Antoine Bordes provides an implementation of the LaRank algorithm, together with the datasets. This new implementation runs slightly faster than the code we have used for the LaRank paper. In addition there is a special version for the case of linear kernels.

A page has been allocated for my segment of the NIPS 2007 Tutorials. The second part of the tutorial Learning with Large Datasets was given by Alex Gray. Alex had to replace Andrew Moore on short notice because airplane delays conspired against our initial plans. The page contains the slides and a video recording a the lecture I gave at Microsoft Research a few days after NIPS.

During the 4th Annual Gala of the New York Academy of Sciences, I became one of the happy winners of the first Blavatnik Award for Young Scientists. The other finalists were very impressive. Choosing the winners must have been difficult. Leonard_Blavatnik told me he attended the Nobel ceremony a few years ago and thought that something similar should be done in New York for younger scientists. Apparently he plans to fund a similar award every year.