Deductible Junkets
May 10-13 Agents '98 Minneapolis, Minnesota
Someday robotic agents may manage your stock portfolio or book your hotel room, but first they need to learn to negotiate. Bots that work together, or distributed software agents, are the focus of this second annual meeting of developers and academics. "A much higher level of sophistication comes with agents that cooperate – just like people," says conference chair Katia Sycara. "And if their goals aren't compatible, they can even antagonize one another." This goes both for software agents and physical Robbie the Robot types, which will be discussed in sessions organized by University of Southern California assistant prof Maja Matari´c.
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May 27-30 E3 Atlanta, Georgia
You're apt to find more than a few companies on the floor of the Electronic Entertainment Expo willing to blow their entire annual marketing budgets on models hired to dress like warrior princess Xena. E3's half million square feet of CD-ROMs, Web sites, and videogames can be daunting. But this year also offers a chance for budding developers to get serious: highlights are a keynote panel featuring Nintendo of America chair Howard Lincoln and Electronic Arts CEO Larry Probst, plus business-oriented workshops including "The Art of the Deal," which will explain how to court venture capitalists.
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May 31-June 4 Eurocrypt '98 Helsinki, Finland
Although Eurocrypt will be held on the southern coast of Finland, it doesn't differ much from its California counterpart – Crypto '98 – also run by the International Association of Cryptologic Research. Says IACR president Kevin McCurley: "It's the same mix of professors, businesspeople, and government spooks. But there's a formal banquet rather than a barbecue, and the beaches are colder than hell." A major topic this year will be fair exchange in ecommerce, in which both the online buyer and seller swap digital signatures in a transaction.
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June 3-6 IDCA Aspen, Colorado
Once known as an excuse for design's old-boy network to come out West, rub shoulders, and rough it in the Rockies, the International Design Conference in Aspen has recently broadened its mission. Now in its 48th year, the organizing board has a new president, architect Harry Teague, and includes more women and Left Coasters. The content is still high concept, with designers from all fields musing over a single idea. This year's theme, sports, both covers how pro sports have influenced street clothing and explores connections between design and play. To take advantage of the ski-bum center of the universe, the big-think talks are mixed with participatory sessions in various athletic pursuits – from river rafting to paragliding.
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June 8-12 AUVSI '98 Huntsville, Alabama
"Dirty, dull, and dangerous" is the mantra of researchers and manufacturers converging on the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International's annual symposium. These three headings describe jobs that robot vehicles might do much better than people. The 25th annual meeting will look at ways micro air vehicles could sniff for chemical weapons, unmanned subs might fix broken undersea cables, or pilotless planes perhaps will monitor oil pipelines in the lonely Alaskan wilderness. Explains Robert Michelson, former AUVSI president, "Huntsville is a hotbed for unmanned systems technology because of the proximity to the Marshall Space Flight Center and the new center for Army Aviation."
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