Below is a summary of the query I posted on several listservers on mining
ideas off newsfeeds or any other open unstructured texts ( see #12 for
original message)
Thank you everyone below for responding. I'm posting the summary to share
with listserver members--since some responses can back to me personally.
If anyone has any other insights about this field, please call (416)
955-2040 or (416) 588-1122 or email me
regards
Walter Derzko
Brain Space
wderzko@pathcom.com
Who responded with ideas and suggestions
1) from Chris Jackson chrjack@hotmail.com
2) from Bill Fulkerson; wf28155@deere.com
3) from Damien Miller; Via (Versatile Intelligent Agents)
damien@kinetoscope.com also http://via.kinetoscope.com/
4) from Dick Webster webster.1@osu.edu
5) from Tom Abeles tabeles@tmn.com
6) from Simon Buckingham go57@dial.pipex.com and http://www.unorg.com
7) from Steven Marvin Exels@chesco.com
8) from Nick Arnett narnett@MCCMEDIA.COM
9) from Jack Bryer <jack.bryar@newsedge.com>
10) from Joshua Polterock <joshuap@sdsc.edu>
11) from Jon Riewe riewe@bluangel.com
12) my original message from Walter Derzko wderzko@pathcom.com
===================================================
1) from Chris Jackson chrjack@hotmail.com
Walter,
My name is Chris Jackson, and I'm with the Associated Press Broadcast
Technology Group in Washington. Russ Miland passed on your query
about newswire feeds to me.
I'll check with the experts here, but it would help if I had more info
on your client -- are they a news outfit or a research group?
Most wires are designed to spit out the latest information for a wide
range of clients -- with the data having a brief "shelf-life" for
broadcast purposes.
If your client subscribes to the AP Newsdesk (our comprehensive wire
service) we can reconfigure their feeds somewhat from our base here in
DC. Other agencies (CNN Newssource etc.) can do the same.
We do this alot for stations with new newsdirectors with individual
tastes.
Get back to me and I'll see what I can do. You can also check our site
www.enps.com which describes our newsroom production systems which have
a subject based search engine. This is geared for the production of news
programs.
regards,
Chris Jackson
=========================================
2) Bill Fulkerson; Deere & Company wf28155@deere.com
Walter,
Take a look at "text mining" software with visual display.
http://www.semio.com/
or
http://www.plumbdesign.com/
:-) Bill Fulkerson :-)
Deere & Company
CIS-Technology Integration
Moline IL 61265
wf28155@deere.com - 309-765-4848
========================================
3) Damien Miller
My company has developed a product that is well suited to the
analysis part of this problem - Via (Versatile Intelligent Agents). The
product doesn't include visualization tools, but includes a nice API
for building the kinds of reasoning that you describe.
We have implemented a similar system in use at Schlumberger to
build knowledge maps from email traffic.
You can download and evaluate this software, it comes with complete
APIs and example agents if you want to develop your own system,
or my company's consultants can build it for you. You can run the
example agents from our site.
<http://via.kinetoscope.com/>http://via.kinetoscope.com/
Thanks, Damien Miller
================================================
4) from Dick Webster webster.1@osu.edu
Replying to LO18221 --
Walter & Other LO Colleagues -
I get a headline service from Delphi Group (Boston - 800-575-3367 or
800-991 -1511, President is Thomas M. Koulopoulos <TK@delphigroup.com>,
and I assume general inquiry e-mail is <info@delphigroup.com>). They are
BIG in knowledge management consulting and I'll bet they have the
information you're looking for. Hope that helps.
Dick Webster
Richard S. Webster, Ph.D. - President
Personal Resources Management Institute
709 Wesley Court - Worthington OH 43085-3558
e-mail <webster.1@osu.edu>, fax 614-433-71-88, tel 614-433-7144
=================================================
5) from Tom Abeles <tabeles@tmn.com>
Replying to LO18221 --
Walter Derzko wrote:
...............
> Even with the key words, this still leaves a torrent of information
> hitting you every day and this can quickly lead to overload and reduced
> use of a valuable service.
>
> Has anyone seen any good filtering tools that can be attached to
> newsfeeds?....
The "spooks" have used a piece of software called "spire" to create
themescapes. this is being developed for the rest of us by a company
in richland washington called thememedia. thememedia is a startup and
i am not certain of the status of the product. It creates 3D maps as it
data mines.
the question is how you set up your searches and then what
you do with emerging patterns- and that still takes a human
biocomputer the cost/bit of info is getting cheaper. the cost/useful bit
- more expensive
[Host's Note: presumably "spook" means intelligence, spies, CIA. ..Rick]
cheers
tom abeles
--tom abeles <tabeles@tmn.com> ======================================== 6) from Simon Buckingham http://www.unorg.com
Walter, I work with a company in the UK called Wireless Information Network that filters high bandwidth feeds from the likes of Dow Jones and turns them into 160 character-long short messages that appear on mobile phones or pagers. The secret is in the filtering- making sure the info is exactly of interest to end users- using service watches and keyword filtering. This service works well in about 10 countries now. Their web page is http://www.wirelessinphonet.com
Have you had a look at any of the unorg material- I would be grateful for your feedback- I have a few unorg supporters in Toronto area and was thinking that I could introduce interested parties to each other.
regards simon buckingham, unorganization: towards a world without force http://www.unorg.com
============================================
7) from Steven Marvin Exels@chesco.com
I know the new updated version of DR-LINK provides an improved "pipe" of information that can be preselected for degree of relevancy. You can select that the articles have a 75% or greater degree and select the number of hits you view at any one time.
A completely new tool being released to beta is what I call an intelligent spreadsheet - not as fancy a term as Knowledge maps or Decision maps. The product (HOBB) measures co-occurences between variables. I think it takes a statistician to appreciate what it does with your existing data.
I was surprised to hear your disappointment with Lotus Notes.. Its been a useful tool for the task you described. I've seen other favorable comments applying Access and AskSam on other lists, sorry I can't be more informative.
To check on DR-LINK, see http://www.drlink.com/demo, for content information see the company's web site at http://www.mnis.net/content.
Hope this begins to tackle some of your questions.
Stephen Marvin Exels@chesco.com
=================================================
8) From: Nick Arnett narnett@MCCMEDIA.COM
A lot of what you want can be done by the Verity Agent Server, which is part of the back-end system at NewsEdge and Dow Jones. Some of the kinds of tracking you're envisioning would require customization. The Agent Server is available in toolkit form for customization.
Nick Phone/fax: (408) 733-7613 E-mail: narnett@mccmedia.com
"Defy Demographics!"
=============================================== 9) from Jack Bryer <jack.bryar@newsedge.com>
Walter--- I'f you're interested, I can help you
Jack Bryar
Knowledge Management and Consulting Services
<color><param>8080,0000,0000</param><bigger>NewsEdge </bigger></color>Professional Services
800-766-4224 x 642 ========================================== 10) from Joshua Polterock <joshuap@sdsc.edu>
If you are looking for off-the-shelf, take a look at IBM's Intelligent Miner at
http://www.software.ibm.com/data/iminer/
Josh ===================================
11) from Jon Riewe riewe@bluangel.com
Hello Walter,
I'm not sure we have the specific solution that you are looking for but our software may partially solve (or could be modified to solve) you problem.
We have a suite of sophisticated off-the-shelf information management tools for the Internet including clients, servers, repository, harvester, software development kits, etc.
I believe our tools could take the news feeds, create a structured record of that information and make that record searchable from one's Web browser. For example, if John Smith was interested in environmental developments during the last 24 hours that had "water" in the title, he would get a list of all the articles that matched those criteria. Or, as an alternative, he could click through a browse tree to find articles that might be of interest.
We'd be glad to talk with you in more detail about our tools to see if there might be a fit.
Regards, Jon Riewe
Blue Angel Technologies, Inc. 1220 Valley Forge Road, Unit #44 P.O. Box 987 Valley Forge, PA 19482-0987 Phone: 610-917-9200 Fax: 610-917-9958 Email: riewe@bluangel.com <mailto:riewe@bluangel.com> Web Site: www.bluangel.com <http://www.bluangel.com> ======================================== 12) my original message
----Original Message----- From: Walter Derzko <wderzko@pathcom.com> To: List Learnng-Org <learning-org@world.std.com> Date: 30 May 1998 21:20 Subject: News Feeds and Knowledge Maps LO18221
I'm working with a client who gets newswire feeds (NewsEdge, DowJones etc) streamed to individual desktops. This "pipe" of information can be sorted/selected by keyword. The client is looking for events, that signal new directions in technology that affects the core business.
Even with the key words, this still leaves a torrent of information hitting you every day and this can quickly lead to overload and reduced use of a valuable service.
Has anyone seen any good filtering tools that can be attached to newsfeeds?
As a sense-making exercise, we have created 1) Knowledge Maps (of external environmental factors) and Decision Maps for the entire team and for individuals. I'm looking for any tools that might link the two tools together-an easy way to transfer relevant information from the newsfeeds that supports or redflags issues addressed in the individual knowledge maps. I do it manually-cut and paste as I read, but it's quite labor intensive.
Has anyone seen any off -the-shelf tools to automate or semi-automate the process? The client uses a Lotus Notes platform, which frankly is not well liked and has been abandoned by many in the department.
Software like Decision Explorer or Nud.ist does quite have all the features I'm looking for .....no temporal feature to link various decisions and environmental factors over time... Visualization of significant information is a key point I think.
2) we also have several end-point scenarios for this technology area, which we would like to link our stream of newswire feeds to.
I'm sure many of your have come up against the same frustration. Is anyone doing something about it?
3) Has anyone seen any software that can data-mine newsfeeds for new unexpected patterns, anomalies, red-flags, new key words? i.e. the frequency of appearance of someone's name over time in certain articles. i.e. the frequency of appearance or disappearance of links of say two names over time. For now, I'm looking for off-the-shelf stuff, vs writing new software code or algorithms.
Walter Derzko Director Brain Space (formerly the Idea Lab at the Design Exchange) Toronto (416) 588-1122 wderzko@pathcom.com
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>