From Business Understanding to Deployment: An application of Machine Learning Algorithms to Forecast Customer Visits per Hour to a Fast-Casual Restaurant in Dublin

This research project identifies the significant factors that affects the number of customer visits to a fast-casual restaurant every hour and proceeds to develop several machine learning models to forecast customer visits. The core value proposition of fast-casual restaurants is quality food delivered at speed which means they have to prepare meals in advance of customers visit but the problem with this approach is in forecasting future demand, under estimating demand could lead to inadequate meal preparation which would leave customers unsatisfied while over estimation of demand could lead to wastage especially with restaurants having to comply with food safety regulations whereby heated food not consumed within 90 minutes has to be discarded. Hourly forecasting of demand as opposed to monthly or even daily forecasting is important to help the manager of the fast-casual restaurant optimize resources and reduce wastage. Approaches to forecasting demand can be broadly categorized into qualitative and quantitative methods. Quantitative methods can be further divided into time series and regression-based methods. The regression-based approach which is used for this study enabled the researcher to gather data on several factors hypothesized to have an impact on the number of customer visits to the fast-casual restaurant every hour, carry out an experiment to test for the significance of these factors and to develop several predictive machine learning models capable of predicting the number of customer visits every hour. The results of the experiments carried out shows that hour, day, public holidays, temperature, humidity, rain and windspeed are significant factors in predicting the number of hourly customer visits. Multiple linear regression, regression tree, random forest and gradient boosting machine learning algorithms were also trained to predict the number of customer visits with the Gradient boosting algorithm achieving the lowest Mean Absolute Percentage Error(MAPE) of 18.82%

An Automated Negotiation System for eCommerce Store Owners to Enable Flexible Product Pricing

If a store owner wishes to sell a product online, they traditionally have two options for deciding on a price. They can sell the product at a fixesd price like the products sold on sites like Amazon, or they can put the product in an auction and let demand from customers drive the final sales price like the products sold on sites like eBay. Both options have their pros and cons. An alternative option for deciding on a final sales price for the product is to enable negotiation on the product. With this, there is a dynamic nature to the price; each customer can negotiate with the store owner on the price which allows the final sales price to both change over time and on a customer by customer basis. The issue with enabling negotiation in the context of eCommerce is the time investment needed from the store owner. A store owner cannot negotiate every time an offer comes in from a potential customer, the potential time investment would not be acceptable. Using software agents to automate the process of negotiation for the seller is a potential solution to enabling negotiation in eCommerce for store owners. In this research, a system such as the one just described is developed in a way that mirrors real life negotiations more closely and after evaluation, is found to be a potential solution for the enabling of negotiation in eCommerce

Tailored for the gram: a technocultural analysis of Nigerian Igbo women fashion designers' self-presentation on Instagram

Includes bibliographical references.2022 Fall.Using African Technocultural Feminist Theory, this study uncovered the ways Nigerian Igbo women fashion designers use Instagram and its affordances to perform digital identities online as well as examined their negotiation of patriarchal ideologies within Igbo culture. The Critical Technocultural Discourse Analysis (CTDA) of Instagram posts and interview data revealed Nigerian Igbo women fashion designers employed self-promotion and cultural digitization of Igbo-centric fashion in their self-presentation online. Instagram's affordance of photos allowed them post visually appealing pictures which showcased the intricacies of their designs as well as facilitated the designers' cultural digitalization of Igbo-centric fashion while creating space to challenge patriarchal structures within Igbo culture. The analysis also showed Nigerian Igbo women fashion designers value building and maintaining professional relationships with their clients as they embodied visual aesthetics, relatability, and authenticity in their self-presentation online. Implications, recommendations, and limitations were discussed

Corporate Social Responsibility in the Diamond Mining Industry on the West Coast of South Africa

the study was aimed at seeing how communities benefit from minin

Feathers and tuxedos: an analysis of political cartoons about Indian gaming

Feathers and Tuxedos: An Analysis of Political Cartoons About Indian Gaming is an exploration into the changing stereotypes of Indians in illustrated media. Beginning with general issues such as poverty and media coverage, this thesis continues to cover chronologically the origins of modern Indian gaming and the resulting expenditure of profits into social welfare of the tribes and the continuous three-way battle between state, federal, and Indian sovereign rights. Normative U.S. societal reactions to Indian gaming are contrasted with their Indian counterpoints. Cartoons allow for a visual representation of contested relationships, including recent imagery of well-to-do entrepreneurs profiting at the expense of the surrounding communities. Mainstream media cartoon illustrations of wealthy Indians reveal a threatened counterimage of whiteness. Cartoons released through Indian media, on the other hand, present as rebuttal, images of white anxiety as a continuation of past injustices. The issues of power underlying white aggression represent the latest tactic in the undermining of Indian sovereignty. The ensuing Indian defense involves negotiations of identity

II-II Wa (Traditional Marriage): Towards the Typologies of Marriage in Ogoni Traditional Philosophy

Every society has its own norms, values and morals, which help them to structure their universe. Among the Ogoni indigenous people, the centrality of ii-ii wa (traditional marriage) as the nucleus of society is the under guiding factor for their comprehensive marriage rites. To the Ogoni indigenous people, marriage is a sacred institution, inextricably attached to the Ogoni traditional religion. It is a process rather than a discrete event that marks one’s transition from one stage of life to another; it involves rituals, negotiations, and transactions that stretch over years. It is a community practice within which the values of a community are shaped and preserved. However, the eventual contact with the western culture through colonialism, christianity, education and, with the subsequent upsurge of globalization, reflects the diffusion of modern orientations and ideologies. These values are not only being challenged but also eroded. Consequently, this onslaught brings into question the place of the Ogoni cultural values and marriage system amidst modernization. This study, therefore, centers on the organized system of the Ogoni traditional marriage forms in relation to specific underlying dimensions, attributes and categories. The study further distinguishes between Bia-k̅, biabe and the assumed Sira-culture that do not exist in Ogoni cultural practices. In analyzing the subject matter, the study adopts the descriptive research design, using the philosophical approach, with special reference to the structural functionalism and the diffusion of innovation theories. Through the research effort it was observed that the fortunes of marriage and family institutions are dwindling due to the emerging trends of individualism, loosed morality, materialism and intrusion of foreign ideas into marriage and family system in Ogoni. Hence, the need to respect, project and protect those core Ogoni traditional marriage values. Keywords: II-II-Wa (traditional marriage), family values, religion, social chang

A Soulful Egg Can Break a Rock: A Case Study of a South Korean Social Movement Leader\u27s Rhetoric

This dissertation introduces and analyzes Ven. Hyemoon’s rhetoric emanating from his leadership of the civic group, the Committee for the Return of Korean Cultural Property in South Korea. On the surface, he seems focused on retrieving cultural artifacts, pillaged by the Japanese colonial invasion. His work, upon deeper analysis, emerges to be about regaining a Korean cultural and national identity that is historically grounded, civically engaged and morally reflective. This study is informed by multiple theories (i.e., framing, narrative, social semiotics, critical geography, rhetoric, and social movement) to examine aspects of a phenomenon in depth – involving nationalism, social movement, rhetoric, repatriation, colonialism, and cultural resources – that work together to dissect or dismantle the complex construction of meanings and processes of specific social movement rhetoric. The central focus is on the examination of Hyemoon’s discursive construction of what it means to be authentic Koreans within the context of South Korea situated within a post-colonial, post-cold war, and post-democratizing movement as well as within global capitalism. The primary focus is on how historical, cultural, and moral landscapes mediated by Korean cultural artifacts are constructed and represented to the public in Hyemoon’s rhetoric and performance. In particular, the ways in which Korean collective-identity landscapes are depicted by relating cultural artifacts to specific places in history is considered. Moreover, the study examines discursive and performative practices and strategies that Hyemoon has adopted and developed to construct and represent his message by using linguistic, visual, and other material signs and symbols. Each chapter explores Hyemoon’s discourse by adopting different theories and focusing on specific events. The study concludes that Hyemoon’s discourse and performance appeals to the Korean public, engaging this audience in associating particular cultural assets with experiential, historic, and social collective memory. Most importantly, he reframes the meaning of cultural artifacts while also searching for cultural assets in terms of morality and civic agency. By offering a new interpretive framework, this work also finds that Hyemoon’s activism is effective in specific historic, political contexts of South Korea, in particular during the extension of the previous democratization social movement that had become quiescent

The making of a new South African craft : township craft and development discourse in post-apartheid Cape Town

Includes bibliographical references (leaves 90-93).The author discusses postdevelopment theory by exploring unintentional effects of development practices in Cape Town's craft scene. A heterodox research design is adopted, drawing on Pierre Bourdieu's ideas on cultural production, notions of authenticity, representation and the modern/traditional dichotomy as well as thoughts on the making of a New South African identity. This is applied to the dynamics of Cape Town's craft scene in the pursuit of answering four research questions: (i) What role does the township play in the image of post-apartheid South Africa? (ii) How does development discourse contribute to the re-imagining of post-apartheid South Africa through 'township craft'? (iii) Is development discourse conducive to maintaining and creating tensions between centres and peripheries in the New South Africa? (iv) To what extent can a heterodox research design contribute to the postdevelopment debate? Through the socio-semiotic analysis of qualitative data obtained from interviews with fourteen stakeholders in Cape Town's craft scene as well as observations made at sites, where 'township craft' is presented and/or produced, the author is able to give three main insights in relation to the stated questions: (i) The image of the township, represented through cultural commodities, plays a crucial role as a place of creativity and positive change in the making of a post-apartheid identity. (ii) Development discourse manifests itself in the making of a New South African identity through material culture in the form of 'township craft' and its conceptual as well as spatial contexts. (iii) The use of development discourse in the making and marketing of 'township craft' in combination with supposedly 'common knowledge' about the art/craft divide has the potential to create and maintain patterns of inequality between producers and sellers of 'township craft'. A recommendation is made to explore further possibilities of heterodox research designs for studies using a postdevelopment theoretical framework

Dialogical Skirmishes

Tan was guest editor for 'And Now China?', a special print edition of the Ctrl+P journal, which critically responded to the celebratory rhetoric’s of ‘China Now’ and other celebratory markers of China's global ascent in 2008. As well as the introductory article 'Dialogical Skirmishes', Tan also interviewed Hans Ulrich Obrist