o’ regional universities. The representatives from Turkish companies such as Zade were actively explaining their latest innovations. And Michael J Fox Foundation that was founded in 2000 in the USA is considered as the world’s’ largest nonprofit funder of Parkinson’s disease and has supported 77 clinical trials. CTR Press
June 7-8, 2016:
The TV of Tomorrow 2016
TVOT is the global conference for the interactive and multi platform TV industry. The conference was about discussing the current topics “that concern TV industry decision makers.” Its focus was on the delivery of advanced TV on multiple platforms. And according to the organizers, it is one of the few conferences and trade shows that selects speakers just for their expertise and not because their companies have paid speakers’ fees. It brought together the executives, technologists and other TV industry specialists from variety of countries to discuss the latest in the industry. In the session on the FCC’s Proposal to “Unlock the Set-Top Box”, the panel discussed the FCC’s new proposal to “unlock the set-top box.” The discussion’s style was the classic Oxford Union format: the chairman first introduced the topic for the discussion and then two teams of two speakers presented their arguments. Bergmayer and Zinn from the pro-FCC proposal team talked in favor of the proposal; then Reinsdorf and Singer that were speakers for the opposing team talked against the proposal. Then the audience made comments and asked questions. And finally a vote was taken via a show of hands. Singer mentioned that Google wants to aggregate contents and he discussed the content creation problems. He pointed out that the customers pay for content and he explained the variations of usage in economy. Zinn argued that the consumers have choice of the device and they should be able to have access to the content and have choice of interface. He discussed the maintains control issues and emphasized that device manufacturers think about the device not contents. Bergmayer discussed the FCC regulations and emphasized on the necessity of exercising control. The result of the vote was in favor of FCC proposal.
The next panel discussed the TV Technologies of Tomorrow.Seth Haberman was the moderator and skillfully kept the panel’s focus on the subject of discussion. He asked them to express their views on the technologies that will have a major impact on the television business in the future and each determine whether it is revolutionary or evolutionary. They discussed Automatic Content Recognition (ACR), Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. They discussed the implications of these technologies for the broadcasters, advertisers and “stakeholders who will be in charge of using them to implement the TV viewing experiences and monetization strategies” of future. Lusk from Sorenson Media talked about TV vs Internet and discussed the dramatic shift. Field from Cisco mentioned that people come to Cisco for content and in his opinion, it is all about contents and distributing contents. Romano from Ericsson talked about machine learning and how content owners worrying about technology. She mentioned that the business model changes lots of personalization. Haberman mentioned that turning TV to web takes time and he discussed that the process is different. He said that for an example, the best art works by Picasso were created when he was young; while the best works by Van Gogh were created during his mature age. CTR Press
June 3, 2016:
Change The Game Summit
Change The Game event was organized by Google Cloud Platform. The aim was to explore the most powerful platforms for the games. “With more smartphones connecting to cloud, game developers have a global audience with billions of potential players.” Donovan from Google started his speech with this sentence: “we try to win hearts and minds of people.” He talked about cloud featuring Pocket Gems, the analytic tool behind Google game engine. Tzou from Google talked about TAR, the revenge of the Jedi. He discussed games in the early days. He explained the most immersive games features such as community and identity, in-game economy and deep players VS players. He pointed out that nowadays there is a different era for gaming. He described his personal experience with Rainbow 6. He mentioned that in 2014, 2.5 billion had access to gaming device and in 2020 it will be doubled. He emphasized on client and cloud as a single platform. Lots of components in cloud computing, Firebase and cloud functions, fully managed serve less analytics (BigQuery, Data flow) and fully managed gaming analytics solution were discussed.
Piliotis from Marvel was the guest speaker. He discussed gaming partnership with Google. He is a lead analyst and he fully explained Kabam. He discussed BI system at launch and Drinking from a fire hose! He pointed out that BigQuery has become a very viable alternative to traditional solutions. He discussed BigQuery VS custom Hadoop. He emphasized on the tool that can process large amount of data. “Data: 1.8 billion rows per day.” He mentioned that for commonly used data, create daily aggregates. He also explained the annoying caveats such as 1000 tables per query. He mentioned that tableau adoption for gaming companies is high. Finally currency economy & flows, fraud tracking and payment fraud were discussed. CTR Press
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June 1-3, 2016:
Clean Energy Ministerial 2016
The Clean Energy Ministerial, CEM, is a forum of the world’s largest countries working together to accelerate the global transition to clean energy. It was launched in 2010 with the aim of engaging energy ministers to drive “faster deployment of clean energy policy and technology.” The meeting of energy ministers is held annually. Kenber talked about the regulatory barriers, energy efficiency and investing in key energy. He emphasized on the importance of following energy management policy by the corporates. “The goal is doubling energy efficiency.” Carr, minister, natural resources Canada talked about national and international campaign for energy management and government partnerships. He mentioned that Canada is working with US and Mexico for managing clean energy. He said that they had allocated the special budget to double their spending for clean energy in the next five years. Representative from UN mentioned that Switzerland has supported clean energy for more than twenty years. Representative from PG&E talked about energy efficiency commitment. “The goal is to reduce the energy consumption in commercial buildings. We believe in clean energy and also we think about our shareholders.”
The panel discussed partnering to drive faster deployment of renewables through corporate procurement emphasized on the necessity of the main companies to join in the plan and buy 100 percent renewables. They mentioned the idea of directors’ actions for corporate access to renewable energy. Amin started his talk with explaining how he was impressed by the positive attitudes of companies in California towards renewable energy. He mentioned that he sat on the Google bicycle and asked for an internship place for his daughter in the company. He discussed the Paris outcome. Herdan from Germany talked about the business model and companies demands. He explained how they brought the price down in Germany. Woolard from Google talked about the energy challenges and the necessity of changing the system and he discussed their initiatives to renewables procurement. Grimbert from EDF, talked about the constraints in the corporate. Bernard from Microsoft pointed out the importance of transparency in business and the transformation process.
In the CEM7 Press Conference, the energy ministers from the United States, Norway, Canada, Mexico and European Commission attended. The minister from China was supposed to attend but his seat was empty. Moniz, Secretary of Energy talked about the tremendous increase in efficiency and increase in air conditioning. He mentioned that San Francisco as a location was chosen because of innovations in Silicon Valley and Women in clean energy in Stanford university. He mentioned that 100 technologist from around of world attending in clean energy. In a response to the question about potentials for lowering costs,minister from Canada replied the solution should be in the partnership between private and public sectors. They discussed the Multi trillion dollars renewable energy. EC representative pointed out that innovation is not just about technology. “Linking private and public sectors is very important.” Minister from Mexico mentioned that in Mexico they had reached the lowest price in energy and they have had development in the wind energy investment.
Paris climate agreement in April 2016 and commitment to strong emissions reduction target were discussed by different panels. The case study they talk about Swaziland that is largely dependent on regional fossil fuel imports to meet power needs with 70% of the country lacking electricity. Representatives from Cleantech Finland , Nordic countries and Honeywell were among the companies present at the exhibition. Representative from Honeywell explained that HFCs under pressure for global reduction and these are not only ozone depleting but also are considerable contributors to the climate change. CTR Press
June 1, 2016:
The Last Five Years
“The Last Five Years” was an interesting two-character musical about the process of union and split. The performance was in the historic Geary theater in San Francisco. It was presented by American Conservatory Theater that “nurtures the art of live theater through dynamic productions.” This musical was written by Jason Robert Brown and it had a unique and interesting technique of storytelling: the two characters, a couple that meet, marry and finally separate, rarely interact on the stage and each sings a solo one after another. They tell the audience their stories in the reverse: Jamie, a rising writer tells his story in the chronological order starting with when the couple first met, on the other hand, Cathy, a struggling actress tells her story in reverse starting with describing the end of marriage. The characters were young and sang energetically and throughout their performances shared the story of their emotional lives with the audience. As the writer of the musical has described the characters: they are twenty something couple in 1990 New York City and they are from “different ethnic and financial background”: “Cathy’s Celtic roots peek through the texture of her songs” and “Jamie’s Jewish DNA is coded into several of his pieces.” Because of the unique way of storytelling by the characters, the audience know from the beginning that this relationship will end in the breakup. The strength of the story emotionally involves the audience in the process and they share the feelings of happiness, sympathy and despair with the characters. The director of The Last Five Years, Michael Berresse once said: ” For me, The Last Five Years is an opportunity to say, at the end of the day, how lucky we are to find each other at all.” The writer himself had experiended an unhappy marriage in his twenties and a successful one in his forties. The audience was impressed by the characters and in their discussions after the show described them as talented. One of the audience mentioned that she would prefer to see the characters interact more and to sing together. Yes, it would be more pleasant to watch them to sing together, but it will be less realistic too, because the main theme of the show was demonstrating the complexity of the modern relationship. The reverse storytellings by the two characters and their solo songs were powerful means to show this complexity of the communication and relationship. CTR Press
May Events:
May 22-28, 2016:
International Microwave Symposium 2016
The IEEE MTT International Microwave Symposium was an international meeting for technologists who are involved in all aspects of microwave theory and practice and they gathered together to discuss the latest innovations. Different technical paper presentations by academics and technologists from around the world, workshops, panel discussions and exhibition involved the attendees in different aspects of the conference. In the Recent developments and applications in wave guiding and radiating structures session Nicolas Fil from France talked about threshold sensitivity to total electron emission yield in parallel plate waveguide. He explained that multipactor effect depends on material electron emissions. He concluded his presentation with mentioning that multipactor power threshold highly depends on total electron emission for incident electron energies. Ceccuzzi from Italy talked about use of corrugations in mode filters for oversized rectangular waveguides. He pointed out that oversized rectangular waveguides are used for high power long distance transmissions but it requires junction based mode filters to face spurious modes. Another speaker discussed Phase tailoring using geometry and explained Geometry for desired phase amplitude combination and Geometry for maximum transmission. He mentioned Near field measurement: lens aperture at 27.5GHz and
Desired phase distribution approximated by unit cells. “Full wave result based on unit cell stimulation.” In the technical session about the advances in passive and active RF nanotechnology applications the speaker from university of Limoges discussed carbon nanotube based wireless on chip interconnects. Rahimi discussed magnetically tunable nano super lattice meta conductors for RF applications. He mentioned 700% tunability using a 0-600 Oe magnetic field is achieved using the magnetically conductors. In the exhibition area a variety of companies exhibited their latest products. The representative of Saint Gobain that makes films and tapes for extreme conditions of high frequency electronics explained the company’s latest products. Parrott, CEO of Vida products explained her company initiatives. Charmers university of Technology representative was introducing the field of Microwave engineering for potential graduate students.
The health hazards of exposing to microwave and RF has not been discussed. According to the US centre for Disease Control, “when the unstable nucleus of the atom decays, it releases ionizing particles which can be called as ionizing radiation and radiation poisoning results when body cells are exposed to chronic ionized radiation for a prolonged duration. It might also lead to permanent damage of cells. Radiation poisoning can even alter the genetic code of the DNA resulting in diseases that might recur for generations.” Electromagnetic (cell phone tower or microwave) radiation hazards, electromagnetic radiations (EMR) also result in serious health problems. Critics have expressed their concerns that public has not been informed about the real dangers of microwave radiation from cell phones, WiFi and other high-frequency-radiation emitting devices and antennas. There have been numerous confirmed cases of deformities in animals and plants near cell phone towers. According to the researchers in University of California, the cell phone industry makes hundreds of billions dollars in profits and they have the money and the power to influence politicians, the media, and even the researchers; some researchers receive considerable funding from the cell phone industry and are pressured to tell the public that it’s safe while the researchers who declare its dangers have had their funding cut.
In the closing session, Dr Truchard talked about software role in next generation 5G RF and microwave systems. He explained advancement of software during the last five decades. He discussed Evolution of instrumentation and Convergence of physical world and wireless. He pointed out that with one platform we can do many types of system level test. He discussed the role of platform that revolutionized our approach to solutions and how Hybrid approach combine graphical and textual. He emphasized on growth of ecosystem and software and hardware platform and creating a platform for the entire design cycle. Professor Jan Rabaey talked about the human intranet, where swarms and humans meet. He discussed the necessity of creating capabilities that we don’t have at the moment. He emphasized that the early adopters: arts, sports and health are driving technology. “Boost human input and output performance”. “Brain and machine interfaces come in different formats.” In the Q&A following his speech, an attendee asked about the future of job and those who won’t have access to the advanced technology in the future. Prof Rabaey replied: ” Always it has been two sides in every technology: good and bad sides…there will be social tensions between haves and have-nots. We have to find a solution. But I am an optimist.”
CTR Press
May 23-26, 2016:
Informatica World 2016
Informatica World conference brought together the specialists from around the world to discuss Cloud innovations , the latest in Deep Dive and data security management. The panels and speakers discussed Informatica products, data as service, how to deliver business value with a real time data warehouse, data quality, mastering big data, analytic modernization for business agility and DaaS. On the subject of capitalizing on big data, the speaker mentioned that incomplete, ungoverned and inconsistent data is not an asset for the company, but a “liability”. Traditional approaches for analyzing big data is too time consuming and may not lead to the business value. He pointed out that big data management needs a proper strategy in the areas such as big data integration, big data governance, big data quality and big data security. The cloud challenges were discussed by the panel. They explained the biggest barriers to “effective cloud adoption” such as connection, synchronization and the processes between cloud and on premise systems. The speaker from Ireland discussed the latest in data and service. He explained DUNS number lookup and mentioned that DUNS number is like a social security number for a business and is key to all business data enrichment services. He pointed out that for accessing all the companies details you need DUNS number to find out the detailed company profile. He emphasized on data as a service and adding new services over time. The speaker from Texas health and human services discussed HHSC and mentioned that it oversees the operation of the health and human services system and how it manages data governing. He mentioned the stages in data governing: Denial, anger, depression, bargaining and finally acceptance stage. He gave some examples of Challenges of analyzing data in Texas health. The speaker discussing “who owns data and data governance” pointed out that Businesses own data. ” Data collection and use require lots of costly steps, from conceptualization to maintenance.” The speaker emphasized that each agency has its own culture in data governing. He explained Data governance model and How to improve efficiency. Ownership of data is a sensitive issue, and consumers need to understand what their rights are. “When the patients go to the doctor and have the examination done, in the past the doctor would hand write a note, or dictate a note, into patients’ chart. But nowadays the doctor can type an entry into the patients’ electronic records, which can be viewed online. Under federal and state laws, patients have legal privacy security and accuracy rights related to their health information. But once the information is entered into the system, the doctor becomes the legal custodian of the patients’ records. If a copy of the medical record is provided to the patient, they may delete that copy, but the master record with the doctor cannot be deleted.” “If you get insurance coverage through your employer, it is the employer who has the rights to that claims data.”
In the health insurance, the consumers should ensure privacy and control their data. But when they switch from one insurance carrier to another how they will be able to keep the claims from their previous carrier? The new issues with data control and privacy who owns the data? “Is it the employer, who is paying for the corporate program? Is it the device manufacturer? Is it the consumer? Is it the insurance company?” The reasonable answer is the consumer, as the prime owner of any health data. CTR Press
May 23-24, 2016:
EmTech Digital 2016
EmTech Digital was an interesting event organized by MIT Technology Review. The focus of the conference was on Artificial Intelligence that has already had notable impact on different industry, social media and tracking personal health and finances. The speakers were from different countries and companies such as Tesla, IBM and Allen Institute for AI discussed the latest in AI. Etzioni, the CEO of the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence discussed the necessity of labeling data. He said: “Everywhere is data, but there’s no label that which is right and which is wrong. We need to label data.” Ng from Baidu, China dominant Internet company talked about deep learning and speech recognition. Deep learning is a field of AI that involves training large stimulated neural networks to recognize patterns in data. Companies such as IBM, Microsoft, Google and Facebook are using deep learning for new applications such as training computers “to hold a conversation while migrating older applications from conventional machine learning to deep learning. When Ng was asked about the future of jobs and massive unemployment as the result of AI. He replied that it will be a huge unemployment and job loss, but “new jobs will be created”, “we will tell them what to do!” Hammond, professor of journalism and computer science talked about AI in the 90s, Narrative science and Semantics. He said that journalists hate AI. He discussed that AI is the future but we must make sure it communicates with us. “To make sense of data we need AI as a partner.” He pointed out that AI is a choice and is not inevitable. He explained the process of visualization based on data, insight and finally actions. Experts believe that computers can’t handle any process that completely integrates information. And according to Giulio Tononi at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the ability of integrating information is a key feature of consciousness that AI lacks. Marcus, cofounder of Geometric Intelligence mentioned that the goal should be redefining the boundaries of machine learning through innovative techniques that learn more efficiently from less data. He showed a variety of pictures that computers generated captains for them; one of them showed that computer program mistook a street sign for a refrigerator and wrote the following caption for the street sign: ” a refrigerator filled with lots of food and drinks.” He also mentioned a quote from Chomsky: ” semantically-annotated data is hard to find and expensive.”
Taylor discussed Machine intelligence in Finance and mentioned that companies are requiring machine intelligence in Finance. He explained 1873 panic , 2008 crisis and Systemic risks. He pointed out that Wall Street and machine intelligence watch market behavior to anticipate the risks by Democratizing machine intelligence. Parris, VP of GE software research talked about Digital industrial transformation. He explained the model creation process by different companies such as Google and Amazon. ” Amazon gathers data of what we bought and what we intend to buy.” ” They create a model of one. We create digital twin with the same approach: gather data and from model of one we use analytics.” He explained Digital twin business outcome, Automated anomaly detection classification and using deep learning to impute the data. “Data are all related and we find the joint distribution.” He explained using Drones in places that it is dangerous for people to reach and Robots as a massive data gathering platform. Packer, director of engineering for Facebook’s language technology explained neural networks that are able to produce more natural-sounding translations than statistical machine translation. Also he talked about the face recognition software, Face recognition algorithm, the process of finding the specific picture among thousands of images, Categorizing images and Searching unstructured data and video. John Kelly talked about IBM Watson. He mentioned that IBM research started 2006 working on artificial intelligence and dealing with unstructured data. He explained working on natural language and revolutionizing entire industry, including health care. He pointed out that 80% of data is unstructured especially in medical data. Kelly mentioned that IBM Watson is a technology platform that uses natural language processing and machine learning to reveal insights from large amounts of unstructured data. He explained the process of converting the technology to business. He pointed out the decision making in health care and the fact that the third leading cause of death in the US is medical errors and misdiagnosis. “Watson understand natural language and read the images and medical records. The advances in medical imaging makes lots of unstructured data and Watson scans the images and tells doctors which image they look by bringing the summary of the huge unstructured data to the attention of physicians, especially when there is the time constraints.” In healthcare, Watson’s natural language, and evidence-based learning capabilities allow it to function as a clinical decision aid system for use by medical professionals.
According to Knight, the automation process and the ratio of robots to workers varies in different countries: in South Korea, there are 479 robots per 10000 workers; in Japan the figure is 315; in Germany, 294; in the USA it is 164 and in China is 35. According to Bengio, a prominent AI researcher, in an interview with MIT Technology Review, the main challenges and unsolved problems of AI are: ” misuse of AI”, ” manipulating people through really smart advertising”, the social impact, like many people losing their jobs”, ” we have to tell the computer what is an image, even at the pixel level…it’s not how human learn…we’re missing something big” and ” natural language understanding…it’s still not at the level where we would say the machine understands. That would be when we could read a paragraph and then ask any question about it and the machine would basically answer in a reasonable way, as a human would. We are still far from that.” CTR Press
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May 13-18, 2016:
American Thoracic Society International Conference 2016
American Thoracic Society International Conference was a productive international conference. More than 16000 researchers, clinicians and educators from a variety of disciplines and continents gathered together to discuss the latest in the fields of pulmonary, critical care and sleep disorders. More than 800 speakers in 500 sessions discussed the latest developments in the diagnosis and management of lung diseases. The American Thoracic Society goal is improving global health by advancing research, patient care, and public health in pulmonary disease, critical illness, and sleep disorders. It was founded in 1905 to combat TB and it has grown to tackle asthma, COPD, lung diseases, acute respiratory distress, and sleep disorders. Patino, MD from Argentina talked about epidemiology and implementation science targeting chronic respiratory disease in developing countries. She discussed MECOR Latin American program and the Asthma patients in Latin America. Gordon, MD presentation was about Ethics, language and challenges of researchers in Malawi. He talked about Queen Elizabeth hospital and HIV patients and mentioned almost all of the young people in Malawi are infected. Researchers from Welcome Trust laboratories with £65m grants for research group are engaging in the experiments and Clinical researches in the hospital. Dr Shea from Portland talked about Circadian rhythms in lung physiology and sleep. “Circadian rhythms are physical, mental and behavioral changes that follow a roughly 24-hour cycle, responding primarily to light and darkness in an organism’s environment.” He discussed Lung and gene clock. “Clock genes are sets of instructions that code for clock proteins. The genes and proteins interact with each other to produce daily fluctuations in protein levels.” Dr Loudon discussion was about Lung epithelial clock, Molecular clock and inflammatory response. He mentioned that local clocks are critical to tissue functions. He discussed Loss of gated cytokines response, Disabling the clock, the constitutive nuclear hormone repressor and Anti inflammatory in macrophages. Dr Gamble explained the health effects of sleep deprivation and circadian disruption. She discussed Relationships between brain clock and lung clock. She pointed out how day shift and night shift differences and lack of sleep affects the clock controlled gene transcription and results in medical errors. “Circadian rhythms can influence sleep-wake cycles, hormone release, body temperature and other important bodily functions. They have been linked to various sleep disorders, such as insomnia.” Our biological clocks drive our circadian rhythms. Circadian rhythms are important in determining human sleep patterns.
The session about health effects of inhaled toxins with a global perspective discussed the recent global events that are putting at risk the local populations following mass inhalational events. These events have caused short or long-term pulmonary and systematic effects, increased susceptibility to infections and development of restrictive lung diseases. Dr Frederic J Baud, one of the best speaker in the conference, talked about managing chemical disasters. He is a toxicologist from Paris and talked with a doctor without borders perspective. He emphasized in the awareness of MSF (médecins sans frontières ) about the involvement in chemical disasters. He explained the high degree of pollution, exposure and contamination in the large cities. He mentioned that from 2013 to 2016, there have been more than 162 chemical attacks in Syria and he showed some videos of the victims in distressing situations; watching the child victims was very upsetting. He explained the early signs that are common to all chemicals such as eyes irritations, irritation of nose, throat and upper airways. He discussed the laryngitis, bronchial and alveolar damages caused by Chlorine. One of the attendees asked this question: “who does make these chemicals?” And the speaker replied: “it is politics, not science.” The speaker from Stanford university talked about lung development and working to recellularize human lungs. He discussed Importance of genetic saturation, Reconstructing development program by single cell RNA seq and Reconstructing the full alveolar program by single cell. The cellular and molecular program was discussed. He explained how they are populating matrix fragments with iPS cells to determine how iPS cells can optimally be made to differentiate into various types of lung cells. In 2013 for the first time, scientists have succeeded to transform human stem cells into functional lung and airway cells. The advance had significant potential for “modeling lung disease, screening drugs, studying human lung development, and, ultimately, generating lung tissue for transplantation.”
One of the main topics in the conference was about COPD: chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. There are three kinds of chronic lung disease: chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, interstitial lung disease, and non-tuberculous mycobacterial disease (NTM). Lareau talked about Pulmonary rehabilitation. And Egbert who was a patient suffering from COPD talked about her own experience as a patient. A person with COPD may have emphysema or bronchitis, but most of the patients have both. Some people with COPD may also have symptoms similar to asthma. In chronic bronchitis the damage is in the breathing tubes (bronchial tubes). The bronchial tubes become inflamed and swollen, and as the result large amounts of mucus are produced and making it very difficult to get air in and out of the lungs. In emphysema there is damage to the walls of the air sacs in the lungs, as the result they not able to transfer oxygen into the bloodstream. According to a new study presented at the conference, exacerbation in COPD patients hasten lung function loss. Investigators analyzed data from 2,861 patients in the COPDGene 5 year follow up study. Exacerbations were defined as acute respiratory symptoms. 37% of the patients reported at least one exacerbation respiratory. In patients with COPD, each exacerbation was associated with excess loss of lung function. In another research the body electrolyte composition of 36 patients with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and without complications or medications and the influence of body sodium or potassium was studied. From these values and serum sodium and potassium levels, the intracellular water, intracellular concentrations of sodium and potassium, were calculated. The patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease showed a slower rate of potassium exchange than the control subjects, requiring at least 48 hours. There was an increase in residual sodium composed of intracellular sodium and exchangeable bone sodium. A study about the complications of lung transplantation has shown that acute fibrinous and organizing pneumonia following lung transplantation is associated with severe allograft dysfunction and poor outcome.
In the exhibition area of the conference different pharmaceutical companies from different countries exhibiting their latest products. Some of the prescription medicines were very new, less than three months old. All the prescription medicines have serious allergic reactions that can happen to any patient. In the patient information leaflet, the pharmaceutical companies are legally obliged to disclose the side effects that are ranging from the breathing problems to death of patients. The ATS journals cover the entire spectrum of pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine. It is a journal for clinicians, clinical researchers and medical educators. CTR Press
May 12, 2016:
Brand Innovtors Social Media Summit
Digital media is transforming the way brands communicate and interact with the consumers. Online video and mobile advertising, location based marketing and social media are creating new methods for connecting with consumers. Brand Innovators Social Media Summit was about brand marketing and how brands are leveraging electronic media. The brand marketers discussed the ways they benefit using digital media. They explained their strategies and tactics for creating the social media campaigns that persuade people to purchase and ultimately increase their revenue. Measuring and analyzing data, and how much of the marketing budget should be allocated to interactive media were discussed. The speakers pointed out that those brands that know how to unlock the ROI in “real time marketing” will be in the winning position. DiMercurio from Autodesk that works in 3D design, engineering and entertainment software, pointed out that people are done to be sold, they don’t want to be disrupted by advertisements anymore. “Know your customers and what inspires them.” He mentioned that challenges in Autodesk is prioritizing and content creation that depends on the audience. He emphasized on Content marketing and Measurement metrics and how to drive people by content. Wung mentioned that she is working on Artificial intelligence and messaging App and she discussed building the right infrastructure by setting the right vision. She emphasized on the necessity to have different content pipelines. Musbach talked about building relationships with partnership and explained the recent partnership with MOMA. He emphasized on brand awareness and building trust. The panel discussed the ways of making meaningful emotional connections with content and the secrets that makes consumers attracted to the content and sharing it. Taketa talked about the crisis in Chipotle, the Mexican grill and how E. Coli outbreak hits Chipotle and the ways Chipotle regained consumer faith using social analytics. “Analyzing Chipotle followers: if you know the type of music they like you can give the concert tickets away and gain their support.” Beckerman as the keynote speaker talked about Cross channel marketing and mentioned that more than $2 trillion will be spent on media worldwide in 2019! “Marketing technology spent will rise from $12 billion in 2015, to $120 billion in 2025.” He pointed out that media such as Time, Forbes and NY Times are becoming content creators. The next panel discussion was about the next wave of brand experience. They discussed the ways brands encouraging consumers to continue to post on social media. Stiglitz emphasized on Authenticity and trust and mentioned that 90% of people believe word of mouths. Williams was overexcited about LinkedIn where she works, and mentioned the unique thing in LinkedIn: using other platforms. She said that NASA was hiring astronauts and LinkedIn provided them with the data that help them to find people qualified to be astronauts. Cantu from Google talked about Integrating social media with other campaigns and then said: ” I tell my supervisors in Google what they want to hear.” The panel discussed the intersection of social and data and how top tier brands use a combination of paid and earned media to increase their revenue. Jeff Lesser from Twitter talked about Customer service, brand and Customer service opportunities. He discussed the anticipating, diffusing and resolving situations that arise on social media. He talked about the process of Shaming the brand on Twitter and providing the opportunity for the businesses to respond to the customer feedbacks. He emphasized on the human element in customer experience and pointed out that automation must be limited and always it should be a human to respond to the customers. CTR Press
May 10-11, 2016:
RedisConf 2016
Redis Conference was organized by Redis Labs that is the open source provider of Redis, a database benchmarked as the world’s fastest. Redis Labs’ software and service solutions power cutting edge applications with blazing fast enterprise-class Redis. These solutions enhance “real-time analytics, fast high-volume transactions, in-app social functionality, application job management, queuing and caching.” It has more than 46000 customers and over 100,000 databases created in the cloud. Volk in the breakout session talked about a Hacker’s guide to a new era in Redis. He discussed String DMA that uses Redis strings as the raw memory. He explained the low level API that uses iterators. An object is an iterator when it knows how to access items from a collection one at a time, while keeping track of its current position within that sequence. He also showed demos and discussed reading Iterators values. “Redis Labs enterprise cluster enables scaling Rediscover for higher throughput and lower latencies by creating additional database instances, with no downtime.” Leonard talked about Redis as a Message Bus. He explained Resque that is a Redis-backed Ruby library for creating background jobs, placing them on multiple queues, and processing them later. He discussed Profile App and rating calculation as well as Task App and rating model then he mentioned that Redis functions as a bridge that communicate between these two. Fraud App and rating reaction and Applications Subsystems were discussed. He emphasized on event in other queue such as “Bus Driver”. Haber talked about New Redis capabilities. He discussed different commands in Redis and his inspiration from GitHub. GitHub is a web based Git repository hosting service that offers all the distributed revision control and SCM functionality. Also it provides a web based graphical interface and access control and also several features such as bug tracking and task management. Tadayon presentation was about SSH I/O streaming via Redis based persistent message queue. He discussed the ways of building a message queue with Redis. He showed some demos and explained Design decisions and request/ response, Authorization steps and the code in the browser and how the messages are formatted. “Retrieve persisted messages and publisher in building a persistent message queue.” He pointed out that first set up a live listener and then publish. He also explained the Lookup by session ID and Lookup by host name. ” Use a zest with time stamp as score.” He showed how to wrap each message in a transaction and how to protect against excessive memory usage. He emphasized that key and channel names are very important. The next speaker discussed Redis Cluster goals. “Redis Cluster is a distributed implementation of Redis with the following goals: High performance and linear scalability, Acceptable degree of write safety: the system tries to retain all the writes originating from clients connected with the majority of the master nodes. And finally Availability: Redis Cluster is able to survive partitions.” He emphasized that Redis is a high performance key-value datastore which differs from other solutions because it handles values. Instead of storing values as simple strings, it recognizes multiple specific data types. ” Each data type has its own set of features to manipulate the data it contains in an atomic manner, making it an ideal tool for highly distributed system where concurrency is a potential issue.” CTR Press
May 3-7, 2016:
Heart Rhythm Conference 2016
Heart Rhythm 2016 conference was organized by Heart Rhythm Society. HRS is an organization that gathers together clinicians, scientists, researchers and health professionals from around the world to discuss the possible ways to end death and suffering from heart rhythm disorders. It is considered a leading resource on cardiac pacing and electrophysiology and it represents medical, allied health, and science professionals from about 70 countries who specialize in cardiac rhythm disorders. The Heart Rhythm Society’s 37th Annual Scientific Sessions brought together the clinicians, scientists, researchers and innovators in the field of cardiac pacing and electrophysiology. The educational sessions covered topic such as pacing, defibrillation, clinical arrhythmia management, ablation, pharmacology, genetics, basic science, and health policy. In the session identification and management of patients at high risk of stroke, the AF & Renal Dysfunction and US guidelines, Pivotal Randomized AF Trials comparison,US prescribing information for stroke, prevention in AF and Weight and age factors were discussed. The science behind the sudden death investigation gathered together medical examiners from different countries to discuss sudden death investigation in general and in specific, the sudden cardiac arrest. Cardiac arrest is “the abrupt loss of heart function in a person who may or may not have diagnosed with heart disease.The time and mode of death are unexpected and usually it occurs instantly or shortly after symptoms appear.” A heart attack may cause cardiac arrest and sudden death and it doesn’t mean the same thing. Heart attacks are caused by a blockage that stops blood flow to the heart. A heart attack refers to death of heart muscle tissue because of the loss of blood supply, not always resulting in the death of the heart attack victim. The speaker from the UK, mentioned that England is the “autopsies nation” in the world. He discussed the unexpected sudden death and underestimation of mortality. “Total referral for autopsies sharply increasing.” He explained the roles of Expert pathology and coroners. “How can molecular autopsies help? There are some pitfalls.” Then Skinner talked about the Sudden death in Asia Pacific region, Australia and NZ. He discussed the sudden death in the young adults and Who leads investigation in the age group 1 to 40 years old sudden death. He pointed out that GPs should not be involved in this process: “It is between coroners and cardiologists.” Then the highlight presentation of the conference was the interesting speech by Sam Gulino, MD. The audience’s feedback was very positive. Gulino discussed Coroners VS Medical Examiners. He mentioned that the origin of coroners is from Medieval England that coroners were elected or appointed tax officials. Then they were exported to the New World. He explained that today in the USA, most of the coroners are not physicians. The Gulino said that the origin of the medical examiners is the late 19th century, northeastern of the USA. “They are physicians and were appointed to assist the coroners. In 1969, forensic path became a medical specialty and today in the US, they are physicians trained in forensic pathology.” He mentioned that the autopsies rate has sharply declined from 60% in pre 1970s to 5% in 2008. He showed a map of the death investigation system and mentioned half of the US population lives in the place that served by coroners. He emphasized that the solution is the abolishment of the corner system and replacing it by medical examiner system.Then Gulino mentioned that most of the emphasis has been on public safety whereas the public health has been in the shadow. Gulino concluded his speech by this:” we should focus on public health as much as we focus on public safety.” Manaris discussed the Incident and impact of device infection and mentioned that it has been 5per cent increase in mortality and 50 percent increase in the cost. He explained the Risk factor for development of CIED and mentioned that the infections vary by device type. How to communicate via social media and mainstream media in order to allow for a better understanding of heart rhythm disturbances was discussed in a session on media and communications for health professionals. It was about the ways that health professionals can learn effective communication and engagement with their peers and patients in order to improve patient care and outcomes. Gross talked about the largest professional network for US physicians that more than 60% of doctors are members. He mentioned that as a physician you can have new opportunity to leverage social media and mobile technologies to improve care and build your career. Also HeartRhythm that is the official journal of HRS serves the electrophysiology community from basic to clinical academic researchers, and the industry. It’s focus is on the original research and therapy of heart rhythm disorders, including mechanisms and electrophysiology, both clinical and experimental and also genetics. CTR Press
April 28 – May 1 , 2016:
Art Market San Francisco 2016
Art Market San Francisco 2016 presented a variety of contemporary and modern artworks from different Art Market exhibitors. This year was its sixth edition. Art Market San Francisco is in partnership with the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco: the de Young and the Legion of Honor. Jay Kelly works of art were attracting visitors attention. His works as a notable fine artist with his unique figurative collages created from books, photos and magazines displaying graceful mixture of classic and modern art. Dixon painting, Still Life with Blue Envelope had minimalistic style and it was beautiful. Ebtekar painting: “under every deep a lower deep opens”(Hafez) was interesting and philosophical; some visitors gathered and were engaged in the discussion about its meaning. Masllorens painting that was acrylic and bleach on paper and was presented by Pigment gallery from Barcelona added more beauty to the pleasant atmosphere of the exhibition. Among exhibitors the representative of Art Dealer Association and MoAD were explaining their latest works. Art Market Productions has produced a new type of art fair since 2011. It focuses on creating high quality exhibition by connecting collectors with dealers in the optimal setting and expanding networks of connection. And de Young museum the partner current exhibition displaying Oscar de la Renta works. There was a lecture about his uniquely graceful design style. His style was focused on the late 60s and 70s. The late ’60s and early ’70s were a defining moment in U.S. fashion as New York-based designers tried to be taken seriously by Europeans. De la Renta defined American style. The speaker explained that Oscar was from a well connected family and was very close to his mother as the only son. From his childhood he wanted to become a painter and he studied where Picasso and Salvador Dali studied. De la Renta’s specialty was evening wear, and he also was known for chic daytime suits. His signature looks were voluminous skirts, exquisite embroideries and rich colors. On a late November night during 1973, five American fashion designers including Oscar gathered at the Palace of Versailles to show against the five French designers considered the best in the world including Yves Saint Laurent. Also in the discussion presented by Fine Arts Museums of SF, the panel explained the idea of the way art containing text is not just “pictures of words”, but a “sophisticated visual construct built from formal pictorial elements including letters and wording.” CTR Press
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April Events:
April 26-28, 2016:
Mobile + Web Developer Conference 2016
Mobile + Web Developers conference was organized by Global Strategic Management Institute (GSMI). Different ways in which mobile and web development are evolving were discussed. The speakers focused on how this development can be applied to elevate different businesses. Williams talked about material design that is an equalizer providing us a set a guidelines in order to make the apps we use more intuitive for the users. He discussed high quality and full bleed images and showed some examples. Moving motion and transition manager,Strategies for managing design and how to implement breakpoint were explained. He demonstrated some examples of material design on other platforms. Luedke talk was about iOS Automated Testing in Swift and Continuous Integration. He explained Unit VS Functional and Test-driven development. He discussed the ways to catch bugs early and facilitate collaboration among team members by using automated tests. He showed demos on XCtest and code coverage. Lindner talked about iOS Finger Print Security and iOS Touch ID technology sensor. He explained the way it works. iOS and Android provide access to the hardware fingerprint reader through APIs. There is the possibility that fingerprint APIs can be used incorrectly. How to set it up in device was discussed. Touch ID is Apple’s biometric fingerprint authentication technology. A capacitive ring activates the scanner on contact which then takes a high-resolution picture of the fingerprint and that fingerprint is converted into a mathematical formula, then encrypted, and carried over a hardware channel to a secure enclave on the chipset. In case the fingerprint is recognized, yes token will be released and if it is not recognized a non will be released. He showed demo of authentication examples and emphasized not to use LAC context. The fingerprint readers was used in the business but ignored by consumers. But now the biometric ID is being taken seriously as a viable method of authentication. Also publicized celebrity iCloud hacking has left some with an alternative to the username and password usage. According to the expert, the problem with usernames and passwords is that they are shared secrets: “We know our password, but so does the service we are using it with. This means that these databases can be real targets for hackers looking to compromise millions of accounts. Hepting from Twitter talked about Charles, Fastlane, CocoaPods and the iOS Tools Ecosystem. He mentioned that by developing your app, you also can spend more time creating value for the users when the debug processes have been done effectively, and release updates have been carried out quickly. CocoaPods is a dependency manager for Swift and Objective-C Cocoa projects. It has more than ten thousand libraries and can help scaling the projects. Fastlane lets us to define and run deployment pipeline for different environment and unify the app releasing processes. Charles generates its certificates for sites by signing a Charles Root Certificate, which is generated for the installation of Charles. It can be chosen to trust each site’s certificate as you encounter it. Gove from Google talked about the Best Design Practices for Apps. She discussed the functionality and design that underpin a great app experience. She talked about 25 key design principles that help developers and designers improve engagement and conversion rates on their apps. She explained the key design recommendations that enable users to get started with your app right away. She described her own personal experience of checking in hotel and choosing the room using apps. Hsu talked about delivering Native Mobile Experiences Across Platforms. He explained how the customers expect a comparable experience regardless of platform. He mentioned that tax preparation should become obsolete. He talked about Setting a vision and making sure that your organization has the proper strategy. “Customers driven innovation enables customer benefits.” He explained the ways of harnessing the data to build innovation models and the Transitioning to cross platform native UI. The next speaker talked about the prototyping the IoT with JavaScript. She mentioned that in the era of Internet of Things we can control the room light by using mobile phone and monitoring the heart rate on browser has been made possible. “By 2020, 50 billion devices will be connected to Internet.” She discussed Arduino and littleBits that can be programmed. Arduino is an open-source electronics platform based on easy-to-use hardware and software. It’s intended for making interactive projects. CTR Press
April 20-21, 2016:
Marketing Innovation Summit For B2B 2016
Marketing Innovation Summit for B2B was organized by Demandbase, “the leader in Account-Based Marketing” that recently launched a next generation ABM solution for Oracle Marketing Cloud. Demandbase ABM makes it easier to deliver customer experiences and facilitates demonstrating marketing’s impacts. Demandbase B2B marketing cloud is subscription-based ad targeting that enables the marketers connect their campaign to revenue. Golec in his keynote speech mentioned: “ABM is the strategy that is bringing marketing and sales team together to better compete and win customers.” Eyal, the author of the book: How to build habit-forming products started his speech with this question: “How did Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and other social media companies change the life of the people so tremendously?” Then he explained the process of forming the habit from psychological point of view and mentioned: “Habit is the behavior done without conscious thought.” He discussed the four basic steps of hook by creating habits: the first step is the triggers, external triggers and internal triggers. He pointed out that negative emotions lead to action and people suffering from depression use social media more, check their email more often than the rest of people. ” In fact they use products to change mood without thought. When they are unsure about something they go to Google, when they are lonely they go to Facebook.” He explained the psychological need of using. Then he asked one member of audience about his last post in Instagram and he replied “it was a plate of food.” Nir Eyal mentioned that Instagram solves the pain of losing moment and it is following what Kodak did in the past by adding more internal triggers of social interaction to it. “The second step is action and looking for immediate rewards.” He said that for any behavior to occur we need Motivation, Ability and Trigger: B=M+A+T. “Brain cycle and software development, the more difficult to understand, the less people use.” ” The third step is reward.” He discussed the Connection between reward and using products. ” Habit forming products are developed by use but wear and tear affects physical products and decrease their value.” He discussed the concept of creating monopoly of mind that changes the consumers preferences and brains. ” The fourth step is investment. We must understand the mind of users. Shirazi talked about the ways that Predictive analytics accelerate B2B marketing success. He explained that collecting data is not enough and DIY solution is not very good for predictive analytics. He discussed the challenges that marketers facing, and how using predictive analytics to acquire new accounts and leverage data insight across the funnel and finally increase the revenue. He explained how Account based marketing can increase the revenue. He described Predictive as using the past data to predict outcomes. He explained Smart segmentation, prospect sourcing, contact engagement and customer scoring. Uncertainty across the funnel was discussed. “Having predictive solution is the Key in scoring customer.” Rowley talked about Social Selling for the B2B marketer. She emphasized on social selling: using social networks to build the relationships that drive revenue. She mentioned that the buyers have changed tremendously during the past 10 years and the extent of change is considerably more comparing to the changes of the last 100 years. She didn’t mention that this change has been for better or worse. “Customers don’t trust logos but they trust other people’s voices.” ” Modern buyer is digitally driven.” She said that no longer calling and emailing for marketing purposes work; they are ignored and deleted. “Not word of mouth but world of mouth.” She mentioned that Sales and marketing are continuously integrated and We need to know more about customers by using social networks and your network is your net worth. She said: “A fool with a tool is still a fool.” She emphasized that Social selling has direct impact on revenue and doing research about buyers through LinkedIn and Twitter. The panel discussed the ABM tech stack. They discussed the technology that is needed to power the strategy. The panel was moderated by Isaacson. Each member of the panel explained the technology they use to make their ABM strategy to be successful. Then Sander Arts had an interesting and lively speech about account-based marketing as a key differentiator in a commoditized market. He mentioned that by 2018, 50% of the Internet of things solutions will be provided by the startups that are less than two years old and we are not able to conceive most of the things that will exist in 2018 because it has not been invented yet. He explained how to change a marketing strategy from good to great. “Great marketing involves online engagement marketing, multi customer approach, integrated multi channel approach and creating ROI. Then a stand-up comedian, Nanjiani came to the stage and struggled to make the audience laugh. He started reading from notes that is not usual for comedians. But thanks to the collective mood of the attendees, his tasteless remarks received some laughter. In exhibition area, Farina from AnalyticsPros, a certified partner of Google analytics, explained B2B marketing with Google Analytics. He explained that the New York Times uses Google analytics but Washington Post uses its rival that is Adobe analytics. CTR Press
April 15, 2016:
Container Camp 2016
Container Camp event was one day of discussing different aspects of Containers. Containers are isolated, resource controlled, and portable operating environments. A container is an isolated place where an application can run without affecting the rest of the system and the system does not affect the application. In fact, Containers can be considered the next evolution in virtualization. To Docker a Windows Server Container can be managed in the same way as any other container. Marks talked about what’s new in Docker. He explained the Docker’s latest releases. He mentioned that Docker has been powering through it’s open source releases. He discussed launching Docker for Mac and Docker for Windows. He described the MultiCPU architectures. Philips talked about Container standards and interfaces. He explained distributable container formats like App Container (appc) images and Docker images, and “container networking plugin Design in Container Networking Interface (CNI) and Container Network Model (CNM).” He also discussed its influence on the ecosystem. Container image format specification requirements, Running containers, Docker image format, App Container and Apps image in a nutshell were discussed. He explained how to create connectivity with two containers and Connectivity for pod. Ways of networking containers together and allocating IP addresses from a fixed block were explained. He later emphasized that Containers can join multiple networks. Hockin talked about Kubernetes that is a very fast-paced project. He talked about challenge of keeping track of all the new features. Kubernetes was first announced by Google in 2014. Its development is heavily influenced by Google’s Borg system. It offered Kubernetes as a seed technology. He explained Kubernetes v1.0 that was released in 2015. Labels and replication controller, Services, Configuration Maps and HTTP balancing were discussed. Different companies such as Triton were exhibiting. Triton Infrastructure Containers deliver the highest possible performance by eliminating layers of virtualization and running on bare metal. By fully leveraging OS virtualization, it eliminates the need for virtual machine hosts. Also it provides an exclusive suite of real time introspection and postmortem debugging tools that provide visibility into each container. CTR Press
April 11-13, 2016:
Subscribed 2016
Subscribed 2016 was organized by Zuora, an enterprise software company that designs and sells SaaS applications for different companies with subscription models. Its applications are designed to automate billing and finance operations. Subscribed conference gathered together “visionaries, disruptors and industry leaders” who are seeking to turn customers into subscribers. The variety of speakers and sessions discussed how to be successful in the subscription economy. They discussed the processes and challenges of turning customers into subscribers. They explained the challenges and opportunities inherent in connecting cross-departmental organizational structures that change how businesses operate. They pointed out that transformation from a perpetual business to a subscription business is the key to success. Representatives from IBM and Time customer service president discussed their experiences. Jacobsen mentioned that Time has 45 million subscribers around the world and he discussed the Advertising revenues and the strategies. Then the speakers from Zuora announced Zuora 17, the latest release of its Relationship Business Management (RBM) solution that is the only enterprise with multi-entity solution that facilitates businesses transition to “subscriber-centric, digitally-enabled business models.” This has the insights that enable rapid product innovation and a pricing engine that supports different monetization models. He mentioned that Zuora 17 monetize anything without burdening the back office. He
emphasized on the importance of deeply understanding your customers and be the business value architect. He explained the process of bringing agility to every team and combining data to find real insight. “Group together different customers with the same behavior: for example their engagement score.” Always bear in mind that customers behavior change through the time and Moments is every second customers behavior. “We are seeing a once in a century shift happening where digital transformation is giving rise to a whole new set of subscription based business models,” said the CEO. ” He emphasized on delivering new sources of value for customers, and pointed out that the “winners are those who can pair digital innovation with subscriber centric business models and hyper agile business practices.” “We help you bill for anything.” “New monetization systems are required for the digital economy, and we have developed a software platform that is agile and flexible enough to support multiple industries.” The highlight of the conference was Scott Kelly speech, an engineer and retired American astronaut. He commanded the International Space Station on Expeditions 26, 45 and 46. He talked about his experience of spending one year in space and being the first one to do it. He mentioned that he felt very strongly about it even from the time of being a kid. He explained the environmental control system in space station. “NASA is all about redundancy.” He described how they watched different movies about the space in space station: “Matt Damon knows as much about space as George Clooney does.” He explained how they kept the social connections from space station and they had telephone system and email for contacting people on earth. He also talked about the hazards of radiation and electronic from outside that can be very dangerous in space station. He described how he missed the wind and sun and rain over his face. And how he could not take shower for one year because there was no water in the space station. He explained how he managed to be productive and happy. “Food was not great and first thing I ate on earth was bananas, ” said Kelly. He also talked about his struggle in school and college. And how one day he found a book in the shelf in a bookstore and it was the start and he was captivated by the book: it was the starting point of leap from poor student to being the best astronaut. He thanked his mother for the artistic ability and nature that he got from her. He showed very beautiful pictures: Bahamas, USA, Europe and Middle East that were taken from space. He mentioned that because of terrible pollution in India and China, it was not possible to take any picture: it was just the smoke. He showed pictures of his colleagues in the space station that were from different countries such as Russia, Italy and Kazakistan. He described how he got the sense of empathy and mentioned if the politicians from different countries to be sent to the space station together, they would get the sense of empathy and learn how to coexist peacefully. CTR Press
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April 3-6, 2016:
Predictive Analytics World 2016
Predictive Analytics World (a part of Data Driven Business) was a “cross-vendor event for predictive analytics professionals and managers and commercial practitioners.” It aimed at strengthening the impact of predictive analytics deployment, establishing new opportunities in data science and leveraging bigger data for prediction. It involved different sectors such as banking, financial services, e-commerce, government, healthcare, manufacturing, high technology, insurance and publishing. There was a variety of presentations and speeches discussing new ways to apply predictive analytics, analyzing different companies strategies in predictive analytics, finding the best solutions, explaining the challenges and the available resources. Siegel talked about Uplift Modeling: Optimizing for Influence and Persuading by the Numbers. He mentioned that the only way to optimize influence is to predict it. “The analytical method to do this is called uplift modeling.” He explained that uplift modeling is very different from standard predictive models, which predict customer behavior. He emphasized that uplift models predict the influence “on an individual’s behavior gained by choosing one treatment over another.” To predict not the outcome but the influence of the outcome and the goal for analytical modeling is to predict the influence. He discussed quantum physics and how it applies to human behavior and the ways of predicting influence if it can’t be perceived. He asked the question: does response modeling predict the wrong thing? And then he explained when the marketing really works. “Response modeling doesn’t drive us to make decision and reach positive outcome.” He discussed the case study, U.S. bank and pointed out that Uplift modeling empowers the organizations. He also discussed the ways of creating the positive responses from customers. He mentioned that persuasion modeling is uplift modeling. Then he explained Retention with churn modeling and the Psychological perspective, Treatment and control and finally How to influence people to purchase. The session discussing the predictive workforce analytics journey at Hoffmann and La Roche, was focused on explaining Operationalization. The speaker discussed the cost when the individuals leaving the company, Controlled experiments and Natural language processing. He mentioned: ” Data scientists’ time spent: 80% on cleaning the data and 20% on complaining about it.” He explained the value of analytics and discussed Data and privacy law in Europe. “Don’t only decrease failure but increase success.” Then he explained diversity and inclusion in workforce. Ramirez talked about tracking satisfaction via social media and how to know the customers. He mentioned that data driven segmentation can help in acquiring new customers. “As organizations compete on the basis of customer experience, analyzing the customer lifecycle becomes the key element.” He explained how predictive analytics can uncover customer complaints in social media and how to improve negative customer experiences. He emphasized on using the advanced analytics, analyzing complaints and applying social media analytics. He mentioned that data is valuable only if the action is taken. He discussed the ways of building a predictive analytics strategy for customer service and expanding it. “We looked at words and phrases and their frequencies.” “Look at the standard deviation and it is outside of range, Look at the customer complaints.” He discussed the process of creating Strategy, analytics, insights and finally action. Cowan talked about network security and Predicting the extent and cost of online attacks that helps selling the security softwares. He discussed the predictive modes developed to calculate the “probability and associated downtime cost of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks” a company may experience. He explained how these models were transformed into a web-based application, which enabled the software customers to answer a few simple questions and receive a projection of their level of risk of an attack. “DDoS attacks aim at serious disruption. It is not like access attacks that penetrate security perimeters to steal information, it attacks to paralyze Internet systems by overwhelming servers, network links, and network devices with bogus traffic.” He emphasized that the cost for the DDoS attack especially for e-commerce institutions would be remarkable. “It is easy to get lost with data.” He explained how evaluating models is so important and showed how the model is implemented. John Elder had an interesting presentation and talked about “doing space age analytics with our hunter gatherer brains.” He mentioned that Predictive Analytics is very powerful and has low risk and amazing return. He discussed three serious challenges: Convincing experts that their ways can be improved, Discovering new breakthroughs, and Getting users to change the way they work. He mentioned that having a mental model of human brain help us to anticipate and predict better. “It is very hard to think analytically and to act on the changes required.” “Multinational oil and gas companies want to predict which project going to fail so they need data in oil and gas exploration.” He talked about his high school teachers, and that one of them had five masters degrees: one in psychology and she was experimenting on the students. He argued that Soft issues are more dangerous than hard in data science. He mentioned his experience on working on the soft issues that 93% solutions implemented and 7% failure that was on oil field. He emphasized on the key issues: Clear thinking , analytical thinking and trust. He recommended reading the book Thinking Fast and Slow. He explained Model of Two systems in our thinking: 95% fast that is unconscious and doesn’t need thinking and the rest 5% slow that is analytical and requires thinking. He pointed out on “horrible conforming, people always go with the majority without thinking”. He discussed Whether they are willing to change or not. ” Instituting change is very hard.” “Marketers are lying”. “People often do the easiest job not what is right.” He mentioned that Culture of a company is very important whether it accepts changes or not. He emphasized on involving the developers and stakeholders: “use the power of stories because it stands in the mind. Story is data point.” CTR Press
March 30- April 1, 2016:
RightsCon Silicon Valley 2016
RightsCon was organized by Access Now. Access Now is an international human rights organization that defends the digital rights of users at risk around the world. It works at the intersection of human rights and technology and its mission is developing and promoting rights-respecting practices and policies. They seek to advance laws and global norms to effect long-term systemic change in the area of “digital rights and online security, developing insightful, rights-based, and well-researched policy guidance to governments, corporations, and civil society.” There were a variety of speech and panel discussions on the different subjects such as: freedom of expression; human rights, trade and business; Internet governance and digital inclusion; network discrimination and connectivity and privacy and digital security. One of the topic discussed by the panel was “the right to be forgotten” that came to the fore with the decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union in the Google Spain case of 2014. The case was involving a Spanish man, who challenged Google to take down links to an old newspaper article about him, which he said that it had been out of date and unfairly damaging. Google argued that it’s the messenger, not the content provider, and for it to take down individual links like that would be censorship. The speaker from Google said that since the ruling was announced they have received thousands of requests that is very time consuming and costly to deal with. Those cases includes the scandal-hit politicians, persons convicted of possessing images of child abuse and doctors who wanted negative reviews of their practice removed. Since the ECJ ruling was announced scholars, politicians and journalists have been divided on “whether it marks a victory for individuals’ right to privacy or a catastrophic setback for freedom of expression and public access to information.” But usually Politicians are in favor of the right and the journalists are against it. UN’s former special rapporteur on freedom of expression and Assistant Director General for Communication and Information at UNESCO, Frank La Rue mentioned that digitalization of data and history is the future and the print materials and written history is going to be erased, so people must have access to the information because it is part of history. The right to be forgotten will be a dangerous tool in the hand of a corrupt politician. Other speakers also categorized the “right to be forgotten” as a blow against free speech, but the speaker from India supported it as a practical tool that helps individuals such as himself to control the information circulated about them. Recently Google announced that it would de-list search results from all domains accessed from the EU. Then the panel discussed what and whom should the Internet forget and who should decide and whether the search engines can be trusted as the guardians and censors of the online world. In the session Whoever controls the future of the Internet controls the future of world, the panel talked about the intensification of stakeholders who want to have a role in governing the internet and why there has been such a marked interest in internet governance and who the key players in conversation are. The panel discussing the Internet freedom and UN human rights mechanism talked about the circumstances that advocates can appeal to the UN Special Rapporteur or a Working Group for assistance, and what information should they communicate to the Rapporteur’s office. Kaye explained the unique challenges that technology and human rights issues pose to civil society engagement with UN mechanisms. The speaker mentioned that violence against female journalists is considered a double attack against journalism and gender. Puddephatt mentioned the issue of the Politicization of the UN and that people are not looking at UN as a solution but the independent rapporteurs. The panel emphasized that access to the information in UN is not easy and they are distant and lack the credibility. In the media attention session, Aaron from Free Press and Knappenberger from Luminant Media discussed the ways to reach reporters and producers with compelling pitches, visuals and validators, and how to generate a discussion of lessons learned with concrete examples from recent digital rights campaigns. Aaron mentioned that there is no objective journalism, journalists are subjective when looking for the stories in deeper level. Knappenberger talked about his new film that is about power and abuse of power and he emphasized on engaging in the personal human stories. The next panel discussed “Building Digital Safety for Journalism”: the major digital threats to journalists and media on Internet, the gaps in knowledge and practices for protecting digital safety of journalists and “initiative for digital safety globally, regionally, nationally and locally.” Another panel discussion was about the digital divide and language divide. They mentioned that language divides present a barrier to reaching global communication and information awareness. “While in theory the world can connect with each other across borders, in practice the internet we see and interact with is limited to the language we speak.” CTR Press
March Events:
March 31, 2016:
Global Tech Symposium 2016
There were a variety of speakers in the Tech symposium. Eustace, an engineer talked about Stratospheric Exploring. He showed a demo about his personal experience of Stratospheric Exploring. He showed how he strapped into a harness beneath a giant helium balloon and lifted off to new heights in the upper stratosphere. Then he reached an altitude of 135,908 feet with a black sky overhead and a visibly-round planet beneath. He severed his connection to the balloon with a small explosive charge, and fell to Earth. He explained that there were forty people involved on the day. He described his experience in the high altitude that there were no sound and atmosphere was changing colors. ” what I was expecting was different from what I experienced: there was no star, you cannot see any star”, he explained. He also emphasized that Google paid part of the huge cost, but he didn’t do it for marketing Google. The next speaker talked about lifelong learning. She mentioned that after a life changing sabbatical, she tried change the world through education. She explained how her team had developed relationships with over 2,000 of the experts in EQ topics. She discussed what inspired her from childhood. “We are very different inside and outside.” Then she explained her 800 hours yoga practice that she made and building relationships. “We have unlimited access to the data and information through technology: classes from Top universities are free online.” Renvoise had a lively presentation about Neuromarketing: The Science of Human Decision. He started his speech by mentioning his passion for marketing and brain. He mentioned that customers don’t know what they want! Traditional research methods won’t help us find what triggers decisions in our brains because “they are based on self reports.” “We need a scientific approach to capture insights which predicts why our customers will choose to buy from us.” He explained Facial imaging techniques,Voice analysis techniques and Biometrics techniques. He emphasized that the companies increasingly are using EEG and eye tracking techniques for marketing. He also mentioned using FMRI as technique for marketing. He explained how he has conducted neuromarketing research for over a decade. “To show what motivates the customers, we use neuromarketing techniques such as facial imaging , layered voice analysis, eye tracking, EEG, and biometrics collected from the skin, the breath and the heart.” He emphasizes that they use any technique possible to encourage the customers to buy. CTR Press
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March 21-22, 2016:
Customer Success Summit 2016
Customer Success Summit was organized by Totango. There were more than 80 speakers and a variety of sessions to discuss the latest tools to master the business of customer success. The focus was on designing customer success for the team involved, mastering customers success and aligning customer success to optimize with all members of the company. The cloud businesses have huge data on customers and it results in opening up new opportunities and innovative ways to understand and engage with the customers in order to maximize the revenue.The emphasis was understanding the customers and delivering recurring value. Blackmore talked about the new way of managing customer relationships. She mentioned that Customer Success has emerged as a new department and profession.”Support, Services, and even traditional Account Management, Customer Success Management is changing rapidly.” She discussed the increasing demands of customers for greater personalization. She emphasized that companies should be ready for the age of the Modern CSM. “There are mind blowing data. Hire people who know how to make escalations.” She said that in the age of customer success technology, creating Customer Success team is a must. Also she mentioned many companies are overwhelmed by data and they should focus how to make the proper data-driven decisions. The next speaker asked this question: Should we need to have customer success team? He mentioned that different CEO have different notion of customer success and Customer Success is a mindset. “CS leader needs to keep the customer lens focused on every part of company.” He explained the process of customer optimizing and mentioned companies cannot afford not to know and unstructured conversations with the customers don’t go anywhere, it should be structured. On the workshop on Monetizing customer success two approaches had been discussed: one approach that is in favor of monetizing and the second one that believes the process of monetizing may result in loosing the original customers. “How can we define customer success and monetization?” Driving revenue directly from customer success was discussed. The speaker mentioned that the focus should be on the right customer that generate more revenue. Martin from Salesforce discussed the importance of an effective customer success program in a subscription-based model. He mentioned that renewal revenue is real money, but success organizations are typically viewed as a cost centers and they are asked to do more with less. He emphasized that building a scalable success program is a top priority. “We should use experimentation with different technologies, tactics, and engagement strategies to help our customers succeed at scale.” Sears talked about building a profile for customer health by understanding them. He talked about his company that started with little knowledge about their customers and faced with the challenge of merging together sources of information from multiple acquisitions and product lines, but finally was able to streamline those disparate data sources into actionable information. He discussed the importance of managing Product feedbacks properly. He gave example of Uber that people rate the drivers and the drivers rate customers! He emphasized on market segmentation strategies that are used to identify and further define the target customers, and provide supporting data for marketing plan elements such as positioning to achieve certain marketing plan objectives. In the workshop on being strategic and proactive to build customer success, the speaker mentioned that they surveyed more than 700 CSMs and the result was that time management had been the most frustrating part of their day. Aly from Google for work talked about the culture of innovation at Google and how they think about success. She mentioned that there are 3.5 billion search per day and 61000 Googlers. She mentioned that the focus is on “user freedom”. Then she said: ” Google users are spoiled!” One of the attendees mentioned: ” in fact it’s the other way around, Google users are used by Google while their data being tracked and used for increasing the company revenue.” The speaker mentioned the word: “Googley” and added: ” it means how they know to work in Google environment”. She later mentioned that every Thursday the leadership speaks to 61000 employees and gave them confidential reports about successes and failures of the week. She talked about innovative measures in Google and said that the idea of creating the driverless cars was the result of one innovator in Google observed that human errors are responsible for 90% of car accidents so he thought: “what about taking human out!” The next speaker, Frank from Global sale, LinkedIn talked about culture and values in data driven sales. He mentioned that culture is what unite us together and values are what drive our decisions. He discussed social selling. Then a data scientist in Salesforce discussed customer usage data and patterns. He emphasized on the necessity of the predictive analytics projects than analyzes customers behaviors and tell the companies in advance which customer is going to leave. He discussed EWS: early warning system and how to collect and analyze data and keep the customers. He introduced a new platform “wave”. “Don’t believe in Statistics, trust human judgement.” CTR Press
March 17-18, 2016:
Droidcon SF 2016
Droidcon is a global developer conference series and a network focusing on the best of Android. The droidcon conferences around the world support the Android platform and create a global network for developers and companies. In Droidcon San Francisco all parts of the Android ecosystem, core development, embedded solutions augmented reality, business solutions and games were discussed. Romain Guy from Google talked about Vulkan, the Vulkan specification 1.0 that was released last month. There are Vulkan SDKs available for Android, Linux and Windows. Still in beta, AMD and Nvidia released drivers that support Vulkan. He discussed System applications. About AOT he mentioned that they changed the meaning to “all of time”.
He discussed Audio Latency, Render script, Open GL ES3.2, ICU4J, Support library and Security. The next speaker talked about Rebound that is a library that was developed at Facebook for bringing lifelike animation to Android. He talked about simple techniques that help to build fluid, and lively interfaces on Android; he developed a simple framework (Rebound) and philosophy for coordinating user interfaces with physics and his ideas with others through open source. Then Lew talked about the Common RXJava mistakes and Software description: RxJava – Reactive Extensions for the JVM – a library for composing asynchronous and event-based programs using observable sequences for the Java VM (Java). About Cache vs replay he mentioned that Cache doesn’t have much options and it is not very smart, but Replay on the other hand gives you lots of flexibility. “There are observers and subscribers. Observer is an interface.” He explained the memory leaks in subscriptions, RX Lifecycle and error handling and Focusing on unexpected expectations. Ferrer Camacho from Twitter talked about Android development. Android SDK has been changed considerably since its first version. Every new version comes with new APIs and there is no perfect API, some do too much under the hood, others couple the class to the context. He discussed how to make the app scalable, and code clean, the performance optimized and the UI neat. He discussed the pragmatic ways and the pros and cons of using certain Android APIs, strategies and libraries. He explained Architecture Test, Fragments pros: reusable and Many activities with reusable views. He also discussed MVP : model view presenter. A Web page or Web Part in a SharePoint application that contains controls for displaying application data and each user can modify the data and submit the changes. “The Web Part retrieves the data, handles user events, alters other controls and submits the changed data. It includes the code that performs the functions in the Web Part and it makes them difficult to maintain and test.” He discussed the Clean architecture benefits and how it may lead to over engineering and be considered as an disadvantage. The speaker from Facebook talked about Developing mobile experience in Facebook. Facebook serves 1.39 billion mobile monthly active users. It’s usage has grown considerably and engineers developing Android applications to dozens of product and infrastructure teams and contributing to the mobile codebases. “The focus is developing methods that facilitate the distributed development across dozens of different teams”. She talked about the general lifecycle for releasing features weekly on Android at Facebook. She described different tools and architectural patterns that are useful for ensuring code stability and encouraging code reuse across multiple teams. She emphasized that they want to make sure to build user experience for everyone and explained Network connection class. Eric Lafortune, CEO guardsquare, talked about Jack and Jill build system. The Jack and Jill compilers for Android apps, introduced by Google last year. He discussed the usage and advantages of the compilers in the development process of an application, and explained the underlying technology of the build system. He discussed the implications for developers and the ways of using the compilers. He mentioned the advantages and disadvantages. He discussed the underlying technology, such as the Gradle build process and the new Jayce byte code that may impact the Android ecosystem more profoundly. He said: “I am not affiliated with Google.” He discussed Java 8 closures, Implementation of closures, OpenJDK, Build performance and optimization, Application runtime performance and DexGuard process byte code that can get the better result and optimization. CTR Press
March 14-18, 2016:
GDC 2016
GDC 2016 was the 30th edition of the Game Developers Conference and attracted about 26,000 attendees. It was one week of summits, tutorials, lectures, expo and VRDC. Virtual reality developers conference focused on developing for games and entertainment applications. In Thinking and writing in different languages session, the panel who were from different countries discussed the issue of language and communication and cultural barriers in developing games. Rautalahti from Finland talked about the Finnish company with international staff and the fact that their works cannot be just in Finnish. He emphasized that the content of story will be affected when you change the language. He discussed how language and cultural issues interfere with the process of developing games. “Language issues are easier to solve than cultural issues.” Protasio from Brazil talked about the localization for different games. He mentioned that game industry speak English and we are not going to suppress our natural culture and language. “The main challenge for a writer is communicating ideas and concepts and giving the data a soul.” Adam from Germany talked about Game design. He said: ” In Germany everything gets dubbed. There is nothing in original language.” He mentioned that there are lots of words that only exist in German. He showed a demo of some German words that are too long and almost impossible to be translated and mentioned in game translation and localization there would be some problems. Sayin from Turkey talked about Spider-Man in Istanbul and how they hate the spider man. He gave the example of Mayk Hammer that was popular in Turkey, but the Turkish translator kamal Tahir made some serious changes and made a left wing story of the right wing original. He also discussed the cultural differences such as Knight that in Turkish culture is villain. Miechowski from Poland mentioned that they make their games in English and discussed some dos and don’ts in game writing. He gave the example of creating a game in Poland with some English characters in the game that was well received the in the UK and it worked but not in the US market the response was not positive. He mentioned that this case gave them a lesson to avoid any specific cultural bonds and connotations. He mentioned that Wheelchair game is very polish and has references to polish characters that is not understandable for people from other cultures. Wver from Denmark mentioned that they created games for Mexico and Native Americans. “Game on spin age to blend in a language culture that you are not part of it.” Voll talked about Brain on VR. She discussed the psychology of doing VR right. She talked about Real world vs Virtual world. She said there are many dark sides to it. She asked the attendees to raise their index finger and shake it and then shake their head. Lots of attendees followed her instructions and did it! Later she mentioned that the brain is “super gullible.””We can actually trick the brain into seeing a lot of interesting things without those things actually being there, which turns out is also helpful in games, VR, and entertainment.” She mentioned that developers need to consider all these if they want to complete the illusion of virtual reality and achieve an enduring sense of presence in their games. “While it might not be real, it’s sure as heck real enough,” she mentioned that the potential for real psychological trauma is there. “Physical trauma as well, people walking into walls, or scaring people to the point they have a heart attack. We don’t know yet how this is going to go, but we have to be careful. We have to be mindful of this. Our players place their trust in us when they place themselves in the rig. If you take nothing away from this talk, take that away this”. She compared People in VR with those singing in Karaoke. She pointed out that when the wow factor wears off, it is psychologically damaging trauma in it especially in scary games. “And it is not cool that I have seen so many people getting upset in VR.” “You cannot take brain out of VR.” She mentioned that publishing the affects of VR on people would be a Marketing nightmare because so many people mentioning that they don’t like VR, “VR makes them sick.” On Making compelling story at 90 FPS, Planck discussed story development and prototyping. He said: “We are new to VR coming from Film industry.” He explained Real time tools and Technical constraints and mentioned that every millisecond is precious. He discussed the ways of creating images. “Using design to deal with technical restraint and Creative constraints.” He said: “Choice is the enemy of performance. Make less choices.” He emphasized that most of people are not ready for the virtual reality. “People are not able to follow the story. In VR you should forget that you’re human!” He mentioned that VR is the medium for telling stories and discussed the story telling in movies, theatre and VR. “How can you grieve for a character in VR?” He explained that it isn’t happening because of the element of desensitization and dehumanitization of VR. Desiderio talked about composing music for VR game. He discussed Music localization techniques in 3D and mentioned: “Binaural sound processing adds 3D in headphones.” He explained binaural processing limitations. He discussed different processes of changing emotions with music mix. In expo halls, companies of different sizes and styles from around the world introducing their products and services: KiteTeam, the video game localization company with the offices in Spain, Mexico and Brazil and the mission of making every player feel the story has the in-house team to audit the whole localization of the game. “Translation and audio quality are ensured by resources who have not been involved in the process of translating or recording but have a deep knowledge of the project and accurate tools to assess the work on a constant basis.” Enzyme company has 15 years of experience in supporting game companies in translation and localization and it is based in Québec, Canada. VMC company is based in Québec too. It offers terminology services, glossary and style guide creation and internationalization for game and app developers. Representative of game industry in Scotland mentioned that the game sector in Scotland employs 65,000 people and Scotland is a country known internationally for the quality of its game development courses. The Italian Game Industry Association was presenting 12 Italian gaming companies such as Balzo that means “leap” in Italian, it develops casual games, puzzles for mobile devices and provides videos, animations, music and sound design. CTR Press
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March 10-11, 2016:
Erlang Factory 2016
Erlang Factory 2016 was an interesting event that discussed the latest processes in Erlang by a diversity of speakers and specialists from around the world. Processes are the primary means to structure an Erlang application. They are neither operating system processes nor operating system threads, but lightweight processes. They don’t share any state with each other. The estimated minimal overhead for each is 300 words. And also many processes can be created without degrading performance. A benchmark with approximately 20 million processes has been successfully performed. Erlang has supported symmetric multiprocessing since release R11B of May 2006. Czaplicki talked about about Elm and making the web functional. He explained Elm Architecture. Lundin talked about the latest news from OTP team- Roadmap. He has been working with SW development since the late 70s. He talked about working together with IEUG and Issue tracker. He explained the process of replacing the Erlang bugs mailing list and Moving rebar3 to Erlang on Github. He discussed the Planned releases and mentioned that OPT 19.0 will be released in May. He explained the Validation callback for heart and Code path cache that was incompatible and removed. He discussed the SSL application that DES cipher was removed. Then he explained some highlights such as gen_statem a new state, Ssh optimization and machine behavior. Fred Hebert had an interesting speech about the history of Time. He started his speech with this self made sentence: “I would die in the wild!” He pointed out that he is not a historian. He discussed some of the various time and calendar systems humanity has used since its infancy based on observations of the real world, and the problems that arose from these. Then he elaborated on time handling in the world of computers, and explained concepts such as logical time (lamport, vector, and interval tree clocks, hybrid clocks, and so on) and finally he showed how they apply to distributed systems. “Software that can be used for time representations.Time based on the location.” Mahdavi mentioned that at WhatsApp they have a somewhat unique take on running a reliable service, and there are some similarities between the Erlang language and how they think about and run the WhatsApp service. He explained how they develop their server components and deployment processes, and how they monitor, alert, and repair the inevitable failures that may happen in a service running at billion-user scale. He explained how WhatsApp has been able to reach billion-user scale with a very small server team. He added that the same ideas that Erlang embodies helped them a lot. He explained Erlang based philosophy for service reliability and Working on media delivery. He mentioned that WhatsApp bought by Facebook in 2014. He emphasized on minimal approach and explained that they always keep everything simple: minimal footprint. ” We use only the software we absolutely need.” He explained working with data center, Investigating every bug, Benefits of Erlang and Compact code base. “We have one common share library. And it is reliable.” Orsini talked about Machine learning, Game of war and M-N Topology. He explained that he used Erlang for its platform compatibility. He discussed Message queuing system and recommended always take time to write proper benchmarks. He also talked about Test failure scenarios under load, MZ high performance And Pitfalls and solutions. Since the open source release, Erlang has been used by several firms including Nortel and T mobile. Erlang was basically designed to fill a niche and has remained an obscure language for most of its existence. Now its popularity is growing because of increasing demand for concurrent services. Erlang has found some use in fielding MMORPG servers.The next speaker talked about pipelined tasks . How do we change data faster? He talked about Expected and observed performance and M process to N process in message passing. He pointed out: “Don’t create too many processes and don’t stop processes frequently.” Alvaro Videla talked about distributed systems and his presentation was one of the best in the conference. He explained that distributed systems algorithms can be classified according to different kinds of attributes such as: the timing model; the kind of interprocess communication used; the failure model assumed for the algorithm; and many others. He explained the asynchronous model where components can take steps in whatever order they choose and they do not offer any guarantee. He pointed out that a problem with this model is that while it is simple to describe and closer to reality, it doesn’t reflect it properly. “A process might take infinitely long to respond to a request, but in a real project, we would probably impose a timeout on said request, and once the timeout expires we will abort the request.” He emphasized that we can use a message passing algorithm to build a distributed shared memory object. He also explained queues and stacks, which are used by some authors to describe consistency properties such as linearizability. He also mentioned the failure modes where processes fail to receive or send messages. Then he explained Quorums that are tools used for designing fault-tolerant distributed systems. “Quorums refer to intersecting sets of processes that can be used to understand the characteristic of a system when some processes might fail.” “Understanding time and its consequences is one of the biggest problems in distributed systems.” The next speaker talked about building high performance Erlang clients using Shackle. He talked about buying ads in the real time, Communication at socket and Architecture of shackle: shackles: pool, backlog, server and queue. Then he explained Implementing shackle user behavior and Arithmetic service. Erlang solution has many years of experience in designing, optimizing and implementing instant messaging solutions. CTR Press
March 9-10, 2016:
Structure Data 2016
Structure Data conference was about the future of data, artificial intelligence and machine learning and how they affect our lives. The conference attendees were computer scientists, software executive and business users. They gathered together to discuss the future of data. The speakers discussed different subjects such as the ways of managing data to increase the revenue, how Internet of things affects the building of products, data security, open source and cloud computing, building brands around data and data analysis and machine learning APIs. Andrews, data scientist from Pinterest talked about how data helped increasing revenue and users satisfaction. She discussed Pros and cons of building infrastructure, Specific building infrastructure and the cost of undoing the decision and going the other way. She explained that Pinterest as a design focused company facilities data scientists and designers cooperation. “Design is intuitive based.” Wills from Slack emphasized the human element in data by saying: “I am human and have feeling and I want the involvement of human element in data.” He later discussed Deep learning and machine learning and what team of analysts do. The panel pointed out that everything will be automated. Then CEO of Brainspace mentioned that they have the only analytics platform with a brain. He explained that Discovery 5 is the industry’s most advanced, large scale machine learning platform. “It rapidly ingests millions of pages of unstructured text, dynamically learning without taxonomy or ontology. It is surfaced through advanced, interactive visualization, give the full power to the user.” He explained that it is used in e-discovery, investigations, intelligence and Pharma R&D. Ng talked about deep learning and AI and how deep learning, more data, more computing power and better algorithms have changed the image of AI. “Deep learning in reality is very different; we exploit huge amount of data comparing to the five years ago.” He talked about Google brain project and Super computing shift in deep learning. He mentioned:”it is good for advertisers and it is good for us!” Economically significant speech recognition and self driving car in deep learning and Commercializing self driving car in the next three years were discussed. “If the train hits your pet, it is not train’s fault , so the same for the self driving car! It is safer than human driving car.” When Derrick Harris asked him about the future of the job, Ng replied: “There will be massive unemployment as the result of automation.” Later he emphasized that We make huge amount of money in deep learning. One member of the audience said: ” “we”! he means top executives in deep learning.” The next speaker, Rahman talked about the startup providing data on privately held companies that makes its search engine smarter with deep learning. He discussed Traditional text search, Elastic search and Investment management platform. Grewal mentioned that Airbnb’s data science team has doubled the ratio of female employees last year. She mentioned that Tech is very male and very white and Airbnb decided to develop diversity by employing more women. She mentioned that Employment satisfaction score is measured quarterly. The next panel talked about tech innovation and how the corporate and academic worlds are coming together to create the next big things. Franklin talked about Open source and data analytics academic research vs commercial research that also was discussed by the other speaker from Microsoft. Combination of open source technologies and how to bring them to the customers and Big data were discussed. “People are still experimenting with open source models.” Then the speaker from Netflix talked about how it keeps up with the big data demands. It has more than 75 million members that generate massive data on viewing habits, streaming video performance, and trends in media consumption. This huge amount of data is available to be analyzed. She discussed the strategies of Netflix and Compression of data storage layer. She emphasized that their engineers use Spark and Amazon storage service is the game changer. Operational monitoring management and security and analyzing the users behaviors were discussed. “We want to share in the community.” The variety of subjects were discussed by many speakers from different companies, subjects such as: data analytics in 21st century business, data access in healthcare, the latest in measuring the data, AI needs human elements and building Google from search engine to AI poster child. Dean in previous presentations demonstrated the system images from 11 million randomly selected YouTube videos. One simulated neuron in the software model fixated on images of cats and others focused on human faces, yellow flowers, and other objects. It showed that deep learning made the system to identify these discrete objects even though no humans had ever defined or labeled them. CTR Press
February 29- March 4, 2016:
RSA Conference 2016
RSA conference was about the measures to secure and safeguard the data and delivering superior detections and protections from the potential advanced malware. It’s mission was connecting people and insights that empowering them to stay ahead of cyber threats. This year more than 40,000 people from around the world attended the conference. There were a variety of seminars and educational sessions discussing different aspects of cyber threats. The speaker on cyber security and challenges mentioned that the way organizations respond to the cyber threats has been transformed considerably and new platforms have been created to respond to security incidents and vulnerabilities. The manual and informal processes have been replaced by a proven platform. According to the ESG, 90% of the IT team have expressed the burden of manual process as the main reason for the limited efficiency. And 75% of the cyber security professionals have said that informal processes at their organizations is the main reason. Nowadays more and more organizations invest heavily in identifying security vulnerabilities by choosing the operations that include cloud based applications such as security incidents responses and vulnerability responses. The next speaker pointed out that a smarter approach needed to go beyond the static malware analysis and find advanced malware that sandboxes cannot see. He discussed Stealing people’s data, Safety and security and the Vulnerable websites. He mentioned that the developers are not trained in security and they may not be aware of the Dark net and other sources of attacks. He referred to the case that just by three clicks 2000 users of Canberra were deleted permanently. He emphasized on the necessity of Constantly scanning and explained the Authorized users vs unknown users and malicious users. He mentioned that almost 100% of victims had firewalls and he explained how EPPM works. Fink talked about the radical new approaches to the cyber security. He emphasized on the necessity of protecting every single layers. “Our digital world is rapidly changing. Our security funding is nearly 4 billion dollars but we are not safer and cyber crime is increasing.
We have to protect everything from tablet to the largest data center. Our financial records, our health records are attacked.” He mentioned that the attackers have access to tax returns. In Sony case they attacked the hardware and damage was considerable. He emphasized that the first step is prevention, then detection and finally response. “We have to build security in every single element. How do you verify every step and processes? Just securing infrastructure is not enough we should secure our data.” He pointed out that one solution is making the stolen data useless.
Then he talked about the Ultimate Big Data problem. He explained Real time monitoring of critical business data. He pointed out that we should use deception to confuse the attackers. He explained the Challenges of dealing with big data, Base rate fallacy and Collect DNS reports and DNS clusters. ” We need to build some intelligent Packard and develop analytics.” He explained DNS malware analytics in Hewlett Packard and mentioned that the HP labs introduced the powerful machine:
Infinite memory machine. “Machine takes us to the whole new level. We need to build security to every part and detect the threat and response on machine level, not human level.” Bostrom talked about safety issues in Advanced AI. He mentioned the defeat of Kasparov by computer in chess game showed that machine can beat human. He pointed out that AI in 2016 is different from AI in 60s: “now the focus of AI is on machine learning program. He also explained different games and “Go” game with robots in China. He also talked about the labor market impact of automation and said that by 2075, 90% of AI goals will be achieved. And he asked this question what would be happened if AI succeeded? He said the year 1956 was the start date of AI. He explained the strategic behavior including deception by AI and the risk of value misspecification: “if some parameters of human values are omitted, an optimal policy sets those parameters to extreme values.” Roesch talked about Ascending the path to better security. He emphasized that we need a better detection and better response and Complexity is the enemy of security. The next speaker mentioned that the Office of Personnel Management announced in June that the data from personnel records of 4.2 million current and former employees had been breached and also background check records of 22 million people were affected and many believe that the hackers backed by China. McLaughlin talked about the inevitable decline of the digital age. The next speaker talked about changing the password and using a tool that designed to predict changes, the researchers could predict how users would change their passwords for 41 percent of the accounts in less than three seconds using a relatively low-powered computer. “The researchers also determined passwords for 17 percent of the accounts in fewer than five guesses and researchers at Carleton University noted that in some cases, an attacker installed software that spies on users as they type. So changing a password in this case may not have any benefit. “The attacker will just be able to scoop up the new password the next time they log in.” None of these means changing passwords is always a bad idea. He noted a number of reasons why mixing it up could be a good thing. He said that in the cases that you think your password has been stolen, if you’re reusing passwords across different services, or even if your password is just weak; “it’s not clear that forcing users to change passwords on a regular basis actually makes sense for all workplaces. A better idea may be for employers to explore log-in options that go beyond passwords such as biometrics or two-factor methods that require users to also prove who they are by plugging unique codes sent via text for each log-in.” Polyakov talked about Cyber security for oil and gas industries: he explained IT and OT, SAP examples and discussed Collecting data from different sources and Vulnerability of operation systems. “Hackers can create fake servers and attack.” He showed a demo how the attackers can use vulnerabilities and steal oils. He mentioned that 75 percent of oil production is managed by SAP system. “How to secure that?” We need to secure the enterprise application, Review all connections and secure them especially when many users have administrative access. “It is easy to ride the back door.” He discussed the Code security and application platform security. The next speaker showed live demos of the hackers attacks and showed the tools of stealing user banking. He explained Malware adoption, Qbot aka and a worm that spreads via network shares. He talked about Anti Sandbox features, Qbot commands and communications:decryption of data. Harvesting banking credentials via session spy was discussed. “Using infected pcs to operate paid proxying services for other crime groups. Building their own private cloud and Stock fabric control panel.” He asked the question: Who were the victims? 1 million banking customers. He emphasized on the necessity of Filtering by bad sender and deleting the emails and also avoiding the infected browsers that injected with malicious. The next speaker on Human element talked about the behavioral psychology and science of habit to change user behavior. He started by telling the story of Eugene Pauly’s Brain that could not retain any new knowledge in his mind and he did not know the location of fridge and couldn’t describe the place but when he wanted to drink he automatically went there but later he couldn’t remember but doing as a matter of habit. He explained How to build a new habit? He talked about the Science behind marketing strategies is creating the habit. The marketers use the High level of algorithm for creating habits. He explained Trigger, routine and rewards stages for creating habits. Creating craves make habits stay. How to change a habit? Old habits never die. He mentioned the Coca Cola advertising shows when you are happy and smiling you drink it, but the Alcoholic companies advertising when you are happy, sad or bored you need an alcoholic drink. He mentioned that they are Creating craving and making it stick. The last speaker of the conference was Sean Penn. He revised his previous quote that when people leave the theater they feel less alone or more alone and he wants to make them less alone and added “Anybody who has the courage to be alone” He mentioned that institutionalized freedom is different from freedom of thought and talked about the Self censorship level in the recent years and political challenges. About pursuing politics he mentioned a quote from an Irish writer: “Politics! I cannot because I have only one face.” He also mentioned that the journalists cannot do 24 hours journalism. In response to the question that if you weren’t an actor what would you do he replied: ” I remembered Chauncey Gardiner: I want to watch.” Then he mentioned “I have two extraordinary children and I want to be an extraordinary father. I want them to be independent.” Different companies in the exhibition area was providing new softwares and services to protect the digital identities of all the users including employees, IT admins, partners and customers. With 500 times more data stored on a single device than a decade ago, data security has become the main focus. Encryption of data at the endpoint, in transit and at rest can be a solution for keeping encryption keys behind the firewall in public, private or hybrid deployments. Regular archived data health checks ensure the files can be recovered years after backup. CTR Press
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February Events:
February 25, 2016:
Business and Technology Forum To Combat Human Trafficking 2016
Business and Technology Forum To Combat Human Trafficking 2016 was organized by United Way Worldwide. United Way is engaged in 1,800 communities across 40 countries worldwide. As the largest privately-funded nonprofit in the world, they aim to create solutions to build stronger communities. Their mission is to improve education, financial stability and to make communities healthier with the help of 2.6 million volunteers and 9.6 million donors across the world. They try to advance community-based and community-led solutions and bring people and organizations together with partnership and cooperation with nonprofits, faith organizations, educators, labor, health providers, community leaders. They target the world’s toughest issues such as trafficking. Gallagher from United way worldwide talked about looking for opportunities and introduced Generation Freedom Campaign that will start to ask the presidential candidate for 3 billion fund to combat trafficking.
Charendoff from Sabre talked about Modern world slavery. He mentioned that Passport to Freedom launched by Sabre to enable education and scholarship for trafficking survivors to reintegrate into society. “Technology can help to combat human trafficking.” He mentioned that trafficking statistics are shocking and Technology can be the key to the sustainable improvement. Richmond as a council in human trafficking prosecution unit talked about some of the current trends in the USA and worldwide. He mentioned that there are many myths about human trafficking: Myth 1 is that slavery is history; myth 2 that human trafficking is hate;
Myth 3 is foreigners must be involved; myth 4, it is about movement and boarders;Myth 5 that trafficking is just body exploitation trafficking , it is also about labor, cheap labor; myth 6 that all victims are minors; Myth 7 victims self identify; Myth 8 animal can be trafficked; Myth 9 the victims want to be rescued and finally myth 10 criminal prosecution is not needed. He emphasized that Human trafficking is a crime motivated by money and it is a big business. He mentioned that the policy makers want numbers and figures. He said that Pimp directed body exploitation trafficking is no 1 in the USA. And they are involved with Force, fraud and coercion. He showed the picture of a man called Patel originally from India who was convicted in New Orleans for body exploitation Trafficking. He mentioned we should combat the demand too Traffickers constantly use technology to recruit people. Then the panel talked about using technology innovations to combat body exploitation and labor trafficking: Cordua from Thorn that works on child exploitation and child abuse mentioned the necessity of creating army of technologists to combat the trafficking. Levine from Polaris that gather data mentioned that the Ecosystem of anti human trafficking has been changed during the last two years. Knox from Palantir technologies, a mission driven company that aims to recruit the best talent to integrate and analyze the data mentioned that we don’t want to victimize the victims twice. On Fighting against human slavery, the next speaker mentioned that disrupting the financial flows of trafficking networking should be the aim. Lorenzo from Western Union talked about anti money laundering, Crime about money and crime about data. He mentioned that that they educate their employees by teaching them to understand the nature of transactions and assess the risk of each transaction. There are 35 transactions every second in real time. He talked about the Link analysis of the transactions and use of algorithm to deny the transaction in the real time. Saar, Public policy council, Google mentioned the case that a girl was burned alive in human trafficking. She pointed out that slave trade of 21 century lies on our ignorance. She emphasized the need to combat trafficking in demand side. She mentioned some cases that the buyers of the children were not arrested. She emphasized on demanding the political will and Naming the buyers as criminals. She talked about Racial justice and civil rights too. The next speaker talked about AnnieCannons cooperation with human rights Stanford university, Preventing and then prosecuting the traffickers and Giving opportunities and voices to those who are deprived. She mentioned the partnership with aftercare organizations, such as rehabilitation shelters, who already provide counseling and treatment for trauma to their residents. She talked about the psychiatric and women’s health treatment from Stanford Hospital and Medical School volunteers and first pilot relationships with trafficking rehabilitation shelters and aftercare organizations in the Bay Area, Romania and Myanmar. “Aftercare entities do the hard work of bringing Survivors back into society at a reasonable pace with everything from nutrition to housing to personal security.” Paterson mentioned that over the last 12 months, IST Research has begun working with a large group of stakeholders to understand how technology can be used to assist the fight against human trafficking. “Gradually as our engagement intensified we have begun to bring to bear the entire technical portfolio of the company to aid in the fight and Mapping labor trafficking in 12 countries. Dillon talked about Made in a free world and how they try to change behavior, FRDM website. He mentioned that Made In A Free World believes the marketplace has the power to protect freedom. “It’s a tool that helps businesses look for and protect against forced labor worldwide. It’s brand new. It’s revolutionary.” CTR Press
February 17-24, 2016:
Developers Week Conference 2016
The Developer Week conference included CTO world congress, the live coding competition, the virtual world hackathon, JavaScript conference and the breakthrough startup competition. It was all about codes and how we design the world in which we live. The message was that the code is no longer instructions given to computers to run software, but it is everywhere in our lives: homes, cars,stores, mobiles, wearables, sensors, drones and robots. In today’s world, everything is connected to code. Programming has become more accessible and more languages, open APIs and devtech tools are available. Different starts ups and tech companies exhibited such as: Raygun, the software application that integrates in minutes with just a few short lines of code and any reports of error or crash will be instantly available in the dashboard; CodinGame, that is based in south of France with the motto that coding is fun and is working in the AI programming with more than 20 programming languages; Stamplay; Circleci and Digital Ocean. There were different workshops on the subject of building data science and how to use it for analysis and monetization. JavaScript speaker talked about the advanced debugging patterns. The next speaker talked about the evolution of the Paypal platform. The next speaker talked about monetizing App. He mentioned that Apps have a massive revenue opportunity in an asset they already own: their first-party data. In this session, he explained how developers can build a profitable app without subjecting their users to more and more ads. He mentioned that the benefits would be two-fold: Make money and keep users happy; he discussed alternative ways to monetize your app, and answered the questions such as what are the key factors to consider when deciding if and how to sell your data, what is the best monetization strategy for the app, “how to choose a data partner, and the risks and benefits along the way.” The speaker from Mozilla talked about the Browser in the third dimension. He mentioned that the “Browsers are considered the late comers”. He explained how to experiment VR in your laptop and showed demos. He said that VR removes you from the place. He explained What makes VR so appealing and then showed some videos of VR. He talked about Google cardboard, 2004 Apple dashboard and created canvas, 3D experience and WebGL: 3D Canvas Graphics. ” A tool that is based on web Components.” “Every time you put a-scene it creates three.js”. He mentioned that WebVR started last year and discussed 3D graphics, Double vision, binocular vision, Three. VR effect. The next speaker showed some demos on Data sells and explained What selling and why selling. He explained Hashed email tied to cookies and devices/ Ad ID. “Why this data is valuable.CRM…cross device marketing, content personalization”. He explained the data economics and pointed out that not all data is useful. He warned that there are lots of bugs in the code. He explained how to collect and share data and how to create Hashed emails. He discussed Privacy policy and monetizing the data. He emphasized on No PII: not send and not receive. On privacy issues he mentioned that HR department have the employees data. And there are lots of buyers of data in hedge funds. The next speaker talked about
the successful transformation, outlining the successes, challenges, and lessons learned in the process of creating a startup. He also talked about reporting bugs for the open source and the subject of Community building. Then the panel talked about the ways to create and deliver content that provides thought leadership to derive technology forward in the San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley and New York. CTR Press
February 18, 2016:
Yahoo Mobile Developer Conference 2016
Mobile Developer Conference was organized by Yahoo and its main focus was Flurry, Flurry’s way of measuring actions, and the foundation for understanding what the customers do in the app and monetization. The message was what Flurry is about: tracking every menu tap, level completion, and purchasing to optimize the customer experience. Going one level deeper and capture even more detail, such as purchasing type or quantity with Event Parameters and diving deeper with User Paths, Funnels, and Segments. Mayer mentioned that 500+ Apps added on Flurry each day. She explained what was the situation in Super bowl and how mobile connections affected the process. She said that Smart phone market has become flat, but by using Mobile engagement techniques the future of Mobil will be engaging more audience. She mentioned that the goal is finding ways to improve monetization. “Yahoo guide more than 1 billion users and growth, retaining the users and monetization are the goals.” The next keynote speaker was Khalaf and he showed interesting demos and mentioned that since the beginning of the mobile revolution, over 170,000 developers have trusted Flurry to track over 540,000 apps. Integrating Flurry Analytics in five minutes can get basic insights into the users and app performance. By setting up advanced analysis of complex events, we can get a deep understanding of everything the users are doing. From initial launch to the top of the charts, Flurry Analytics is free at any scale and available for iOS, Android, Blackberry, Windows Phone, and mobile. He mentioned that eight years ago was very different from now in every segment of the industry. He discussed the mobile addiction issue and pointed out that mobile addiction continues to rise. ” It is far more than just addicting, they are glued to their device.” He showed different slides about the rate of mobile addicts in different countries: mobile addicts compared to the world population ranked the eight in 2014, but it jumped to the fourth in 2015. He mentioned that Gaming time has been declined, but messaging and social media involvement increased in 2015. “Entertainment shifted from TV to the mobile device.” “According to Tumblr analysts, the TV industry is in the crisis.” He discussed Mobile ads and app purchases revenue. He mentioned that currently the growth rate is declining, but he has a strong confidence of growth after one year of pause in 2016. “Phablets will be at the top and will create a boom in the industry .” He discussed the Content creation, connectivity to productivity and the prospect of $800 billion market. “When egos goes down the productivity goes up.” Graham, the Product management at yahoo, Flurry mentioned that Analytics predict that China will be the top mobile market for monetizing. Then Flurry analytics was discussed by Jones and he said: “Your analytic tools should bend to your needs, not you bend to the analytics tools. In Flurry you can filter it in different ways: age and gender.” The next speaker talked about iOS created by Apple, iOS app analytics and
yahoo app publishing. Lundell talked about monetization by understanding audience behavior. Analyze the monetization strategy and track the users and analyze the data.Target advertising and how to maximize revenue was discussed by the next speaker. He mentioned that there are 250,000 developers, 800,000 Apps and 10 billion daily sessions in the mobile movement. CTR Press
February 14-18, 2016:
IS&T International Symposium on Electronic Imaging 2016
International Symposium on Electronic Imaging was organized by the Society for Imaging Science and Technology (IS&T). IS & T is an international non-profit society with the mission of keeping members and other imaging professionals apprised of the latest developments in the field through conferences, educational programs and publications. IS & T covers all aspects of imaging. It has particular emphasis on digital printing, electronic imaging, color science, sensors, virtual reality, photofinishing, image preservation, and hybrid imaging systems. There was a variety of interesting conference groupings. Human perception and cognition for emerging technologies group discussed human visual, auditory and tactile perception and the cognition related to the electronic imaging algorithms. Psychophysiological measures of image quality and visual aesthetics in electronic media were discussed. Foxe talked about neural model of multi-sensory integration in human neocortex. He discussed the issue of the brain damage and the images of brain in the left hemisphere of the brain and also the multi sensors and speech signals. Olfactory and color perception and food perception were explained. He discussed how sight, sound, and touch are knitted together in the brain. “Children with autism often have difficulty processing sensory information and the resulting overload may contribute to the repetitive behaviors and the other problems that individuals with this condition experience.” He mentioned that he focused on autism and other intellectual and developmental disabilities. Peterzell talked about study of simple mirror approach in psychophysical investigation and visual feedback for phantom limb pain. He also discussed VA phantom limb pain project that studies people who have lost limbs. And he explained the effects of mirror and creating the visual illusion and how getting the illusional image of the missed limb subsequently alleviate the pain. Watson from NASA talked about the Pyramid of visibility. He referred to the Paper by de Lang in 1958 and talked about high frequencies, Temporal CSF and Spacial CSF. He also mentioned Papers by Van Nes and Bouman in 1976 and discussed the parameters. He explained modelFest and Ferry Porter Law and the linearity relations and explained how special and temporal acuity are related. He focused on the Window of visibility. In the image reproduction and material appearance group, the applications of color hard and soft copy and quality evaluation of 2.5D and 3D soft and hard copy reproductions were discussed. Valpereda from Italy talked about 3D scanner characterization for open design. He explained the Open source design with low cost technology. He focused on 3D print and scan for all. He mentioned using cheap scanner without gnome. He analyzed the influence of different factors on scanner accuracy. Scanner practical limitations and Initial calibration procedure of the device were discussed. He mentioned that it is almost impossible to scan blue color objects. Skaff talked about learning optimal incident illumination using BRDF image. She explained material based angle selection and different numbers of selected illuminations. The Boher from ELDIM company in France talked about multi spectral BRDF measurements on anisotropic surface. He explained the visual sensitivity of human eyes, BRDF measurements and its definition. He discussed the accurate measurement of angular characteristics in terms of luminance, color coordinates. He showed colorful slides and mentioned that OLED displays exhibit luminance fluctuations and color shifts that can be sensitive to human eye in particular conditions. By viewing angle and imaging multispectral measurements “we show that color shifts are generally related to the multilayered structure of each sub-pixel. Interference fringes result in angular variations while thickness variations result in surface non-uniformities.” In image and video processing, quality and systems group, microarray imaging, electronic cinema, image and video compression and segmentation and recognition were discussed. Ulichney talked about the effects on Fourier peaks used for periodic pattern detection. Then 3D movie rarities and how 3D archives created were discussed. He talked about the restoration of 3D movies such as “Bubble” and “Gog”. Then he showed a lively 3D movie. In visual information processing and communication, the speaker from Intel talked about RealSense hardware and software modules and 3D sensing hardware. He talked about adding human like sensing to computing devices and showed a video demonstrating a frog staring at an iPhone and jumping in front of it and finally biting the finger of iPhone owner! He mentioned that the facial recognition software will be used instead of password in the future. He talked about scanning 3D models of people. He said: “There is a special cooperation between Google project Tango and Intel that I should not say in public.” He showed the video of Drones that see the world in 3D and the Magic mirror that shows a person with different cloths on. In document recognition and retrieval group, languages and modalities, pattern discovery, clustering, media forensics, authentication, biometric and user identification were discussed . Garz from university of Switzerland talked about geometrical descriptors for writer identification. She mentioned that handwriting is a biometric feature and is used for identification and it is unique to each person. She discussed its applications for forensic purposes, Identifying a writer by their recurrent patterns and unconscious practices. She explained the Geometric relationship and angular relationship. “How we write the location of the interest point changes.” She explained Multi scale detectors, X=number of scales and Y=number of angles. She pointed out that Different languages have different clusters. Atanasiu talked about cuckoo among each person data as a quality control method to retrieve mislabeled writer identities from handwriting datasets. He compared each one to different animals and mentioned that it will be a swan when people writing beautifully. “Handwriting is a kind of sport and it is difficult to have no variability.” He analyzed different scripts and talked about artificial cuckoo and natural cuckoo and Detecting forgeries. Bauer talked about intelligent pen and tracing the handwriting. He discussed the competing lines, Intelligent pen and intelligent scissors. He explained the Cost function and the amplification of difference between handwriting and background. David Hébert from France talked about language identification in document images. He explained Writing type identification and language identification and using OCR ( optical character recognition) for language identification. He mentioned that we don’t have 100 percent OCR accurate. He discussed Maurdor dataset and Google Language identification plug in. “There are two basic types of core OCR algorithm, which may produce a ranked list of candidate characters.” CTR Press
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February 11, 2016:
Stock Market: Surviving the Next Bubble
This trading event was organized by Schwab Trading Services. First the panelists talked about the present situation of stock market and different trading strategies. Frederick mentioned that the labor market has been very stable and this will have positive impact on the stock market. He discussed the momentum and value stocks. He mentioned that the Utilities stocks have been very good to invest and they pay good dividend. “But be aware that the good dividend stocks, sometimes there is the risk of the price going down.” Benefits of the low oil price needs time to show. He emphasized that the rate of unemployment is falling and we think that we are at the end of the bear market. He pointed out that in 2009, market declined 40 percent and then followed by seven years of bull market and now it may be just two years of bear market. “As long as there is volatility in oil price, the market will not be stable. Mercer talked about stock mania and crashes. He mentioned that bubble conversations are everywhere. “What will the next one be?” He explained the Tulip Bubble that introduced to the Dutch in 1593: they invested in bulbs and the price continued to rise. People sold houses to invest and gain profits. Then prices started to slide and many lost their life savings. What went wrong? “Get rich quick mentality and over investing in speculative product and also irrational exuberance.” He also talked about 1929 crash that resulted in 40% market decline and 12 years of depression. It took 25 years to return to pre crash peak. He explained the situation in 1987 crash that there was 22.6% drop in a single day. He discussed the dot com bubble in 2002 that there was 78% loss in NASDAQ composite from peak to bottom. He advised the investors to stay calm and focus on making progress toward the long term trading and investing goals. “If speculating, adjust investment size and risk management strategy appropriately.” He emphasized on avoiding not to miss out attitude and blindly following others. ” When they are asked why are you selling that stock? They reply because everyone else does!” He emphasized on having the personal financial plans that meets each person specific situation. Then Romer, Economist shared her knowledge of the Federal Reserve and how monetary and fiscal policy affect the economy and capital markets. She explained the Stimulus package in 2008 and where the economy headed. She mentioned that the Collapse of Lehman was the trigger for financial crisis. She said that she doesn’t dare to comment on Fed policy. “Fed job of mopping up after bubble burst is not easy or appropriate.” Handling the crisis by the balanced approach of lowering interest rates may results in the struggling economy. She emphasized on the importance of the Education spending. During Q&A, Mercer gave some tips for managing exposure and risk during the future bubbles. CTR Press
February 6, 2016:
Scholarly lecture on Pierre Bonnard’s Paintings
The special opening of the exhibition, Pierre Bonnard, Painting Arcadia Legion of Honor hosted an interesting program featured a scholarly lecture, live chamber music Society of San Francisco that performed favorites by French composers Satie, Debussy and the most popular one Ravel. Also there were different art-making activities for all ages. Bell who specializes in 17th- and 18th-century European painting and is currently curator of European painting, drawing, and sculpture talked about Pierre Bonnard, a French painter and a founding member of the post impressionist group of avant grade painters Les Nabis. She mentioned that Bonnard preferred to work from memory, using drawings as a reference, and his paintings are often characterized by a dreamlike quality. She described him as “one of the most thoroughly idiosyncratic of all the great painters”, and the unusual vantage points of his compositions rely less on traditional modes of pictorial structure than “voluptuous color, poetic allusions and visual wit.” She said that Bonnard had unique use of color and very complex imagery. As Smith mentioned “It’s not just the colors that radiate in a Bonnard’s painting but there’s the heat of mixed emotions, rubbed into smoothness, shrouded in chromatic veils and intensified by unexpected spatial conundrums and by elusive, uneasy figures.” She showed different slides of his colorful paintings and pointed out that Bonnard was known for his intense use of color, especially via areas built with small brush marks and close values. She showed his painting: “man and woman” and mentioned that it shows complex relationship between man and woman and he portrayed an invisible separation between them. She called his paintings “the most thoughtful”. Bonnard used to stay just two months each year in Paris and he preferred to stay in the south of France that was not much noise or distraction. His complex compositions specially those of sunlit interiors of rooms and gardens populated with friends and family are both narrative and autobiographical. The exhibition focus was on the radiant late interiors and still life of Pierre Bonnard. The paintings, drawings, and watercolors on display dated from the artist’s later years, when he centered his painting activity in his pink stucco house overlooking the Mediterranean in the village of Le Cannet. He used to work in a converted upstairs bedroom, he transformed the rooms and objects that surrounded him into iridescent subjects, remarkable in color, light, and vision. She mentioned that the specific metaphors for a range of sensations, his late paintings convey a disquieting effect. It is these interiors that define Bonnard’s modernism and prompt a “reappraisal of his reputation in the history of twentieth century art.”
CTR Press
January Events:
January 19-22, 2016:
Design the Future
Design the Future conference was organized by O’Reilly Media. In O’Reilly Design Conference, the interaction designers, UX designers, user researchers, product designers, product managers, and entrepreneurs gathered together to explore new ways of designing. The conference was focused on providing designers with the full stack of skills they need to remain competitive and create the next generation of products. The latest tools, techniques, and technologies for creating innovative products and services, insights and inspirations were discussed. Dill from Airbnb explained the ways of designing for a journey over time and how to identify the right time of owning the experience and enabling it. She talked about the process of awareness of the tool and mentioned that community based services such as uber has changed the human relations. She mentioned that she may know the name of the driver in uber service but she doesn’t know the name of the taxi driver. About Airbnb she answered this question: “How do you bring order to the chaos?” She explained the digital and physical part of experience ; the digital platform helps the process. She pointed out that Happiness=reality_expectations, she recommended to forget about the flaws of Airbnb and Keep it real. She showed some photoshopped pictures of the places where places were shining and people were beaming. The audience reaction was that it could not be real and some people discussed the photoshopped pictures. She mentioned that the customers have profiles and are verified. She again emphasized that people should see the other half of the glass that is full! “Understanding the community through customers feedback is important; Open up to the community.” Fadell ,the founder of Nest Labs, Inc., the company that developed the Nest Learning Thermostat and Nest Protect: Smoke + Carbon Monoxide Alarm was the next speaker that discussed the art of noticing the world around us and making it better with O’Reilly, CEO of O’Reilly Media. He explained how to think about the future as a designer. He mentioned that designers change the people and the world. “People are different from 20 years ago.” “The community moves with you when you make the changes.” They discussed the implications of the on-demand economy, AI, and other technologies that are transforming the nature of work and the future shape of the business world. On the subject of collaboration and how to make all the people together Fadell mentioned that the process was very secretive. He explained the changing strategies and what he wants to accomplish in Nest. He talked about the cellphone hardwares and how he thinks about design that was born from frustration. “Design is understanding frustration and solve it and bring clarity.” “First notice and then clarify.” O’Reilly mentioned that uber is redesigning the taxi and changing the business model. They discussed the ways to change the business model, design ethics and our responsibility. How to design differently? How to remove the screen that blocks us from the reality and talk to each other. They also talked about Trust and privacy and how people are worried about them. He mentioned that we have to gain the trust by remodeling the design. Then the panel talked about the design and venture capital. They discussed the ways they approach investment decisions, what life is like as a designer in a VC firm, and what should be done for launching and building a successful company. Veen mentioned that the fundamental quality of a designer is understanding how audience react and empathy element. Who is in charge of prioritizing in the company: what we do now and what we do later. “I should build stuff otherwise I would not be happy.” Kuniavsky in his lively presentation discussed the challenges of creating embedded intelligent systems and offers UX design approaches for addressing these challenges. He talked about designing for predictive machine learning for the IoT. He mentioned that Amazon model is loosing money to keep people stuck to their devices. He discussed Predictive behavior enabled by machine learning and mentioned that increasingly predictive machine learning drives the consumer to Internet of Things. Cloud-based algorithms collect data from thousands of connected devices and then create models that aim to predict what behavior will create the most positive outcome. But how should the human user interact with these algorithms? How? “Predicting future by looking at past.” “They modeled you to predict what is good for you.” He discussed the Issues with the UX of predictive behavior. He mentioned that the financial institutions using it to take our money for years. “How smart devices set the expectations.” He discussed the issue of Uncertainty and control. He explained the Extremely complex relationship between people and computers, Sharing control and responsibility with algorithm. He mentioned it is like your dog, but ” do you let your dog drive your car?” On the issue of building and maintaining trust, he said :”We trust what is more human, not what wants to dominate us.” The audience reaction to his speech was highly positive. Roman talked about the importance of story and story telling. He mentioned that consciously or unconsciously when we look at the world, we see stories. From people and objects to landscapes, everything makes sense to us because we know there’s a story behind them. Some stories are more compelling than others. The more aware we are of what makes stories captivating, the better we can be at telling our own stories.”Finding the story is the key.” He told story of shahrazad from 1001 nights and the power of story, how shahrazad stories changed the fate of kingdom. “Story has beginning, middle and end.” He showed a demo of Story cubes: throw the dices and tell the story based on the shapes. He showed a beautiful and emotional video that made some audience in tears but they liked it. How to be human and balancing the art and science of product design was discussed by the next panel. They talked about the art and science of product design and exploring how to build a product that hits all the aggressive growth goals but still feels human.
Tong compared Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest and mentioned that Facebook is about the activities in the past, Twitter is about activities in the present and Pinterest is about activities in the future. Johnson from LinkedIn talked about the great products that begin with great culture. He mentioned that if you want to hire someone first think about perspective and diversity. He emphasized on the importance designed around diverse perspectives and inclusion. CTR Press
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January 20, 2016:
Cyber Security and Privacy in the Internet of Things
Cyber security and privacy in the Internet of things was organized by the Cybersecurity & Privacy Law section of SFBA. The panel discussed different aspects of the “Internet of Things” that is a phrase refers to physical objects connected to the Internet or otherwise able to exchange information through digital networks. They mentioned that businesses are increasingly producing IoT goods. It has been predicted that over 50 billion things will be connected to the Internet by 2021. They emphasized that companies and their attorneys should be aware of the security and privacy issues these billions of connected things generate. They pointed out that Cyberspace and its underlying infrastructure are vulnerable to a wide range of risks from both physical and cyberspace. Criminals exploit vulnerabilities to steal information and money and also are developing capabilities to disrupt, destroy, or threaten the delivery of essential services. They mentioned that Cyberspace is particularly difficult to secure because of a number of factors such as the ability of criminals to operate from anywhere in the world, the connection between cyberspace and physical systems, and the difficulty of reducing vulnerabilities and consequences in the cyber networks. They expressed concern over the cyber threat to critical infrastructure, which is increasingly subject to sophisticated cyber intrusions that create new risks that could cause harm or disrupt services upon which the economy and the daily lives of millions of people depend. Rabkin mentioned that some companies don’t have the privacy policy, while some companies have the written privacy policy but they don’t observe it. He talked about the job of the data scientists and the location of storing the data and how to protect the deeply personal information which is gathered by IoT and shared by third party. Calderon talked about the hacking tools that criminals use and how criminals plan to monetize the information they illegally gained using the security vulnerabilities of the cheap digital devices. He mentioned that security researchers find the vulnerability and ask for the money to fix it. Berger talked about the geo location of data collection and the automated password guessing tools and ip camera companies. She explained how hackers access the customers life and cameras and how some hackers invade home network. She warned about visiting unsafe websites. She pointed out that some companies mention in their privacy policy that they cannot guarantee that hackers do not reach the customers data. McNabb talked about the flaws in IoT devices, cars that use Internet ,smart meter and concern of the individual that utility companies may use these data. She mentioned that public utilities Code 8380-8381 requires gas and electric utilities that provide smart meters to customers through a third party contractor prohibit the third party company from using customer data for a secondary commercial purpose without the customers prior consent. Lynch from EFF showed demos and two pictures comparing and explaining Internet of thing and gathering the digital data. She mentioned that smart meter data can show how many people live in the house, which tv program the house residents watch and when they take shower. She also pointed out that Google tracks all the internet use and keep the data. She mentioned that some consumers do not buy the IoT for home because of the violation of privacy. Using IoT devices presents a variety of potential risks that could be used to harm the customers. “It is not clear where the data is going”. It enables unauthorized access and misuse of personal information. She mentioned that some Nest devices that users don’t have control over them. The panel emphasized that the companies should build security into their devices at the outset, rather than as an afterthought. Also companies should minimize the data they collect and retain. CTR Press
January 17-19, 2016:
Winter Fancy Food Show 2016
Winter Fancy Food Show, the largest specialty food trade event on the West Coast was organized by the Specialty Food Association that is a community of food artisans, importers and entrepreneurs whose mission is bringing craft, care and joy to the foods they sell. It was established in 1952 in New York and is a not-for-profit trade association that provides its members in the U.S. and abroad the knowledge and connections to nurture their companies. This event brought specialty food’s top manufacturers, buyers, and thought leaders together for three days and featured more than 80,000 products, 19,000 buyers, and 1,400 exhibitors.The Winter Fancy Food Show also presented various educational seminars discussing how to grow a sustainable specialty food business. The marketing, selling, pricing, and distribution, as well as innovations, trends, and the future of food were discussed. 1500 exhibitors from around the world exhibited the latest specialties in foods and beverages. They were showcasing dozens of niche and artisanal specialties. Specialty cheese companies from California and other states and also from Italy, France, Spain and other countries were offering different types of cheese to the visitors to taste and compare. There were lots of new flavored cheese that during the last five years have outperformed unflavored cheese in both volume and dollar sales. They were high quality cheese that were awarded the gold medals; different cheeses such as different types of Blue cheese, Feta, French cheese, Gouda, Mozzarella and other world class natural cheese were exhibited by variety of companies such as Sartori. Olive oils and vinegars were exhibited by different companies such as “Boschetto”, from Tuscany, Italy. Boschetto fruit flavored vinegars and musts, specially the peach one was so aromatic and fresh that fascinated many visitors. Different roasted nuts were exhibited by Santé from Santa Clara. Boulart company with the moto: “saying NO is a good thing” attracted visitors’ attention. They provided a wide range of Non-GMO project verified breads. Their representative mentioned that they do not conform to the industry standards, they set new ones. Their breads have no genetically modified products, no preservatives, no additives, no color, no chemicals and no added sugar. They add different natural ingredients such as olive, raisin, walnut, hazelnut and honey. Other companies such as Wasa also provided Non-GMO snacks. Spanish company, Chiquilin exhibited organic saffron. Comté cheese company provided different food recipes with cheese and fruits, different herb omelet and walnut biscotti. Star Kay White exhibited vanilla extract, 100% Grade 1 Madagascan beans. Another Spain based company: seawater for life, provided 100% natural and purified Mediterranean seawater. They use unique filtering process that retains the minerals in seawater. A Dutch company celebrating its artists was exhibiting different products and cheese named after Rembrandt, Vermeer and the most popular ones called Vincent. It had a large picture of Vincent Van Gogh on it that added a tasty artistic flavor to the Specialty Food Show. CTR Press
January 12, 2016:
Tomorrowland: Tech and Medical Treatment in 2020
Tomorrowland: Tech and medical treatment in 2020 event was organized by La French TECH in San Francisco. The panel discussion was about the future of digital health, the convergence of the digital and genomic revolutions with health care and society. They talked about the digital health that is empowering people to better track, manage, and improve their health, live better, more productive lives, and improve society. “It’s also helping to reduce inefficiencies in healthcare delivery, improve access, reduce costs, increase quality, and make medicine more personalized and precise.” They discussed the digital technology and health care and how medicine is becoming more personalized by more targeted treatment and more patients involvements. Chambon from New Leaf Venture Partners talked about the information technology and healthcare and remote controlling the patients that is a revolution itself and what is going to happen in the next twenty years. “We should rethink about drug re pricing.” Nicolas, the VP of diabetes integrated care within Sanofi, mentioned that with these advances in digital technology, the role of pharmaceuticals is changing. “The business model is going to change. We are experiencing different business models; in the future , digital technology provides access of the real time data and solution on mobile platforms for the patients. Real time coaching will be fully personalized. Remote tele medicine too provide patient cares.” He said that deploy, learn and improve is the rule. Pierre Leurent, CEO and founder of Voluntis, mentioned that the role of physicians is changing; healthcare spending and hospitalization costs and developing softwares can provide advanced doctors & patients cooperations. He talked about the role of technology in helping healthcare team to provide right care for the right patient at the right time. He also talked about managing side effects of the drugs. He said that France wants to have experiments in different regions and changes the ways doctors manage the patients. He talked about the huge difference in funding between USA and Europe. Valencia, VP Qualcomm Life, talked about monitoring patients and cooperation of tech companies and healthcare. He emphasized on providing healthcare at homes. “Our focus is to identify and digitalize the data and network technology of the future that affects our today decisions. Data itself becomes a therapy.” He also discussed the drug approval processes . The panel talked about the connecting technologies in order to have more real time data about the patients. They emphasized that better understanding of the patient needs should be the aim. The real-time telehealth, a telecommunications link that allows instantaneous interaction. Videoconferencing equipment that is one of the most common forms of real-time telemedicine. The Peripheral devices that can be attached to computers or the video-conferencing equipment which can aid the interactive examination. “The availability of better and cheaper communication channels, direct two-way audio and video streaming between centers through computers lead to lower costs.” The audience asked about the connectivity barriers and how to overcome them and the issue of Cyber security challenge and the patients data. The panel mentioned that capturing data in a very secure way is the aim, but it is almost impossible to create 100% secure way.The digital healthcare is concerned about the development of interconnected health systems so as to improve the use of computational technologies, smart devices, computational analysis techniques and communication media in order to help healthcare professionals and patients to manage the illnesses and health risks, as well as to improve health and wellbeing. Telehealth adds a new paradigm in healthcare, where the patient is monitored. This has been shown to significantly reduce hospitalizations and visits to the Emergency Room, while improving patient’s quality of life. Telehealth also benefits patients where traditional delivery of health services are affected by distance and lack of local specialist clinicians to deliver services. The other side of the digital advancement that can result in the massive job loss of the health care personnel had not been discussed.
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January 7, 2016:
Social Media 2016
Social media and ethics rules event was organized by the Estate Planning, Probate and Trust section of San Francisco Bar Association. It was an interesting event for discussing legal aspects of the popular social media. The speakers Kohlmann and DeLeo talked about the problems have arisen for attorneys using Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other social media. They discussed the general ethical issues when using social media and they recommended the best practices tips for being a social media savvy attorney. Antonchuk mentioned that over one billion people use social media. They explained that lawyers should be familiar with the ethical rules in their jurisdiction, including rules as they relate to advertising, solicitation, and communication about the lawyer or law firm’s services. But many lawyers seem to forget these rules or don’t apply them to their online activities, including their interaction on social networking platforms. They explained how the ethical breaches occur as a result of headings or settings that the lawyer or law firm has no control over because they are set by the social media platform. But this fact that the lawyer cannot control the setting doesn’t necessarily mean that the lawyer is safe. DeLeo talked about great and terrible internet. She mentioned that the more connections you have with other on the social media, you make them more able to reach your data. She mentioned that Facebook privacy options is changed on the regular basis and users are not aware of the details. She discussed the privacy concerns about Twitter, Snapchat and LinkedIn. “90% internet users use social media”. She discussed the cases of blog posts and how can it violates the rules. “Even articles on family laws could be a problem as an attorney.” She also mentioned the variety of the audience on social media that could go to one or one million. She also discussed the problem with endorsement in LinkedIn that can be a violation. “Attorney is responsible for monitoring the posts in social media.” Kohlmann explained many tech words and their meanings that applies to blogs, social networks and content communities. He discussed LinkedIn privacy issues that have access to your content and YouTube flaws. He explained the social media lawyer ethics and how to respond to online negative posts and how to use social media to search opposing parties. He mentioned the lawyers do “blawgging”instead of blogging. He talked about the communication restrictions on social media, advertising rules and restrictions. “Blogging can be masked but other social media doesn’t have this”. He discussed the case studies: websites and rules on business and professions codes. He mentioned the following sentence: “Another great victory, now who wants to be the next?” “Who wants to be next?” is a problem because guarantees the outcome and that can mislead the public.”Even Facebook’s friending could be a problem”. “Fake profiles are also problem.” Facebooking with clients could be problem if we look from the old school point of views. He mentioned that in the case of Facebooking with the judges, you need to disconnect if you appear before them in the court during the trial duration. He said don’t post anything that is not considered nice about others; but if you really want to mention something that is not nice, don’t do it online. On LinkedIn in addition to the individual profiles, law firms can create Company Pages for their firms to showcase firm-wide information and provide Updates, information about employees. When completing the “About” section on a LinkedIn Company Page, users will see an option to list the firm’s Specialties. Firms should use caution when completing this section, and be sure that doing so will not be a considered a violation of ethical rules. Law firms are advised not to list specialties on their LinkedIn Company Page. The opinion notes that while firms are permitted to list their areas of practice, they may not do so under a “Specialties” heading, even where the firm has no control over the heading and is not able change it. Also simply listing the attorney’s areas of practice under this section would be akin to listing areas of practice on an attorney’s website, but making any further representations regarding the level of proficiency in any particular area is not allowed. The attorneys should avoid placing anything on a LinkedIn profile that might be considered ‘false or misleading.’ They mentioned that social media use is governed by regulations .”Think about how you use Twitter, or Facebook whether these fall within the rule? If so, you may use these channels to solicit clients, motivated by gain and the people you’re chatting with. In the case that communications with prospective clients aren’t realtime, consider if your posts to particular social media platforms should conform to the rules that might include labeling the communication with the words that are not allowed and considered as the violations.” Finally they concluded that with all these rules and regulations may be it is better not to use the social media or if you have to, use it limited. CTR Press
2015 EVENTS:
November 2015:
November 18-19, 2015:
STRUCTURE 2015
Structure conference was about future of cloud, the state of multi-cloud world, public and private cloud, cloud based applications and the future of the data-driven data center. Olson talked about the convergence of tech and science in treating cancer patients. He talked about connection of private clouds in collaborative cancer cloud. He mentioned that he himself suffered from cancer and it was a personal experience for him. Collison talked about bridging the IT innovation gap. He explained how businesses and technologies have evolved around cloud computing and why the hybrid cloud makes so much sense, why containers are complex, and at the same time the least important and how the next innovation in development might be faster than the 10-year path from virtual machines to containers. He said there is a bubble and mentioned that for six years he worked in Google from 2003 to 2009. He explained the process of testing of the productions in Google. “The power is in data, not in technology. Google and Facebook own the data.” The next speaker talked about the future of cloud. He mentioned that Google and Facebook had made their own architecture and had focused on the innovations. “90% of innovation comes from the startups.” He talked about Verizon selling the consumers data and selling off the cloud infrastructure. He talked about new applications by startups and mentioned the growth was there. Then the panel talked about the future of containers, clustering and distributed system. Brewer from Google mentioned that containers enabled more magic. He talked about packaging , distribution, and performance management. He mentioned that Google insisted on open source. Polvi talked about the importance of consistency in building infrastructure. The next speaker from Microsoft, machine learning, talked about future of analytics. He explained how predictive analytics impact businesses and operations. He talked about building the services and machine learning in cloud. ” there are two types of analytics.” He talked about value based monetization. King talked about open sourcing in cloud. He mentioned that WalmartLabs had been developing and using a powerful cloud technology, OneOps that “enables it to accelerate code development and enabling it to switch entire cloud environments to new providers at will.” VP, global engineering from Facebook talked about global cloud strategy. He explained how Facebook keeps tackling new geographies and audacious projects. “Facebook crossing serving 1 billion people.” He talked about OCP and telecom industry. He revealed Facebook’s first full-scale drone, which plans to provide internet access in remote parts of the world. “Our mission is to connect everybody in the world. This is going to be a great opportunity for us to motivate the industry to move faster on this technology.” It is named “Aquila”, the solar-powered drone that is able to fly without landing for three months at a time, using a laser to beam data to a base station on the ground. He talked about Parse, building powerful mobile apps faster. Then the panel talked about trust. They discussed why trust is crucial. Hoffman said it is not about control, but governance. He talked about quality and security. For accomplishing the purpose of cloud it should be easy to use. Trust in platform and Policy driven system were discussed. “When organization changes, the behaviors change too.” They talked about Linux containers that it’s focus is system containers, the containers which offer an environment as close to possible as the one you’d get from a VM but without the overhead that comes with running a separate kernel and simulating all the hardware.” Then Ittycheria talked about future of data driven enterprises. “Open source business model has become too good these days.” He explained how the enterprises increasingly turning to NoSQL, and how MongoDB can keep chipping away at a multi-billion-dollar market. He mentioned that smartphone has more than fifty sensors nowadays, but in the past there was just a couple of sensors. Shmunis talked about the situation of connected business in the cloud. He explained what can be done for a better acceptance of cloud in the businesses. The next panel talked about how Silicon Valley investors regarding the technologies, trends, and betting on in the cloud. They focused on innovation and building skills. They talked about the startups in the cloud infrastructure. They analyzed the impact of cloud. They mentioned they were looking for opportunities for investing and seized them. Herrod said: “Success can be very dangerous if it comes early in startups.” Shuttleworth focused on the phase change of modern software. He discussed how next-gen cloud management tools like Juju Charms, which encapsulate service orchestration best practices; LXD, a hypervisor for containers; and Docker as a key to the “future of defining and deploying infrastructure and applications.” He talked about model-driven approach. The panel on new technologies talked about Amazon and Google and called Amazon as an unbeatable in cloud. They mentioned that in cloud computing, the first is Amazon web services and then there are other companies. “Without data these days you cannot make any proper business decision.” SVP of Product and Engineering, Yahoo mentioned that internet companies using data to predict the companies revenues. The next panel discussed the cloud usage trends and pricing. Flores from Accenture talked about reliability of cloud that was much more important than cost. The Cloud refers to the availability of various services through a network like the internet, as opposed to locally on a computer, so reliability is very important. Tessel from Barcelona talked about container strategy and how to implement containers in the work environment. In the exhibition areas, many companies such as Intel, Cisco, Apcera, Ring Central, PubNub and Formation were present.
November 13-15, 2015:
Green Festival Expo 2015
Green festival was an inspiring event introducing the latest green products and services in the market. It promoted sustainability in life choices and actions and it aimed to a zero waste market place. It’s focus was on organic, non-GMO and local foods for achieving a healthy and sustainable lifestyle. There was a variety of topics discussed by different speakers. How to use renewable energy and solar generation and the major infrastructure projects to undergo climate change impact were discussed. There was much emphasis on buying locally, and the challenges of local agriculture and how to promote sustainable agriculture were explained. There was a special focus on green filmmaking and how to make the film makers attentions to the environmental issues. On the subject of green businesses, there was emphasis on the necessity of growing green startups. “Free- range”, organic and non genetically modified foods and how to involve the local communities in the process were discussed. Challenges and solutions for protecting our lives from synthetic chemicals was another topic of discussion. The issue of hydro fracking, gas storage, pipelines and the role of the federal politics and justice system were discussed by the speaker. On the subject “organic fashion”, the speaker mentioned that manufacturers globally use chemicals on textiles that are hazardous to health, especially health of children whose development and growth being affected by these hazardous materials. On the vegetarian magazine booth, there was a lively discussion among the visitors. They all agreed on avoiding genetically modified foods, but some believed that vegetarian diet is not healthy enough and our brain and body needs meats proteins to function properly. There were some publishing companies exhibiting; companies such as PM press and Haymarket books. Slow money representatives were advocating alternative ways of investment. Many speakers encouraged the attendees to grow their own food in their backyard year-round. They mentioned that by growing food, hundreds of dollars would be saved and also a clean, safe, pesticide-free and highly nutritious self made food would be a health guarantee for the families. There were 30 mentors and business expertise at the event to discuss the attendees ideas for launching a green business and how to make their dream a reality and make the world a better place to live.
November 12-13, 2015:
FUTURESTACK 2015
FutureStack 15 was an interesting event organized by New Relic, a Software Analytics company that makes sense of billions of metrics across millions of apps. It helps companies that build modern software understand the stories of their data. The conference was about the Vision of the future software. In the session about Open cloud platform, Underwood mentioned that Stack creates communication platform that shortens distance. Engates talked about Data in action in the home and the sensors of the drones. He said that Data is everywhere and there are 4.9 billion connected device in the world and it will increase sharply in the near future. He talked about Automation of the process. “100,000 alerts, 90% are resolved automatically.” Lawson mentioned: “If it touches production, it is production.” She talked about the Software maturity and self healing systems. “We have changed our oral culture to written culture.” She explained strong foundation of knowledge and documentation. She said that 20 years ago,1995, was very different and there had been lots of changes; now 4 billion people are online. “22% of downtime incidents are caused by human error.” “following the mantra of “automate everything” all tasks, tools and processes are treated the same way that we do our products, with a well defined lifecycle.” She emphasized on the necessity of finding a solution that is effective. Rochwerger talked about the different tools that engineers use. He explained the story of tools and process that the company has done to improve quality code—both automated and cultural changes. He said:”Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”He explained many testing and communication cases. He emphasized that Testing for code is usable if you run it continuously. Wassenaar showed a video about saving the world. O’Brien mentioned that Kiva’s motto is loans that Chang lives and said that Kivas operates in 82 countries. He mentioned that the administrators monitor the loans to reach to the farmers with no waste. Kiva is a non-profit organization with a mission to connect people through lending to alleviate poverty. Kiva lets individuals lend as little as $25 to help create opportunity around the world. CEO Cirne mentioned that all employees have two days off as service days. Then the next speaker explained the process that they had fixed Healthcare.gov website.He explained what went wrong. He mentioned that the culture of war room was more important. And he explained SOPs and pre-approved changes and problem management on a 12 hour cycle.The changes: the past was using private clouds but in the future will be public and hybrid clouds; limited visibility. “Are public clouds secure? Securing applications of public clouds is the top priority.” Then he explained a case study App2.0. And mentioned that the new service is the US digital service. The highlight of conference was the keynote speaker Steve Wozniak, a co founder of Apple. He was a natural and energetic speaker. The ambiance in the conference hall was exceptional and the audience response was highly positive. He talked about being a Geek, a Technology geek. He mentioned that the things that you do on your own will be the most important thing in life. He said that in high school they did not have computers. He mentioned that he is a self taught person and explained how he designed computer on papers. He talked about his first impression of Steve Jobs and how his (Steve) personality was changed from outgoing character. He said that Steve Jobs movie is about his personal life -and some negative aspect. He mentioned: “People don’t have the voice that I have.” He said that he had never ever used illicit substances and added he had lots of other ways for fun. He said: “I like to be independent. I am in favor of open source thinking.” He talked about his personal experiences and mentioned: “Happiness= smile – frown”, “3Fs: Food, Fun and Friends is happiness.” He said that Schools defeat creativity and emphasized: “Don’t push your values on others.” He mentioned he values Honesty and freedom the most. He explained the school system faults and conformity issues. He said that the most interesting technology is the third party App.” Asking Siri five largest lakes in California and I received the correct answer”. He emphasized on the importance of freethinking and how he is against forces of conformity and against drug use that leaves the youngster not master of their own. Wozniak first met Apple co-founder Steve Jobs in 1971. He was in college and Jobs was at high school. Squeo talked about the subject: From Howard’s Head To Dashboards and mentioned that a simple change in the user experience can have huge impact on the revenue. Karon talked about the customer experience and said that we have to spend development time wisely and Interactions define customer experience.”Measurement gives us the data we need for taking right decisions.” Billy talked about User expectation. “Application performance is crucial part of the online experience.” She mentioned that Online mobile sales has doubled last year and $30 billion spent on marketing. Worral talked abou accelerating innovation.” APM is an assumption.” He said that Profiling your app in dev=time saved.” Develop with the agent installed locally.” He mentioned to use the API to add the additional data into the capture request. Gordon mentioned that One area, third party, is the area that we don’t have control of security. He talked about SaaS security:how New Relic’s security program operates and what they look for when evaluating services for use by our business. He discussed how effective is the security program and mentioned that Checklist only deals with the expected problems, not with unexpected ones. He talked about Compliance, monitoring and transparency.”Is your employees understand that data security is important?” In the panel discussion Butt talked about differences in data set and metrics. Rabinovitch talked about infrastructure data. And Serebryany talked about making tools very easy to use. Build, run and monitoring the service. How to create alerts. They discussed the trends in infrastructure and application monitoring. And Serabryany shared his experiences and views on the critical considerations of cloud monitoring.
November 6, 2015:
“China Doll”
China Doll : David Mamet/ Al Pacino
China Doll was an interesting play written by Pulitzer Prize Winner, David Mamet who wrote the play especially for Al Pacino. It was a two casts play or better to say it could be considered as a one cast play because Al Pacino were always present on the stage and did the most of the talks. Pacino played the role of Mickey Ross, a very rich retired businessman who recently had bought an airplane to travel with his much younger girlfriend. He was a very well connected and powerful person who had a very firm and confident tone of speech in his various phone conversation with top people in corporations and government. Most of the time he was on the phone and the audience came to know the details of his life through his lengthy conversation on the phone such as his plan to fly on his newly purchased airplane to London with his British girlfriend. His conversations on the phone was with the variety of people: his lawyer, a Governor of the state, the plane manufacturer and especially his girlfriend.
Al Pacino had a strong presence on the stage and he reproved his exceptional talent. David Mamet’s play was strong but he did the right thing to write the role exclusively for Pacino to play, because Pacino’s powerful talent of acting and his charisma made the play successful. The lengthy conversations on the phone by a player who was always present and talking could be boring for some audience if it was played by a less strong player. Pacino skillfully used his facial expressions to convey lots of hidden messages of the play. Pacino on the casting decision once said: “For me over the years the relationship and the collaboration with David Mamet has been one of the richest and most rewarding. We’ve done four projects together and the opportunity to create a new character in the David Mamet canon was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up.”
China Doll was commercially very successful. The Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre in New York was packed with the enthusiastic audience who paid up to $400 for watching the play. The reviews by the critics were mixed and some were unhappy about lengthy conversations, but the nature of “China Doll” play had the intensity of Harold Pinter’s plays and the purpose was to be intellectually stimulating and maybe not for the average audience. The presence of Al Pacino made it possible for all to enjoy the play. There were many comments by different audiences after the show and almost all were happy. An Italian couple who were Pacino fans travelled the continent to see the play. Another couple travelled from the West coast and I heard them on the cell phone talking; the wife said: “She is asking did it worth the travel and money?” The husband replied: “Tell her, definitely Yes.”
November 2-4, 2015:
MIT Media Lab Conference, Cambridge, MA
MIT Media Lab conference was an interesting and inspiring event organized by MIT Technology Review. The focus was discovering the future trends and understanding the latest technologies that drive the new global economy; it was an event for discussing tech, business, and culture and how they converge. AI , robotics, data-driven health care, future cities, and the latest technologies were discussed and it celebrated the 2015 Innovators Under 35. The session Robots among us examined the advances in AI, robotics, and automation that lead to more natural interactions between humans and machines. It was explained that the goal is to establish an era of reliable robots assisting workers across numerous industries. The Gene editing technology and what happens if Machine being able to understands us and live among us were explained. Wood from Harvard university mentioned that Robotics has two sides: automation side and mechanical side. He pointed out that everyone will be impacted by robots. He also explained the Bio inspired robots and its manufacturing options, the RoboBee Project and RoboBee flight control. This bio-inspired insect-sized aircraft dubbed RoboBee can push flight-worthy craft into their smallest wings.These robots don’t have their own brains and cellphone-sized microchips are too big for them. They lack their own power source. The tiny bugs had to be tethered with tiny power cords that lasts about 10 to 15 minutes. He showed pictures and demos on Running robots and advanced manufacturing techniques. He explained how to make the robots with twenty legs and highly dynamic locomotion. He talked about the robots that are Programmable by folding: printable robots, Self folding machine and Soft bodied robots. The speaker discussed the robotic surgical devices and their functions, their application in health care, customizable system devices and Biological manufacturing: control insects. Then Lipson from Columbia university talked about Creative machines. He mentioned that AI taking lots of data from stock market and predicting the future. He explained how lots of data converge and Converging AI. He said that AI focus is on analysis rather than synthesis; synthesis is much more difficult than analysis. He talked about Human creativity: how human innovates. “Soft robots is very difficult for engineers to design.” He talked about the robots that are programmed to paint. ” Can robot paint?” “Robots are going to take away the manual jobs as well as highly skilled jobs such as a lawyer job.” He talked about the future of robots and how robot technologies destroy jobs. “What happens if the robots can be creative and do jobs better than people?!” He also explained about the process of restructuring the economy. Another speaker, Soghoian, a chief technologist, privacy researcher and activist talked about Privacy and security and Surveillance technology. He explained the relationship between telephone companies and governments and how they breach the privacy. He talked about the different approaches by two giant companies: Apple and Google on privacy issue. He explained how Apple rejected the request to disclose their customers information to the government. He explained the Encryption of data on iPhone and mentioned that Apple customers data is protected but the Android: operating system by Google do not use encryption. So Google customers data is not protected. He mentioned that those who can afford to buy expensive iPhone can enjoy the privacy of their data, but those cheap android devices are not secure. He mentioned the giant company, Apple has a powerful presence in the market and its stance on privacy has positive impact. He mentioned the easiest way to protect your computer against the hacker is to put a sticker on your webcam. He insisted on the necessity of providing encrypted phones for all, not just for the rich who can afford iPhones. Grenier talked about drones at work, Irobot, recreational drones and commercial drones. She explained about what type of data the drones are collecting and Data collection eco system. She showed the pictures of some Pocket flyers that were very small, pocket size. She mentioned that there would be a great market place for drones. She also talked about Delivery drones. Sacchi, the Federmacchine board member, and Forte from Italian Trade agency talked about advanced manufacturing and mentioned that Italy is among the largest player in machinery after Germany. Sacchi said that China focus is on manufacturing and Russia is a source for oil and gas. “The first product that Italy exports is machinery.” He talked about the Customization of Ferrari and human touch on some part of design and how to adjust the system and the whole process. He mentioned that education for labor force and the solution for the problem of pollution will be the focus of new innovations in five years time. Then Nano architecture was discussed by the next speaker, Greer. She talked about Micro lattices and nano lattices and how to create the ultra light,strong and tolerant materials. She showed pictures and demos of two dimensional nano and 3D architecture. She mentioned that Metallic glass can be extended in nanoscale. Then the innovators under 35 had presentations. On the subject of 3D printing Tibbits from MIT talked about 3D printing, food printing, bio printing , printed pharmaceuticals and printed electronics. He emphasized on the Mass customized products: “Those things that can’t be printed is because of the scale, they are too big to be printed.” He mentioned that software tools needs to catch up with advances in the hardware. “Real world products with the real world materials.” Also he talked about the idea of 4D printing: printing materials that works like robots. Next speakers: Rosenberg and Rosenkrantz talked about the Digital fabrication, expanding 2D structure to 3D. They mentioned that changing the objects would be more meaningful if we customize them, for example making wedding rings that the couple have designed for each other. They introduced a project in kinematics and kinematic clothes and showed some videos. In the panel discussion DuBravac mentioned that in 1981 computing power was very limited, but that scarcity has turned into surplus in 2015. “Shift from technologically possible to technologically meaningful.” “Today 2 dimensional education has shifted to 3 dimensional.” The presenter showed a demo of a dress made by robotic fabrication that the cost is $5000 and the weight is 5 pounds. Then there were different tours of Media Lab including CSAIL that the focus was on AI and the project about the robots that can make decisions. Later there was a discussion among some attendees about ethical issues raised by rapidly advancing robotics technology and the presence of robots in the workplace.
October 2015:
October 25-29, 2015:
Oracle OpenWorld Conference 2015 & JavaOne 2015
Oracle OpenWorld conference was about integrated cloud applications and platform services: four days of technology sessions, labs, industry keynote speech, demos, showcases, exhibition and networking. It was the annual Oracle convention for business decision-makers, IT management, and line-of-business end. Executive Chairman, Ellison talked about the competition in the cloud market and the state of information security. He mentioned that the transition to the cloud has been underway for over 15 years, and the first cloud companies such as Salesforce were SaaS (software as a service) companies before the word “cloud” had even been invented. He said that automation has accomplished two things: it dramatically lowered the cost in the technology and implementing these fault-tolerant systems and second, it eliminated the human error. He added that we need much better security: “We need a next generation of security, because we are not winning a lot of these cyber battles. We’re losing a lot of these cyber battles. We haven’t lost the war, but we’re losing a lot of battles. And it is a technology confrontation between sometimes nation against nation, company against company, hacker agains ethical technologist.” He mentioned that Oracle has more cloud application, platform, and infrastructure services than any other cloud provider, it has the only truly integrated cloud stack. He announced a broad set of new products and highlighted why integrated cloud delivers the most innovative and cost-effective benefits to customers. His emphasis was on the security that he pointed out is our biggest concern. This cloud technology is a big thing. He explained how to change the application. He mentioned the transition from EC2 when the majority of computing is done in cloud and after the fusion project was launched. “Everything is different in 2015 especially providing infrastructure.” He said that we do not see the worlds largest companies in the cloud. Most cloud players are small and there is a new competitive technology. He emphasized on pushing security low in the stack; the security features should always be on; encryption must be always on; we cannot compromise the security. What happens when the credit cards, 20 million credit cards information is lost; in Russia you can buy active credit cards. He also mentioned that there is a plan to get rid of the signatures. He said:” in Oracle nobody can read customers data in the cloud; your SaaS service provider should be asked who can see your data.”
All your data should be encrypted.There was a variety of sessions discussing different topics such as: software in silicon services, security for On-premise and private Cloud deployments, Solaris server running SAP with the new compliance tool and the discussion about NAND based devices that have reached a cost per GB that, coupled with new larger capacity points, allows for infrastructure consolidation. The speaker explained about HDD solution and SSD solution and TCA example. Another speaker mentioned that application performance equals business performance. He pointed out that applications are complex and we must act in environments that span the cloud, middleware, third-party services and diverse networks. In JavaOne session, the speaker talked about the operational in memory computing platform that would help the companies manage their data and distribute processing by using in memory storage and parallel execution for application speed and scale.In the exhibition area, the marker zone there was a humanoid robot that attracted the attention of the visitors, and there were some discussions about robots. Some visitors did not hide their dislike of robots. In HCM central, the speaker mentioned here we don’t like the robots, we fear them and they seem scary to us, they threaten our jobs in the future. All the jobs are affected by automations. He mentioned the case Japan, a very closed society that is very open to robots! Another speaker talked about the digital transformation and mentioned that in the 90s we lacked the technology for automation, but now in 2015 we have the technology. Then he discussed the future of work and different workers: mobile worker, at home worker and how different work force interact globally considering different time zones. He mentioned that we have lots of data and lots of people but what we need is the skill to gather them together at the right time.
October 22-25, 2015:
The San Francisco Fall Antiques Show 2015
This year Antiques Show was focused on the lasting quality of beautiful pieces, the time that goes into creating a work of art and the timespan the works of art and antiques in the show encompass. It demonstrated the evolution, design and beauty of timepieces from across time. And all the proceeds from the show benefited Enterprise for Students that helps high school students to develop skills for their future job and career exploration. Also there was different lectures on antiques, jewelry, interior design, historical castles in France, architecture and refined design and craftsmanship from 18th century to the present. The lecture Time Travel through the castles of France was about a journey from Leondardo da Vinci to Marquis de la Fayette and through cultural heritage of French Royalty. Another lecture was about designing with antiques in the contemporary world. The speaker emphasized on the use of antiques that brings the personality of the owner to the attention. He was involved in a four year design project in Mexico and explained the differences in style. He mentioned that historical knowledge and lots of traveling experience by the designers make a huge difference on the interior design process. Ike on the lecture on Shingle style house mentioned that he had coined the word Shinglish because this type of the house has roots in the colonial architecture in 1880s and the style is from English cottage style. But his colleague Kligerman disagreed with him and mentioned that it uniquely American style. Then the speakers talked about the difference of American and European style. They discussed different classic, gothic and minimal style and showing different slides for each style. Different exhibitors in the exhibition area presenting different antiques and the most notable ones were the beautiful antique rugs hanging on the walls. There was a Persian Kashan rug from 1880s with a unique design and beautiful natural colors that attracted the attention of the most visitors. Nearby building, there was a painting and photo exhibition, San Francisco Open Studios. There were interesting works by Keenan. She mentioned that she uses art to honor the bond between the divine in humanity and the diversity in nature, and share her net proceeds with organizations working for peace, parity and eco-sustainability. The Photos by Boyko were according to the artist, the nonverbal means to explore the unconscious and the conscious in our lives. His focus was on their communication through non verbal means that is life changing.
October 21-22, 2015:
Collaborative Economy Conference 2015
Collaborative Economy conference was about discovering the economic advantages, new markets and opportunities that have been born out of the collaborative economy and why they matter to the future of business and understanding of the collaborative economy and how the private sector has adapted it in such a way that it has empowered the local communities. Gray talked about the new era of economic abundance and mentioned that she is introducing the term Copianomics: the economics of abundance. She mentioned that Airbnb is masterminding the ultimate game of monopoly. She compared revenues of Airbnb and hotels, she mentioned that for each hotel there are 1000 listing in Airbnb.Then she explained sharing economy versus on demand economy. She mentioned that sharing economy and corporate assets shares are under utilized. She asked the audience : are you ready for the new era of economic abundance? She said that abundance economy can pose a threat to your company, if it isn’t managed properly. The next speaker talked about building collaborative infrastructure: assessing ongoing legal concerns of the sharing economy. He mentioned that it is important to fit new ideas into old rules. ” Innovators want freedom to innovate at lower costs. And regulators want consumer protection.” Then he explained the areas of law implicated by the sharing economy. He mentioned the legal aspect of the employment and two touchstones to classify workers. He asked how bossy is your boss? It affects the duration of relationship between worker and hiring party. He explained the reputation system and worker classification. He talked about O’Connor V. Uber trial starting 2013 to present. Davis talked about privacy and data security law. He mentioned in the US we have a general FTC Act. He explained who enforces privacy rules and how FCC is involved and How does the FTC regulate privacy. He talked about the Privacy policies of Prozac website and revealing personal information of the users and violating another company’s privacy policies. “Retroactively changing your privacy policy.” He also talked about secretly tracking or monitoring users without their consents. Then Jeff Dema by introducing Machinery Link Sharing talked about sharing solution in a transformative agricultural economy. He explained how technology can accelerate the pace of innovation in agriculture. To feed a growing population, modern agriculture must continue to transform. He mentioned that farmers are struggling to make a profit. He explained the seasonality of farming and the equipment the farmers in different regions need. He said that there is $244 billion in idle or not frequently used machinery. He explained that machinery link sharing can be a solution. He showed a video about sharing machinery by farmers. It was interesting and smart way for the farmers to increase productivity and decrease the costs. He mentioned that time is right for these types of innovations and sharing models. He said that everyone benefits from this model. He also mentioned that 65% of farmers are over 55 years old. ” Technology and business models can make farming more attractive for the younger generations.” He emphasized on the importance of the connected farms. A member of the audience asked the speaker how do they solve the location problem? He answered that they have the experience of redefining the neighborhood and it is their job to facilitate the process.
October 21, 2015:
Graph Connect 2015
Graph Connect was an event for all the graph database enthusiasts, the developers to CIOs to explore new ideas, share innovations in graph technology, and make connections with researchers and developers. Needham talked about Stack Exchange API, how to import data quickly and easily, the Initial model in Converting JSON, Converting questions to CSV and Introducing Cypher: how to create new patterns in the graph. Then another speaker, Hunger talked about Loading CSV with headers and how to use neo4j shell to load script and then he showed the demo. Williamson, data scientist at Monsanto talked about how they leveraged a polyglot environment, with a graph database implemented in Neo4j at the core, to enable the required shift in agricultural product development. He said that six years ago he joined Monsanto and left his work at the university. He talked about NASA project about California drought. Then he talked about food and improved genetic corn.”How to isolate DNA of particular crop?” He talked about how genetic gain is created through breeding cycles. He explained the data lab and data field and explained how the transformation of the genetic ancestry dataset into a graph has replaced months of computational effort. He was wearing a T shirt with graph roots design on it. He mentioned every breeding cycle extends a tree of genetic ancestry. ” In Monsanto we give a starting population and return all ancestors.” He mentioned that genetic ancestry is a naturally occurring graph. “The job is finding the roots. We want to analyze the ancestry of all the plants. The aim is to build a grammar for ancestral milestones. Real time reads requires real time data.” Boland, the online Editor of International Consortium of Investigative Journalists talked about the Secrecy for Sale: Unraveling the Shady World of Offshore Finance. He explained how ICIJ used Neo4j to restructure and re-visualize the complex data sets to reveal the vast networks that allow some of the world’s most powerful people and companies to hide their money. Neo4j is an open source graph database implemented in Java.The developers describe Neo4j as “embedded, disk-based, fully transactional Java persistence engine that stores data structured in graph rather than in tables”. He talked about the project, Secrecy for Sale and how their website is blocked in China. He talked about the Big data leak of HSBC in Swiss.” Managers do not know the name of the clients and use the codes. ” He talked about the Collaborative method of publishing and Exploring full potential of graph. He mentioned the story of 36-year-old Falciani, a systems specialist they suspected of stealing data from HSBC Private Bank. Falciani’s HSBC data trove ended up first in the hands of authorities in France, which then indicted London-based HSBC for illegal direct marketing to French nationals, money laundering and facilitating tax fraud. He mentioned that Secret documents reveal that HSBC profited from doing business with arms dealers who channeled mortar bombs to child soldiers in Africa, bag men for Third World dictators, traffickers in blood diamonds.”They provide a rare glimpse inside the super-secret Swiss banking system — one the public has never seen before. ” The next speaker Feingold talked about gaining insight with graph visualization. He explained different graph layouts with clean labeling that each can be customized such as circular, hierarchical and symmetric. In Lightning Talk session, Willemsen talked about mining Github activity in Neo4j. The next speaker Mazerolle talked about tracking the world’s food from source to table. He talked about full visibility of the recipes and how recipes are changing on daily basis.
October 14, 2015:
Rich Data Summit 2015
The Rich Data Summit was an interesting conference that featured some engaging presentations, panel discussions, and workshops, as well as a lively data solutions expo and its focus was on turning big data into rich, meaningful data. Silver talked about how rich data is taking the place of big data. He talked about the analysis of data for business, politics and science. He emphasized on change of methodology and more qualitative approach. He mentioned that prediction for foreign policy is not easy, but for education data we have done successful prediction. The next speaker Weigend who was chief data scientist in Amazon and is an expert on the future of big data, social-mobile technologies, and consumer behavior was wearing the google glass and started his speech by showing a document from the official state security service of the former East Germany, Stasi. He mentioned that the year 1985 was about connecting computers; 1995, connecting pages; 2005, connecting people and 2015 is about refining data. He said that when the United Nations General Assembly was briefed on the progress of Global Pulse, an innovation initiative of the Secretary-General, he had an introductory speech and mentioned that the data is the new oil. He emphasized that the Data has become a product. “Social media change what we feel about others and ourselves. Data has become something that we breathe like the air.” Later he added that soon there will be the time we don’t need people anymore, we have Google! Then he mentioned that from business perspective the value of the data based on the impact on people. He discussed the question of identity and said you are what you are with. He concluded his speech with four points: 1. Start with a question not with the data. 2.Focus on decisions and actions. 3.Base your function on metrics that matter to your customers. 4. Let people do what they are good at and computer does what it is good at. Stokvis talked about the result of the study on the mental effect of doing physical job on experimental groups. He mentioned when you change the perspective of people you have changed their body too. He mentioned that simply by thinking differently about the problem you have already tried to solve it. Another speaker, Lightner talked about the ways to leverage the crowd to create efficiencies and optimize the process of extracting insights from online conversation, social buzz and media coverage. He discussed some case studies and concluded how media reports have the biggest impact. Stancil talked about how to tell a compelling story with data. He mentioned that understanding your audience is essential and he talked about the context from which the data originates. He also emphasized that data analysts and data scientists embedded in organizations should learn from journalism about telling better stories with data and he explained how. He mentioned that data scientists spend 80% of time to gather data and the left 20% spend on analyzing it. Also he talked about the job of data journalists that skillfully do the both preparing and analyzing the data. He mentioned that they have the right type of narrative and walk you through the process. They highlight what is important and they have the specific methodology. Paterson talked about the possibilities that exist to monetize data and how to get started. He explained the second type of monetization of data. “30% of businesses will monetize their information assets by 2016.” He mentioned that Verizon use their customer data in marketing insight processes. He emphasized on target marketing campaigns that are based on data and information. Braga talked about the privacy issues in crowdsourcing process. She mentioned that the users are often not aware that their data may be analyzed. She talked about law and regulations on data privacy and compared the US and Europe. She mentioned that when people buy a new iPhone or mobile device they agree on the terms and conditions on collecting their data but they are not really aware of the content. Stanford talked about how Stanford university uses data enrichment to track its reputation, perform sentiment analysis, and test messaging on social networking. He mentioned that they analyze all the posts about Stanford on Twitter. “We look at the specific adjectives to find out about the negativity and the positivity of the posts.”
September 2015:
September 28-30, 2015:
GMIC Silicon Valley 2015
GMIC Silicon Valley brought the global mobile ecosystem to Silicon Valley for three days of interesting presentations on the industry’s most discussed topics. GMIC Silicon Valley is considered one of the Silicon Valley’s largest mobile conferences, drawing thousands of mobile leaders from over 60 countries. Mobile executives, entrepreneurs, developers, and investors from around the globe and across platforms attend GMIC each year. On the Marketing and Growth Track there were various discussions around mobile user/customer acquisition, ad spend optimization, user retention, maximizing revenue, data tracking and a variety of other topics. The panel who discussed monitization in 2016 explained advertising and different forms of revenue generation. Levanon talked about how to keep the users, lots of them leave after 30 days. She emphasized on not just tracking by click or impression but analyzing the actions and behavior of the users; and it is not enough just to have great idea. Manning mentioned that Engagement factor is very important; know who the people are who buy from you and why they are buying. He emphasized on the Market personalization, one to one. The Disrupting Diversity in Tech Summit discussed and brought to light the disparity gaps amongst groups from both a qualitative and quantitative perspectives; the panel on Silicon Valley Women in Technology talked about how to include more women in Tech. Whitney mentioned that the culture that they think they are not welcome should be changed. “Feeling isolation is the reason for women leaving the work.” She discussed the Data index of companies performance and mentioned that eBay is diversified. Data about women in executive, senior, middle and entry level should be fully analyzed. A software engineer in the panel explained how her mother in India opposed her to study engineering because she thought no Indian man would marry her because it takes a long time to graduate. Myrow, the female reporter from Silicon Valley mentioned that What you measure you can change, what about the things that is not measured. Marketing is female dominated and at the same time in the workplace the women who are too bossy are rejected and are not included in the projects.The Thought Leader sessions included discussions by visionaries and executives representing the world’s leading companies that are redefining the future of mobile and internet. Ng from Baidu asked the audience “Can US companies compete Chinese?” He said that the US and China companies and markets are very different and if you don’t know the local context ecosystem and user behavior that is so different in China, you can’t succeed. He mentioned that all the apps in China use text messages but it is rare in the USA. He said that cheap labor and type of market in China have made ordering food in China takes 20 seconds! He supported O2O services in China and India. But according to consultancy firm McKinsey, the Chinese search engine Baidu’s deepening investment in so-called online to offline commerce or O2O, left a chill on its stock price and it has been unsuccessful. One imporant question about these companies is whether they can keep the high-margin online profits to themselves while shuffling off the more prosaic “offline” aspects of the job to others. In the US, this is under threat due to legal questions about whether the independent contractors that on-demand companies use to keep their costs low should be reclassified as employees. Another speaker who was advocating India was questioned by a member of the audience about fake medicines and products from India that is more than one in five products. The speaker from Samsung talked about the way AR and VR could hit $150 billion by 2020. He mentioned that comparing Augmented reality and virtual reality, AR is more flexible because you can see.
VR is entertainment focused, but AR has more functions. He explained the
Mobility, vision, immersion, in AR and VR. Hulet from Ancestry mentioned that Ancestry has two million subscribers; he talked about Building systems and building 70 million family trees, Hypothesis Testing. He mentioned the rule is: Think it, test it, build it. Period. Then he explained the human genome and mentioned: “Your genes are your family history.” He talked about Genetic Testing and Clustering the data by testing genomes. He said all these are highly valuable to pharmaceutical companies.
September 24, 2015:
Recent market trends in the Development of Healthcare Facilities event
The interactive discussion regarding recent market trends in the development of healthcare facilities was organized by Hanson Bridgett, a US-based, full service law firm with more than 150 attorneys in offices throughout in Northern California. The panel of experts discussed their experiences and lessons learned based upon actual projects. Topics included how concepts and techniques as well as sustainability influence construction processes, the effect of legislative changes on healthcare facility design and construction and migration from inpatient centric model of care to distributed network. The panel started the discussion with talking about their career path. Cardella mentioned that she has been working in the healthcare market in Northern California for more than 20 years. She pointed out that she is responsible for healthcare business development in San Francisco. She talked about the problems in the hospital buildings and she discussed what should be done about the old building of the old hospitals. She mentioned that Kaiser recently bought empty offices and repurposed them into medical offices. Then she talked about telemedicine and connecting patients to the specialists. She talked about Google medical center and healthcare facilities complex and its patients that suffer from depression, anxiety and sleep disorder. Another speaker, Kraiss, regional director of CBRE, mentioned his experience in stock exchange and how he is responsible for protecting Healthcare real estate and facilities solutions. He discussed the way the healthcare providers react when the
expenses are rising. He mentioned for each $9, one dollar is spent in facilities. Also he discussed the following topics: Different types of partnerships, Integrative healthcare environment and Third party capital in healthcare and he mentioned that we should make standardized patient cares and be more efficient. Vegas talked about Consulting the project frog. She mentioned that she is director of facilities development at El Camino hospital, but she had a very bad experience in the hospital when her four year old son had an accident and she said: “if I did not work there I would give it a one star in Yelp!” She also mentioned that one of the building design is not suitable for the community hospital. Also she discussed the increasing Demand for spending more and charging less and the different problems in hospital building. “There are so many hospitals in competition in the Bay Area so the prices for the customers should go down, but we don’t see it.” Then she talked about the Prefabricated hospitals in California. Wagner talked about Upgrading the facilities and mentioned that sometimes building new hospitals is more economical than upgrading that is very expensive. She emphasized on the necessity of changin the culture of designing and building. One member of audience compared the US healthcare costs to the Eurpean countries healthcare costs especially in Sweden and concluded that the US costs is double, the panel mentioned that there’s a better service, but she disagreed. The moderator talked about Hanson Bridgett’s construction practice focusing on complex infrastructure projects.
September 9-10, 2015:
Converged IT summit 2015
The Converged IT Summit that was organized by Cambridge Healthtech Institue covered a broad range of topics that framed the issues behind creating computational solutions for modern research methodologies. There were a variety of topics such as technologies currently in use, how organizations are using them to accelerate discovery, efforts that have worked and those that have failed, organizational challenges and policies for research computing, and the art of converged infrastructure as a research tool. Data scientist from Intel talked about how computing on new large data sets will be done. He mentioned that some major initiatives are underway that will expand the datasets to cohorts of millions of patients. He also explained about how health care works, using electronic data,Improving health care, Internet of things and how data captured. He asked the question: What does a patient look like to a data scientist? And explained analyzing data that comes from multiple sources. The audience were mainly biologists, data scientists and IT professionals. “Data accuracy is a challenge: more than 63% of the key data that a physician should know about the patient is missing. Where is the missing data?” He explained that solution can be building an open source analytics platform. It costs a lot to generate the data. Dart talked about bringing science and IT together. He mentioned that the science DMZ model describes a performance oriented approach to network architecture, network design and performance engineering. “The Science DMZ is designed to handle high volume data transfers, typical with scientific and high performance computing by creating a special DMZ to accommodate those transfers.” He explained TCP performance. “A small amount of packet loss makes a huge difference in TCP performance.” Then he explained working with TCP in practice. He showed science DMZ design pattern in picture and mentioned a picture worths thousands of words. Then he explained HCP center data path. Director of TACC talked about opportunities and perils of science as a service. He mentioned that TACC is an internationally known research center specializing in advanced computing technology. He said that Data and software sharing is still too hard. He also talked about storing, organizing and sharing primary data and Adopting efficient analytics “The resources can be the laptops, mobiles, local computers with storage.” Jamison talked about integrating 100G capable firewalls into science DMZs. He explained the current project for NASA, USDA and Stanford university. Then he explained science DMZ security controls. Science DMZs are spreading far beyond their original target audience. The Science DMZ is designed to handle high volume data transfers, typical with scientific and high performance computing by creating a special DMZ to accommodate those transfers. Then Dwan talked about collaboration and mentioned that future belongs to institutions that can collaborate seamlessly as member of fast moving community. He said that the institute transforms medicine by using systematic approach. He was very optimistic about curing cancer in the near future, but some of the audience didn’t share this optimism. Also he emphasized that moving the data is the machine job. Then he explained the cloud backed file storage and emphasized on agility, scalability and consistency.
August 2015:
August 19-21, 2015:
Open Collaboration Symposium 2015
OpenSym 2015 was the premiere research and practitioner conference on open collaboration. Open collaboration is collaboration that is egalitarian, meritocratic and self organizing. The main places to find open collaboration are wikis, Wikipedia and other Wikimedia Foundation projects, open source projects, open data and open government initiatives, and the open educational resources. Gabriel talked about using machine to manage public sentiment on social media. He explained the Artificial sentiment. And he mentioned that people are using more social media and still are more isolated than before. He talked about advertising that uses machines to understand people and offer them product to buy as the target advertising. He explained Personality analysis based on two hypothesis, Linguistic analysis,Values, needs and Sentiment analysis. He talked about Big five personality sentiment analysis. “In some cases behavior can be predicted.” He talked about the analysis of words by machine in order to describe the personality. “Emotions are not the same with personality.” Then he explained the VAD emotion model, How words display various emotions, Emotional analysis & VAD scores, and Tone analysis that includes social and writing tones. He asked this question: “Can a program manipulate language like a poet?” Then he explained the Research goal and assist creativity, Word net and Algorithmic rhyming.
Then he read some poems and analyzed them. Then he compared the Twitter written by people and the Twitter written by machine. He demonstrated the Control of language by machine. Then Krabina talked about the Vienna history Wiki that is a collaborative knowledge platform for the city of Vienna. He explained the results of the Users survey: 50% were the first time visitors. Majority of the visitors were old and male. “Everything done through configuration. Audience was asked about controversy and users editing ability and possible education. Main Editors should approve the editing process by the public.” He also talked about the License issues with the publishing house. The next speaker talked about Wikidata and mentioned that Wikidata is a free linked database that can be read and edited by both humans and machines. Aitamurto talked about participants motivation factors and profile in crowd sourced law reform.
August 11-13, 2015:
Casual Connect Conference 2015
Casual Connect Conference gathered some of the brightest in the video games industry for 3 days of in-depth, cutting-edge lectures . It provided the critical skills, innovative game design, comprehensive marketing and emerging technology. There were more than 300 speakers representing the leaders in the next-generation of games. Manchado talked about game monetization with google analytics. He explained how AdMob bringing innovation of its solutions to help game developers figure out the right monetization strategy. He mentioned that there are more than 200billion apps requested each year and more than $620 billion paid by advertisers in order their apps to be shown by 2017. He pointed out that app advertising is bigger than app purchase in U.S. and UK. He mentioned that always target the users who purchase. “How can you monetize better?” Better apps are those that put the users first. He explained the Smart monetization & Different types of users. He said that Google have developed solutions and Knowing the users. He mentioned that only 21% of developers use analytics and it must increase. He explained: “How to treat different users differently? Custom audience targeting.” He emphasized on distinguishing between casual users and highly engaged users. “AdMob can determine which users can become regular purchasers.” He emphasized that the profit is the goal. He explained Maximizing ad yield across networks and Certified mediation adapters for 40 networks. There was a panel that discussed the future of VR and virtual reality possibilities. Callewaert who was very excited about VR mentioned that he started VR in 90s and he noticed that there are differences in experiencing VR between kids and adults.”Kids look around, but grown up looks ahead in the VR experience”. He talked about experiencing AR and VR and how different they are. He mentioned that Augmented reality is the blending of virtual reality and real life, as developers can create images within applications that blend in with contents in the real world. With AR, users are able to interact with virtual contents in the real world, and are able to distinguish between the two. But Virtual reality is all about the creation of a virtual world that users can interact with. This virtual world should be designed in such a way that users would find it difficult to tell the difference from what is real and what is not. One attendee mentioned it is scary that virtual reality ruins someone’s connection with the real world and real people. Falstein from Google mentioned his first VR project was in 1984 when he started his first VR demonstration. He mentioned: “We are constantly working on renovation. Many VR does not have realistic features.” He talked about their Neuroscience experiment in the university and how they were seeking FDA approval. He also talked about the Degrees of control. Another speaker talked about four different ways of devising truly novel games and how these methods can improve game design. In the exhibition area there was a variety of exhibitors and companies such as Google; Tapjoy, Appboy that offers five optimization features, Growmobile that provides simplified solutions for companies mobile advertising, YellowHead, Adjust that it’s head of communication, Kendall talked about the data tracking battle; from PHL Collective, a game studio in Philadelphia, Bren King explained that the company is less than two years old and created ClusterPuck 99, Noodle Arm and more; Appsflyer and Valuepotion representatives also were explaining their products to the visitors. In the exhibition area some overenthusiastic visitors were playing the games and one of them mentioned that he is addicted to it! The panel who talked about $18 billion industry mentioned that you have to consider which parts of your game are going to make money, whether you’re nudging consumers in the right direction, whether you’re balancing the money-grabbing with enough fun to keep the player onboard and that’s before your game is even on sale. Then in VR/AR gaming speed pitch session each of five developers from emerging game companies such as Jahan and otherworld showed demos and got the investors panel feedback.
August 4-7, 2015:
Inman Connect Conference 2015
Inman Connect conference was a real estate technology event for everyone who cares about the real estate industry and where it is going. Thousands of real estate leaders gathered at Real Estate Connect to network, make deals, explore current trends and technology, and to learn how to embrace and leverage the change that surrounds the industry. Real estate industry professionals from around the world gathered together for accurate, innovative and timely information about the business. It was a forward-thinking event by Inman that is considered as the industry’s leading source of real estate information.There were 77 sessions and 198 speakers. COO from Zillow group, a $4.5 billion company mentioned that her focus is on the consumers and 90% of the time she spends at work is focused on the consumers issues. She said that consumer database helps us to increase the revenue and there is an eight percent margin error in the data that they use to connect customers and agents. One attendee who was working in the real estate business in a small company expressed her unhappiness about the behavior of the giant companies.Then Altschul with 28 years of experience in the Player Development and Casino Marketing management mentioned: “Having the ability to maintain and develop relationships and new markets of business in an extremely competitive market place is the key to success.” He talked about his experience in Las Vegas and London and mentioned that some people win and some people loose. He said that gambling is regarded differently in the different cultures and he mentioned that gambling is part of Chinese culture and they cherish it. A professor of Psychology in Duke university talked about honesty and decision making. He said: “Despite our best intentions, why do we so often fail to act in our own best interest?What are the forces that influence our behavior?” He talked about his own personal experience while he was hospitalized for 70% burn and how he started to study after he left the hospital. He engaged the audience by asking them several questions. He talked about the Psychology of money and mentioned that we don’t think just about the outcome but efforts. He asked the audience how they feel if they are asked to pay by bite in the restaurant! He mentioned his experiment involving his students to pay for the pizza by bite, 25 pence per bite and how they made the biggest portion they could. His final remark was : “If you think your customers less intelligent you will be better to serve them!” Then the panel talked about the secrets of the working with the luxurious real estate and clients. And each mentioned that how they anticipate the future of the real estate market. Grey talked about Life expectancy, Genetics, diets, better medicines and the relationship between quality and quantity of life. He mentioned that he is an advocate of Regenerative medicine against aging that includes the possibility of growing tissues and organs in the laboratory and implanting them when the body cannot heal itself. Inman who was interviewing him asked the audience: “who wants to live forever?” Just five people raised their hands. Lawson from Google Marketing mentioned that we usually check our phone 150 times per day and it can be used for a better purpose too. He talked about the Micro moments: the new battleground for marketers and explained how Google talks about the data. The next speaker mentioned that according to the National Association of Realtors, sales of U.S. residential real estate to overseas buyers between April 2014 and March 2015 reached a record $104 billion, or about 8 percent of total existing home sales. Chinese were far and away the top foreign buyers of real estate last year, one third of the International buyers were from China and they mainly favored homes in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle and New York.
July 2015:
July 30-31, 2015:
Datacenter Dynamics Internet Conference 2015
DCD Internet Conference was a premier event for Tech Companies to collaborate on emerging trends and showcase the technology. The professionals from IT, Networks, Facilities, Finance, Line of Business Executive, Corporate Policy and Governance gathered together with data center executives, managers and technical professionals who plan, design, build, provision and operate data center and cloud infrastructures. Driven by all-things 3rd Platform and Web 3.0 – IoT, cloud, mobile, and big data/analytics – DCD Internet focuse was on the movement toward the full-stack – physical and logical. Industry experts uncovered the impact of the next-generation IT foundation technologies and the role of the application optimized software defined infrastructure of SDDC, SDN, cloud, open-source, and hyperconvergence. Villa talked about the industrialization of the data center and setting new standards. He explained the New cooling technology and mentioned that the results is not typical it is variable. As the Solution he mentioned that all the components should work together and the environment is not static, it is dynamic. He pointed out that the needs of company A may be vary from company B and Decision should be based on real time data. “Intelligent decisions should be made by the right people.” He mentioned that in Germany they insisted on the use of the word guaranteed but we say word improved for the power usage. Ryan from Google talked about scaling. He explained the history and the first cluster from 1998. He mentioned that Machines still belong to groups and Today’s number is over 3 billions searches a day. “Fundamental changes needed to handle this growth in Data center levels Storage.” About Networking inside data center he mentioned that we control everything in the networks. “We launch over 2 billion containers per week.” He explained the ways that Google can help businesses in the open source and also he mentioned that they have access to the stuffs that Google doesn’t want them to touch. Limbuwala talked about data center management evolution. He explained age of instrumentation and Explosions of data and mentioned that Data center has become dynamic. “Meters should be calibrated and What does data alone reveal? Predictive modeling can be wrong or sth is wrong in the data center.” He mentioned that 40% of all metered data is junk. Sensors need to be calibrated and don’t stay that way. T J Kniveton talked about exploring the true virtual data center. He explained the most trusted cloud for the businesses, Focus on trust, best security and B2B activity on cloud. Rallo talked about massive waste in the data center. He mentioned that a data center that is not used properly is like an Airplane sitting on the ground and not flying. He emphasized on the necessity of High level awareness and mentioned that Data centers shouldn’t be the most expensive sections. Taylor also mentioned that paying attention to the management issues and considering the possibility of some solutions can avoid considerable loss in the technical structure. He emphasized on the importance of improving relations between the Facility group and IT group.
July 27-29, 2015:
Employee Engagement Conference 2015
Employee engagement conference was organized by Human Capital Institude. HCI aggregates open-source human capital best practices from prominent companies, thought leaders, and academic research. Their network includes expert practitioners, Fortune 1000 and Global 2000 corporations, government agencies, global consultants, and business schools — all sharing their new ways to manage talent. Efron talked about how to think big and act fast. He introduced all the latest cars productions such as Tesla Powerwall and Model x. He mentioned that the competition is fierce and talked about Spacecraft center. He said that in the sustainable transportation: What =mission, Where= vision and Why =purpose. “Purpose+ talent +hard Working= result, but Purpose +talent +engagement =accelerated results.” He emphasized on the measured engagement and exceptional leaders and engaged customers. “The goal is to change the world. Employee engagement = customer engagement.” He mentioned when there is customer engagement as the result of employees engagement people will spend more. Bednarski mentioned that Engaged team of employees results in more profit and more productivity. “Attract and keep the best talent.” She mentioned 3 modes of engagement: Drive is engaged,Neutral is not engaged and Reverse is actively disengaged. She talked about action planning process: Step 1 survey and Step 2 after the survey: how to use data. She explained How to understand and read your scorecards. She emphasized on the necessity of achieving very positive responses, action planning session focus for a data driven company. She described Data driven engagement and Strength and weakness in the analysts. Allen talked about the managers responsibility and accountability for employees engagement. He himself actively engaged the audience during his speech by asking several interesting questions from the attendees. He mentioned that managers are responsible to keep talented people engaged in the company. “Boredom is the enemy number one.” Managers have the responsibility to manage people and engage them. He mentioned: “Hiring managers that cannot manage is the worst thing to do and the most valuable asset of the companies are people.” He explained how the disengaged people leave the company. He asked the audience Why we hire someone that is not competent to manage people. How do you measure engagement? He also talked about the engagement surveys and said:”The means of the engagement should not be the end.” He asked the audience to raise their hands if they knew an incompetent manager in their companies. Almost all the hands were up. He explained how the managers are accountable for the engagement and what are the appropriate metrics and how HR are responsible to help the managers to be more successful in engaging the employees.
July 24-26, 2015:
World Future 2015
With the theme of Making the Future! Futurists and those who were curious about the future gathered together in the conference. Futurists don’t just report on the future; they try to create it by shaping how individuals, communities, firms and nations see the world and its potential. This year they tried to link the dynamism of foresight to the energy of makers and other entrepreneurs creating the future today. The event was organized by World Future Society. It has 5800 members worldwide,77% of the members are male and 23% female. There were variety of pre conference master classes on the subject of future and how to make it happen. In one of the master classes, the speaker emphasized on seeing the future in the non threatening way. He explained the process of the Brainstorming, Empathetic interviewing and Persona construction. He asked the attendees to create a persona and build a scenario that is consistent and a challenge, then connect with potential client and create a persona and his needs: it could be a cartoon or just the descriptions. The weekend speeches were on the variety of issues such as the global issues, tech and innovation, business of foresight and books. The panel from around the world talked about different issues such as crimes, energy, tech, science and economy. They talked about the unemployment in Mexico and Venezuela; how to be prepared for the new technology in the future. Some attendees expressed their concerns about the artificial intelligence advancements and how robots replace humans. One speaker from Silicon Valley said: “Coding is new literacy”. He talked about involving in the technology projects. The speaker from Spain talked about the unemployment rate and guarantee income system and he mentioned that the gap between rich and poor in some parts of Spain is like Norway. Speaker from Turkey talked about the gender equality in commerce, empowering women project and she complained that it was stopped by the government. She insisted on creating the future lesson beside history lesson in the schools! The speaker from Israel mentioned that they use the phrase “the free time” instead of unemployment. Some members of the audience mentioned the dangers of future joblessness as the result of artificial intelligence. One attendee mentioned for a great life we need happiness, hope and peace and we do not need the technology. The attendees were very diverse in the opinions. Some were very optimistic about the future and some had the pessimistic views. One speaker in the response to a question about the possibility of robots taking over the world and destroying human beings mentioned that new human beings with the new principles will emerge! The speaker who talked about the future of the courts and artificial intelligence mentioned that Convicted by a robot will not happen, but taking the paper and building out of court system and Create a 100% digital and global court and alternative dispute resolution system and save Thousands of hours to write decision. He mentioned today Court=building but in the Future: Court= Globe. There were some debates among the attendees about the future of the human and artificial intelligence, one attendee mentioned a quote from Musk that describes the creation of artificial intelligence as “summoning the demon.” The speaker from Singularity mentioned that in the east Asia especially Japan, robots are considered better than human and are loved more than human!
July 22-23, 2015:
MDM & Data Governance Summit 2015
MDM & Data Governance conference provided the broad and deep practical advice on both Master Data Management (MDM) and Data Governance initiatives. A conference for data management professionals, it offered an extensive agenda for the organizations to understand the tools and technologies needed to start or grow master data initiatives and programs. The analyst Keynote, Goetz talked about the importance of data. She said Data matters, what the customer needs determine the success of the company. She asked the attendees “how many mobile devices do you have?” The answers were different, mostly between three to five; but she mentioned that she had seven. She explained how the available data should be used. What does data quality most impact your business? Customer experience is the first. She mentioned that 78% of businesses love data but only 14% use it for strategic decision making. What causes data distrust? She emphasized data quality is important. She emphasized on solving the problems using Data Trust Trinity. “It is all about network. How do you get your customer information?What is your top priority of 2016? What data do? Does it change the opinion?” She mentioned that data trust begins with the consumption experience and explained the Business Intelligence from analytic perspective. She asked: “Why data scientists are unique? Analytic approach; Can you trust data or not? Measure data. Where to go, get that data.” The speaker several times emphasized on the importance of the Business strategy. She mentioned the word No is not in the business vocabulary. Job must be done. Drive outcome with planning. Finally she mentioned Data only matters if it gives you money.period; data is just for the business. She warned the businesses:” If you do not start building your business strategy on your data, with this advancement of machine, artificial intelligence, you will loose.” Rund asked the audience this question: what the companies such as Uber, Facebook and Alibaba have in common and the answer was that they don’t own anything. He emphasized that 90% of the critical information is out of your company. He talked about the necessity of having contacts in the business and the importance of data governance in the business. Smith talked about MDM program and asked “What is wrong with our data quality?” He talked about data in the health care company. He mentioned that patients being tracked, all the electronic records use of Social security numbers, there is a Challenge of identity resolution. He said that millions of social security numbers are associated with more than one person. Jackson too talked about managing data in the Health care company. She emphasized that Money is the aim. We should avoid any waste by looking for quality data. “Lack of mastering the data, data management and data integration will result in the loss of money.” She talked about Data governance oversight, prioritizing data governance projects and avoiding duplicate patients to improve patient identity data quality. She explained the three elements: Patients, providers and the Payers. “We never want two patients with one account that will be dangerous. Legally we cannot ask about social security number, so we have other means to gain it!” She emphasized on the necessity of accurate data and then explained the process of Tracking patients for the payment, Patients identity scorecard & patients identity dashboard.
July 22 ,2015:
IDEAS: art, literature and science festival 2015
An intellectual festival with a variety of presentations in art, literature, neuroscience, cooking and film. A professor of philosophy, Óscar de la Borbolla read some pages from his book in Spanish. It was a conversation between a psychiatrist and his patient. All the words were containing a vowel followed by a consonant and so on. It was so interesting and sounded so pleasant even for the attendees who did not know Spanish language. A professor of Neurosurgery, Buylla talked about mechanisms of adult neurogenesis and neuronal replacement. He mentioned that contrary to the dogma held for over a century, some populations of neurons continue to be produced in juvenile and adult brains. Basic mechanisms of neural development can be studied in a fully assembled brain, providing key insights into the nature of neural stem cells, mechanisms of neuronal migration, and neural maturation. He mentioned that they’re studying the V-SVZ in the human brain and found that in infants the V-SVZ contains many migrating young neurons. Interestingly, in addition to the migration to the olfactory bulb (OB) in young children, new neurons derived from the V-SVZ migrate towards cortex. Then an award winner chef, Reygadas talked about her passion for breads and mentioned that she always loved to cook, and always loved to eat, since she was really young. And then she got really into the nutritional side because her father had a stroke, so in her house, suddenly what they ate totally changed. So she always was conscious about what was good for you, what was not good for you. ” I never thought of cooking as a profession. I never thought to study cooking, to me that was really strange. I studied English literature, actually. I chose literature because I like to read, but I never wanted to be a writer or anything like that. I didn’t know what I wanted to be. Then suddenly I started to realize that cooking was the thing I enjoyed the most.” Then documentary director, Almada talked about her films and explained that her film addresses violence without depicting it. Mateos, with a Ph D in physics talked about small-world networks that are transforming our lives. He mentioned that coals and diamonds are made of carbon and the difference is the structure and architecture that makes one so precious. He compared it to the human brains that are made of neurons and what makes a person smart is the structure of neurons.
July 20-21, 2015:
Data Science Summit 2015
The Data Science Summit brought together researchers and data scientists from academia as well as industry to discuss state of the art data science, applied machine learning and predictive applications. Data Science is the extraction of knowledge from large volumes of data that are structured or unstructured which is a continuation of the field data mining and predictive analytics , also known as (KDD). “Unstructured data” can include emails, videos, photos, social media, and other user-generated content. Data science often requires sorting through a great amount of information and writing algorithms to extract insights from this data. Although use of the term “data science” has exploded in business environments, many academics and journalists see no distinction between data science and statistics. Gil Press argues that data science is a buzzword without a clear definition and has simply replaced business analytics in contexts such as graduate degree programs. In the presentation on the subject machine learning innovations, Heer from University of Washington talked about Bacteria species and respond of bacteria to drugs research and Visualized data that tell us Which antibiotics should be used?He emphasized on showing the data variation not design variation. He mentioned that always there are some errors in data on the Wide variety of bacteria. He talked about Data transformation, Visual encoding design and thousands of possible charts and Data voyagers. Data analysis: What to optimize? How to evaluate? Ré from Stanford University talked about DeepDive: a data system for macroscopic science. He talked about Dark data system, Interference problems and Thinking about features not algorithms. He mentioned that the world scientific knowledge is accessible but not readable. Macroscopic knowledge need for dealing with the problems.”Could we build a machine to read for us?” How to stitch data together and how to bring them together. He compared human and machine in extracting data and concluded that machines are much more exact and precise. Then he mentioned data analysis in the human trafficking and how data produced by DeepDive helps to fight human trafficking. He expressed his views against the publishers and then apologized in case there was any publisher present among the audience. Tibshirani talked about post selection inference for the lasso and forward stepwise regression. Then Jordan talked about Splash and how to resolve conflicts, different ways:pros and cons. He mentioned that Splash is a programming interface for parallelizing stochastic and he explained its functions. In the break and networking time, there was a discussion between two participants: how data science and statistics are different? Other people involved in the discussion and the result was that data science makes predictions.
July 14-16, 2015:
Semicon West and inter Solar 2015
SEMICON West is a trade and technology event for the global micro- and nano-electronics industries. Held annually since 1970, SEMICON West showcases the latest products, process, and technology developments for the design and manufacture of semiconductors, LEDs, MEMS, plastic/organic electronics, PV/solar, and other related and adjacent technology industries. It featured the Silicone Innovation Forum, a unique forum for strategic investors and key decision makers meeting new and emerging early stage companies developing the future of microelectronics. There were variety of companies exhibiting such as U.S. based company Pike Kinetics IQ system; Viasys, video analytics based security systems that integrates best practice CCTV infrastructure with video content analysis; NY nanotechnology, New York’s Tech Corridor as a global leader in R&D; Sierra Components, Inc specialized in quick turn dicing; Gold Tech industries specialized in precision plating applications to the aerospace, electronics, communications and defense industry. In the Solar exhibition, the examples of passive solar design was exhibited. Passive solar home design applies the principles of heat transfer to keep building comfortable all year long with little fuel besides sunlight. Solar inventor Mouchot built the precursor to the modern solar oven in 1877 for the French Foreign Legion. Using his portable solar oven, he baked a pound of bread in 45 minutes. The U.S. solar industry employed 174,000 people in 2014, according to a report from the Solar Foundation, a growth of more than 20 percent compared to the previous year. Nearly one-third of the jobs were located in California, with the rooftop solar sector creating the majority of new jobs. Intersolar North America is an important educational and networking platform for installers, contractors, project developers and others.The workshops at Intersolar North America 2015 were designed for both seasoned industry veterans and those new to solar to gain insight into the newest technologies and trends impacting the downstream market. Within the panel titled “Future Paths for the East Coast Electricity Business”, speakers focused on the need for the solar and utility industries to get along, given the fact that electricity is inherently tied to utilities. Certain forward-thinking utilities have invested heavily in solar, from solar farms to installing panels on utility poles. With the integration of distributed energy with the electricity grid, the nation will move away from a centralized utility system to adopt “the sharing utility,” which features collaborative consumption and introduces a middle ground between ownership and shared resources, the panelists predicted.
July 9-10, 2015:
Wearable Technologies Conference 2015
Wearable Technologies is the pioneer and world leading innovation and market development platform for technologies worn close to the body or on the body. Since 2006 the platform has established an ecosystem of more than 30,000 companies comprising market leaders and highly innovative companies. There were various presentations on different wearables and various technologies and functions. Hanna from Richline group talked about the elegant empowered woman and the function needs fashion. He explained about the process from fine jewelry business to technology business. He mentioned that fine jewelry lasts a long time and the jewelry industry knows the place of technology. He emphasized on the “connection” element in every piece of jewelry that has a memory, emotional aspect, special meaning and individually. Lahtela from Oura started his speech by the Steve Jobs quote: “Simple can be harder than complex.” He introduced the world’s first wellness ring and mentioned that it especially designed to be worn and ultimately improve the sleep quality. Also he talked about turning the raw data to knowledge. Jean François Rubon,innovation and strategy director at Gemalto, talked about digital security. Gemalto is an international company with 14000 employees worldwide and more than €2.5 billion in revenue. It develops solutions based on secure elements and customized software platforms. He talked about security and privacy: secure email and data protection. As 2015 initiatives, he mentioned wearables and automotive and how using a wearable bring the improvement of the users experience, less likely to be forgotten and faster to detect. He emphasized on the company’s unique position in the ecosystem and how it brings security and simpler cellular connectivity to the wearable device market. Shaun Rahimi talked about a wearable for chronic pain. He talked from personal experience. As a result of congenital defects in his spine, he has suffered nerve pain from his neck to his feet since he was in his teens. After college, where he studied biomedical engineering, his situation grew worse when he developed carpal tunnel syndrome so severe he was forced to go on worker’s comp.So he set out to make something people with chronic pain would be able to wear without shame or inconvenience. He teamed up with a product engineer to create a discreet wireless patch that can be used to deliver TENS continuously and almost invisibly. Not much bigger than a nicotine patch or a Band-Aid, CUR, as the product is called, can be worn under clothing, but in appearance it looks more like a fashionable wearable device than a medical aid. Larson from Leaf Healthcare talked about expanding applications in the hospital environment. As a doctor he also mentioned his experience in the hospital. He mentioned that there are more than one million patients suffering the pressure ulcer in the U.S. and about its causes he pointed out the Pressure on hospitalized patients because of the lack of movement.How to prevent? He mentioned Florence Nightingale example who started turning movement initiatives in the hospitals. Wearable makes difference and he mentioned some examples of the wireless patient monitoring devices and the growing application of monitoring the patients. Ruane talked about reinventing quitting with a wearable. He mentioned that many diseases are the result of smoking. He explained different ways of stopping smoking using technology. He introduced a patch that one can take shower with it. He explained the optimized nicotine delivery and how peaks are preprogrammed to the real time compliance sensing to track adherence and engagement. He explained the Personalized digital coaching as a service provided with the device. Interesting conference talks, but one subject was almost forgotten: the side effects and the risk of radiation exposure in wearables for our health. Wearable technology is raising health concerns worldwide too. In the New York Times, Nick Bilton brought up important and unanswered questions about the safety of wearable tech, according to the non-profit research group, Environmental Health Trust (EHT), which educates individuals, health professionals and communities about controllable environmental health risks and policy changes needed to reduce those risks.
July 8,2015:
INmarket Conference 2015
INmarket conference was organized by 6sense company that is specialized in uncovering net-new, in-market prospects based on data science and billions of time-sensitive intent interactions. INmarket as a forum that unites executive-level marketing strategists, data and technology visionaries and digital practitioners for an exploration of the complex B2B universe of customer intelligence and data. There were discussions by diverse group of thought leaders in predictive intelligence, marketing and sales. The panelists who discussed the subject “winning the in-market prospect: the sales leader’s perspective” explained the best ways of finding buyers and different marketing strategies. They emphasized on finding buyers earlier in the sales cycle. Frank from LinkedIn, global sales operations, emphasized on the necessity of building trust. He mentioned that gaining the trust is a long journey and marketing initiatives must be honest. ” The nature of marketing is a challenge”. He explained the segmentation and “social selling”. He emphasized on getting as much as information you can about the people before starting any conversation. Enabling the sales people and marketing people was another topic of discussion. Vertical marketing strategies and prioritzation were discussed too. Ballard from Lenovo mentioned that marketers are responsible for contributing more to the sales pipeline than ever before. He mentioned his company cooperation with 6sense. He explained “profile score” and mentioned “we track everything you do!” He explained about the audience manager and email campaigning. He mentioned that as a creative guy he did not want data. Adams from the documentary group “Girl Rising” mentioned that all the registration fees collected for INmarket, $75,000, has been donated to Girl Rising. Amanda, CEO, 6sense as a sign of respect made a Buddhist bowing before her. Adams mentioned that educating girls is the smartest investment of our time and it is the greatest solution to solving hunger, poverty and disease. Audience watched a documentary about lifetime of servitude featuring a girl called Amina. One young audience was in tears. Adams explained the future projects in India. The panelists who discussed the future of B2B marketing technology explained the aspirations for the companies they founded and the challenges they were trying to solve. Miller explained about the lessons they learned from 2008 market crash. He mentioned the core strategy and big factors such as culture and focus. He emphasized the importance of focusing on the vision. Raab discussed the new frontiers of data driven marketing. He mentioned Martech+Adtech=Madtech. He explained about business strategy and marketing strategy. He emphasized on the personalization in the marketing and the issue of marketing to machines. Kushner talked about the big data and the little data. She explained that the big data is unstructured such as behavior, but the little data is structured such as the profile data. She emphasized on understanding the buying patterns and mining signals that indicate decision making.
June 2015:
June 23-24, 2015:
The TV of Tomorrow Show 2015
The TV of Tomorrow Show is held every spring in San Francisco and is the leading global conference for the interactive multi platform TV industry. The conference talks and discussions are about the special topics that concern TV industry decision makers. Its focus is exclusively on the delivery of interactive TV on multiple platforms and it selects the speakers and panelists for their expertise. The panelists on the subject “technology leaders on the innovations that will shape the TV of tomorrow” discussed the technologies that will have the largest impact on the television and video spaces going forward and the precise nature of the impact.Haberman talked about 25 years in technology innovations and he mentioned that interaction changes the nature of the content and what makes narrative so powerful is the lack of control, but in interactivity you have the control. He talked about the book “the paradox of choice” and how eliminating consumer choices can greatly reduce anxiety for shoppers; he emphasized that too much choice makes it less interesting. Lauder also mentioned that more choices don’t make us happier, but in the capitalist society we always have more choices. He talked about the color TV and how expensive it was at the beginning. He mentioned that fragmentation is a big problem for the cable industry. The global TV industry is technically and commercially fragmented. Another speaker pointed out that after two decades of robust growth, the industry is facing significant challenges to future growth. With more than 300 existing programming channels resulting in increased audience fragmentation, the prospects for creating additional revenues by launching new channels are very limited. Reynolds mentioned that DVD players were sold 27 million in the first 18 months because the price was right at the time, but the price of color TV was wrong. Also he talked about the targeted advertising. Other topics discussed: live social broadcasting, a new kind of television, connected TV and powering a new television user experience. The panelists discussed the new kinds of content offerings and user experiences that are made possible by smart and connected TV. Also they discussed the prospect for the services that enhance programming on the smart TV. The panelists on the subject “social TV: more than idle chatter ” discussed the recent and ongoing programming project and emerging technology platforms and the increasingly close ties between television and social sphere. They mentioned that TV has always been a social device and content creation targeted the fan community. There will be no successful show without fans. Social TV as a new form of story telling. Mazzara mentioned that if the audience miss an episode they leave and do not come back and TV is about life and the production chain should be changed. Tankersley answered the question, How do we define success? What measures? He mentioned Revenues, how much money it generates and building the social audience. Toeman mentioned that it is Not always the money, it should be authentic. Data is important. Low audience but high social activities VS high audience,but low social activities. And the necessity to build audience. Mazzara mentioned there are no music in YouTube in Germany and how it affects the engagement of younger viewers. Also there were some master classes by Adobe and Experian. The panelists on intelligent technologies that enable new viewing experience discussed viewers and traditional pay-TV, OTT that refers to delivery of audio, video, and other media over the Internet without the involvement of a multiple system operator in the control or distribution of the content and made-for-web content across a range of devices.
June 18-19,2015:
Quantified Self Conference 2015:
The Quantified Self is an international collaboration of users and makers of self-tracking tools. And the Quantified Self conference was a gathering of the global community of self-trackers and tool makers. It was an interesting and inspiring event. There was a variety of talks, face to face interactive discussions on different topics such as mood, data visualization, sleep, ethics, different technologies and culture of self-tracking. Lanyard talked about her experience in breaking the TV habit. She explained how she quit watching TV and presented her data about the activities that replaced her viewing habit. She mentioned that she had successfully replaced the habit that she “felt locked into” with reading fictions. Troia talked about his indoor environment. He mentioned that he had tracked the air quality and electromagnetic radiation in his home and he shared his interesting findings: simple hacks can have a huge impact, the need to take consistent readings over time, we can never completely eliminate the environmental issues, we can only minimize their effects. He also emphasized the need to understand the hazards of radiations on immune system, our moods and sleep. The next speaker, Wilson, talked about three years of logging his inbox count; he mentioned that after passively tracking it for three years he found out the direct correlation between the number of emails in the mailbox and stress level. Another speaker, both an artist and a scientist, talked about microbiome, the human microbiome that is the population of more than 100 trillion microorganisms that live in our gut, mouth, skin and elsewhere in our bodies. He mentioned we cannot change our genome, but our microbiome is changed by each touch, even by a simple hand shake; the more intimate with others, the more similar we will become. Some other speakers mentioned in their speech that there are too many wearables and asked: “where’s the ceiling?” Smolicki talked about self-tracking as an artistic practice: he mentioned that since 2009, he has done several artistic practices to document his presence, taking different initiatives from one minute soundscapes to photographing the objects he has observed during the daily walks. It includes facing: drawing faces in the public transports, traversing, minuting: recording a sound every day, street sampling, passing and scribbling the new ideas. Many speakers in the conference had done something that last beyond their life.
In the exhibition area there were various companies such as beddit that does medical sleep monitoring which involves wearing multiple electro physiological sensors for a single night, a sleep laboratory at home. Another company, brain stimulator that manufactures the basic and advanced kits with pins for self adhesive electrodes. The companies representatives mentioned that their products have passed the quality control stages, but at the same time they said that there had been some cases of side effects such as headache and the redness of the skin. In the Office Hours sections different companies representatives introduced their products and answered the visitors’ questions.
June 15-18, 2015:
Visual Studio Live 2015
Visual Studio Live was a premier educational resource with a variety of sessions and workshops about the technology solutions both current and upcoming. The subjects discussed in the workshops were: big data, analytics and NoSQL, App development for iOS, Android and windows using C and ALM with Microsoft Stack. Educational sessions had different topics such as cloud computing, database and analytics, mobile client, visual studio, web development and windows client.
Some highlights from the educational sessions:
Remillard talked about managing Dev/Test environment in Azure. He fully explained how to create Dev/Test environment on Azure. Kurata talked about Angular JS forms and validation. She explained about the ways of building web-based data entry form using HTML and AngularJS, the client-side validation and how to implement server side validation. Tuliper from Microsoft talked about Bower; he explained about “What is Bower?” and What is Grunt and how they fit into the development ecosystem, where they overlap and how they differ. Also he explained about how to utilize them and how to implement them into the workflow and also the Package manager optimized for front-end way and its usage via visual studio. Also he elaborated on What is required? Files and folders and the settings go in bower.json. He said about the Bower components and showed the examples. He talked about the common mistakes with the Bower. He explained about development dependency and package registry. He also explained about Grunt: JavaScript task runner; it can run tasks on the files. He mentioned the reasons to use the task runner. Finally he explained Gulp and installing it. He showed Gulp demo. He mentioned that it can be installed globally and locally.
Hundhausen discussed Scrum development using visual studio 2015. He teaches scrum and explained about setting up a scrum team project. He quoted Poppendiek saying: “we need to figure out a way to deliver software so fast that our customers have not any time to change their mind.”
He mentioned that by Agile he means Scrum! He explained Scrum in 60 seconds. He talked about the way to plan and track a Scrum software development project using visual studio and the way to create, manage a product backlog and finally how to plan a sprint. He mentioned that the hardest part is the finishing the sprint in the right time.He explained the acronym HARD is honest, appropriate, respectful and direct. Also he discussed the different ways to create a new product successfully.
June 7-11, 2015:
Design Automation Conference 2015
The Design Automation Conference (DAC) was the premier conference for design and automation of electronic systems. DAC offered training, education, exhibits and networking opportunities for designers, researchers, tool developers and vendors. The exhibitors were companies in the following areas: Electronic Design Automation (EDA), Intellectual Property (IP), Embedded Systems and Software, Automotive Systems and Software and Design Services. About 200 technical presentations and sessions offered information on recent developments and trends, management practices and new products, methodologies and technologies. Some highlights from workshops and tutorials: system-to-silicon performance modeling and analysis: the workshop addressed cross-domain aspects related to the design and verification framework covering methodology, interoperable tools, flows, interfaces and standards that enable formalization, specification, annotation and refinement of functional and extra-functional properties of a system. Design automation for HPC, clouds and SoCs: the workshop explained that traditionally SoC design methods have focused on low-power consumer electronics or high performance embedded applications. But now SoC design methods are moving into high-end computing due to the emergence of embedded IP offering capable double-precision floating point, 64-bit address capability, and options for high performance I/O and memory interfaces.
Keynote speaker from Google discussed Google smart lense design. He mentioned that we have amazingly sparse access to information about our own bodies, the healthier we are, the less data we collect. Technologies that monitor critical biomarkers are still in their infancy, but continuing advances in chip design and biocompatible system integration help the next generation of these devices. He explained about the Google Smart Contact Lens platform, and the scarcity of power, extreme miniaturization, and end-to-end connected systems that span the design space from transistors to the cloud. In the exhibition area, the exhibitors competed to attract more visitors to their booths: they included “lucky draw”, in their schedules to reward the visitors; even some exhibitors included acrobatics and magicians performances to attract the attention of the visitors. Exhibiting companies were so diverse, both in size and function. The companies such as Smic, Cadence, Library Technologies Inc, Chip Estimate, and Silicon analytics, Inc exhibited. Highlights of the tutorials were the discussion about 3D memory and logic integration: the speaker mentioned the fundamental knowledge, individual skill sets and the most recent state of the art technologies used for 2.5D/3D integration. In particular they discussed the low cost silicon interposer, low power logic design techniques and EDA tools and methodologies to perform system co-design.
June 1 & 2, 2015:
EmTech DIGITAL 2015
EmTech Digital conference, organized by MIT Technology Review, was an interesting and productive event about innovations and ideas for the future and the role of artificial intelligence and virtual reality in forming the future.
Day one: it started by the editor in chief and publisher’s remark on the way we interact with our world and with each other in our connected world and the necessity of providing the Internet access to those countries that are not connected to the Internet. Then Cheyer, co founder of Viv Labs talked about redefining our digital experience with AI. He mentioned that by 2020 it will be 300 million watches and the Revolution is happening under the hood on how the computer is programmed; Who writes the code is changing.Google translation did English into Chinese translation without anyone talking Chinese. He mentioned that human and machine working together in a way that neither could do it alone. In response to the question: What about danger to people livelihood by developing robots? He replied: “human will adapt.”
Cassidy, Vice President of Google was another speaker who emphasized on the wider connectivity. He mentioned that three quarters of the world population are not connected to the Internet. He talked about the Project Loon and Launching balloons in Brazil rural areas that are difficult to get signals. Anyone with smartphone can get internet access anywhere. He mentioned that the goal is :”Internet everywhere”.The first 60 balloons launched burst because of outside pressure and the Balloons were named after the birds. He pointed out that there are some Negotiations over landing zones with different governments and the Balloons last 100 days and it is tricky how to make connections between the balloons.
There was a panel discussion about the future of money. Whiteaker mentioned that cash and check goes away, everything will become digital. Gorelov, CEO, Kasisto talked about the world without physical money, virtual banking and digital. He mentioned that the global population still do cash transactions. He also discussed the future of financial industry and how mobile devices impact banking and what would be the Consumer experience.
Picard, MIT Media Lab discussed Mapping between Brain and Body and better living through data. Then Ausiello, chairman of the center for assessment technology and continuous health, Massachusetts General Hospital talked about genome project with Apple and mentioned: “The patient is an enormous repository of information that needs to be harvested as a partnership not only in clinical care but in discovery. It is the only way we will define wellness and its progression to disease, rather than traditional medicine that defines disease and its progression to death. The ability to stratify the phenotypic expression of wellness and disease will ultimately lead to better validation of human therapeutic targets for drug discovery.”
Day Two: Dixon, SVP, Business and Legal affairs,Mozilla emphasized on building and Designing for trust. She mentioned that in the past it was the cookies following you around the web, now there are lots of things can follow you around the web. She explained about What is trust in data. Users do not understand it, we make it complicated. She pointed out that users should be involved in the exchange. She said that Mobile operating system have access to our data and about Putting the apps in the device she mentioned that apps collect information from you and can have access to the data, camera, etc. she mentioned: “Give users opportunity to see what happens to their data.”
There was some sort of secrecy about the speakers from the Magic Leap. They did not elaborate on what they are doing. They mentioned that they are building technology which makes it possible to see virtual 3D objects as if they were part of the real world, but the audience were in the dark and as they discussed in the break and networking time, they were expecting to see some slides about what the Magic Leap really does.
The conference talks were dynamic and interesting, but there was a gap, a subject that was nearly forgotten to be discussed: ” the moral and ethical issues on artificial intelligence research.”
May 2015:
May 12& 13,2015:
Apps World North America 2015
Apps world events were 2 day developer events with marketing application conferences and app exhibitions. The shows represented the entire app ecosystem. It was run by Apps World part of Informa Telecoms and Media. There were more than 350 exhibitors and 6 developer workshop tracks. Developer World, Droid World, Gaming World, Enterprise World, CIO leadership Summit and connected cars. There were so many visitors and participants and it was difficult to concentrate on speakers words.
In mobile strategy and marketing workshop, one speaker mentioned his experience of marketing for NY times. He emphasized on the Keywords: type of keywords is important,
Company name is important, Description part is how people find about the company. He talked about iOS device vs computer/ android device vs computer and Marketing budgets. He also mentioned that Google predicts 85.9B mobile search in 2015. He
recommended the following for the description of your company App:
Use bullet point,
The image,
Going after niche market,
Include promo graphics and
Ratings and reviews..
And he suggested that for getting more reviews, the company should use Support email,Native prompt and Do not buy reviews, just responding to the reviews.
The following were some of the interesting exhibitors that were eager to introduce their company to the visitors and explain their products: Globalstep, a large and fast growing game testing company that is dedicated exclusively to the video games market.Nexaweb introduced the nexacro platform, a mobile and web application development platform designed to produce application for a wide variety of devices from a single code base. Qwikword invited the visitors to its official Launch Party. Branch.io encouraged the visitors to check out their blog to find out about their case studies on mobile growth. Another company, +1, that is based in Lima, Perú, masuno.pe, and provides project solutions on multi-platforms was among many foreign companies with the sales branch in the U.S. that exhibited at the event. Red hat company based in the U.S. with 70 offices around the globe is provider of open source solutions, and offers consulting services too.
An exhibitor company that provides website and app translation, charges its client, from 10 to 25 cents per word but pays its translators something between 2 to 4 cents per word; in response to the question about the ethics, the representative just mentioned other expenses, but he didn’t explain that.
Some highlights from the topics discussed were:
what’s the best strategy on how to engage with developers?
Is your app secure?
Getting to number one on both Android and iOS.
April 2015:
April 29&30, 2015:
Marketing Innovation Summit For B2B
An interesting and inspiring conference. It was an opportunity for the B2B community to gather together and discuss the ways of empowering B2B marketers with the technology that is custom-built and sharing their own experiences.
Day One: there were different workshops on Full Funnel ABM and ABM Optimization. The fundamentals of Account-Based Marketing and the real tactics and strategies were discussed. Some introductions to Marketing tech, Adobe analytics, google analytics
Geography, Industry and Testing assumptions against best customers were discussed. Prioritizing by putting the money where the list is and Creating segments from the list, Marketing need: horizontal,upswell, renewal? And Maintaining the ownership of process were fully explained.
Day Two: it started with the speeches by founder, CEO and CMO, Demandbase. Then Siroker, co-founder, Optimizely, explained the possible Opportunities to expand businesses. He explained how the opportunities look like, the Challenges, the Highest paid opinion and the Job goal. He mentioned that the goal should be creating the new experience and happy customers.Innovation through optimization and the simple data can be turned into action. Then CEO of Stop Hunger Now invited the audience to participate in packaging meals that will be distributed in the developing countries.
Blitzer from Pardot talked about sales and marketing. He mentioned that the buyers are more connected than ever; people buy from other people in the buying cycle. He explained about the cost of being disconnected; he mentioned that sales talk about revenue, but marketing talks about leads. He also discussed the following:
Get to a single Funnel,
Most contents sit on the shelf, and
Different buyers consume contacts differently.
Then there was the panel discussion about marketing tech stack. Aman and Hersant discussed the challenges of building an integrated marketing tech stack. They shared their own experiences on implementing methods for creating successful B2B companies. They discussed the modern marketing technology. They emphasized the need for the constant tracking what your competitors do in the market and making familiar with the latest innovations in the field.
April 24, 2015:
Hustle Con 2015
Hustle con was about how to be a successful startup. And many experienced entrepreneurs shared their ideas and gave some tips: how to be a successful startup, to the enthusiastic audience that paid considerable amount of money to attend the event and learn something.
Smith,26 years old, an Advertising Hustler, mentioned that the goal should be finding out the rules of the game and learning how to break it. It is the key strategy to the success in the business start-up process. He started from a tiny office in London and then moved to San Francisco with his business partner. At the start their objectives were to get to AngelPad. He mentioned the main part of the process is to select your weapon of choice: he mentioned LinkedIn as an example:
1. Ad-Unit
2.Targeting, see number of people reading your ad…
3.payment
4.review the process
His talk was amusing to the audience and there were lots of laughter especially when he mentioned how he used the fake means to reach his goal.
Another speaker was Walker Williams, founder of Tee Spring. He mentioned that the main platform is converting idea to the planned product and he explained that he did whatever it took and also told about the Disadvantages and Advantages . He pointed out that the advantage is that you can do things that don’t scale by recruiting the early users. The goal should be to turn users into champions. He encouraged the business starters do so many calls for developing the users and he mentioned : “Don’t focus on ROI…focus on growth.”…” For selling T shirts, focus on the users..white glove service brings the champions. Go where your competitors cannot go, talk to users constantly and as much as you can. Read all the comments on the social media.” He also talked about Customer Service handling by experiencing the pain of the users of the faulty products. He emphasized on reaching out to the people and seeking feedbacks through Social media.
Another speaker was Warner from Mixergy. He did not share any idea and to the surprise of the audience, he distributed beads among the audience and asked them to perform some rituals with it. Some people did and some found it very unpleasant. It was the least popular talk of the day.
Arram Sabeti from Zero Cater, honestly shared the process of starting his business and explained how he was obsessed with the startups. He also pointed out that there is always the possibility that a start up process to fail when the co founder have different ideas and can’t cooperate and as the result departs.
THE LONDON I NTERNATIONAL BOOK FAIR 2015
Rights round-up, Fair highlights: April 14,15&16:
The London Book Fair 2015 celebrated a wealth of publishing rights deals, launches and announcements made over the three days. Over 220 seminars gave insights across the world of publishing and audiences heard from top authors including David Nicholls, Valeria Luiselli and Anthony Browne.
Hall from HarperCollins said: “the talks at the Fair have been excellent this year. The skills and development talks about the future skills necessary for publishing have been really useful”. Tuckwell, Cambridge University Press commented: “a new venue is always going to present challenges, but the Fair has felt fresh, buzzing and full of people passionate about publishing”.
The third edition of What Works? Successful Education Policies, Resources and Technologies welcomed an international line up of top level policy makers and publishers as well as speakers from major universities and international organisations to discuss the use of technology, policy and content in education.
The Book Fair Mexico Market Focus has welcomed representatives of Caniem, Conaculta, FCE, Planeta and Sexto Piso to shine the spotlight on Mexico’s publishing industry. The handover ceremony took place at the Market Focus Pavilion on Thursday afternoon, with Mexico handing the baton to the IPA Congress for 2016.
The Literary Translation Center was one of the highlights of the Book Fair:
The Literary Translation Centre, sponsored by Amazon Crossing provided a hub for learning, debate and networking for all those passionate about the art and business of literary translation.
Emerging Spanish-to-English translators Ollie Brock and Sophie Hughes tested their linguistic mettle in a light-hearted duel of words.
March 2015:
March26 & 27, 2015:
Erlang user Conference 2015- Erlang Factory
An interesting, productive and dynamic conference.
The sequential subset of Erlang is a functional language with eager evolution, Single assignment and dynamic typing.
The first version was developed by Joe Armstrong and Robert Virding in 1986. Erlang’s main strength is support for concurrency. It has a small but powerful set of primitives to create processes and communicate among them. Processes are the primary means to structure an Erlang application. Erlang’s concurrency implementation is the Actor model. They are neither operating system processes nor operating system threads,but lightweight processes. Like operating system processes (but unlike operating system threads), they share no state with each other. The estimated minimal overhead for each is 300 words.Thus, many processes can be created without degrading performance. A benchmark with 20 million processes has been successfully performed.
Day one: the highlight of the day: Jose Valim talked about Elixir:
He was a very good speaker indeed; he talked passionately and energetically about Elixir and made great impressions on the audience.
Elixir is a dynamic, functional language designed for building scalable and maintainable applications.
Elixir leverages the Erlang VM, known for running low-latency, distributed and fault-tolerant systems, while also being successfully used in web development and the embedded software domain. He explained about data types, modules and processes. He mentioned that for running codes everything is interconnected.
” Laziness in Collections”, goals+ extensibility, Enumerable protocol and compatibility were discussed by him. He explained about Opt & Elixir and mentioned that Genserver introduced two new structures and agents. He elaborated on the Task for any developer, agent lattices and parallelism. During the coffee break, Jose Valim was one of the subjects of the discussions by the participants and they praised his talent and wished him the best.
Day two: the highlight of the day: Joe Armstrong talked about Erlang:
Joe Armstrong is the principal inventor of Erlang and coined the term “Concurrency Oriented Programming”. At Ericsson he developed Erlang and was chief architect of the Erlang/OTP system. In 1998 he formed Bluetail, which developed all its products in Erlang. In 2003 he obtain his PhD from the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm. He is author of the book “Software for a concurrent world”.
Joe mentioned that changes in softwares follow changes in hardwares. Big changes to the hardware is equal to big changes to software. He explained about the new problems in 50 billion connected devices. He talked about future: self managing, self repairing and energy awareness. Also he discussed about “where is Erlang today?” He concluded with a sentence from Alan Kay, the best way to predict the future is to invent it. His lecture was very interesting and he highly impressed the audience. He proved that he is a very knowledgable man who is dedicated to the subject of his research. Very interesting that such a great professor in computer science is not a member of social media such as facebook. Joe has an impressive character and he was one of the best speakers in the conference.
February 2015:
February 26, 2015:
A tour of Legion of Honor
High on the headlands above the Golden Gate—where the Pacific Ocean spills into San Francisco Bay—stands the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, the gift of Alma de Bretteville Spreckels to the city of San Francisco. Located in Lincoln Park, this unique art museum is one of the great treasures in a city that boasts many riches. The museum’s spectacular setting is made even more dramatic by the imposing French neoclassical building.
The Legion’s rich collection of over 800 European paintings includes masterworks from the 14th into the early the 20th centuries. Approximately 250 paintings on view present a survey of pre-twentieth century artistic accomplishments by Europe’s leading masters, from Fra Angelico to Picasso.
Ancient Art has been an integral part of the Legion of Honor and the de Young since they were founded. Antiquities were considered essential to any museum in the early twentieth century, and both M.H. de Young, founder of the de Young, and Alma Spreckels, founder of the Legion of Honor, furnished their institutions with a variety of ancient objects. The works they brought to the Museums, and those that have been added over the years cover a broad geographical and chronological range across the ancient Mediterranean basin—primarily Egypt, the Near East, Greece, the Aegean Islands, Etruria and Rome.
The Legion of Honor also amassed historical photographs prior to merging with the de Young Museum. The Legion’s most important acquisition was its purchase in 1943 of negatives and prints by Arnold Genthe representing San Francisco in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake of 1906. After the two institutions were combined to form the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco in 1972, the photography holdings were united at the Legion of Honor within the Museums’ department of works on paper, the Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts.
January 2015:
January 29, 2015:
2015 Tech Superwomen Summit
An interesting event.
Milstein talked about the bias and creating a new system of finding and recruiting people and the focus on equal opportunities involving more women and people of color. She said:”we value people that other people do not value.”
Other speakers such as Pamela Rice mainly talked on the women in power and how the picture of power is changing and she emphasized that in the 90% male dominated, women must speak up. She said:”I could see the internal vice of people who say I am too bold, bossy and loud.” Ekaterina Walter also talked very emotionally about women in power, but the audience who were 99% female did not seem impressed. Raina Kumra emphasized that she is from India! And she repeated that she felt that she was smarter than her boss; the audience did not give her the approval that she expected.
Harper Reed and Richard changed the atmosphere by appearing on the stage with a very long beard and speaking honestly about their mistakes. The audience responded positively and it was a breath of fresh air.
Then Cheryle Contee arrived on the stage dancing Samba and mentioned that she has just returned from Brazil and she is still in the mood and the audience liked it. She was interviewing Del Harvey fromTwitter; Harvey seemed stiff and uncomfortable in contrast to the relaxing manner of Contee. Some people in the audience asked her about abuse and threats in Twitter and mentioning their personal experiences. They thought that joining Twitter is a must and they were seeking for a solution for the problems they were facing and they expressed their concern. May be the best solution for their problem was leaving Twitter.
The summit continued with more speakers discussing the role of women and the stereotypes and what can be done.
NOVEMBER 2014: EVENTS ARCHIVE
October 28,2014:
A tour of the greenest building in North America:
New headquarter of San Francisco Public Utilities Commission
One of the first buildings in the nation with onsite treatment of gray and black water.
The building’s 25,000 gallon rainwater harvesting system provides water for irrigation uses around the building.
Maximizing daylight harvesting saves electricity and minimizes artificial lighting.
A state-of-the-art raised flooring system incorporates the building’s data and ventilation infrastructure and reduces heating, cooling and ventilation energy costs by 51%.
Not only is 525 Golden Gate immediately available for occupancy after an earthquake, but because of the unique concrete shear walls running vertically through the building, any damage should be negligible.
Individual air comfort controls at workstations that creates a very pleasant atmosphere for those who work there.
November 4,2014:
A Tour of Conservatory of Flower:
The Potted Plants Gallery:
It holds an ever abundant assortment of Hibiscus, Begonicas, Bromeliads, Cymbidium orchids and unusual vines.
The Lowland Tropics:
It is a steamy jungle of plants that are native to the low-lying tropical forests of countries such as Mexico,Brazil and I ndonesia, in regions below 3000 feet.
The Highland Tropics:
This gallery provides an intimate glimpse of life in the cloud forests of the tropics.
The Aquatic Plants:
From Amazon River to Mekong, the waterways of the tropics are filled with water lilies and lotus.
The conservatory visit is a pleasant and unforgettable journey.
November 5,2014:
A tour of the de Young Museum:
Founded in 1895 in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, the de Young Museum has been an integral part of the cultural fabric of the city and a cherished destination for millions of residents and visitors to the region for over 100 years.
The de Young’s American Art Department is home to one of the finest survey collections of American paintings in the United States. Strengthened by the acquisition of the Rockefeller Collection of American Art, the de Young’s holdings include more than 1000 paintings ranging from 1670 to the present day.
The aesthetics of African art—its bold forms, intense expressionistic aesthetic, and strong sculptural qualities—shook the art world and changed it forever, though few Westerners at that time recognized the complexity of African cultures or knew much about what these objects meant to the peoples who made them.
The de Young has exhibited Oceanic art since it opened in 1895. M.H. de Young and museum supporters purchased works from the California International Midwinter Exposition that still form the core of the Oceanic collection. The strength of this charter collection lay in small groups of objects, including important New Zealand Maori woodcarvings from meetinghouses of that period, as well as in singular works of importance, such as a rare Micronesian figurative weather charm.
The de young showcases American Art from 17th to 21th centuries, international modern and contemporary art, photography and international textiles and costumes.
Also de Young Café, with its inviting view of the Barbro Osher Sculpture Garden, offers soups, salads, sandwiches, and hot entrees available for dining in the café or to take away for an alfresco lunch in the beautiful environs of Golden Gate Park.
November 7,2014:
A tour of San Francisco Botanical Garden:
San Francisco Botanical Garden is a living museum of plants located within Golden Gate Park. The mild mediterranean climate provides the right conditions to grow and conserve plants from all over the world, including some no longer found in their native habitats. Fifty-five acres of sanctuary – featuring both landscaped gardens and open spaces – showcase over 8,000 types of plants from around the world.
A conservator of cloud forest plants from both Mesoamerica and the Andes in South America, the Garden has also been developing the first Southeast Asian cloud forest collection of its kind. Many of these flowering shrubs, trees and impressive plants are rare and endangered, and SFBG is one of the only botanical gardens in the world where these plants can grow outdoors successfully, conserving many plant species. The best times to visit the Mesoamerican collection is November-December; the Andean is September-October; the Southeast Asian is year-round, but note that it is still in development.
A protector of California’s native flora, the Garden features a serene, century-old towering Redwood Grove right in the heart of San Francisco, with understory trees, shrubs and groundcovers, as well as a four-acre, award-winning designed open California landscape, featuring an array of plants thriving in the Mediterranean climate. This popular aspect of the Garden may be enjoyed year-round.
As an important representative of mediterranean habitats worldwide, the Garden displays many rare and unusual plants that flourish in the Bay Area climate, including collections from Australia, California, Chile, the Mediterranean, and South Africa.
Also the Garden is host to the most comprehensive collection of high elevation palm species in any botanical garden, including some that grow up to an elevation of 11,000 feet in their native habitats. Visitors may enjoy the palms year round, and expect to see many of them flower in the next 5-10 years.San Francisco Botanical Garden’s magnolia collection includes 51 species and 33 cultivars, including many prized examples from Asia.
November 13,2014:
A tour of 2014 Cleantech Open Global Forum:
Cleantech is any product or services that improves operational performance,productivity or efficiency while reducing costs, inputs, Energy consumption, waste or environmental pollution. Its origin is the increased consumer, regulatory, and industry interest in clean forms of energy generation—specifically, perhaps, the rise in awareness of global warming, climate change and the impact on the natural environment from the burning of fossil fuels Cleantech is often associated with venture capital funds and land use organizations.
The first keynote speaker was Cathy Zoi, as she mentioned in her speech, “she is a policy person”, a consulting fellow at Stanford Universityand 30 years of experience in the energy sector. Another speaker was an environmentalist and actress, Alexandra Paul. She has been driving electric car since 1990. In her speech, she raised her concern about the pollution by cars that is not taken seriously. She also mentioned that she is an advocate of the smaller family.
There was interesting Tech Demos by a variety of small companies in different categories such as agriculture waste, energy distribution and storage, energy efficiency, energy generation and green building:
Ohio-based Ag-bioscience venture developing a pipeline of biological inoculants, bio-fertilizers, and bio-pesticides designed to help growers of all types of crops improve plant health, yield, and safety while reducing chemical inputs in both conventional and organic systems. Another was enabling small industrial wastewater generators to treat on-site, with a very simple system to install and operate, that requires no chemicals and very little power. Another company developed an air conditioner that controls all aspects of indoor air quality: temperature (up or down), humidity (high or low), cleanliness (to micron level) and bacteriostatic (kills all known bacteria and viruses including SARS). And a company innovating the Residential and commercial buildings built with the materials that consume up to 70% less energy for heating and cooling needs, be highly resistant to earthquakes and strong winds and be mold, mildew and termite proof.
November 14,2014:
A tour of Green Festival:
The largest and longest-running sustainability and green living event in the United States. It was a three-day event. At the festival you could not find the usual plastic and Styrofoam service items. Every exhibitor and vendor was mandated to use only biodegradable service items, or Bio-ware, for all food service and sampling. What this means is that every cup, plate, fork, spoon, bowl, napkin, toothpick, sample cup and food item is 100% compostable. They guaranteed that every last item is composted and returned to the Earth as a safe and fertile soil amendment. If a vendor was using anything but Bio-ware, they could be shut down until they secure the serving materials.
The exhibitors were mostly those with green, natural and organic products and the overall ambiance was in line with the main policy of the Green Festival. But there were also some cases that were merely present for commercial purpose. There were some exhibitors that presented unnatural, low quality products from India. Some visitors who had been interviewed were unhappy about that and raised their concerns. Overall the majority of the visitors were happy with their visit.
Some visitors enjoyed more than 60 organic food and beverage exhibitors and were especially impressed bysome Organic Fruit and Nut Bar flavors. And in one day alone, lots of attendees did test drives of newest electronic vehicles in the Fort Mason parking lot.
November 17, 2014:
A tour of 2014 Topcoder Open:
In fact, it is a day of competitions, discussions, demos and fun! The ambiance is very relaxing and educative. It will be a live report: now waiting for the next speaker. Matt Thompson, manager of Microsoft’s Developer and Startup Efforts to begin his Speech: he demonstrated some of his pictures as a photographer and he continued his speech about the Hacker Ethic and he explained about sharing, Openness, decentralization, free access to information and the desire to make things better. Then he discussed that coding is becoming the basic form of learning. He emphasized on coding initiative for students and younger kids.He mentioned that students should be active creators in the global economy, not the passive participants. It was a very interesting lecture, but later he began to emphasize the role of the company that he works for it and even making some exaggerated remarks about his company.
There were some competitions:
Algorithms (competition length about two hours): Competitors are given a set (usually three) of algorithmic problems and have 75 minutes to correctly solve as many as they can.Design (competition length one week): Competitors are given a set of user requirements and attempt to convert them into a usable software design specification. Their efforts are judged on a variety of “real-world” criteria on how correct and practical their design is.Development (competition length one week): Competitors are given a set of design specification and attempt to write software components that match this specification. These components are judged on their functionality and coding style.Marathon Matches (competition length one or two weeks): Contestants are given a particularly difficult algorithmic problem. The scoring is done by computer based on criteria specifically suited to theproblem.
November 23,2014:
A tour of 2014 Fabric & Trim Show:
At the exhibition, the visitors found fabric and trim suppliers with low minimums and flexible ordering options. Also there were some business development seminars. The manufacturing trade association were encouraging the visitors to join by paying annual membership fees and attend in the networking events and sell industry- related items
in the classified section of their website.
There were a variety of colorful fabrics on display by variety of exhibitors. The Premier Prints, Inc exhibited the variety of beautiful and colorful fabrics and attracted the attentions of the visitors; their fabric were all made in USA that ranged from traditional to modern. Also there was 100 percent wool fabrics in beautiful color exhibited by B Black & sons ; their fabrics were Eco-friendly and organic, all made in the US. Also the Hemp Traders with natural coton and 100% hemp fabric exhibited the colorful fabrics.
Archives 2014
October 28,2014:
A tour of the greenest building in North America
New headquarter of San Francisco Public Utilities Commission
One of the first buildings in the nation with onsite treatment of gray and black water.The building’s 25,000 gallon rainwater harvesting system provides water for irrigation uses around the building.Maximizing daylight harvesting saves electricity and minimizes artificial lighting.
A state-of-the-art raised flooring system incorporates the building’s data and ventilation infrastructure and reduces heating, cooling and ventilation energy costs by 51%.Not only is 525 Golden Gate immediately available for occupancy after an earthquake, but because of the unique concrete shear walls running vertically through the building, any damage should be negligible.Individual air comfort controls at workstations that creates a very pleasant atmosphere for those who work there.
November 4,2014:
A Tour of Conservatory of Flower:
The Potted Plants Gallery:
It holds an ever abundant assortment of Hibiscus, Begonicas, Bromeliads, Cymbidium orchids and unusual vines.
The Lowland Tropics:
It is a steamy jungle of plants that are native to the low-lying tropical forests of countries such as Mexico,Brazil and I ndonesia, in regions below 3000 feet.
The Highland Tropics:
This gallery provides an intimate glimpse of life in the cloud forests of the tropics.
The Aquatic Plants:
From Amazon River to Mekong, the waterways of the tropics are filled with water lilies and lotus.
The conservatory visit is a pleasant and unforgettable journey.
November 5,2014:
A tour of the de Young Museum:
Founded in 1895 in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, the de Young Museum has been an integral part of the cultural fabric of the city and a cherished destination for millions of residents and visitors to the region for over 100 years.
The de Young’s American Art Department is home to one of the finest survey collections of American paintings in the United States. Strengthened by the acquisition of the Rockefeller Collection of American Art, the de Young’s holdings include more than 1000 paintings ranging from 1670 to the present day.
The aesthetics of African art—its bold forms, intense expressionistic aesthetic, and strong sculptural qualities—shook the art world and changed it forever, though few Westerners at that time recognized the complexity of African cultures or knew much about what these objects meant to the peoples who made them.
The de Young has exhibited Oceanic art since it opened in 1895. M.H. de Young and museum supporters purchased works from the California International Midwinter Exposition that still form the core of the Oceanic collection. The strength of this charter collection lay in small groups of objects, including important New Zealand Maori woodcarvings from meetinghouses of that period, as well as in singular works of importance, such as a rare Micronesian figurative weather charm.
The de young showcases American Art from 17th to 21th centuries, international modern and contemporary art, photography and international textiles and costumes.
Also de Young Café, with its inviting view of the Barbro Osher Sculpture Garden, offers soups, salads, sandwiches, and hot entrees available for dining in the café or to take away for an alfresco lunch in the beautiful environs of Golden Gate Park.
November 7,2014:
A tour of San Francisco Botanical Garden:
San Francisco Botanical Garden is a living museum of plants located within Golden Gate Park. The mild mediterranean climate provides the right conditions to grow and conserve plants from all over the world, including some no longer found in their native habitats. Fifty-five acres of sanctuary – featuring both landscaped gardens and open spaces – showcase over 8,000 types of plants from around the world.
A conservator of cloud forest plants from both Mesoamerica and the Andes in South America, the Garden has also been developing the first Southeast Asian cloud forest collection of its kind. Many of these flowering shrubs, trees and impressive plants are rare and endangered, and SFBG is one of the only botanical gardens in the world where these plants can grow outdoors successfully, conserving many plant species. The best times to visit the Mesoamerican collection is November-December; the Andean is September-October; the Southeast Asian is year-round, but note that it is still in development.
A protector of California’s native flora, the Garden features a serene, century-old towering Redwood Grove right in the heart of San Francisco, with understory trees, shrubs and groundcovers, as well as a four-acre, award-winning designed open California landscape, featuring an array of plants thriving in the Mediterranean climate. This popular aspect of the Garden may be enjoyed year-round.
As an important representative of mediterranean habitats worldwide, the Garden displays many rare and unusual plants that flourish in the Bay Area climate, including collections from Australia, California, Chile, the Mediterranean, and South Africa.
Also the Garden is host to the most comprehensive collection of high elevation palm species in any botanical garden, including some that grow up to an elevation of 11,000 feet in their native habitats. Visitors may enjoy the palms year round, and expect to see many of them flower in the next 5-10 years.San Francisco Botanical Garden’s magnolia collection includes 51 species and 33 cultivars, including many prized examples from Asia.
November 13,2014:
A tour of 2014 Cleantech Open Global Forum:
Cleantech is any product or services that improves operational performance,productivity or efficiency while reducing costs, inputs, Energy consumption, waste or environmental pollution. Its origin is the increased consumer, regulatory, and industry interest in clean forms of energy generation—specifically, perhaps, the rise in awareness of global warming, climate change and the impact on the natural environment from the burning of fossil fuels Cleantech is often associated with venture capital funds and land use organizations.
The first keynote speaker was Cathy Zoi, as she mentioned in her speech, “she is a policy person”, a consulting fellow at Stanford Universityand 30 years of experience in the energy sector. Another speaker was an environmentalist and actress, Alexandra Paul. She has been driving electric car since 1990. In her speech, she raised her concern about the pollution by cars that is not taken seriously. She also mentioned that she is an advocate of the smaller family.
There was interesting Tech Demos by a variety of small companies in different categories such as agriculture waste, energy distribution and storage, energy efficiency, energy generation and green building:
Ohio-based Ag-bioscience venture developing a pipeline of biological inoculants, bio-fertilizers, and bio-pesticides designed to help growers of all types of crops improve plant health, yield, and safety while reducing chemical inputs in both conventional and organic systems. Another was enabling small industrial wastewater generators to treat on-site, with a very simple system to install and operate, that requires no chemicals and very little power. Another company developed an air conditioner that controls all aspects of indoor air quality: temperature (up or down), humidity (high or low), cleanliness (to micron level) and bacteriostatic (kills all known bacteria and viruses including SARS). And a company innovating the Residential and commercial buildings built with the materials that consume up to 70% less energy for heating and cooling needs, be highly resistant to earthquakes and strong winds and be mold, mildew and termite proof.
November 14,2014:
A tour of Green Festival:
The largest and longest-running sustainability and green living event in the United States. It was a three-day event. At the festival you could not find the usual plastic and Styrofoam service items. Every exhibitor and vendor was mandated to use only biodegradable service items, or Bio-ware, for all food service and sampling. What this means is that every cup, plate, fork, spoon, bowl, napkin, toothpick, sample cup and food item is 100% compostable. They guaranteed that every last item is composted and returned to the Earth as a safe and fertile soil amendment. If a vendor was using anything but Bio-ware, they could be shut down until they secure the serving materials.
The exhibitors were mostly those with green, natural and organic products and the overall ambiance was in line with the main policy of the Green Festival. But there were also some cases that were merely present for commercial purpose. There were some exhibitors that presented unnatural, low quality products from India. Some visitors who had been interviewed were unhappy about that and raised their concerns. Overall the majority of the visitors were happy with their visit.
Some visitors enjoyed more than 60 organic food and beverage exhibitors and were especially impressed bysome Organic Fruit and Nut Bar flavors. And in one day alone, lots of attendees did test drives of newest electronic vehicles in the Fort Mason parking lot.
November 17, 2014:
A tour of 2014 Topcoder Open
In fact, it is a day of competitions, discussions, demos and fun! The ambiance is very relaxing and educative. It will be a live report: now waiting for the next speaker. Matt Thompson, manager of Microsoft’s Developer and Startup Efforts to begin his Speech: he demonstrated some of his pictures as a photographer and he continued his speech about the Hacker Ethic and he explained about sharing, Openness, decentralization, free access to information and the desire to make things better. Then he discussed that coding is becoming the basic form of learning. He emphasized on coding initiative for students and younger kids.He mentioned that students should be active creators in the global economy, not the passive participants. It was a very interesting lecture, but later he began to emphasize the role of the company that he works for it and even making some exaggerated remarks about his company.
There were some competitions:
Algorithms (competition length about two hours): Competitors are given a set (usually three) of algorithmic problems and have 75 minutes to correctly solve as many as they can.Design (competition length one week): Competitors are given a set of user requirements and attempt to convert them into a usable software design specification. Their efforts are judged on a variety of “real-world” criteria on how correct and practical their design is.Development (competition length one week): Competitors are given a set of design specification and attempt to write software components that match this specification. These components are judged on their functionality and coding style.Marathon Matches (competition length one or two weeks): Contestants are given a particularly difficult algorithmic problem.
The scoring is done by computer based on criteria specifically suited to the
problem.
November 23,2014:
A tour of 2014 Fabric & Trim Show
At the exhibition, the visitors found fabric and trim suppliers with low minimums and flexible ordering options. Also there were some business development seminars. The manufacturing trade association were encouraging the visitors to join by paying annual membership fees and attend in the networking events and sell industry- related items
in the classified section of their website.
There were a variety of colorful fabrics on display by variety of exhibitors. The Premier Prints, Inc exhibited the variety of beautiful and colorful fabrics and attracted the attentions of the visitors; their fabric were all made in USA that ranged from traditional to modern.
Also there was 100 percent wool fabrics in beautiful color exhibited by B Black & sons; their fabrics were Eco-friendly and organic, all made in the US. Also the Hemp Traders with natural coton and 100% hemp fabric exhibited the colorful fabrics.