As Mitch Kapor, founder of Lotus Development Corporation, once said, Getting information off the Internet is like taking a drink from a fire hydrant.

On September 19th, I will be presenting a seminar to the NSW branch of CHISIG - the Computer-Human Interaction Special Interest Group of Australia – about our research in CSIRO that focuses on controlling the flow of information to deliver the right content to the right people at the right time in the right form.

Our research approaches the problem by using knowledge about users and their interaction to tailor the information that is gathered and to present it appropriately. The context information that is captured and reasoned about can include user preferences and characteristics, as well as details of a user’s current task, their previous history of interaction and their environment. This context can determine which information should be retrieved, and how that content should be aggregated, organised, and presented, in order to best support the user.

My presentation will cover work that builds on concepts and techniques from a variety of different fields, including: natural language generation, information extraction, information retrieval, discourse analysis, user modelling, task analysis and HCI, so if any of those topics spark interest (and you happen to be in Sydney) you might consider coming along to PTG Global on Tuesday 19th.