NMC Horizon Report: 2017 Higher Education Edition

The NMC Horizon Report > 2017 Higher Education Edition is a collaborative effort between the NMC and the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI). This 14th edition describes annual findings from the NMC Horizon Project, an ongoing research project designed to identify and describe emerging technologies likely to have an impact on learning, teaching, and creative inquiry in education. Six key trends, six significant challenges, and six important developments in educational technology are placed directly in the context of their likely impact on the core missions of universities and colleges. The three key sections of this report constitute a reference and straightforward technology-planning guide for educators, higher education leaders, administrators, policymakers, and technologists. It is our hope that this research will help to inform the choices that institutions are making about technology to improve, support, or extend teaching, learning, and creative inquiry in higher education across the globe. All of the topics were selected by an expert panel that represented a range of backgrounds and perspectives

Towards Ubiquitous Semantic Metaverse: Challenges, Approaches, and Opportunities

In recent years, ubiquitous semantic Metaverse has been studied to revolutionize immersive cyber-virtual experiences for augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) users, which leverages advanced semantic understanding and representation to enable seamless, context-aware interactions within mixed-reality environments. This survey focuses on the intelligence and spatio-temporal characteristics of four fundamental system components in ubiquitous semantic Metaverse, i.e., artificial intelligence (AI), spatio-temporal data representation (STDR), semantic Internet of Things (SIoT), and semantic-enhanced digital twin (SDT). We thoroughly survey the representative techniques of the four fundamental system components that enable intelligent, personalized, and context-aware interactions with typical use cases of the ubiquitous semantic Metaverse, such as remote education, work and collaboration, entertainment and socialization, healthcare, and e-commerce marketing. Furthermore, we outline the opportunities for constructing the future ubiquitous semantic Metaverse, including scalability and interoperability, privacy and security, performance measurement and standardization, as well as ethical considerations and responsible AI. Addressing those challenges is important for creating a robust, secure, and ethically sound system environment that offers engaging immersive experiences for the users and AR/VR applications.Comment: 18 pages, 7 figures, 3 table

CHORUS Deliverable 2.1: State of the Art on Multimedia Search Engines

Based on the information provided by European projects and national initiatives related to multimedia search as well as domains experts that participated in the CHORUS Think-thanks and workshops, this document reports on the state of the art related to multimedia content search from, a technical, and socio-economic perspective. The technical perspective includes an up to date view on content based indexing and retrieval technologies, multimedia search in the context of mobile devices and peer-to-peer networks, and an overview of current evaluation and benchmark inititiatives to measure the performance of multimedia search engines. From a socio-economic perspective we inventorize the impact and legal consequences of these technical advances and point out future directions of research

Study of result presentation and interaction for aggregated search

The World Wide Web has always attracted researchers and commercial search engine companies due to the enormous amount of information available on it. "Searching" on web has become an integral part of today's world, and many people rely on it when looking for information. The amount and the diversity of information available on the Web has also increased dramatically. Due to which, the researchers and the search engine companies are making constant efforts in order to make this information accessible to the people effectively. Not only there is an increase in the amount and diversity of information available online, users are now often seeking information on broader topics. Users seeking information on broad topics, gather information from various information sources (e.g, image, video, news, blog, etc). For such information requests, not only web results but results from different document genre and multimedia contents are also becoming relevant. For instance, users' looking for information on "Glasgow" might be interested in web results about Glasgow, Map of Glasgow, Images of Glasgow, News of Glasgow, and so on. Aggregated search aims to provide access to this diverse information in a unified manner by aggregating results from different information sources on a single result page. Hence making information gathering process easier for broad topics. This thesis aims to explore the aggregated search from the users' perspective. The thesis first and foremost focuses on understanding and describing the phenomena related to the users' search process in the context of the aggregated search. The goal is to participate in building theories and in understanding constraints, as well as providing insights into the interface design space. In building this understanding, the thesis focuses on the click-behavior, information need, source relevance, dynamics of search intents. The understanding comes partly from conducting users studies and, from analyzing search engine log data. While the thematic (or topical) relevance of documents is important, this thesis argues that the "source type" (source-orientation) may also be an important dimension in the relevance space for investigating in aggregated search. Therefore, relevance is multi-dimensional (topical and source-orientated) within the context of aggregated search. Results from the study suggest that the effect of the source-orientation was a significant factor in an aggregated search scenario. Hence adds another dimension to the relevance space within the aggregated search scenario. The thesis further presents an effective method which combines rule base and machine learning techniques to identify source-orientation behind a user query. Furthermore, after analyzing log-data from a search engine company and conducting user study experiments, several design issues that may arise with respect to the aggregated search interface are identified. In order to address these issues, suitable design guidelines that can be beneficial from the interface perspective are also suggested. To conclude, aim of this thesis is to explore the emerging aggregated search from users' perspective, since it is a very important for front-end technologies. An additional goal is to provide empirical evidence for influence of aggregated search on users searching behavior, and identify some of the key challenges of aggregated search. During this work several aspects of aggregated search will be uncovered. Furthermore, this thesis will provide a foundations for future research in aggregated search and will highlight the potential research directions

Systems Applications of Social Networks

The aim of this article is to provide an understanding of social networks as a useful addition to the standard tool-box of techniques used by system designers. To this end, we give examples of how data about social links have been collected and used in di erent application contexts. We develop a broad taxonomy-based overview of common properties of social networks, review how they might be used in di erent applications, and point out potential pitfalls where appropriate. We propose a framework, distinguishing between two main types of social network-based user selection-personalised user selection which identi es target users who may be relevant for a given source node, using the social network around the source as a context, and generic user selection or group delimitation, which lters for a set of users who satisfy a set of application requirements based on their social properties. Using this framework, we survey applications of social networks in three typical kinds of application scenarios: recommender systems, content-sharing systems (e.g., P2P or video streaming), and systems which defend against users who abuse the system (e.g., spam or sybil attacks). In each case, we discuss potential directions for future research that involve using social network properties.Comment: Will appear in ACM computing Survey

Persuading users into verifying online fake news

Abstract. Checking authenticity of fake news before sharing online can reduce spread of misinformation. But fact-checking requires cognitive and psychological effort, which people are often not willing to give. Some fact-checking methods might even be counterproductive, entrenching people into their deeply held beliefs. Numerous online fact-checking services have emerged recently which verify false claims to address the issue. While these services are quite efficient technologically, they seriously overlook human behavioral factors associated with fake news. Persuasive systems have been proven successful in attitudinal and behavioral changes, which could be applied here as behavioral interventions for fact-checking. A review of current fact-checking services showed that they significantly lack persuasive features, resulting in a passive and linear user experience. Findings from cognitive science and persuasion literature paved way for development of a fact-checking mobile application that would encourage users into regular fact-checking. Qualitative and quantitative evaluation of the artifact showed promise of persuasion in combating fake news. Social support persuasive features were found most effective, followed by tunnelling and self-monitoring. Implications of these findings and future research directions are discussed

The web 2.0 Internet: Democratized Internet collaborations in the healthcare sector

Les col•laboracions democratitzades a Internet, entenent-les com les eines participatives de la xarxa, o la Web 2.0, afecten en l'actualitat a nombrosos aspectes la nostra vida. Els acadèmics destaquen el potencial de la Web 2.0 per millorar l’aprenentatge o la salut, així com el seu continu impacte en sectors com el de la tecnologia de mitjans de comunicació. També plantegen un gran nombre de qüestions importants als professionals i estudiosos. Per exemple, la consideració crítica de la Web 2.0 com una bombolla o bé com un element més del màrqueting, que necessita d'una determinació del seu abast i naturalesa. Aquest mateix punt és aplicable a l'ús de la Web 2.0 en el sector sanitari, també anomenat com Medicina 2.0 o Sanitat 2.0. Referent a això, considerant el risc que el contingut generat per altres usuaris sigui utilitzat per prendre decisions relatives a la salut, i tenint en compte l'eficàcia no provada de la Web 2.0 com a instrument de la política sanitària, els acadèmics del tema conviden a la definició de millors models que es puguin aplicar a l'ús pràctic d'aquesta eina. Aquesta tesi es centra en l'estudi d'aquestes qüestions fonamentals, en un camp que es mou a gran velocitat, per darrera de la pràctica real, i que requereix la concertació d'una investigació interdisciplinària. Per tant, aquesta tesi incorpora set obres diferents que ofereixen àmplies perspectives sobre l'ús d'eines de col•laboració en la xarxa en el camp de l'atenció sanitària, cadascuna analitzant el tema amb una profunditat suficient com per seguir sent rellevant en un camp en ràpida evolució. Aquestes obres inclouen un examen d'(1) la Web 2.0 i (2) la Medicina 2.0, utilitzant l'anàlisi del contingut de milions de converses de la xarxa per identificar les principals qüestions pràctiques o teòriques i les tensions subjacents a cada concepte. Dos estudis addicionals analitzen (3) com i per què els metges fan servir les eines de la Web 2.0, i (4) com els metges busquen la informació en aquest context en constant moviment com és el d'Internet. Aquests dos estudis es basen en enquestes, diaris i entrevistes amb els metges que treballen en el Servei Nacional de Salut del Regne Unit. Tots dos destaquen resultats importants com ara models per a l'ús de la Medicina 2.0, o contribucions importants a la literatura com la connexió de la recerca cognitiva en la xarxa i la valoració de la informació en xarxa, tots dos camps sense connexió amb anterioritat a aquest treball. Tres estudis addicionals analitzen la web 2.0 des d'una perspectiva organitzacional, incloent (5) un estudi dels models de disseny de l'ús de la Web 2.0 en el sector farmacèutic, el qual detalla els millors models de pràctiques d'ús, i la seva clara relació amb els models de disseny de codi obert, i (6) també les estratègies d'innovació oberta al sector farmacèutic, on les eines de col•laboració en la xarxa permeten aquest tipus d'estratègies. Els dos últims estudis fan servir entrevistes amb 120 executius del sector farmacèutic analitzats a través d'anàlisi temàtic. Tots dos fan contribucions importants a la literatura mitjançant la caracterització de les estratègies d'innovació oberta i les implicacions per generar la capacitat d'absorció en el context d'innovació oberta. L'últim estudi (7) examina la Medicina 2.0 des de la perspectiva dels proveïdors de serveis de salut, per ajudar a la gestió d'ús de la Web 2.0 com un instrument per a millorar l’atenció sanitària. En general, hi ha moltes contribucions importants a la literatura, que en conjunt aconsegueixen ampliar el panorama de la Web 2.0 en l'assistència sanitària, i aporten consideracions especifiques a la literatura que abasta els sistemes d'informació, les ciències de la informació i la informàtica mèdica , així com la innovació oberta i l'estratègia. Las colaboraciones democratizadas en Internet, entendiéndolas como las herramientas participativas de la red o la Web 2.0, afectan en la actualidad a numerosos aspectos nuestra vida. Los académicos destacan el potencial de la Web 2.0 para mejorar el eAprendizaje o la salud, así como su continuo impacto en sectores como el de la tecnología de medios de comunicación. También plantean un gran número de cuestiones importantes a los profesionales y estudiosos. Por ejemplo, la consideración crítica de la Web 2.0 como una burbuja o bien como un elemento más del marketing, que necesita de una determinación de su alcance y naturaleza. Este mismo punto es aplicable al uso de la Web 2.0 en el sector sanitario, también denominado como Medicina 2.0 o Sanitad 2.0. A este respecto y considerando el riesgo de que el contenido generado por otros usuarios sea utilizado para tomar decisiones relativas a la salud, y la eficacia no probada de la Web 2.0 como instrumento de la política sanitaria; los académicos del tema invitan a la definición de mejores modelos que se puedan aplicar al uso práctico de esta herramienta. Esta tesis se centra en el estudio de estas cuestiones fundamentales, en un campo que se mueve a gran velocidad, por detrás de la práctica real, y que requiere la concertación de una investigación interdisciplinaria. Por lo tanto, esta tesis incorpora siete obras distintas que ofrecen amplias perspectivas sobre el uso de herramientas de colaboración en la red en el campo de la atención sanitaria, cada una analizando el tema con una profundidad suficiente como para seguir siendo relevante en un campo en rápida evolución. Estas obras incluyen un examen de (1) la Web 2.0 y (2) la Medicina 2.0, utilizando el análisis del contenido de millones de conversaciones de la red, para identificar las principales cuestiones prácticas o teóricas y las tensiones que subyacen a cada concepto. Dos estudios adicionales analizan (3) cómo y por qué los médicos usan las herramientas de la Web 2.0, y (4) cómo los médicos buscan la información en este contexto en constante movimiento como es el de Internet. Estos dos estudios se basan en encuestas, diarios y entrevistas con los médicos que trabajan en el Servicio Nacional de Salud del Reino Unido. Ambos destacan resultados importantes tales como modelos para el uso de la Medicina 2.0, o contribuciones importantes a la literatura como la conexión de la búsqueda cognitiva en la red y la valoración de la información en red, ambos campos sin conexión con anterioridad al presente trabajo.Tres estudios adicionales analizan la Web 2.0 desde una perspectiva organizacional, incluyendo (5) un estudio de los modelos de diseño del uso de la Web 2.0 en el sector farmacéutico, el cual detalla los mejores modelos de prácticas de uso, y su clara relación con los modelos de diseño de la open source, y (6) y también las estrategias de innovación abierta en el sector farmacéutico donde las herramientas de colaboración en la red permiten este tipo de estrategias. Los dos últimos estudios emplean entrevistas con 120 ejecutivos del sector farmacéutico analizados a través de análisis temático. Ambos hacen contribuciones importantes a la literatura mediante la caracterización de las estrategias de innovación abierta y las implicaciones para generar la capacidad de absorción en el contexto de innovación abierta. El último estudio (7) examina la Medicina 2.0 desde la perspectiva de los proveedores de servicios de salud, para ayudar a la gestión de uso de la Web 2.0 como un instrumento para la gestión de una mejor atención sanitaria. En general, hay muchas contribuciones importantes a la literatura, que en conjunto logran ampliar el panorama de la Web 2.0 en la asistencia sanitaria, y aportan consideraciones específicas a la literatura que abarca los sistemas de información, las ciencias de la información, la informática médica, así como la innovación abierta y la estrategia.Democratized internet collaborations, referring to participatory online tools or Web 2.0, now impact many aspects of people’s lives. Scholars note Web 2.0’s potential to improve eLearning or healthcare, and its ongoing impact in sectors such as tech-media. They also raise a plethora of important questions for practitioners and scholars, such as the criticism of Web 2.0 as hype or marketing term, which necessitates some determination of the scope and nature of Web 2.0. This holds equally for Web 2.0’s use in health care, denoted as Medicine 2.0 or Health 2.0. Moreover, given the risks of people using user-generated content for health decisions, and its unproven effectiveness as a health policy tool, scholars have called for best practice models of use. This thesis addresses these fundamental issues, in a field that is fast moving, behind actual practice, and that requires concerted inter-disciplinary research. Therefore, this thesis incorporates seven distinct works that provide broad perspectives on the use of online collaboration tools in healthcare, each analyzing a specific topic in enough depth to remain relevant in a fast moving field. These works include an examination of (1) Web 2.0 and (2) Medicine 2.0, using content analysis of millions of online conversations to surface the major practical or theoretical issues and tensions that underpin each concept. Two further studies examine (3) how and why doctors use Web 2.0 tools, and (4) how doctors search or forage for information in this evolving internet environment. These two studies rely on surveys, diaries and interviews from doctors working in the UK’s National Health Service (NHS). Both highlight important results, such as models for Medicine 2.0 use, or make important contributions to literature such as connecting the previously separate cognitive online search and internet information judgment literatures. Three further studies examine Web 2.0 from an organizational perspective, including (5) design patterns of Web 2.0’s use in global Pharma, which details best practice models of use and its clear link to Open Source design patterns, and (6) global Pharma’s Open Innovation strategies, where online collaboration tools enable these strategies. The latter two studies employ interviews with 120 pharmaceutical executives analyzed through thematic analysis. They make major contributions to literature by characterizing open innovation strategies and gleaning implications for Absorptive Capacity in the Open Innovation context. The final study (7) examines Medicine 2.0 form the perspective of health service providers, informing management using eHealth as an instrument for improved healthcare management. Overall, there are many major contributions to literature, which together achieve both a broad overview of Web 2.0 in healthcare, but also make specific additions to literature encompassing information systems, information science, medical informatics, and open innovation and strategy

A taxonomy and business analysis for mobile web applications

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, System Design and Management Program, 2009.Includes bibliographical references (p. 113-115).Mobile web applications refer to web applications on mobile devices, aimed at personalizing, integrating, and discovering mobile contents in user contexts. This thesis presents a comprehensive study of mobile web applications by proposing a new taxonomy for mobile web applications, and conducting a business analysis in the field of mobile web applications. The thesis reviews the current surrounding environment for mobile web applications, namely, web 2.0 and 3.0, wireless communication technology, and Smartphone platform. The recent entry and success of Apple's iPhone greatly enhanced the public awareness of the Smartphone technology. Google's release of open-source Android platform and T-Mobile's deployment of Android-powered "Dream" Smartphone not only intensify the competition among suppliers, but also provide an open-source foundation for mobile web applications. This thesis introduces a new mobile web application taxonomy to systematically study the values and the groupings of the mobile web applications. By introducing features and categories, the taxonomy provides a framework so the related companies and businesses can be comparatively analyzed and summarized. Selected case companies are studied in the light of the taxonomy. The thesis discusses the key issues of mobile web aggregation, namely, mobile application development platform, context modeling, mobile user interface, mobile application logic, and mobile web aggregation strategy.(cont.) "System Thinking" is applied to the management of mobile web application business. The market ecosystem, the value proposition, and the revenue model for mobile web application are described. A system dynamic model is constructed to understand the dynamic among the key factors in the mobile web business. Experimental results are reported in the thesis.by Kevin Hao Liu.S.M

Examining older users’ online privacy-enhancing experience from a human-computer interaction perspective

The advancement of Internet technologies, including instant and unlimited access to information and services, has been an excellent source of support for older adults. However, pervasive and continuous online tracking can pose severe threats to older adults’ information privacy. Surprisingly, very few empirical studies have focused on older users’ online privacy-enhancing experience from a Human-Computer Interaction perspective. Therefore, it remains unclear how older users protect their online information privacy and what factors influence their online behaviors. Thus, my thesis aims to study older users’ online privacy-enhancing experience by examining the following questions: 1) what older users know and do to protect their online information privacy, 2) how their emotional state influences their adoption of privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs), and 3) what usability challenges they encounter while using one of the most popular PETs currently available to the public. To examine these questions, a diverse set of empirical approaches was adopted, including a survey, a quasi-experiment, and a usability study. My research findings suggest that three are three elements that play a crucial role in older users' online privacy-enhancing practices. First, older users' knowledge of online privacy has a significant influence on their daily online privacy protection behaviors. In addition, there seems to be a privacy knowledge gap among older users that reveals the phenomenon of ‘Privacy Divide.' Second, the design of privacy-enhancing features affects older users’ emotional state and their attitudes regarding their future adoption of the tool. Third, the findings of usability study indicate that the current design of a privacy- enhancing browsing tool, Tor Browser, poses particular challenges for older users. For instance, the technical terminologies and recurring warning messages have made Tor Browser more difficult for older users to use. These usability challenges not only decrease older users’ satisfaction in but also deter their future adoption of the tool. Therefore, it is crucial that current design of PETs considers older users’ needs. My thesis research contributes to the privacy literature in several ways. First of all, this is the first empirical research examining older users’ actual online privacy protection behaviors. In addition, this thesis includes the very first empirical study that illustrate the importance of the role of emotion in users’ adoption of a privacy-enhancing tool. Furthermore, this thesis provides usability recommendations that can improve the current design of Tor Browser for older user audiences. As the world's aging population continues to grow and advances in Internet technologies progress rapidly, the design of future technologies, from smart homes to self-driving cars, has to adopt user-centered approach, which consider end-users' needs of all age groups. Also, information privacy has become a significant aspect in our digital world, which makes the design of user-friendly privacy-enhancing tools an essential mission ahead of us. Moreover, knowledge and awareness are a key factor in older users’ online privacy- enhancing practices. Henceforth, creating educational programs for older adults is extremely important in protecting their online privacy