Modelling In-Store Consumer Behaviour Using Machine Learning and Digital Signage Audience Measurement Data

Audience adaptive digital signage is a new emerging tech- nology, where public broadcasting displays adapt their content to the audience demographic and temporal features. The collected audience measurement data can be used as a unique basis for statistical analysis of viewing patterns, interactive display applications and also for further research and observer modelling. Here, we use machine learning methods on real-world digital signage viewership data to predict consumer behav- iour in a retail environment, especially oriented towards the purchase decision process and the roles in purchasing situations. A case study is performed on data from a small retail shop where demographic and audience data of 1294 store customers were collected, manually verified and analysed. Among all customers, 246 store customers were involved in a buying process that resulted in an actual purchase. Comparison of different machine learning methods shows that by using support vector machines we can predict with 88.6 % classification accuracy whether a customer will actually make a purchase, which outperforms classification accuracy of a baseline (majority) classifier by 7.5%. A similar approach can also be used to predict the roles of an individual in the purchase decision process. We show that by extending the audience measurement dataset with additional heuristic features, the support vector machines classifier on average improves the classification accuracy of a baseline classifier by 15 %

Design Thinking as Heterogeneous Engineering: Emerging Design Methods in Meme Warfare

The shift of production of material artefacts to digital and online making has been greatly disruptive to material culture. Design has typically concerned itself with studying material cultures in order to develop a better understanding of the ways people go about shaping the world around them. This thesis contributes to this space by looking at an emerging form of artefact generation in digital and online making, namely, visual communication design in online information warfare. Developing understanding of participation in this space reveals possible trajectory of working with material culture as it increasingly becomes digital and online. Marshall McLuhan wrote in 1970 that “World War 3 is a guerrilla information war with no division between military and civilian participation” (p. 66), anticipating ubiquitous symmetrical capacity of users as both producers and consumers of information through communication technology. This space has emerged as our digital and online environment, and prominent in this environment are images with characteristics of visual communication design. It appears that the trajectory of visual communication design from the late 19t h century is moving toward ubiquitous making and exchanging of visual communication, as anyone with a smartphone can make an internet meme with worldwide reach and influence

The influence of marketing communications on the youth's adoption of m-payments in KwaZulu-Natal.

Doctoral Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban.There has been poor subscription and usage of m-payments in the recent past in South Africa (RSA), especially with the failure of Vodacom M-Pesa and MTN Mobile Money. Presumably, this is attributed to a lack of knowledge on the functionality and benefits of such services and the fact that ‘cash is king’. This study places integrated marketing communications (IMC) at the centre of the adoption of m-payments, as it plays a key role in informing users on the effect of reducing user uncertainties and risks as knowledge structures are built. The study adopted a survey research design to determine the influence of IMC on the adoption and use of mpayments among the youth in KwaZulu-Natal. The questionnaire utilised in the study adopted scale items from constructs embedded within the Unified Technology Acceptance and Use Theory 2 (UTAUT2) and the communication performance construct, to obtain quantitative data. Quota sampling was used to draw a sample of 383 respondents from three institutions of higher learning located in the cities of Durban and Pietermaritzburg. With a 73% response rate, analysis of the gathered data was carried out using descriptive and inferential techniques. Hypotheses were tested using multiple linear regression, Student’s t Test, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modelling, so as to refine and develop a conceptual model. The structural model was found to have a good fit with all but two hypotheses-linked paths being statistically significant and hence supported. IMC measured in the form of communication performance was found to have a strong direct positive impact on the risk factors (functional risk, social influence, price value and facilitating conditions). Communication performance had the greatest positive impact on price value, suggesting that the youth are a rational user market segment with a need for utilitarian motivation within m-payment purchase or use situations, regardless of gender. This study explored the relationship between IMC and innovation adoption, thereby extending the body of knowledge in a multidisciplinary field of marketing and information technology, producing a model that may be used in probing m-payments use behaviour from a marketing perspective. Key words: Integrated marketing communications, mobile payments, structural equation modelling, technology adoption, youth market.List of Exhibits on page xvi of thesis

Next generation analytics for open pervasive display networks

Public displays and digital signs are becoming increasingly widely deployed as many spaces move towards becoming highly interactive and augmented environments. Market trends suggest further significant increases in the number of digital signs and both researchers and commercial entities are working on designing and developing novel uses for this technology. Given the level of investment, it is increasingly important to be able to understand the effectiveness of public displays. Current state-of-the-art analytics technology is limited in the extent to which it addresses the challenges that arise from display deployments becoming open (increasing numbers of stakeholders), networked (viewer engagement across devices and locations) and pervasive (high density of displays and sensing technology leading to potential privacy threats for viewers). In this thesis, we provide the first exploration into achieving next generation display analytics in the context of open pervasive display networks. In particular, we investigated three areas of challenge: analytics data capture, reporting and automated use of analytics data. Drawing on the increasing number of stakeholders, we conducted an extensive review of related work to identify data that can be captured by individual stakeholders of a display network, and highlighted the opportunities for gaining insights by combining datasets owned by different stakeholders. Additionally, we identified the importance of viewer-centric analytics that use traditional display-oriented analytics data combined with viewer mobility patterns to produce entirely new sets of analytics reports. We explored a range of approaches to generating viewer-centric analytics including the use of mobility models as a way to create 'synthetic analytics' - an approach that provides highly detailed analytics whilst preserving viewer privacy. We created a collection of novel viewer-centric analytics reports providing insights into how viewers experience a large network of pervasive displays including reports regarding the effectiveness of displays, the visibility of content across the display network, and the visibility of content to viewers. We further identified additional reports specific to those display networks that support the delivery of personalised content to viewers. Additionally, we highlighted the similarities between digital signage and Web analytics and introduced novel forms of digital signage analytics reports created by leveraging existing Web analytics engines. Whilst the majority of analytics systems focus solely on the capture and reporting of analytics insights, we additionally explored the automated use of analytics data. One of the challenges in open pervasive display networks is accommodating potentially competing content scheduling constraints and requirements that originate from the large number of stakeholders - in addition to contextual changes that may originate from analytics insights. To address these challenges, we designed and developed the first lottery scheduling approach for digital signage providing a means to accommodate potentially conflicting scheduling constraints, and supporting context- and event-based scheduling based on analytics data fed back into the digital sign. In order to evaluate the set of systems and approaches presented in this thesis, we conducted large-scale, long-term trials allowing us to show both the technical feasibility of the systems developed and provide insights into the accuracy and performance of different analytics capture technologies. Our work provides a set of tools and techniques for next generation digital signage analytics and lays the foundation for more general people-centric analytics that go beyond the domain of digital signs and enable unique analytical insights and understanding into how users interact across the physical and digital world

Application-driven visual computing towards industry 4.0 2018

245 p.La Tesis recoge contribuciones en tres campos: 1. Agentes Virtuales Interactivos: autónomos, modulares, escalables, ubicuos y atractivos para el usuario. Estos IVA pueden interactuar con los usuarios de manera natural.2. Entornos de RV/RA Inmersivos: RV en la planificación de la producción, el diseño de producto, la simulación de procesos, pruebas y verificación. El Operario Virtual muestra cómo la RV y los Co-bots pueden trabajar en un entorno seguro. En el Operario Aumentado la RA muestra información relevante al trabajador de una manera no intrusiva. 3. Gestión Interactiva de Modelos 3D: gestión online y visualización de modelos CAD multimedia, mediante conversión automática de modelos CAD a la Web. La tecnología Web3D permite la visualización e interacción de estos modelos en dispositivos móviles de baja potencia.Además, estas contribuciones han permitido analizar los desafíos presentados por Industry 4.0. La tesis ha contribuido a proporcionar una prueba de concepto para algunos de esos desafíos: en factores humanos, simulación, visualización e integración de modelos

Methodological-technological framework for construction 4.0

The construction industry has traditionally been characterised by the high diversity of its agents and processes, high resistance to change and low incorporation of technology compared to manufacturing industries. However, the construction sector is experiencing now a strong renovation process in methodology and tools due to the incorporation of the Building Information Modelling, Lean Construction and Integrated Project Delivery. Meanwhile, in production systems, “Industry 4.0” is a new paradigm that proposes automation, monitoring, sensorisation, robotisation, and digitalisation to improve production and distribution processes. In this context, some authors have proposed the concept of “Construction 4.0” as the counterpart of Industry 4.0 for the construction sector, although the methodological-technological implications are not clear. This research shows a methodological-technological framework adapted to the Architecture, Engineering, Construction, and Operations industry. This papers includes a detailed proposal for a reference frameworks and related technologies that could impact on this sector, responding to its complexities and specific challenges, such as the unique spaces for each work, which are difficult to standardise, arbitrary cost overruns and a productivity far below the average for other industries, increasing competitiveness and globalisation, as opposed to its traditionally local deployment, and an increasing demand to reduce the carbon footprint for all its activities

30th International Conference on Information Modelling and Knowledge Bases

Information modelling is becoming more and more important topic for researchers, designers, and users of information systems. The amount and complexity of information itself, the number of abstraction levels of information, and the size of databases and knowledge bases are continuously growing. Conceptual modelling is one of the sub-areas of information modelling. The aim of this conference is to bring together experts from different areas of computer science and other disciplines, who have a common interest in understanding and solving problems on information modelling and knowledge bases, as well as applying the results of research to practice. We also aim to recognize and study new areas on modelling and knowledge bases to which more attention should be paid. Therefore philosophy and logic, cognitive science, knowledge management, linguistics and management science are relevant areas, too. In the conference, there will be three categories of presentations, i.e. full papers, short papers and position papers