Amazon at WSDM: How the scale of the web makes old problems new

Amazon scientists and conference general chairs Liane Lewin-Eytan and David Carmel on the transformations wrought when data goes online.

“.. Two of the three general chairs at this year’s ACM Conference on Web Search and Data Mining (WSDM) are scientists from Alexa Shopping’s offices in Haifa, Israel: Liane Lewin-Eytan, senior manager of applied research, and David Carmel, a principal applied scientist.

When they volunteered for the role, Lewin-Eytan and Carmel were hoping to bring the conference to Jerusalem. “It was the beginning of March [2020],” Lewin-Eytan says. “We had a beautiful bid, with many, many attractions in Jerusalem, because the steering committee of the conference takes also into consideration what the country can offer to participants. We were very excited to bring it here — it was a big honor to the local community — but because of COVID-19, we ended up online. We still hope to host the conference here one day. …”

By Larry Hardesty March 05, 2021

https://www.amazon.science/blog/amazon-at-wsdm-how-the-scale-of-the-web-makes-old-problems-new