ICML 2006

ICML = the International Conference on Machine Learning. ICML is different to KDD. KDD grew out of an applications/database community. ICML is much more theoretical.

Two big surprises:

• ICML isn’t about AI. At ICML there is no talk of “beliefs” or “goals” or "teams". Rather, we study ML since it is like some sub-routine that is used by many fields. ML is a great foundation for a varied career- ML grad students learn how to leap from application to application in a single bound.
• This was that this wasn’t some big industry-funded, government sponsored, DARPA-saturated, NASA-business-level stuff. Instead, a bunch of theory types sat on folding chairs in a gymnasium and discussed arcane mathematics. And such mathematics- I meet so many people who left meetings with a puzzled look on their face asking “how many people in the audience understood that last talk? Two? Three?”.
  

But it wasn’t all quadratic programming in concave manifolds. They played the world cup on a television in the foyer and it attracted a huge crowd. And the final score: maths=0; soccer=1.

Too much here for one blog so see:

• Ornate dinner
  
• Pretty good time
  
• I meet lots of Aussies, and I liked that.