Microsoft to Highlight Next-Gen Web Work at Research Summit

Microsoft will show off some of its Windows Live search projects at the annual Microsoft Research Faculty Summit next week.

On July 17 and 18, Microsoft researchers, product group engineers and architects and invited academic researchers from around the world will convene in Redmond, Wash., to discuss everything from bioinformatics and e-science to nomadic computing and mesh networking.

Among the specific projects Microsoft researchers will highlight is Windows Live Image Search.

The Live Image Search engine for the Live.com platform went to the beta testing stage in March.

Microsoft researchers plan to “explain our research into how users interact with image search engines, some of our findings, and the motivations behind our dramatically different user interface model.

“We also overview our architecture and discuss the work that is yet to be done, including improvements to relevance, adult filtering, result filtering and increasing collection size,” according to the session abstract on Microsoft’s Web site.

The team also will highlight ongoing research in the Windows Live mobile and local arenas, specifically around the “Wild Thing” mini-keyboard and shorthand texting application.

Microsoft Live Labs head Gary Flake is set to give what sounds like a very Web 2.0ish theoretical talk, entitled, “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Imminent Internet Singularity.”

“In this talk, Flake will introduce a kinder and gentler version of the idea, which he calls the Internet Singularity.

“Like the original, the Internet Singularity suggests continued acceleration of progress, but makes greater emphasis on our ability to improve science, analytic methods, and engineering on data as opposed to on the physical world,” according to a synopsis of Flake’s talk.

Read the full story on Microsoft Watch: Microsoft to Highlight Next-Gen Web 2.0 Work at Upcoming Research Summit