KDnuggets™ News 12:n09, Apr 19

Features

New Poll: Largest Dataset You Analyzed / Data Mined? - Apr 18, 2012.
New KDnuggets Poll is asking: What was the largest database / dataset you analyzed? Please vote
Target hears you said yes, before you do - Apr 9, 2012.
A woman received an envelope from Target at her parents house, which said: Congratulations, WE HEARD YOU SAID "Yes". Very awkward results. Should Target and similar companies stay away from personal life?
Predictive Analytics World Chicago - June 25-26, 2012 - Apr 18, 2012.
Be part of the leading event featuring over 40 sessions, hands-on workshops, unlimited networking, access to top solution providers, and a whole lot more. KDnuggets discount - see details.
Video Series: Big Data and Predictive Analytics - Apr 17, 2012.
Watch this video series to learn more about Predictive Analytics Drivers & Benefits, Operationalizing Analytics, Predictive Analytics in the Cloud, and more.
Ranking Data Scientists and Data Miners - Apr 11, 2012.
We look at ranking of Data Scientists according to Kaggle competitions, LinkedIn skills, Online influence, and Research publications.
Top KDnuggets tweets last week - Apr 16, 2012.
ECML/PKDD Challenge; R programmer looks at Julia; Netflix opens up - why $1M Netflix Prize algorithm was not implemented; Ranking Data Scientists and Data Miners.
Top news for Apr 8-14 - Apr 15, 2012.
Python in Big Data; Target hears you said yes
Top jobs: Manager, Adv. Analytics at Orbitz; Statistician at Enterprise
Top KDnuggets tweets last week - Apr 11, 2012.
Can Python swallow the elephant (Hadoop)? Target prediction - awkward results, again! Julia - the best from Python, R, Perl, C?; NPR on massive data mining.
Top news for Apr 1-7 - Apr 8, 2012.
Top 10 in Data Mining; Skeptical of Machine Learning; NPR on Massive Data Mining. Top jobs: Data Scientist, Trulia; Dir. Predictive Analytics, Rezolve Group.

Courses, Events

DePaul's MS in Predictive Analytics - Apr 18, 2012.
DePaul's MS in Predictive Analytics develops both analytical skills and business acumen. Courses in analytics, data mining and marketing prepare graduates to be leaders in the field.
May 18 workshop: Increase Business Impact via Analytics - Apr 18, 2012.
Why did some of your analytics project fail? Our structured 5-step framework helps you get from Data to Decisions efficiently, and enables alignment with stakeholders and clients. Special discount to KDnuggets subscribers.
TMA Courses in Predictive Analytics [May: DC; July: NYC; August: San Jose] - Apr 16, 2012.
Get up to speed in data mining faster and more effectively than any other training program available. Next courses: May in DC, July in NYC, August in San Jose.
Lipari Summer School, July 21-28: Social Data Mining and Emergent News - Apr 5, 2012.
The theme this year is Social Data Mining, with focus on the current regime of online news and text/data mining techniques to advance our understanding of the new media and emergent news.

Webcasts

Webcast: Predictive Analytics New Options, with Sybase and KDnuggets - Apr 6, 2012.
Gregory Piatetsky of KDnuggets and Joydeep Das of Sybase examine how Sybase IQ facilitates three approaches: the traditional "pull" model, a newer "push" model where much of the heavy lifting takes place in the database; and a novel hybrid model that leverages Hadoop. Watch recording and slides

Software

Aberdeen report finds KXEN is faster, more accurate - Apr 13, 2012.
Aberdeen Group report indicate that KXEN InfiniteInsight(tm) helps customers to build and refresh models faster, helping marketing be more productive and improve targeting effectiveness.
James Taylor on SAS High-Performance Analytics appliances - Apr 10, 2012.
SAS HPA is appliance-ready software that uses hardware from database partners (Teradata or EMC Greenplum) for high performance data exploration, model development and model deployment and scoring.
Python in Big Data - Apr 9, 2012.
What Python has to offer to the world of Big Data, specific use-cases, and interaction between a python and an elephant (Hadoop).
Kontagent kSuite DataMine - Apr 9, 2012.
Kontagent kSuite DataMine is a SaaS offering that enables analysts to use Hive-powered, SQL-like queries to get data out of a Hadoop deployment.
James Taylor First Look: Pervasive RushAnalyzer - Apr 5, 2012.
RushAnalyzer is a combination of the KNIME data mining workbench and Pervasive DataRush, a platform for parallelization and automatic scaling of data manipulation and analysis.
DEAP 0.8: Distributed Evolutionary Algorithms in Python - Apr 4, 2012.
a library for doing Distributed Evolutionary Algorithms in Python. You can download it here.

Jobs

Actuarial Specialist II at Chubb Insurance, Whitehouse Station, NJ - Apr 18, 2012.
Chubb is the 11th largest property and casualty insurer in the US. This position provides actuarial support in the Predictive Modeling Unit.
Actuarial Specialist -Home at Chubb Insurance, Whitehouse Station, NJ - Apr 18, 2012.
Chubb is the 11th largest property and casualty insurer in the US. This position provides actuarial support for Homeowners, Valuable Articles, Earthquake and Flood coverage.
Director of Algorithms & Analytics, PhD Scientist at Guardian Analytics, Mountain View, CA - Apr 16, 2012.
Guardian Analytics delivered the first behavioral analytics fraud prevention solution and revolutionized the industry with a SaaS-based rapid deployment model.
Marketing Analyst at Springleaf Financial Services, Evansville, IN - Apr 16, 2012.
We are one of the nation's largest consumer finance companies. Responsibilities include analyzing and supporting marketing, including response analysis and ad-hoc analytics.
Financial Analyst at Springleaf Financial Services, Evansville, IN - Apr 16, 2012.
We help others bring their dreams to life with loans, retail financing, and other credit related products. You will develop short term and extended financial forecasts.
Data Analyst II at Measured Progress, Dover, NH - Apr 12, 2012.
Responsible for statistical analysis, data management, validation of data integrity, and preparation of data obtained from student assessment results and related efforts.
Manager, Advanced Analytics at Orbitz, Chicago, IL - Apr 10, 2012.
Use analytics to help solve business problems such as CRM, email optimization, personalization, pricing, and fraud prevention.
Manager, Statistical Modeling & Analysis at Orbitz, Sunnyvale, CA - Apr 10, 2012.
Responsible for different facets of advanced analytics - with a strong focus on online marketing's Travel Research channel.
Statistician at Enterprise Holdings, Inc., St. Louis, MO - Apr 9, 2012.
Our goal is to provide timely informational reporting, statistical tests, and statistical modeling to all business areas to assist in their short term and long term decision making.
Analytics Lead/Scientist - NLP at Opera Solutions, San Diego, CA, or Jersey City, NJ - Apr 6, 2012.
Help design, develop and deploy state-of-the-art, data-driven predictive models to solve business problems using the latest and most appropriate technologies in machine learning, statistical modeling and NLP/text-mining.
Director of Predictive Analytics at Rezolve Group, Boston, MA - Apr 4, 2012.
Responsible for building predictive scoring modules that will allow Student Aid Services to better serve its higher education clients via the identification and segmentation of unique student profiles.

Academic/Research positions

Teaching Positions in Strategy & Analytics at Brown U. Continuing Education, Providence, RI - Apr 18, 2012.
Hiring faculty, guest lecturers for new Executive Master program for upper-level managers seeking to innovate and leverage big data and predictive analytics.
1-3 Phd positions in CS, specialization in data mining at Stockholm U., Sweden - Apr 12, 2012.
The research will focus on high-performance data mining for drug effect detection. The positions require that applicants can be admitted to the doctoral program in Computer and Systems Sciences. Application deadline: Apr 30.

Competitions

ECML/PKDD 2012 Discovery Challenge: Large Scale Hierarchical Text Classification - Apr 12, 2012.
The challenge comprises three tracks and it is based on two large datasets created from the ODP web directory (DMOZ) and Wikipedia.
Global Data Science Hackathon, Apr 28-29 - Apr 15, 2012.
Data Science London Hackathon has expanded and became a global hackathon, with remote participation in New York, Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, Melbourne, Canberra, Berlin and Turku.

Meetings

Data Science Summit keynote announced - Apr 18, 2012.
Attend EMC Data Science Summit (May 22-23, Las Vegas) - check extraordinary agenda and speaker lineup. Keynote speaker Nate Silver, a leading political and sports analyst, debunks the myths of prediction. Respond by Apr 20 to reserve your space!
SAS Analytics 2012, June 14-15, Cologne, Germany - KDnuggets discount - Apr 18, 2012.
KDnuggets subscribers receive an exclusive discount! Join hundreds of your peers and the brightest minds in analytics for two days at the Third Annual Analytics 2012 Conference in Cologne, Germany.
Data 2.0 Summit Wrap-up - Apr 13, 2012.
The main themes were Big Data, Social Data, and Cloud Data. Some take-aways included how crowd-sourcing can be more effective than algorithms, NoSQL technologies, Personal Data Innovation, and Data Content versus Data Infrastructure struggle. Watch the videos from the summit.
Business Analytics Innovation Summit Chicago, May 23-24 - Apr 11, 2012.
A place for business analytics leaders to meet, show their expertise and share experiences on the challenges of business analytics and BI.

Publications

NPR: The New World of Massive Data Mining - Apr 6, 2012.
Tom Gjelten and a panel of experts discuss the opportunities of Massive Data Mining for business, science, medicine, education, and security - and the privacy concerns.
Text Analytics Insider Podcasts: Part III - Apr 5, 2012.
These podcasts, recorded at the recent Text Analytics Summit West, cover important topics, such as employing the cloud for efficient content analytics, and using text analytics to drive the customer experience.

News Briefs

Pitney Bowes Portrait Explorer - Apr 17, 2012.
Portrait Explorer brings powerful data analytics to business users, with innovative interface designed to look, feel and behave like apps marketers use in their personal life.
PAKDD 2012 Distinguished Contribution and Influential Paper Awards - Apr 13, 2012.
The Distinguished Contribution Award goes to Prof. Huan Liu of ASU. The Most Influential Paper went to a paper on enhancing effectiveness of outlier detections. The awards will be presented at PAKDD 2012, Kuala Lumpur, 29 May - 1 June.
TIBCO ActiveSpaces to Analyze Big Data in Motion - Apr 12, 2012.
ActiveSpaces is a distributed peer-to-peer memory data grid. Its "shared nothing" approach helps overcome database and storage bottlenecks, and to harness digital, social and event streams.

CFP - Calls for Papers

IADIS: EUROPEAN CONFERENCE ON DATA MINING 2012, due Apr 30
IDA: Intelligent Data Analysis, due May 12
IDAMAP-2012: Intelligent Data Analysis in bioMedicine And Pharmacology, due May 15
ADKDD 2012: The 6th Annual Int. Workshop on Data Mining for Online Advertising and Internet Economy, due May 16
UDM: Ubiquitous Data Mining Workshop, due May 31
ISMIS'12: Int. Symposium on Methodologies for Intelligent Systems, due Jun 1
Data 2.0: Data 2.0 Labs, due Jul 24

Quote

"If all data was clear, a lot fewer people would subtract value from the world, A lot more people would add value."

Gilad Elbaz, founder of Factual Startup