"How to calibrate an evolutionary process?"

Prof.dr. Guszti Eiben (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam)

The talk will start with a brief introduction of Evolutionary Algorithms just to put the main subject into perspective. The issue of controlling parameters of an evolutionary algorithm is one of the most important and promising areas of research in evolutionary computation: It has a potential of adjusting the algorithm to the problem on-the-fly while solving the problem (evolution of evolution). In this talk we provide a classification of such control mechanisms revising the terminology and review available technical options.
We illustrate the advantages and the pitfalls of parameter control by two case studies that lead to unexpected results. We conclude with suggesting some directions for further research.

"Dynamics of organisations: design, modelling and simulation"

Prof.dr. Catholijn Jonker (Technische Universiteit Delft)

In this talk we address the design and simulation of new (virtual) organisations and their dynamics, as well as the modelling and simulation of existing organisations and their dynamics. Examples from different domains are discussed, such as incident management and the navy.

"Taming the Terabytes with a Softer Approach to Information Retrieval"

Dr. Eduard Hoenkamp (Universiteit van Maastricht)

Much of today's success in Information Retrieval (IR) comes from a hard approach: employing blazingly fast machines, ever more refined statistics, and increasingly powerful classification schemes. In recent years, however, the hard approach has entered a phase of diminishing returns. This talk demonstrates a softer alternative which, we argue, is still in the phase of increasing returns. As the quality of an IR system is ultimately decided by its users, the approach starts from how these users structure information. Many useful principles are readily available in the cognitive literature, and we illustrate three experiments in which the softer approach lead to significant, immediate, and fundamental results. It shows how prolific the application of cognitive science to the core of IR can be, and we believe that both disciplines stand to benefit from this approach.

"Designing business models and evaluating disruptive innovations"

Prof.dr. Yves Pigneur (Lausanne)

Today’s business environment is characterized by rapid technological change that makes disruptive innovations and new business models possible. A "managing as designing" approach is suggested for defining and evaluating business models. There are three reasons why researchers attending the SIKS day could be interested in this course: (a) It gives a short overview of a scenario-based approach for assessing a technological (ambient intelligence) environment; (b) it presents a rigorous conceptual framework for defining and designing a business model. It shows how this framework can be applied to design a concrete case study; and (c) it describes an analytical instrument for evaluating a business model in its environment and detecting its potential disruptiveness.