On the international level Japan is not very active in conducting research in the area of user modeling compared with Europe and the USA. The main emphasis seems to be on intelligent tutoring systems and student modeling, one of the oldest and best established subfields of user modeling.
(New Feb. 97) The USA holds a leading position with respect to intelligent agent technology and has also been trend-setting for the application of user modeling techniques in the specific area of adaptive agents for intelligent information retrieval. The trend in user modeling towards intelligent information filtering is not only visible in academic research, but also in the commercial sector. Compared to Europe, a much broader spectrum of commercial activities related to flexible information access can be recognized and many new products and services are already available. However, the ambitious vision of a highly personalized and automated information service still requires substantial application oriented basic research.
(New Mar. 97) The availability of the new Office Assistant help tool from the American software giant Microsoft Corp. constitutes a significant commercial breakthrough for user modeling technology. For the first time, advanced user modeling techniques have been included within a standard software package targeting at the mass market. It can be expected that this important development will lead to further commercial applications involving latest user modeling techniques. Given the fact that Microsoft is a global player with a strong market position throughout the world, it is very likely that a global trend will emerge towards more adaptive interfaces which build upon sophisticated user modeling technology.
(New Aug. 97) With just a single contribution to UM-97, the leading user modeling conference, current research in Japan can not be regarded very active on the international level. In contrast to this, user modeling research in the USA addresses the whole spectrum of open issues in user modeling. Compared with European research efforts, current activities in the USA exhibit a stronger focus on practical applications and the commercial exploitation of user modeling technology.
(New Oct. 98)
The
15th National Conference on Artificial Intelligence
in the USA, AAAI-98, attracted also a broad spectrum of
contributions from the general field of intelligent (multimedia) user
interfaces.
Recommender systems obviously constitute one of the hot topics in user
modeling.
As the special workshop on this topic AAAI [1998a] shows there is
growing interest in this kind of applications not only within academic
research but also in the commercial sector.