Archive

Posts Tagged ‘AIIP’

Google Carousel – a roundabout of images but not for all searches

September 28, 2012 Leave a comment

Every Wednesday, Daniel Russell, a researcher working with Google, posts a search question on his search & research blog. The search question for 26 September 2012 related to differences between the coastlines on the East and West coasts of the USA. Attempting to answer the question I typed in [Atlantic islands] into Google. Unlike the usual list I’d expected, I got this:

Google Carousel for Atlantic Islands

(Click for full size image)

The images at the top of my search were a surprise. Clicking on the arrows gave me further images – totalling 55 island pictures. I tried a few other searches [Pacific Islands], [Indian Ocean Islands], etc. and found similar results. Yet most searches such as [Scottish Islands] gave me the normal type of listing.

Search for Scottish Islands

(Click for full size image)

Intrigued, I contacted a couple of colleagues – Karen Blakeman of RBA Information Services and Marydee Ojala, Editor of Online magazine (and the Online Insider blog). Both Karen and Marydee are also members of the Association of Independent Information Professionals and like so many AIIP members, are expert searchers. (All three of us are presenting at the forthcoming Internet Librarian Conference  in London and led the London Websearch Academy in 2011).

Marydee admitted to being bemused but guessed it was connected to Google’s Knowledge Graph initiative – the new service that puts details on a search topic to the right of the search results – as with this example search for [Albert Einstein].

Albert Einstein Search

(Click for full size image)

Knowledge Graph was launched by Google in May 2012 and aims to give instant answers to many encyclopedia type search queries. However this didn’t explain what I’d found. Marydee looked a bit further and found that the TechCrunch blog had discovered this earlier in September.

I mentioned that I’d found it because of Dan Russell’s blog and Marydee asked him about the new feature. Dan responded that the “carousel” of images is triggered whenever Google knows about a collection or group of connected items such as “Atlantic Islands”. The group is then summarised and made available at the top of the results list – allowing searchers to quickly recognise the collection and the other group members.

So that’s it then! It’s a new feature giving a “carousel” of images. If you search for [knowledge graph carousel] you get the above Techcrunch link and also Google’s own search blog on the topic . (There’s a lesson here – always check Google’s own blog posts if you spot what looks like odd Google behaviour). A search for [Knowledge graph] gives Google’s own description of the feature, including a YouTube video explaining it.

Dan Russell’s reply however said more:

What it triggers on is a bit more problematic.  Answer:  only collections we know about, which can be a bit odd.  [moons of Saturn] but not [U.S. presidents].  [famous jazz composers] works, but not [cities in UAE]

This seems to explain why not all searches show the carousel. [Atlantic Islands] does. So does [Pacific Islands] but [Islands] doesn’t. [Greek Islands] is mentioned as an example in the YouTube video – but the less touristy [Scottish Islands] fails to show the carousel. It’s not just islands that give oddly inconsistent results. [Famous Jazz composers] results in the carousel appearing but [famous composers] gives a normal display. [20th century composers] works as does [19th century composers]. Bizarrely [18th century composers] doesn’t work and nor does [20th century artists] or [19th century artists]. Yet [impressionist artists] and [surrealist artists] do work. The results definitely seem surreal!

The TechCrunch blog tested the feature looking at rides at the Cedar Point theme park in Northern Ohio. I decided to ride the carousel on Disney parks. Again the results were odd – but a pattern seemed to emerge. [Disneyland rides], [Epcot rides], [Magic Kingdom Rides] all worked but [Disneyworld rides] didn’t. I then tried [Disney Paris Rides]. That works. So does [Disney California Rides]. However [Disney Florida Rides], [Disney Tokyo Rides] and [Disney Hong Kong Rides] all failed to work.

It seems as if there are two factors playing out here. The first is whether Google knows enough about the topic to create a set of common images. My guess is that Disney Hong Kong and Tokyo fail on that count – and possibly this explains why 18th century composers also fails. That can’t however explain the difference between Disney California and Paris, compared to Disney Florida. That brings in the second factor: the number of items in the collection. There are several Disney World theme parks for Disney Florida – Epcot, Magic Kingdom and more. I suspect that there are too many rides to be displayed in a meaningful manner. The aim of the Carousel is to encourage exploration – and a never-ending list tends to do the opposite: like a carousel that goes to fast, there is a risk that people may fall off.

Telling stories – fairy tales, case-studies & scenarios….

April 14, 2011 5 comments

Telling Stories - At the ICI/Atelis competitive intelligence conference that took place last week (April 6-7, 2011) in Bad Nauheim, Germany there was a panel discussion on story-telling as a method of reporting intelligence. At about the same time, the Association of Independent Information Professionals (AIIP) held their 25th annual conference in Vancouver, Washington in the USA. Mary-Ellen Bates described how stories can help information professionals market themselves by showing how their skills can solve client problems. The fact that both conferences looked at story-telling shows how businesses are adopting the technique as a way of addressing complex issues.

Story telling is an ancient art-form that might seem strange as a business tool. However, often stories will be an excellent approach for solving business questions as they allow people to look at a situation objectively, remove themselves from the scene and take an outside view. The trick is to tell the right story, catching the imagination and making people think. During the ICI / Atelis conference I suggested a framework for when different story styles can be used.

The first story type is the “fairy-tale” – the “Once Upon a Time in a Kingdom Far Away” type of story. Fairy-tales are possibly the most abstract example of a story that can be applicable to business. The danger is that they can be seen as childish and far-removed from real-world business realities. In fact, they can be a powerful way of highlighting deep-seated organisational problems, as management refusal to see such problems can be illustrated with stories. Such stories can help managers recognise their own situation, and so identify the problems and think of possible solutions.

Consider a company where the CEO or other senior management refuse to see that their business has changed.  Often such management grew up in the industry and believe that they know it inside out. Accepting that things have changed is anathema to them. A standard comment given by such managers when asked why things are done in a particular way is “We’ve always done it that way“. Essentially such management suffers from corporate denial – or what Ben Gilad called a business taboo in his book “Business Blindspots“.

Telling such managers a fairy-tale story can help them see the problem (assuming that you can arrange a session they will be willing to attend).

Once upon a time, in a far-away country there was a king who loved to sing. He loved to sing so much that he made laws that all his people were to learn his favourite songs.

Every Sunday, the people were to gather in the town squares and village greens and sing the songs the king loved.  The people were happy as they also loved the music and they prided themselves as being the most musical people in the world.

One day, a travelling minstrel sailed into the the kingdom from across the sea – singing a new song. Soon, children started to sing this new song, followed by their parents, and word reached the king that the people were no longer singing the king’s songs but were singing something different.

The king flew into a rage, and put the minstrel into a deep and dark dungeon. However this didn’t stop the minstrel singing – and soon the guards started to sing the new song. The king then made laws saying the new song lacked harmony, was discordant, and that anybody caught singing it would be severely punished.

Gradually the people became unhappier. They liked the new song and wanted to sing it along with the old songs. Instead they stopped singing – and the king got angrier and angrier that his songs were no longer being sung. He tried to force people to sing, but they just sang out-of-tune. He made new laws that said they had to sing on Sundays and Mondays, but found that lots of people said they’d lost their voices from singing so much and so couldn’t sing on Sundays or Mondays. And so the king also got unhappier as he no longer heard his songs being sung as in the past….

The basic lesson for a story such as this is to accept and embrace change – rejecting change is likely to be self-defeating. There are many companies and industries that fail in this – the music industry being a classic example, that lost out by refusing to recognise the impact of music downloading, Napster, iTunes and peer-to-peer file sharing. A fairy-story can help highlight the problems – although the solution will need to come from full discussion and management acceptance.

The second story-type is the traditional case-study. Case studies should be used where the organisation knows the problem, but not the solution. Finding the solution directly is difficult as management is too close to the situation. The case-study serves as a way of examining the problem dispassionately, by looking at a parallel situation involving a company or organisation, from another industry, or market. The aim is to analyse the problem and work out appropriate strategies to solve the problem and apply them to the real situation. The key for a case-study is to find one that matches the organisation’s problems. There is a vast bank of case-studies for a range of industries, topics and problems at the Case Study Clearing House.

A third story-type are future scenarios, generally generated as part of a scenario-planning exercise. Such stories attempt to answer “what if” questions by looking at external factors and their correlations and impacts, and then considering how these could play out in the future. It is essential that such scenarios are internally consistent and that there is a clear line of development from the current situation to the future scenario. This can then allow for strategies to be put in place that take into account what could happen. Such strategies need to be adaptable to changing situations and allow for organisations to prepare for any eventuality.

As a reporting approach, telling stories is one way of putting across ideas that stimulate the imagination, and so can help organisations develop strategies that lead to success. There is a common theme to all three story types: problem identification, its acceptance and the need for strategies to cope with change. They differ in their perspective on the world. The fairy-tale approach looks at understanding problems and overcoming blindspots that relate to the past imposing on the present; case studies look at solving present problems; scenarios are aimed at preparing organisations for the future.

Emotional responses

May 26, 2008 Leave a comment

I’ve not posted anything for months – not because I’ve not had things to post, but because of work pressures, and perhaps also not having anything I thought worth posting.

That’s not to say that things haven’t happened – but others will have posted on the London Online conference, the SCIP annual and European conferences in San Diego and Bad Nauheim, Germany, and the AIIP annual conference in Pittsburgh. I attended all – and each was worthwhile in its own way. (My favorite was AIIP – but then this is such a great organisation anyway!).

In the last few months I’ve also been to China where I led a workshop on CI, and on a personal level, celebrated my oldest nephew’s wedding in Jerusalem and saw the loss of my father a month later.

So what has prompted this post?

Well I try and link ideas to marketing and competitive intelligence. Those who know me will know that one of the areas I specialise in is competitive intelligence analysis and game theory. My talk at SCIP Europe (and also at the SCIP 2007 conference) was on Game Theory.

One of the areas I emphasise is that when looking at a competitor you should try and look at things from their perspective. Just because something looks stupid or illogical to you doesn’t neccssarily mean that it is stupid and illogical. It could also be that the competitor is viewing something from a different angle to you – and that if you switched viewpoints it would make perfect sense. Developing an ability to switch perspectives could save you $, £, €, or ¥ as it should lead to greater anticipation of how competitors are likely to respond and thus better and more effective strategies. The assumption is that competitors behave logically, and choose strategies based on the information and knowledge they currently have.

There is, however, an exception to this. Sometimes a competitor can be blinded by hatred, greed, fear, or another strong emotion. In such cases their decisions are likely to be stupid and illogical as they can’t see reality and instead, they base what they do on their emotionally biased view of the world.

As a result, when looking at a competitor it is also important to look for any emotional aspect in their decision making. Is this leading to how they behave or react? If it is, then you can use it against them to win out. Of course the same applies to you – and it’s important that you make decisions that are not based on emotional reasons. Decisions need to be made based on facts, evidence and logic – anything else will lead to vulnerabilities that can be attacked by a competitor.

There are many examples of companies that have made poor decisions based on emotion: a classic is the failure of the 2000 Time Warner – AOL merger, which was partly driven by Time Warner management’s fear of being left behind in a digital world. In fact many mergers fail as they are not really motivated by logic but more by fear of being left behind or greed – seeing acquisition as the best way to grow.

So when looking at a competitor, you need to

  1. assume that they are behaving logically – try to see things from their perspective
  2. consider that they may be acting emotionally, and not basing decisions on fact and logic.

Which of these two applies will depend on the pattern of decision making, the decisions made, and the competitor’s management. Part of the job of the CI analyst is to step back from their own emotional perspectives and, dispassionately, look at the competitor and decide what has led to their decisions and strategies: logic or emotion.

I still haven’t answered what prompted these thoughts.

Generally I try to understand the opinions and views of people with whom I disagree – and accept that often there is a valid rationale to these views. I fervently disagree with Islamic terrorist groups, and I totally support Israel. At the same time, I understand the view of the Palestinians and believe that they have a case. I understand the Islamic religious view of Hamas that Israel is occupied Islamic land and that only Islamic rule is valid. I don’t personally agree with this – but I accept that from some Islamic perspectives (not all) this is logical as it follows some Koranic precepts. So I’m applying my rule above of trying to understand the other side, and looking at things from their perspective.

I can even apply this (with difficulty) to some terrorist actions in Europe and the USA. The attacks on 911 were reprehensible, evil and criminal. However using the above principles I can understand these actions – as they fall into a logical pattern.

  1. Western Values represent an attack on Islamic values.
  2. Western Values are winning out – even in Islamic society.
  3. For Islamic values to triumph, Western values must be destroyed, so that the world realises that it’s only true Islamic values that will lead to human peace and happiness.
  4. What the West calls terrorism is actually a misnomer – and is, in fact, an attempt by true Muslim believers to alert their own governments to how they’ve been led astray, while at the same time to destroy the forces that are doing this – leading to a growth in Islamic values and beliefs.

What I fail to understand however, is how a follower of any religion can take advantage of people with mental problems and use them for terrorist activity. One of the basic principles behind all religions: Christian, Jewish, Islamic, Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist… is the protection of less-well-off and weaker members of society. They teach that it is a major sin to take advantage of such people.

The recent bomb attempt in Exeter, England, when an Islamic convert who was reportedly mentally ill, with low IQ and suffering from Aspergers, was so radicalised that he was preparing bombs to use to maim and kill people, suggests that the people behind him were not acting under any religious framework at all – but were driven by emotions only: hatred and fear. Worse, they bring shame on true Islamic believers, and through their actions will lead even more people to see Islam as an evil creed that only destroys and has no respect for the poor, sick and down-trodden. This is false! So called “Imams” who believe that they can recruit victims like poor Nicky Reilly have desecrated Islam and the teachings in the Koran and Hadith, and should be denounced by all true Muslims as false.

It’s April – so it must be Spring, SCIP and AIIP

April 20, 2007 Leave a comment

April is a peak time for information professionals. There are two major industry events – and AWARE managing partner – Arthur Weiss – can be seen at both.

The first is the Association of Independent Information Professionals (AIIP) annual conference – taking place this year in sunny Minneapolis. The second is the Society of Competitive Intelligence Professional’s conference – a week later, in New York.

Both are major events on the calendar – and major networking opportunities. Networking is a crucial skill for info-pros – and it pays off. A few years ago I helped out a colleague and she has now put me in touch with WS Radio who just interviewed me on my role as a CI professional. You can listen to the broadcast now: Radio Interview with WSRadio.

What better proof of the power of networking than being heard on a network 🙂 I hope that you enjoy listening to the show as much as I enjoyed participating in it.