Interactive product browsing and configuration using remote augmented reality sales services

Real-time remote sales assistance is an underdeveloped component of online sales services. Solutions involving web page text chat, telephony and video support prove problematic when seeking to remotely guide customers in their sales processes, especially with configurations of physically complex artefacts. Recently, there has been great interest in the application of virtual worlds and augmented reality to create synthetic environments for remote sales of physical artefacts. However, there is a lack of analysis and development of appropriate software services to support these processes. We extend our previous work with the detailed design of configuration context services to support the management of an interactive sales session using augmented reality. We detail the context and configuration services required, presenting a novel data service streaming configuration information to the vendor for business analytics. We expect that a fully implemented configuration management service, based on our design, will improve the remote sales experience for both customers and vendors alike via analysis of the streamed information

Developing the ArchAIDE Application: A digital workflow for identifying, organising and sharing archaeological pottery using automated image recognition

Pottery is of fundamental importance for understanding archaeological contexts, facilitating the understanding of production, trade flows, and social interactions. Pottery characterisation and the classification of ceramics is still a manual process, reliant on analogue catalogues created by specialists, held in archives and libraries. The ArchAIDE project worked to streamline, optimise and economise the mundane aspects of these processes, using the latest automatic image recognition technology, while retaining key decision points necessary to create trusted results. Specifically, ArchAIDE worked to support classification and interpretation work (during both fieldwork and post-excavation analysis) with an innovative app for tablets and smartphones. This article summarises the work of this three-year project, funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement N.693548, with a consortium of partners representing both the academic and industry-led ICT (Information and Communications Technology) domains, and the academic and development-led archaeology domains. The collaborative work of the archaeological and technical partners created a pipeline where potsherds are photographed, their characteristics compared against a trained neural network, and the results returned with suggested matches from a comparative collection with typical pottery types and characteristics. Once the correct type is identified, all relevant information for that type is linked to the new sherd and stored within a database that can be shared online. ArchAIDE integrated a variety of novel and best-practice approaches, both in the creation of the app, and the communication of the project to a range of stakeholders

Evaluation of Use of Social Media in Marketing Communication Activities of Institutions

Rapidly evolving technology has led to the differentiation of communication tools used by institutions and brands in marketing communication activities. Social media with low-cost, fast feedback providing a possibility to access large masses in a shorter time with Web 2.0 technology has become a preferred tool for brands. In this study the concepts of social networks and social media is explained within the scope of communication studies, in relation with public relations, advertisement, and sales promotion. In the scope of the research; it has been benefited from the statistical information inferred from the data based on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram during 1-31 January 2018 period by SocialBrands, which measures more than 25 thousand brands’ social media performances. Social media marketing communications studies of two of the successful brands in home decoration sector in Turkey, Madam Coco and English Home, have been analyzed by the data of SocialBrands. It has been tried to explain that brands become more successful in brand communications with social media through which they find the measurable and fast opportunity to determine their target audience

Applying vision-based pose estimation in a telerehabilitation application

In this paper, an augmented reality mirror application using vision-based human pose detection based on vision-based pose detection called ExerCam is presented. ExerCam does not need any special controllers or sensors for its operation, as it works with a simple RGB camera (webcam type), which makes the application totally accessible and low cost. This application also has a system for managing patients, tasks and games via the web, with which a therapist can manage their patients in a ubiquitous and totally remote way. As a final conclusion of the article, it can be inferred that the application developed is viable as a telerehabilitation tool, as it has the resource of a task mode for the calculation of the range of motion (ROM) and, on the other hand, a game mode to encourage patients to improve their performance during the therapy, with positive results obtained in this aspect.This work has been partially supported by the Spanish State Research Agency, under project grant AriSe2: FINe (Ref. PID2020-116329GB-C22/AEI/10.13039/501100011033), the Spanish Government projects “GenoVision” (Ref. BFU2017-88300-C2-2-R), the “Research Programme for Groups of Scientific Excellence in the Region of Murcia” of the Seneca Foundation (Agency for Science and Technology in the Region of Murcia—19895/GERM/15) and HORECOV2 (Ref: 2I20SAE00082_HORECOV2) of Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER)

Business plan for a local accommodation management company: creation of a business plan for a company specialized in the management of properties for local accommodation in Lisbon

The tourism sector is one of the main drivers of economic activity in Lisbon, which became a safe and attractive destination for tourists from all over the world. One of the fastest growing segments within the tourism sector in Lisbon is Local Accommodation, which contributed to over 20% of overnight stays in the region during 2019. This segment, which allows home and apartment owners in the city to monetize their properties through temporary accommodation for tourists, has been the target of growing interest from visitors and investors, as evidenced by sharp increases in overnight stays and registrations of new properties in recent years. This growth trend was halted in the beginning of 2020, with the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced an almost total shutdown of the tourism sector for much of the first half of 2020. The economic impact caused by the pandemic and the consequent financial crisis are expected to be long and especially hard for the tourism sector. The project at hand, is aimed at creating a brand specialized in managing properties for the accommodation of tourists in a local accommodation regime, with its implementation to occur on a post-crisis phase, at a time of economic recovery and resumption of tourism activity. The business plan presented in this project describes the business idea, the main strategies and the project implementation plan, based on a detailed market analysis.O setor turístico é um dos principais motores económicos para a região de Lisboa, que se tem vindo a destacar como um destino seguro e apelativo para turistas de todo o mundo. Um dos segmentos com maior crescimento dentro do setor turístico em Lisboa é o do Alojamento Local, que contribuiu para mais de 20% das dormidas na região, em 2019. Este segmento, que permite que proprietários de casas e apartamentos na cidade rentabilizem as suas propriedades através do alojamento temporário de turistas, tem sido alvo de um crescente interesse da parte de visitantes e investidores, comprovado por aumentos acentuados de dormidas e registos de novas propriedades em anos recentes. Esta tendência de crescimento foi contrariada no início de 2020, com o surgimento da pandemia COVID-19, que obrigou a uma paralisação quase total do setor turístico durante grande parte do primeiro semestre de 2020. É previsível que o impacto económico causado pela pandemia e a consequente crise financeira sejam duradouros e especialmente duros para o setor turístico. O presente projeto, com vista à criação de uma marca especializada na gestão de propriedades para acomodação de turistas em regime de alojamento local, apresenta um modelo de negócio a implementar numa fase posterior à crise, num momento de recuperação económica e retoma da atividade turística. O Plano de Negócio apresentado neste projeto descreve a ideia de negócio, as principais estratégicas e o plano de implementação do projeto, tendo por base uma análise de mercado detalhad

Animators of Atlanta: Layering Authenticity in the Creative Industries

This dissertation explores post-authentic neoliberal animation production culture, tracing the ways authenticity is used as a resource to garner professional autonomy and security during precarious times. Animators engage in two modes of production, the first in creating animated content, and the other in constructing a professional identity. Analyzing animator discourse allows for a nuanced exploration of how these processes interact and congeal into common sense. The use of digital software impacts the animator’s capacity to legitimize themselves as creatives and experts, traditional tools become vital for signifying creative authenticity in a professional environment. The practice of decorating one’s desk functions as a tactic to layer creative authenticity, but the meaning of this ritual is changing now that studios shift to open spaces while many animators work from home. Layering authenticity on-screen often requires blending techniques from classical Hollywood cinema into animated performance, concomitant with a bid to legitimate the role of the authentic interlocutor for the character. Increasingly animators feel pressure to layer authenticity online, establishing an audience as a means to hedge against precarity. The recombined self must balance the many methods for layering creative and professional authenticity with the constraints and affordances of their tools, along with the demands of the studio, to yield cultural capital vital for an animator’s survival in an industry defined at once by its limitless expressive potential and economic uncertainty

Let Me Take a #Shelfie: An Assemblage Explored Through Framing

As emerging technologies rapidly change the way that individuals socially interact, researchers can look back to older theories of social organization in order to apply traditional concepts to new ways of being. A #shelfie is a popular hashtag used on Instagram, a social media application, typically used with a post that consist of any visual media containing book(s) or item(s) related to literature in a physical space within, around, and/or upon a piece of furniture. This thesis is centered around the examination of a data collection that gathered top #shelfie posts on Instagram for the purpose of visual content and textual analysis. I argue that users are performing and constructing identities using curated #shelfies that actually span beyond the original typical bookshelf content, that this particular content is being utilized mostly by users identifying as women, and that it highlights areas of multiple framing occurring at the same time through Instagram and the objects being posted. My thesis is anchored within a multi-disciplinary framework that utilizes Erving Goffman’s theories of self and framing, cultural materialism as framing from scholars such as Daniel Miller, and that this analysis can be understood in a Deleuzian lens by examining how assemblage theory can help to navigate what #shelfie is, how it was produced, and what it may mean for future studies of digital media and the self. There will be no pixel left unturned

Digital Fishes - An Interactive Virtual Aquarium

This work is supported by AUIP - Asociación Universitaria Iberoamericana de PostgradoThis work describes the creation of an interactive virtual aquarium, Digital Fishes, with a physical representation in a cubic fish tank with synchronized visual information and animated elements, such as fish and vegetation, which can be used for educational purposes. Here the solution to simulate the movement of marine flora and fauna added to our virtual Aquarium is described. An implementation of the fish behavior, to move in groups using the Boids algorithm, is created, in addition to autonomous behaviors such as chasing prey and fleeing from predators, interactive behaviors such as following the finger on the screen and going towards the food that the user may throw in the pond. The solution described in this work has managed to bring into the hands of children an interactive virtual representation of an interactive as one more learning tool at their disposal. These children who participated in the Digital Fishes Interactive Aquarium's evaluation provided positive feedback, showing great enthusiasm and positively assessed the solution