HIIT Update 2/2003

Headlines in this issue:

- FOREWORD
- HIIT LAUNCHES THREE PROJECTS IN THE FENIX PROGRAMME OF TEKES
- SEARCH-INA-BOX (SIB)
- MOBILE CONTENT COMMUNITIES (MC2)
- INTELLIGENT WEB SERVICES
- WIRNE PROJECT LAUNCHED WITH EKAHAU
- ALVIS CEC PROPOSAL CLEARS TECHNICAL EVALUATION, ENTERS CONTRACT NEGOTIATION
- HIIT ORGANIZES INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP ON MOBILE IPR
- THIRD HELSINKI-BERKELEY SUMMER SCHOOL HELD
- JUKKA KEMPPINEN BECOMES PROFESSOR AT LUT
- SENIOR PERSONNEL NEWS: DR. JAN LINDSTRÖM AND DR. TIMO SAARI JOIN HIIT
- MERVI RANTANEN NOMINATED AS PLANNING OFFICER AT HIIT
- FUTURE EVENTS

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FOREWORD

This issue of HIIT Update can report in commencing several important new projects. A major feature of the new projects is networking: they will mainly be executed by consortia where HIIT joins forces with research groups from other universities in Finland and internationally.

I am especially pleased to be able to report that HIIT can start project co-operation with the Department of Computer Science and Technology of the high reputed Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. It is equally satisfying that two of the projects include co-operation with out long-term partner, the School of Information Management and Systems (SIMS) at the University of California at Berkeley.

HIIT also participated actively in the highly competitive first call of applications of the Sixth Framework Programme of the European Union. The ALVIS proposal, coordinated by HIIT, has now cleared the technical evaluation with high marks and has presently entered project negotiations. The project is expected to launch in January 2004, thus becoming the first major CEC research project of HIIT. Further proposals are presently being prepared for the second call due in October 2003.

These and other important developments keep HIIT on the path of becoming an internationally recognized research centre. They also mean that we will be facing new types of challenges, such as learning how to orchestrate and coordinate research networks so that the objectives of the new research activities can be met while combining the talents and competences of each partner in a most fruitful way.

Martti Mäntylä
Director of HIIT, Advanced Research Unit

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HIIT LAUNCHES THREE PROJECTS IN THE FENIX PROGRAMME OF TEKES

The new TEKES programme FENIX was launched during the Spring 2003, with the first call of research projects closing on 31.3.2003. HIIT submitted several proposals to the call. Three of them were eventually successful, and have been launched during the Summer 2003.

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SEARCH-INA-BOX (SIB)

The project Search-ina-Box (SIB) is intended to form a central part of the next-generation Internet search research area at HIIT, already commenced with the support of the Academy of Finland in the PROSE project. SIB will study especially topic-specific search engines for intranets. Besides researchers from the Complex System Computation group at HIIT, the research consortium also includes research groups from the University of Tampere, the School of Information Management and Systems (SIMS) at the University of California at Berkeley, and the Department of Computer Science and Technology at the Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. The project was launched on March 1st, 2003.

For more information, please contact Professor Henry Tirri, University of Helsinki and HIIT, or Program Coordinator Mikko Kontiainen, or see the project WWW page at http://cosco.hiit.fi/sib/.

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MOBILE CONTENT COMMUNITIES (MC2)

The Mobile Content Communities project investigates communities that create and distribute digital content amongst themselves, with special emphasis on mobile game communities. The multi-disciplinary research consortium also includes researchers from the Software Business and Engineering Institute (SoberIT) at HUT, the Center for Knowledge and Innovation Research (CKIR) at the Helsinki School of Economics, the University of Tampere, the School of Information Management and Systems (SIMS) at the University of California at Berkeley, and the MIT Media Labs both from Boston and Dublin. The project was launched on June 1st, 2003.

For more information, please contact Senior Research Scientist Marko Turpeinen, HIIT, or Program Coordinator Anton Puolakka, or see the project's WWW pages at http://pong.hiit.fi.

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INTELLIGENT WEB SERVICES

The project Intelligent Web Services investigates how Semantic Web techniques can be used to add content and intelligent features to Web Services based on open standards such as UDDI, WSDL, and SOAP. The project is planned to be one of the activities in a group of independent but closely aligned projects studying different aspects of next-generation digital service creation and deployment. The project was launched on August 1st, 2003.

For more information, please contact Professor Eero Hyvönen, University of Helsinki and HIIT, or Program Coordinator Anton Puolakka, or see the project's WWW pages at http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/group/seco/webservices/.

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WIRNE PROJECT LAUNCHED WITH EKAHAU

The project WIRNE: Personalized Location-Dependent Services in Wireless Networks, was launched on March 1st, 2003, with funding from Ekahau Oy. The project's research will focus on developing intelligent technologies that can be used in future location-aware applications.

For more information, please contact Professor Petri Myllymäki.

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ALVIS CEC PROPOSAL CLEARS TECHNICAL EVALUATION, ENTERS CONTRACT NEGOTIATION

HIIT coordinated and submitted the proposal ALVIS: European Search Engine for the first call of applications of the Sixth Framework Programme of the European Union on April 24, 2003. The proposal cleared the technical evaluation conducted during May and June, 2003, with high marks, and entered project negotiation stage in July, 2003. The official "go/no-go" decision will be given on 15th October. If the decision is positive, the project is likely to be launched in January, 2004. In addition to leading European research groups, the project's consortium also includes the data base research group from the Department of Computer Science and Technology of the Tsinghua University in Beijing, China.

The project belongs to the Next Generation Search cluster of HIIT, together with the existing PROSE and SIB projects. ALVIS complements their research by focusing on the development of a distributed, Europe-wide search service making use of grid computing facilities.

Please contact Senior Research Scientist Wray Buntine, or Program Coordinator Mikko Kontiainen, for more information, or see the Next Generation Search page at http://cosco.hiit.fi/search/.

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HIIT ORGANIZES INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP ON MOBILE IPR

With support of TEKES through the Mobile IPR project, HIIT organized The First International Mobile IPR Workshop: Rights Management of Information Products on the Mobile Internet in Helsinki on August 27-28, 2003. Keynote speakers of the event included Professor Hal Varian (UC Berkeley, USA) and Professor Ross Anderson (University of Cambridge, United Kingdom). Proceedings of the event are available in the report series of HIIT.

For more information, please contact Program Coordinator Olli Pitkänen or see the home page of the workshop at http://www.hiit.fi/de/mobileipr/workshop/.

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THIRD HELSINKI-BERKELEY SUMMER SCHOOL HELD

The 3rd Helsinki-Berkeley Summer School on Telecommunications Software Architectures organized by HIIT and the University of California at Berkeley was held in Berkeley, California on August 18-20. Main organisers of the Summer School were Professor Kimmo Raatikainen and Professor Randy Katz. See http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kraatika/Courses/BerkeleyAugust2003/program.html for more information.

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JUKKA KEMPPINEN BECOMES PROFESSOR AT LUT

Dr. Jukka Kemppinen, Principal Scientist and head of the Digital Economy research area at HIIT, has been nominated as Professor at the Lappeenranta University of Technology (LUT) from 1.9.2003 until 31.8.2005. He will also continue his work at HIIT on a part-time basis, sharing his time between LUT and HIIT. This will obviously provide a sound basis for extended co-operation between HIIT and LUT in the future.

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SENIOR PERSONNEL NEWS: DR. JAN LINDSTRÖM AND DR. TIMO SAARI JOIN HIIT

Dr. Jan Lindström from the University of Helsinki has joined HIIT as Research Scientist (post-doc) from August 1, 2003. Dr. Lindström's research interests focus on transaction processing and concurrency control, physical data structures in databases, database design, and programming languages. His 1993 doctoral thesis from the University of Helsinki dealt with Optimistic Concurrency Control Methods for Real-Time Database Systems.

Dr. Lindström's research will be closely aligned with the objectives of the Fuego research area at HIIT, with emphasis on issues related to mobile data.

Dr. Timo Saari from the Center of Knowledge and Innovation Research (CKIR) at the Helsinki School of Economics has joined HIIT as Senior Research Scientist from August 1, 2003. He is also associate director of M.I.N.D. Lab, Michigan State University and heads the local M.I.N.D. Lab Finland based in CKIR.

Dr. Saari´s area of expertise is experiments and theoretical work on emotion, cognition, meaning, and involvement with information, user interfaces and technology. Dr. Saari has been a visiting scholar in Stanford University, in the Center for the Study of Language and Information (CSLI) in 1998-1999 and 2000-2001 with Social Responses to Communication Technology (SRCT) group headed by professor Clifford Nass. Dr. Saari has worked as Director of Research in the holding company of Alma Media Corporation in 1995-2002. He is also an accomplished journalist in television and newspapers, and has edited several commercial new media titles. Saari has a degree of Doctor of Social Sciences in Media Studies from the University of Tampere, Finland. His thesis dealt with mind-based media and communications technologies.

Dr. Saari will participate in the recently launched Mobile Media Communities (MC2) as coordinator and researcher of the user research part of the project.

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MERVI RANTANEN NOMINATED AS PLANNING OFFICER AT HIIT

M.Sc. Mervi Rantanen has been nominated as the Planning Officer at the HIIT Advanced Research Unit from October 1, 2003. She received her Master's degree in Political Science from the Åbo Akademi University and also has a Master of International Law degree from the University of Lund.

Ms. Rantanen will take a central role in the administrative processes of HIIT, including preparation of HIIT Board meetings and internal management team meetings, facilitation of the various planning processes, and coordination of external and internal reporting and publicity. Before joining HIIT, Ms. Rantanen worked as a coordinator for international relief with the Finnish Red Cross.

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FUTURE EVENTS

2.10.2003 at 9.00-12.30: ARU Research Portfolio seminar at High Tech Center. The seminar will present project ideas to be developed further for submission to various funding organisations during 2003. Attendance by invitation only. Inquiries: Research Director Martti Mäntylä, mailto:Martti.Mantylahiit.fi

3.10.2003 at 15.00-16.30: ARU Friday Seminar at High Tech Center. Program TBA. Event cancelled!

16.-17.10.2003: The first HIIT Scientific Advisory Board meeting will be held in BRU premises at the Department of Computer Science, University of Helsinki, and ARU premises in High Tech Center, Ruoholahti.

23.10.2003: The SIMS-BCIS-HIIT Seminar on Information Society Research will be held in Berkeley, California. The seminar is co-sponsored by the School of Information Management and Systems, the Berkeley Center for the Information Society, and the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology. Speakers include Prof. Hal Varian, Prof. Annalee Saxenian, and Prof. Marc Davis from UCB; Dr. Pekka Himanen from BCIS and HIIT; and Prof. Henry Tirri and Dr. Marko Turpeinen from HIIT.

31.10.2003 at 15.00-16.30: ARU Friday Seminar at High Tech Center. Program TBA.

7.11.2003 at 15.00-16.30: ARU Friday Seminar at High Tech Center. Pekka Himanen will present latest news from the Berkeley Center for the Information Society (http://www.icsi.berkeley.edu/BCIS/)