A selection of highlights from 2022:
- We organized ECIR’22 in Stavanger, Norway, marking it as the first major IR conference with a hybrid setup that allowed in-person travel after the pandemic. We wrote about our experiences in SIGIR Forum.
- Co-organized a workshop on Measuring the Quality of Explanations in Recommender Systems (SIGIR’22).
- Pioneered work on natural language user profiles for transparent and scrutable recommendation, published as a perspectives paper at SIGIR’22.
- Trond Linjordet successfully completed and defended his PhD thesis “A Critical Look at the Evaluation of Knowledge Graph Question Answering“.
- Two new PhD students started at IAI under my supervision: Nolwenn Bernard and Weronika Łajewska.
- Above all, I became a father this year, a personal milestone that far outshines any professional success. It has made me even more deliberate about where I spend my time, prompting me to say no more often, including accepting committee invitations and traveling to conferences.