Ben Taskar, Boeing Professor of Computer Science & Engineering at the University of Washington, passed away on the early morning of November 18 2013 of sudden and severe heart failure. Ben left behind his wife Anat Caspi, their two year old daughter Aviv Taskar, his mother, father, and sister, and an array of other family members, friends, and colleagues – all of whom miss him tremendously.
When a 30-something person dies unexpectedly, leaving behind a spouse and a young child,… Read more →
Google funds Turing Award at $1 million
The New York Times reports:
“The A.M. Turing Award is often called the Nobel Prize of computer science. Now, thanks to Google’s largess, it will be a Nobel-level prize financially: $1 million.
“The quadrupling of the prize money, announced on Thursday by the Association for Computing Machinery, the professional organization that administers the award, is intended to elevate the prominence and recognition of computer science. The move can be seen as another sign of the boom times in technology.
“Computing… Read more →
“5 Lessons That Business Leaders Could Learn From Academics”
A nice piece in Entrepreneur by UW iSchool professor (and UW CSE adjunct professor) Jake Wobbrock:
“As noted in the New York Times, government-sponsored university research has played a major part in the breakthroughs underlying companies like Google, Intel, Qualcomm, Apple, Microsoft and more. In fact, a study of 30 well-known companies like these by the National Research Council found that $500B/year in their revenues were attributable to discoveries from university research.
“So how is it that academics… Read more →
Middle schoolers, high schoolers, and families: Attend UW’s Computing Open House, December 6
WHAT: Participate in hands-on activities and visit research labs to find out what computing is all about! Students and faculty from UW’s computing majors will introduce you to the broad range of problems computing can address. Representatives from local technology companies will show cool demos and tell you why they love their jobs.
WHO: Middle and high school students and their families.
WHEN: 1pm – 5pm on Saturday, December 6th, 2014.
WHERE: UW’s Paul G. Allen Center for Computer Science … Read more →
Congratulations to UW CSE’s Anna Karlin and Dan Weld
Anna Karlin has been reappointed for another 5-year term as the Microsoft Professor of Computer Science & Engineering. An ACM Fellow, her research is primarily in algorithmic game theory, and she is co-author (with Yuval Peres of Microsoft Research) of a forthcoming book about game theory that includes modern applications in computer science related to the Internet and electronic commerce.
Dan Weld has been reappointed for another 5-year term as the Washington Research Foundation / Thomas J. Cable Professor of… Read more →
Women faculty at the top 25 engineering schools
We all need to do far better. But the efforts made by the University of Washington’s College of Engineering – spearheaded by ADVANCE PI Ana Mari Cauce, Director Eve Riskin, and Program/Research Manager Joyce Yen – are evident.… Read more →
CSE’s Krittika D’Silva and her “CGNet Swara” app in National Geographic
National Geographic writes:
“An Android app designed to give voice to tribes at the heart of India’s Maoist insurgency was launched September 20 as part of a campaign by activists to end the conflict through the combination of oral tradition and new technology …
“The CGNet Swara app is the brainchild of [UW CSE undergraduate] Krittika D’Silva, a student at the University of Washington, in Seattle.”
Read more here. Learn about CGNet Swara here. Read Krittika’s original research… Read more →
Tony DeRose: The science behind the cuteness of Pixar’s characters
“Everybody knows Pixar employs some of the most talented storytellers in the business. But the company employs some wonderfully sharp mathematicians, too. In fact, without those mathematicians working fastidiously behind the scenes, many of your favorite Pixar stories would not have gotten told – at least not in the adorable way we’ve come to love.
“One such math wiz in Pixar’s employ is Tony DeRose, Senior Scientist and Lead of the Research Group at Pixar Animation Studios. With a… Read more →
UW CSE Ph.D. alum Seth Bridges, startup Rival IQ, in GeekWire
GeekWire writes:
Rival IQ wants to help organizations make better sense of information, while also keeping close tabs on the competition. And today the Seattle startup – which helps organizations better analyze digital content and track keywords in an effort to surface competitive intelligence – is announcing $1 million in funding …
“Rival IQ has assembled an impressive founding team that includes former V2Green executives John Clark, [UW CSE Ph.D. alum] Seth Bridges and Seth Pollack, as well as former… Read more →
UW CSE Masters alum Kate Matsudaira in Business Week
UW CSE Masters alum Kate Matsudaira is one of several successful computer scientists from under-represented groups interviewed in the Business Week article “What It’s Like to be Black or Female in Silicon Valley.”
Of course, Kate has never actually worked in Silicon Valley – she’s been at Microsoft, Amazon, Delve Networks, Moz, UW CSE startup Decide, and her own startup popforms, all in Seattle. But the press thinks of “Silicon Valley” as a state of mind rather than a physical… Read more →