Interview

8) What is your vision for WebMiner? How large you think it will grow?

The vision is to optimize e-businesses by provide data mining insight and real-time solutions as a service via the Web. We are already doing this with some clients -- getting some fantastic lift in their sales, so we know it works. As far as how big we will get, sound like the same question they asked Lennon about the Beatles, I think his answer was well you can be big headed and say you will be around for years and then you think, you may be gone by next week. In this weak economy, who knows -- although our ASP model should help since everybody is looking for online profits.

9) Excluding your own work, what were the largest successes of web mining so far? What were the biggest failures?

I have seen more failures than successes by far, and one of the reasons is that most of these web mining firms concentrated on the analysis exclusively of clickstream data. Also some concentrated on technologies that had some inherent limitations, such as collaborative filtering. Still others have failed because they neglected to mine their data altogether, while other have gone and purchased huge eCRM systems from which they only use 15% of its functionality.

10) Tell us how you see the field in 2005 -- what would be the new technologies, new problems, new application areas?

I see some of these technologies and problems to be privacy, wireless, geolocation and the globalization of the Web, for example, we are already dealing with challenges in delivering targeted offers to visitors in some of Brazil�s major portals using an assortment of these technologies.