Expanding Sales and Operations Planning using Sentiment Analysis: Demand and Sales Clarity from Social Media

We outline the use of sentiment analysis as a tool for demand planning in sales and operations planning (S&OP). First, we explain how S&OP functions and the reliance on cooperation or collaboration with other firms to gain information. We introduce sentiment analysis and show its value in determining marketplace-changes which feed into supply chains. We show how sentiment analysis supports data acquisition independent of other firms in the supply chain; incorporated into S&OP, these data can support preparation for changing requirements. While demonstrated in marketing, this concept remains unproven in supply chain research. We believe this is the first assertion and examination of how sentiment analysis can support effective S&OP but further empirical research is required to validate this concept

Strengthening Connection for People with Intellectual Disability in Emergencies: Social Media and Access to Essential Information

Climate change is increasing the rate and severity of emergency events globally which is having disproportionate impacts on the most marginalised community members, including people with intellectual disability. In an emergency many people with intellectual disability do not have access to the information they need, in formats they understand, to utilise vital services and survive. Concurrently social media has become a vital tool for sharing information and building connections for people with and without disability. This research aims to build a better understanding of how people with intellectual disability engage with social media in an emergency to identify gaps in response efforts and improve emergency messaging

Social Turing Tests: Crowdsourcing Sybil Detection

As popular tools for spreading spam and malware, Sybils (or fake accounts) pose a serious threat to online communities such as Online Social Networks (OSNs). Today, sophisticated attackers are creating realistic Sybils that effectively befriend legitimate users, rendering most automated Sybil detection techniques ineffective. In this paper, we explore the feasibility of a crowdsourced Sybil detection system for OSNs. We conduct a large user study on the ability of humans to detect today's Sybil accounts, using a large corpus of ground-truth Sybil accounts from the Facebook and Renren networks. We analyze detection accuracy by both "experts" and "turkers" under a variety of conditions, and find that while turkers vary significantly in their effectiveness, experts consistently produce near-optimal results. We use these results to drive the design of a multi-tier crowdsourcing Sybil detection system. Using our user study data, we show that this system is scalable, and can be highly effective either as a standalone system or as a complementary technique to current tools

POLARIS: A 30-meter probabilistic soil series map of the contiguous United States

A newcomplete map of soil series probabilities has been produced for the contiguous United States at a 30mspatial resolution. This innovative database, named POLARIS, is constructed using available high-resolution geospatial environmental data and a state-of-the-art machine learning algorithm (DSMART-HPC) to remap the Soil Survey Geographic (SSURGO) database. This 9 billion grid cell database is possible using available high performance computing resources. POLARIS provides a spatially continuous, internally consistent, quantitative prediction of soil series. It offers potential solutions to the primary weaknesses in SSURGO: 1) unmapped areas are gap-filled using survey data from the surrounding regions, 2) the artificial discontinuities at political boundaries are removed, and 3) the use of high resolution environmental covariate data leads to a spatial disaggregation of the coarse polygons. The geospatial environmental covariates that have the largest role in assembling POLARIS over the contiguous United States (CONUS) are fine-scale (30 m) elevation data and coarse-scale (~2 km) estimates of the geographic distribution of uranium, thorium, and potassium. A preliminary validation of POLARIS using the NRCS National Soil Information System (NASIS) database shows variable performance over CONUS. In general, the best performance is obtained at grid cells where DSMART-HPC is most able to reduce the chance of misclassification. The important role of environmental covariates in limiting prediction uncertainty suggests including additional covariates is pivotal to improving POLARIS\u27 accuracy. This database has the potential to improve the modeling of biogeochemical, water, and energy cycles in environmental models; enhance availability of data for precision agriculture; and assist hydrologic monitoring and forecasting to ensure food and water security

Cloud ConsultingCrowdsourcing-Based Framework for ERP Consulting

Information Technology (IT) altered the way of running businesses in all fields. The installation and integration of an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system is a critical process. With the emergence of Web 2.0, many businesses were created or reengineered to gain an advantage from this technology. This offers an enormous network of users with different interests and skills, and support knowledge transfer. Our expectation is that ERP consulting business will be the next to be changed. In this work, a cloud consulting framework will be provided to enhance the services offered based on crowdsourcing. After examining literature on crowdsourcing and ERP consulting, the following research question was stated: “How can cloud consulting employ crowdsourcing to improve ERP consultancy?” Thus, the research objective is to develop a cloud consulting framework for ERP consulting based on crowdsourcing

Socio-Technical Resilience for Community Healthcare

Older adults at home frequently rely on ‘circles of support’ which range from relatives and neighbours, to the voluntary sector, social workers, paid carers, and medical professionals. Creating, maintaining, and coordinating these circles of support has often been done manually and in an ad hoc manner. We argue that a socio-technical system that assists in creating, maintaining, and coordinating circles of support is a key enabler of community healthcare for older adults. In this paper we propose a framework called SERVICE (Socio-Technical Resilience for the Vulnerable) to help represent, reason about, and coordinate these circles of support and strengthen their capacity to deal with variations in care needs and environment. The objective is to make these circles resilient to changes in the needs and circumstances of older adults. Early results show that older adults appreciate the ability to represent and reflect on their circle of support

Socio-Technical Resilience for Community Healthcare

Older adults at home frequently rely on ‘circles of support’ which range from relatives and neighbours, to the voluntary sector, social workers, paid carers, and medical professionals. Creating, maintaining, and coordinating these circles of support has often been done manually and in an ad hoc manner. We argue that a socio-technical system that assists in creating, maintaining, and coordinating circles of support is a key enabler of community healthcare for older adults. In this paper we propose a framework called SERVICE (SocioTechnical Resilience for the Vulnerable) to help represent, reason about, and coordinate these circles of support and strengthen their capacity to deal with variations in care needs and environment. The objective is to make these circles resilient to changes in the needs and circumstances of older adults. Early results show that older adults appreciate the ability to represent and reflect on their circle of support

Why Education and User Feedback Won’t Close the Performance Gap for University Accommodation

It’s often correctly stated that making buildings work requires an educated and engaged end user. This paper presents results from a study of user feedback in student accommodation. Students that volunteered their energy meter readings used 20% less energy than non-participants. However, this did not change before, during, or after the period of enhanced education and feedback. Furthermore, among those that stated higher awareness of energy issues throughout the study, there were no changes in their energy use habits. While it is no doubt true that education and feedback are useful in addressing the performance gap, this research finds two fundamental challenges to implementing such strategies: 1) most feedback is preaching to the converted, and 2) education does not necessarily correspond to action

Ethical issues in the use of surveillance cameras to support ageing in place

Background and Objective: Surveillance technology allows family members to monitor older adults’ daily activities and their interaction with the home environment. In particular, video surveillance cameras and surveillance technology’s implementation raises critical ethical concerns due to their invasive and obtrusive nature. Thus, this paper aims to address the ethical issues regarding the use of video surveillance for older adults to age in place. Methods: A literature review is conducted using Springerlink, Sciencedirect, and PubMed Publications related to older adults’ care, ageing in place, and the use of surveillance technologies were included in this project. Results: A total of 19 publications met the inclusion criteria. Nine ethical issues emerged from the data: informed consent, privacy, conflict of interest, stigmatization and obtrusiveness, homogeneity among older adults, and imbalance relationship. These nine themes were further explored in respect to ethical principles, including autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence, justice and fidelity) Conclusion: Although surveillance cameras can be invasive, well-grounded ethical thinking and proactive response help reduce the risk and ethical challenges associated with it. By examining the ethical issue in video surveillance, it helps to reflect and enhance the current legislation