Recent Videos posted to Information and decision systems on MIT Video

Meet 2011 TR35 Winner Alina Oprea

Wed, 30 Nov 2011 05:00:00 GMT

Oprea describes her work at EmTech 2011: Guaranteeing cloud security RSA Laboratories PROBLEM: Cloud computing offers numerous advantages to businesses and individuals by enabling them to store data and run websites on remote computers rather than ones they own. But many hesitate to use the technology for fear of what might happen if a cloud provider's systems aren't secured properly or break down. SOLUTION: Software created by Alina Oprea, a researcher at RSA Laboratories in Cambridge, Massachusetts, can guarantee users that their data hasn't been tampered with and won't become inaccessible. For her 2007 PhD thesis, she developed a digital fingerprint capable of quickly verifying that data stored in the cloud hasn't been maliciously altered or accidentally corrupted. Then, at RSA, Oprea helped create HAIL, a technology that lets users divide data among multiple cloud providers in such a way that if one provider goes offline, the missing information can be reconstructed from the data stored by the others. Learn more: http://techre.vu/xoJ0AA

Impact of Context on Information Spreading

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 18:00:38 GMT

Wang Dashun from Northeastern Univ.

METHODS FOR CLUSTERING MULTI-LAYER GRAPHS IN MOBILE NETWORKS

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 17:58:10 GMT

Nikolai Nefedov from the Nokia Research Center in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Fellows: Crowd-Sourcing the Evaluation of an Overlapping Community Model based on the Cohesion Measure

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 17:55:59 GMT

Adrien Friggeri (INRIA)

Stochastic Blockmodels with Growing Number of Classes

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 17:53:24 GMT

David S. Choi of Harvard presents.

Robustness and limited modular information in networks

Wed, 27 Jul 2011 20:52:40 GMT

James P. Bagrow from Northeastern Univ. presents

Computing global social balance in large-scale signed social networks

Wed, 27 Jul 2011 20:30:24 GMT

Claudio Altafini from SISSA International School for Advanced Studies in Trieste, Italy presents.

A Personalized Trip to the Grocery Store

Mon, 25 Apr 2011 04:00:00 GMT

Technology Review IT editor Erica Naone visits a Stop & Shop in Braintree, Massachusetts, to test Modiv Media's new iPhone app. This lets consumers shop using a smart phone and serves up personalized offers when they do.

The Future of Digital Commons

Thu, 22 Sep 2005 04:00:00 GMT

Nancy Kranich says the debate boils down to this: "Is information a public good or a commodity?" The more profit to be made, the higher the tension. Kranich envisions an "information society of the 21st century," where the ruling metaphor is the commons: information is neither public nor private but something shared. Intellectual assets are not given away but managed "to sustain communities of interest," and to foster free expression, creativity, innovation and democracy. Ideas, unlike popsicles, do not disappear once they are consumed, Ann Wolpert notes. And the resources of the academic world are intended to be used repeatedly -- exchanged and enhanced. Wolpert finds particularly threatening the notion of extending copyright law to the work of academics. Ideas should not "be stuffed in the same box as Mickey Mouse," she says. The internet has fundamentally changed the flow of information, and while it has encouraged a greater degree of "social sharing," it is now threatened by market forces, which insist on controlling and realizing profit from ideas. Asserts Wolpert, "Neither the academy nor society can tolerate tight control over movement of information. For knowledge to advance, production and distribution systems can and should occur outside the tightly controlled, capital intensive publishing system." Steven Pinker admits that "as both a consumer and producer of information," he has not resolved the conflicting demands of distributing his research freely, and making a living from it. "There is the question of how many ' books would I write if I didn't get a check in the mail from the publisher every once in while." He warns against designing and promoting an information commons that relies exclusively on generosity, openness and inclusiveness -- human nature being what it is. However, Pinker finds hope in such models as Apple's iTunes, with its micropayments to download music, and Wikipedia the online, participatory encyclopedia where people engage in uncompensated activity for the prestige of making "accurate and useful entries" in a shared online resource. Participants: Nancy Kranich, Former President, American Library Association; Guest Lecturer; Ann Wolpert, Director of Libraries; Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology; Harvard University Event date: 09/22/2005 Host(s): School of Humanities, Arts & Social Sciences, Communications Forum