A fistful of dollars or the sting? Considering academic–industry collaborations in the production of feature films

Increasingly universities and film schools are looking for ways to provide richer experiences for students to enhance their employability as well as find ways to make their programmes stand out in a competitive marketplace. Likewise, economic pressure on commercial feature film production companies, particularly independents, is forcing them to consider alternative means of production and new sources of cost-effective project support. This paper looks at the emergence of formal academic-industry collaboration in the creation, production and support of commercial feature films. Looking at a wide range of examples from collaborations worldwide, it considers three basic models: University as film production company with 'soft' investment; University as film production company with 'hard' investment; and University as film production service provider. It is argued that all three models can be viable but that alignment with corporate and institutional objectives, as well as realistic expectations, are essential to success

A toolkit of mechanism and context independent widgets

Most human-computer interfaces are designed to run on a static platform (e.g. a workstation with a monitor) in a static environment (e.g. an office). However, with mobile devices becoming ubiquitous and capable of running applications similar to those found on static devices, it is no longer valid to design static interfaces. This paper describes a user-interface architecture which allows interactors to be flexible about the way they are presented. This flexibility is defined by the different input and output mechanisms used. An interactor may use different mechanisms depending upon their suitability in the current context, user preference and the resources available for presentation using that mechanism

An Overview of Scientific and Space Weather Results from the Communication/Navigation Outage Forecasting System (C/NOFS) Mission

The Communication/Navigation Outage Forecasting System (C/NOFS) Mission of the Air Force Research Laboratory is described. C/NOFS science objectives may be organized into three categories: (1) to understand physical processes active in the background ionosphere and thermosphere in which plasma instabilities grow; (2) to identify mechanisms that trigger or quench the plasma irregularities responsible for signal degradation; and (3) to determine how the plasma irregularities affect the propagation of electromagnetic waves. The satellite was launched in April, 2008 into a low inclination (13 deg), elliptical (400 x 850 km) orbit. The satellite sensors measure the following parameters in situ: ambient and fluctuating electron densities, AC and DC electric and magnetic fields, ion drifts and large scale ion composition, ion and electron temperatures, and neutral winds. C/NOFS is also equipped with a GPS occultation receiver and a radio beacon. In addition to the satellite sensors, complementary ground-based measurements, theory, and advanced modeling techniques are also important parts of the mission. We report scientific and space weather highlights of the mission after nearly four years in orbi