This book addresses the question of how competition authorities assess mergers in the Information Communication Technology (ICT) sector so as to promote competition in innovation. A closer look at the question reveals that it is far more complex and difficult to answer for the ICT, telecommunications and multi-sided platform (MSP) economy than for more traditional sectors of the economy. This has led many scholars to re-think and question whether the current merger control framework is suitable for the ICT sector, which is often also referred to as the new economy. The book pursues an interdisciplinary approach combining insights from law, economics and corporate strategy. Further, it has a comparative dimension, as it discusses the practices of the US, the EU and, wherever relevant, of other competition authorities from around the globe. Considering that the research was conducted in the EU, the practices of the European Commission remain a key aspect of the content.Considering its normative dimension, the book concentrates on the substantive aspects of merger control. To facilitate a better understanding of the most important points, the book also offers a brief overview of the procedural aspects of merger control in the EU, the US and the UK, and discusses recent amendments to Austrian and German law regarding the notification threshold. Given its scope, the book offers an invaluable guide for competition law scholars, practitioners in the field, and competition authorities worldwide.

The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the implementation of digital transformation strategies, and there has been an exponential increase in the demand for intelligent and reliable communications solutions. The pandemic brings huge challenges for all economic agents, as resilience and the capacity to adapt to new risks and hindrances are now fundamental elements in our societies. In this context, it is essential that digitalization brings opportunities to transition to a smarter economy based on innovation, sustainability, and well-being. The Handbook of Research on Digitalization as a Driver for Smart Economy in the Post-COVID-19 Era discusses digitalization, information and communication technologies, marketing, entrepreneurship, and innovation in an organizational context to optimize the practices established in the most diverse domains of knowledge, specifically attending to the relation between digitalization and sustainability in a post-pandemic era. It is ideal for academicians, instructors, researchers, industry professionals, business managers, private institutions, and students as it covers a range of key topics such as sustainability and smart economy.

The popular view is that information technology will change the world by boosting productivity and economic growth. But while IT has many visible effects on the modern economy, studies have found little correlation between IT investment and overall productivity.

By presenting new micro- and macroeconomic evidence, this volume shows that in recent years IT investment has exerted a strong influence on productivity and economic growth in many industrial and newly industrialized countries. It also identifies national IT strategies to promote participation in the information economy.

Alarm or alert detection remains an issue in various areas from nature, i.e. flooding, animals or earthquake, to software systems. Liveness, dynamicity, reactivity of alarm systems: how to ensure the warning information reach the right destination at the right moment and in the right location, still being relevant for the recipient, in spite of the various and successive filters of confidentiality, privacy, firewall policies, etc.? Also relevant in this context are to technical contingency issues: material failure, defect of connection, break of channels, independence of information routes and sources? Alarms with crowd media, (mis)information vs. rumours: how to make the distinction? The prediction of natural disasters (floods, avalanches, etc.), health surveillance (affectionate fevers of cattle, pollution by pesticides, etc.), air, sea and land transport, or space surveillance to prevent Risks of collisions between orbital objects involve more and more actors within Information Systems, one of whose purposes is the dissemination of alerts. By expanding the capabilities and functionality of such national or international systems, social networks are playing a growing role in dissemination and sharing, eg. with the support of systems like the Google Alert (https://www.google.fr/alerts) which concerns the publication of contents online. Recently, the Twitter microblogging platform announced a broadcast service, designed to help government organizations with alerts to the public. The proper functioning of such systems depends on fundamental properties such as resilience, liveliness and responsiveness: any alert must absolutely reach the right recipient at the right time and in the right place, while remaining relevant to him, despite the various constraints. on the one hand to external events, such as hardware failures, connection faults, breaks in communication channels, on the other hand to confidentiality, such as the collection and use of personal data (with or without the consent of the user), or the disparity of access policies (generation according to industrial, technological, security constraints, management of internal / external policies, etc.) between actors. This book opens the discussion on the "procrastination", the dynamics and the reactivity of the alert systems, but also the problems of confidentiality, filtering of information, and the means of distinguishing information and rumor.

Engaging Older Adults with Modern Technology: Internet Use and Information Access Needs takes a structured approach to the research in aging and digital technology in which older adults' use of internet and other forms of digital technologies is studied through the lenses of cognitive functioning, motivation, and affordances of new technology. This book identifies the role and function of internet and other forms of digital technology in older adult learning. It also bridges the theories with practices in older adults' internet/digital technology use by focusing on effective design and development of internet and other digital technologies for older adults' learning. This title is targeted towards educators globally with an emphasis on diverse aspects in older adult and internet learning that include learner characteristics, cognition, design principles and applications.

This book presents the outcomes of the 17th IEEE/ACIS International Conference on Computer and Information Science (ICIS 2018), which was held in Singapore on June 6-8, 2018. The aim of the conference was to bring together researchers and scientists, businessmen and entrepreneurs, teachers, engineers, computer users, and students to discuss the various fields of computer science and to share their experiences, and to exchange new ideas and information in a meaningful way. The book includes findings on all aspects (theory, applications and tools) of computer and information science and discusses related practical challenges and the solutions adopted to solve them. The conference organizers selected the best papers from those accepted for presentation. The papers were chosen based on review scores submitted by members of the program committee and underwent a further rigorous round of review. From this second round, 13 of the conference's most promising papers were then published in this Springer (SCI) book and not the conference proceedings. We impatiently await the important contributions that we know these authors will make to the field of computer and information science.

Cognitive architectures represent an umbrella term to describe ways in which the flow of thought can be engineered towards cerebral and behavioral outcomes. Cognitive Architectures are meant to provide top-down guidance, a knowledge base, interactive heuristics and concrete or fuzzy policies for which the virtual character can utilize for intelligent interaction with his/her/its situated virtual environment. Integrating Cognitive Architectures into Virtual Character Design presents emerging research on virtual character artificial intelligence systems and procedures and the integration of cognitive architectures. Emphasizing innovative methodologies for intelligent virtual character integration and design, this publication is an ideal reference source for graduate-level students, researchers, and professionals in the fields of artificial intelligence, gaming, and computer science.

The interaction between humans and computers is evolving rapidly, impacting every aspect of human and organizational life. This book presents the latest developments in this field of "Human Computer Interaction" (HCI). It discusses issues related End User Computing, as well as issues related to the human side of IT. This book will help to set a framework for the social and organizational issues related to IT, giving emphasis to its role as facilitator of social relationships, enabling the development of the organizational and individual intelligence and helping to improve human conditions. In Issues of Human Computer Interaction, models and theories are presented together with practical cases that will help students, lecturers, researchers and managers to have a clear idea of what is going on in HCI, today.

The book provides a detailed overview and analysis of important EU Internet regulatory challenges currently found in various key fields of law directly linked to the Internet such as information technology, consumer protection, personal data, e-commerce and copyright law. In addition, it aims to shed light on the content and importance of various pending legislative proposals in these fields, and of the Court of Justice of the European Union's recent case law in connection with solving the different problems encountered. The book focuses on challenging legal questions that have not been sufficiently analyzed, while also presenting original thinking in connection with the regulation of emerging legal questions. As such, it offers an excellent reference tool for researchers, policymakers, judges, practitioners and law students with a special interest in EU Internet law and regulation.

This book investigates a new interactive data visualisation concept that employs traditional Chinese aesthetics as a basis for exploring contemporary digital technological contexts. It outlines the aesthetic approach, which draws on non-Western aesthetic concepts, specifically the Yijing and Taoist cosmological principles, and discusses the development of data-based digital practices within a theoretical framework that combines traditional Taoist ideas with the digital humanities. The book also offers a critique of the Western aesthetics underpinning data visualisation, in particular the Kantian sublime, which prioritises the experience of power over the natural world viewed at a distance. Taoist philosophy, in contrast, highlights the integration of the surface of the body and the surface of nature as a Taoist body, rather than promoting an opposition of mind and body. The book then explores the transformational potential between the human body and technology, particularly in creating an aesthetic approach spanning traditional Chinese aesthetics and gesture-based technology. Representing a valuable contribution to the digital humanities, the book helps readers understand data-based artistic practices, while also bringing the ideas of traditional Chinese aesthetics to Western audiences. In addition, it will be of interest to practitioners in the fields of digital art and data visualisation seeking new models.

This book focuses on novel and state-of-the-art scientific work in the area of detection and prediction techniques using information found generally in graphs and particularly in social networks. Community detection techniques are presented in diverse contexts and for different applications while prediction methods for structured and unstructured data are applied to a variety of fields such as financial systems, security forums, and social networks. The rest of the book focuses on graph-based techniques for data analysis such as graph clustering and edge sampling. The research presented in this volume was selected based on solid reviews from the IEEE/ACM International Conference on Advances in Social Networks, Analysis, and Mining (ASONAM '17). Chapters were then improved and extended substantially, and the final versions were rigorously reviewed and revised to meet the series standards. This book will appeal to practitioners, researchers and students in the field.

The rate of cybercrimes is increasing because of the fast-paced advancements in computer and internet technology. Crimes employing mobile devices, data embedding/mining systems, computers, network communications, or any malware impose a huge threat to data security. Countering Cyber Attacks and Preserving the Integrity and Availability of Critical Systems addresses current problems and issues emerging in cyber forensics and investigations and proposes new solutions that can be adopted and implemented to counter security breaches within various organizations. The publication examines a variety of topics such as advanced techniques for forensic developments in computer and communication-link environments and legal perspectives including procedures for cyber investigations, standards, and policies. It is designed for policymakers, forensic analysts, technology developers, security administrators, academicians, researchers, and students.

This book presents selected papers from the Sixteenth International Conference on Intelligent Information Hiding and Multimedia Signal Processing, in conjunction with the Thirteenth International Conference on Frontiers of Information Technology, Applications and Tools, held on November 5-7, 2020, in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. It is divided into two volumes and discusses the latest research outcomes in the field of Information Technology (IT) including information hiding, multimedia signal processing, big data, data mining, bioinformatics, database, industrial and Internet of things, and their applications.

This book explores the digitization of culture as a means of experiencing and understanding cultural heritage in Namibia and from international perspectives. It provides various views and perspectives on the digitization of culture, the goal being to stimulate further research, and to rapidly disseminate related discoveries. Aspects covered here include: virtual and augmented reality, audio and video technology, art, multimedia and digital media integration, cross-media technologies, modeling, visualization and interaction as a means of experiencing and grasping cultural heritage. Over the past few decades, digitization has profoundly changed our cultural experience, not only in terms of digital technology-based access, production and dissemination, but also in terms of participation and creation, and learning and partaking in a knowledge society. Computing researchers have developed a wealth of new digital systems for preserving, sharing and interacting with cultural resources. The book provides important information and tools for policy makers, knowledge experts, cultural and creative industries, communication scientists, professionals, educators, librarians and artists, as well as computing scientists and engineers conducting research on cultural topics.

This book is a timely collection of chapters that present the state of the art within the analysis and application of big data. Working within the broader context of big data, this text focuses on the hot topics of social network modelling and analysis such as online dating recommendations, hiring practices, and subscription-type prediction in mobile phone services. Manuscripts are expanded versions of the best papers presented at the IEEE/ACM International Conference on Advances in Social Networks Analysis and Mining (ASONAM'2016), which was held in August 2016. The papers were among the best featured at the meeting and were then improved and extended substantially. Social Network Based Big Data Analysis and Applications will appeal to students and researchers in the field.

User Centered Design for Medical Visualization features a comprehensive review of leading advances in medical visualization and human-computer interaction. This book investigates the human roles during a visualization process, specifically motivation-based design, user-based design, and perception-and-cognitive-based design. An essential resource for researchers, scholars, healthcare practitioners, and medical technology specialists, ""User Centered Design for Medical Visualization"" provides real-world examples and insight into the analytical and architectural aspects of user centered design.

As recently as 1968, computer scientists were uncertain how best to interconnect even two computers. The notion that within a few decades the challenge would be how to interconnect millions of computers around the globe was too far-fetched to contemplate. Yet, by 1988, that is precisely what was happening. The products and devices developed in the intervening years-such as modems, multiplexers, local area networks, and routers-became the linchpins of the global digital society. How did such revolutionary innovation occur? This book tells the story of the entrepreneurs who were able to harness and join two factors: the energy of computer science researchers supported by governments and universities, and the tremendous commercial demand for Internetworking computers. The centerpiece of this history comes from unpublished interviews from the late 1980s with over 80 computing industry pioneers, including Paul Baran, J.C.R. Licklider, Vint Cerf, Robert Kahn, Larry Roberts, and Robert Metcalfe. These individuals give us unique insights into the creation of multi-billion dollar markets for computer-communications equipment, and they reveal how entrepreneurs struggled with failure, uncertainty, and the limits of knowledge.

In the next millennium, it is anticipated that human factors issues will take centre stage in initiatives targeted at enhancing economic competitiveness and productivity. This development is already discernible in nascent knowledge and digital based industries and economies, which are expected to emerge in force in the near future and continue to dominate thereafter. These developments will establish irreversibly the emerging global economy. The theme of the APCHI 2000 conference is: "Towards a seamless integration of collaborative human computer systems" to reflect the already discernible shift in focus of human computer interaction (HCI). whilst the theme of the ASEAN Ergonomics 2000 conference is: "From user centeredness to people centeredness" to reflect the imminent shift in focus that is required of human factors.

The papers in these proceedings provide a good contrast of human factors contributions to both old and new economies that make up ASEAN and APEC. They highlight the diverse roles human factors can play in advancing the quality of life in developed, developing and third world nations. They also serve as a guide to human factors practitioners in old economies on what to expect as their economies develop.

This book explores the subject of artificial psychology and how the field must adapt human neuro-psychological testing techniques to provide adequate cognitive testing of advanced artificial intelligence systems. It shows how classical testing methods will reveal nothing about the cognitive nature of the systems and whether they are learning, reasoning, and evolving correctly; for these systems, the authors outline how testing techniques similar to/adapted from human psychological testing must be adopted, particularly in understanding how the system reacts to failure or relearning something it has learned incorrectly or inferred incorrectly. The authors provide insights into future architectures/capabilities that artificial cognitive systems will possess and how we can evaluate how well they are functioning. It discusses at length the notion of human/AI communication and collaboration and explores such topics as knowledge development, knowledge modeling and ambiguity management, artificial cognition and self-evolution of learning, artificial brain components and cognitive architecture, and artificial psychological modeling. Explores the concepts of Artificial Psychology and Artificial Neuroscience as applied to advanced artificially cognitive systems; Provides insight into the world of cognitive architectures and biologically-based computing designs which will mimic human brain functionality in artificial intelligent systems of the future; Provides description and design of artificial psychological modeling to provide insight into how advanced artificial intelligent systems are learning and evolving; Explores artificial reasoning and inference architectures and the types of modeling and testing that will be required to "trust" an autonomous artificial intelligent systems.

The way humans interact with technology is undergoing a tremendous change. It is hard to imagine the lives we live today without the benefits of technology that we take for granted. Applying research in computer science, engineering, and information systems to non-technical descriptions of technology, such as human interaction, has shaped and continues to shape our lives. Human Interaction with Technology for Working, Communicating, and Learning: Advancements provides a framework for conceptual, theoretical, and applied research in regards to the relationship between technology and humans. This book is unique in the sense that it does not only cover technology, but also science, research, and the relationship between these fields and individuals' experience. This book is a must have for anyone interested in this research area, as it provides a voice for all users and a look into our future.

This book explains the fundamentals of the Internet of Things - from different architectures for managing IoT platforms to the insights on trust, security, and privacy in IoT environments, including consumer electronic devices or home applications. This opens the doors to new innovations that will build novel interactions among things and humans, and enables the realization of smart cities, infrastructures, and services. The book presents a complete overview on the research and the technology of this rapidly emerging topic.

The book presents the proceedings of four conferences: The 24th International Conference on Image Processing, Computer Vision, & Pattern Recognition (IPCV'20), The 6th International Conference on Health Informatics and Medical Systems (HIMS'20), The 21st International Conference on Bioinformatics & Computational Biology (BIOCOMP'20), and The 6th International Conference on Biomedical Engineering and Sciences (BIOENG'20). The conferences took place in Las Vegas, NV, USA, July 27-30, 2020, and are part of the larger 2020 World Congress in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, & Applied Computing (CSCE'20), which features 20 major tracks. Authors include academics, researchers, professionals, and students. Presents the proceedings of four conferences as part of the 2020 World Congress in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, & Applied Computing (CSCE'20); Includes the tracks on Image Processing, Computer Vision, & Pattern Recognition, Health Informatics & Medical Systems, Bioinformatics, Computational Biology & Biomedical Engineering; Features papers from IPCV'20, HIMS'20, BIOCOMP'20, and BIOENG'20.

This contributed volume discusses diverse topics to demystify the rapidly emerging and evolving blockchain technology, the emergence of integrated platforms and hosted third-party tools, and the development of decentralized applications for various business domains. It presents various applications that are helpful for research scholars and scientists who are working toward identifying and pinpointing the potential of as well as the hindrances to this technology.

This book features the latest research in the area of immersive technologies, presented at the 5th International Augmented and Virtual Reality Conference, held in Munich, Germany in 2019. Bridging the gap between academia and industry, it presents the state of the art in augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) technologies and their applications in various industries such as marketing, education, healthcare, tourism, events, fashion, entertainment, retail and the gaming industry. The volume is a collection of research papers by prominent AR and VR scholars from around the globe. Covering the most significant topics in the field of augmented and virtual reality and providing the latest findings, it is of interest to academics and practitioners alike.