62,275 research outputs found
Reflections on the introduction of value added tax in the United Kingdom and goods and services tax in New Zealand
Twenty-two years ago (in 1985) the New Zealand (NZ) Goods and Service Tax
(GST) Act was enacted. The Value Added Tax (VAT) in the United Kingdom (UK)
has now been operational for over thirty-four years. VAT and GST are now an
accepted part of taxation policy. Such controversy as remains is concerned with
specific issues rather than the existence of the tax itself. However the specific form
the legislation takes in each country differs and the process of introducing the tax can in hindsight be evaluated in order to analyse the rules, methods and techniques that have proved to be most efficient and effective
Innovation and the Evolution of Market Structure for Internet Access in the United States
How and why did the U.S. commercial Internet access market structure evolve during its first decade? Commercial Internet access market structure arose from a propitious combination of inherited market structures from communications and computing, where a variety of firms already flourished and entrepreneurial norms prevailed. This setting nurtured innovative behavior across such key features as pricing, operational practices, and geographic coverage. Inherited regulatory decisions in communications markets had a nurturing effect on innovative activity. On-going regulatory decisions also shaped the marketâs evolution, sometimes nurturing innovation and sometimes not. This narrative and analysis informs conjectures about several unique features of U.S. market structure and innovative behavior. It also informs policy debates today about the role of regulation in nurturing or discouraging innovation behavior.
Machines and machinations: The integrated care record service in the UK national health service
This paper examines the use of Actor Network Theory (ANT) as a lens to get a better understanding of the implementation of the Integrated Care Record Service (ICRS) in the UK National Health Service (NHS). Actor Network Theory has been deployed in various environments to achieve a better understanding of the roles of not only the humans but also the artifacts that constitute, in this case, healthcare networks of services and organisations. The theory is used as a means of supporting real world interventions, providing a richer understanding of complexities involved and thereby helps management to make better decisions. This study also explores Latourâs concept of machines as machinations, whose role is to translate other actors into the network. We propose ICRS as a fruitful empirical context for the use of ANT to support decision making for actors in health care provision. Actor Network Theory (ANT) is well-suited for use in the socio-technical evaluation of IS into the ICRS project because this approach treats human and non-human actors symmetrically. This approach facilitates a more thorough examination of the ways in which information technology is enabled or restricted in social processes
Generating Feedback Reports for Adults Taking Basic Skills Tests
SkillSum is an Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Natural Language Generation (NLG) system that produces short feedback reports for people who are taking online tests which check their basic literacy and numeracy skills. In this paper, we describe the SkillSum system and application, focusing on three challenges which we believe are important ones for many systems which try to generate feedback reports from Web-based tests: choosing content based on very limited data, generating appropriate texts for people with varied levels of literacy and knowledge, and integrating the web-based system with existing assessment and support procedures
Four domains of complexity
In this short paper, which reflects on one of my contributions to the systems literature in 1992 (Pluralism and the Legitimation of Systems Science), I discuss the context at that time. Systems scientists were embroiled in a paradigm war, which threatened to fragment the systems research community. This is relevant, not only to understanding my 1992 contribution, but also because the same paradigms are evident in the complexity science community, and therefore it potentially faces the same risk of fragmentation. Having explained the context, I then go on to discuss my proposed solution to the paradigm war: that there are four domains of complexity, three of which reflect the competing paradigms. The problem comes when researchers say that inquiry into just one of these domains is valid. However, when we recognise all four as part of a new theory of complexity, we can view them as complementary. The four domains are natural world complexity, or âwhat isâ (where the ideal of inquiry is truth); social world complexity, or the complexity of âwhat ought to beâ in relation to actual or potential action (where the ideal of inquiry is rightness); subjective world complexity, or the complexity of what any individual (the self or another) is thinking, intending or feeling (where the ideal of inquiry is understanding subjectivity); and the complexity of interactions between elements of the other domains of complexity in the context of research and intervention practice. Following a discussion of the relevance of this theory for complexity scientists, I end the paper with a final critical reflection on my 1992 paper, pointing to some theoretical assumptions and terminology that I would, in retrospect, revise
Firewatch: Use of Sattelite Imagery by Remote\ud Communities in Northern Australia for Fire Risk\ud Communications.
This paper presents the contextual background and early findings from a new research project funded by the Australian Research Council titled Using community engagement and enhanced visual information to promote FireWatch satellite communications as a support for collaborative decision-making. FireWatch (provided by Landgate in Western Australia) is an internet-based public information service based on near real time satellite data showing timely information relevant to bushfire safety within Australia. However, it has been developed in a highly technical environment and is currently used chiefly by\ud
experts. This project aims to redesign FireWatch for ordinary users and to engage a remote community in Northern Australia in this process, leading to improved decision making surrounding bushfire risk
Shifting Spatialities of Power: The Case of Australasian Aviation
This paper explores how different modalities, spatialities and scales of power operate in a geopolitical context. By tracing the dynamic and shifting economic geographies of state and firm power in the events leading up to the collapse of a major Australian firm, Ansett Airlines, it reveals the difference that place and position make to the creation and use of power. The paper stresses agentsâ relational positioning, their âplacesâ in multiple networks of association and the ways in which their past actions and visions of the future condition their strategic options. The paper contextualises the workings of power and explores how power relationships are re-configured in specific contested events. It concludes that power cannot be
separated from the spatial and temporal dimensions of actual contexts, from actorâs positions in contexts, or from their strategic objective
Composability in quantum cryptography
In this article, we review several aspects of composability in the context of
quantum cryptography. The first part is devoted to key distribution. We discuss
the security criteria that a quantum key distribution protocol must fulfill to
allow its safe use within a larger security application (e.g., for secure
message transmission). To illustrate the practical use of composability, we
show how to generate a continuous key stream by sequentially composing rounds
of a quantum key distribution protocol. In a second part, we take a more
general point of view, which is necessary for the study of cryptographic
situations involving, for example, mutually distrustful parties. We explain the
universal composability framework and state the composition theorem which
guarantees that secure protocols can securely be composed to larger
applicationsComment: 18 pages, 2 figure
FutureGRID: A Program for long-term research into GRID systems architecture
Proceedings of the 2003 UK e-Science All Hands Meeting, 31st August - 3rd September, Nottingham UKThis is a project to carry out research into long-term GRID architecture, in the University of Cambridge
Computer Laboratory and the Cambridge eScience Center, with support from the Microsoft Research
Laboratory, Cambridge.
It is part of a larger vision for future systems architectures for public computing platforms, including
both scientitic GRID and commodity level computing such as games, peer2peer computing and storage
services and so forth, based on work in the laboratories in recent years into massively scaleable distributed systems for storage, computation, content distribution and collaboration[26]
Identification and Comparison of Gray Literature in Two Polar Libraries: Australian Antarctic Division and Scott Polar Research Institute
Gray literature collections were investigated and compared at the libraries of the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD) and the Scott Polar Research Institute (SPRI) in order to improve accessibility. These collections are important to Arctic and Antarctic researchers, but are problematic because they are not well documented, often have limited access, and are arranged by subject using a classification system specific to polar libraries. Tangible results of the project include estimates of the number of gray literature items in the polar subject categories for the two libraries, along with a template of a userâs finding aid to these collections.
In addition, 172 sources from four Antarctic expeditions in the early part of the 20th century were selected as a representative sample; 64 from AAD and 108 from SPRI. While small, the sample was a focused topic with enough variety of materials to provide good examples for accessibility issues. Inquiries are continually received at AAD and SPRI for information related to these four expeditions, so improved access will be beneficial for both researchers and the two institutions. Making the material more available is also very timely, anticipating renewed interest from the public with the approaching centennial celebrations of two of the expeditions coming up in 2010 and 2011.
Despite the similar subject nature of the collections, only ten items were duplicated in the two libraries. Solutions for improving access, such as linking the gray literature collections to broader initiatives are addressed in more detail in the final report. Providing the references in a metadata format to include in an online catalog or linked to a website will increase visibility and use of the materials. Suggestions for improving the arrangement of the materials and reducing duplication within the collections are also discussed in the final report available on my blog. http://www.consortiumlibrary.org/blogs/dcarle/sabbatical/Summary / Project Background / Project Methodology Part I / Results Part I / Project Methodology and Results Part II / Discussion and Recommendations / Additional Activities / Additional Accomplishments / Additional Professional Activities / Project Goals Not Completed/ Benefitsof Sabbatical / Conclusion and Acknowledgement
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