New perspectives after 7 years of research in recommender systemsMartín López NoresDepartment of Telematics EngineeringUniversity of Vigo (Spain)

My educational backgroundI got the Telecommunications Engineering degree in the

University of Vigo in July 2003.1st National Award for Outstanding Graduates of the Year.

I got the Ph.D. in Computer Science in November 2006.No awards this time

I achieved the Master’s Degree in Telematics Engineering in 2007.

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My teaching experience I started as an assistant professor in February 2004.I became an associate professor 6 years later.

… but there is yet one more step to consolidate my position.In 7 years of teaching, I have touched many different topics:

Computer architectures.Programming.Operating systems.Computer networks.Switching systems.Queueing theory.Internet technologies and services.

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My research activities• My Ph.D. thesis was about formal methods applied to the

specification and operation of telematic systems.• Implementation of interaction patterns for multiuser systems.• Management of communications in mobile ad-hoc networks.

• By the time I got the degree, I had published:• 16 papers in international conferences.• 5 articles in SCI-indexed journals.

• Then I moved on to research on recommender systems and personalization technologies.• I started producing twice as many publications per year. • Often with greater impact, too.

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Why the increase?

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• Formal methods were no longer a hot topic.• After decades of research, it was comparatively hard

to really come up with something new.• On the contrary, recommender systems represented a

brand new paradigm, with plenty of possibilities.• There was real demand for research in this area, to

fight the problem of information overload.• Indeed, it was necessary to come up with new

applications in all areas of computer science.• Technology was much more advanced that our use of it.

It is essential to choose a propitious

theme for a Ph.D.!!!!!

A quick overview (I)

• My group’s research in recommender systems started out with the AVATAR system (2004), aimed at identifying the most interesting TV programs for each viewer.• Content-based and collaborative filtering strategies

grounded on semantic reasoning.• Classical similarity metrics.

• Ontology-based modelling of items and users.• TV-Anytime metadata.

• Implicit and explicit forms of feedback.6

A quick overview (II)

• In 2007, we started working on MiSPOT, aimed at selecting the most suitable items to advertise during TV programs.• New modules to reason about the suitability of the

items in the different scenes.• TV-Anytime + MPEG-7 + eCl@ss metadata.

• Possibilities to link the ads to interactive applications.• To browse details of the recommended products, purchase

them online, etc.

• Solutions for receiver-side personalization.• Pruning of the ontologies by relevance criteria, stereotypes,

etc.7

A quick overview (and III)• Lately, we have been using MiSPOT as the framework to

try new ideas:• Content-based filtering with spreading activation.• Modeling the influence of time on the

recommendations.• Temporal functions linked to nodes of the ontologies.

• Reckoning that the influence of time may be different for different types of users.• Stereotype-driven corrections of the temporal functions.

• Integrating electronic health records as another dimension of the user profiles.• Combinations of the above.

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What’s ahead?• We are running out of ideas on how to improve MiSPOT

even further.• The situation is much like the one I suffered with formal

methods 5 or 6 years ago.• Indeed, it seems that recommender systems are also

ceasing to be a hot topic by themselves.It is time to

move on to a fresher area!

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•Social networks are everywhere, and there seems to be plenty of space for innovation within Facebook and the like.

• Also, smartphones have taken mobile applications to a new dimension.

• The increasing availability of broadband connectivity is

leading to an era of cloud computing and lightweight clients.

The new buzzwords

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• New challenges for semantics-based personalization:

• Gaining insight huge loads of unstructured information.• Reasoning about multiple dimensions of context:

location, emotions, environmental conditions, etc.• Exploiting social relationships and word of mouth.• Personalization beyond content selection: automatic

formation of groups of people, automatic composition of interactive experiences…

• …

• Curiously, these advances create a propitious scenario to revisit long-existing areas of research:

• After all, Web 2.0 (the social web) is conceptually before Web 3.0 (the semantic web), isn’t it?

• Likewise, geolocation capabilities were supposed to be the cornerstone of context-awareness and pervasive computing.

It’s not only about new topics…• For many years, research activities were evaluated, essentially,

in terms of:• Kilograms of printed pages.• A priori numbers (impact factors and the like).

• Nobody will be fooled by these criteria any longer.• Instead, the economic crisis is making institutions consider the

real interest that the research has raised:• In other researchers: number of references collected by

publications; number of downloads of software packages…• In the industry: technology transfer results, privately-funded R&D

projects, patents, products in the market, spin-offs created, …

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My suggestions• Don’t focus too much on degrees and papers.• Think of the university as a propitious context to get

inspiration for new ideas…• … and to make valuable contacts that can help you in

making them real!• Take advantage of the fact that you can study.• If you get a grant, remember that someone is investing

in you.• Take some time to think what topics you really want to

explore.• Try to be ambitious and creative, not “continuative”.• Be enthusiastic.

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One context for new research in Vigo

• Our group is currently offering a position for Ph.D. students within the CLOUDIA project.• “Social ecosystem for the ubiquitous and personalized provision

of services in the cloud”.• Conditions:• An FPI grant of the Spanish government.• 4 years, starting in late 2011.• About 1,200€ (gross) per month during the first two years, and

over 16,500€ (gross) per year over years 3 and 4. • Possibility to apply for travel and subsistence for short stays (2-6

months per year) in other research centers.

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A possibility for minor collaborations

• I am leading a project to develop a kind of "social shop" in Facebook.• Selling batches of products allows to offer lower prices per unit.• We will act to gather the necessary number of purchasers in time,

having interested people to propagate the offers.

• We have requested patents for the service, and the aim is to launch it commercially by the end of 2011.• A prototype should be ready by the end of March.• However, we still need reasoning mechanisms to identify the set

of users who will get the offers directly from us.• We must define measures of (i) each user's potential interest in

the products and (ii) his/her potential influence on other people. 14

SMAP 2011

• The 6th International Workshop on Semantic Multimedia Adaptation and Personalization will be held in Vigo.• December 1st and 2nd, 2011.

• Focused topics, and a clear commitment to quality.• By attending, you will have the opportunity to

learn about the works and ideas of a very active community.

• We are waiting for your submissions! 15

Thank you!mlnores@det.uvigo.es