Last Friday in our theory reading group, Yael Kalai observed that there's only one other woman in the room. She noticed it because in cryptography meetings, at least in the Boston area, there is a significantly higher female presence. Make no mistake, cryptography, even in Boston, still has a very lopsided gender ratio. But I think it is still … Continue reading An observation

I just gave the final lecture in my seminar on Sum of Squares Upper Bounds, Lower Bounds, and Open Questions. (see also this previous post). The lectures notes are available on the web page and also as a single pdf file.  They are extremely rough but I hope they would still be useful, as some … Continue reading Sum-of-Squares seminar: lecture notes and open problems

The closing of MSR-SV two months ago raised a fair bit of discussion, and I would like to contribute some of my own thoughts. Since the topic of industrial research is important, I would like the opportunity to counter some misconceptions that have spread. I would also like to share my advice with anyone that (like me) is … Continue reading Out the Window

Hope everyone has a great FOCS! In the previous post we mentioned the two workshops on different aspects of the Fourier transforms occurring today. I also wanted to mention the Tutorial on obfuscation today with talks by  Amit Sahai, Allison Lewko and Dan Boneh. The new constructions of obfuscation and their applications form one of the most exciting and … Continue reading FOCS 2014 is starting

[Guest post by Anna Gilbert, who is co-organizing with Piotr Indyk and Dina Katabi a FOCS 2014 workshop on The  Sparse Fourier Transform: Theory and Applications, this Saturday 9am-3:30pm]  After reading Boaz's post on Updates from the ICM and in particular his discussion of interactions between the TCS and applied math communities, I thought I'd contribute a … Continue reading Applied mathematicians vs Theoretical Computer Scientists

Not unrelated to our last post, the upcoming FOCS will have a panel-led discussion on "How might FOCS and STOC evolve?" (organized by David Shmoys) on Saturday 10/18 at 6pm. If you are interested in the future of FOCS and STOC, and haven't yet registered or made your travel plans, I urge you to do so … Continue reading Evolving FOCS – mobile edition

[Note: As I commented on Omer's touching post, I too was shocked by the sudden closure of the amazingly successful MSR Silicon Valley lab. I hope that this blog, whose contents had very little to do with MSR itself and everything to do with the great group of people that was there, would continue to … Continue reading Sum of Squares: Upper bounds, lower bounds, and open questions

Dozens of comments following Omer’s post, which confirmed the closure of the lab, would make you believe that it was a magical place where amazing things happened. And indeed, it was. But it was also more than just a place – the lab was a community with its own values, identity, voice and will. In … Continue reading Riding the Wheel of Samsara