LINGUIST List 8.1613

Mon Nov 10 1997

Jobs: Ling Engineer-Perspecta (Correction of 8.1611)

Editor for this issue: Martin Jacobsen <martylinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. A. Deitz, Linguistics Engineer-Perspecta (Correction)

Editors Note: This job posting was originally posted with an incorrect
email address. Please use the address above for any correspondance
with Perspecta.

M. Jacobsen

Position Specification
Perspecta
Linguistics Engineer


While the Internet has revolutionized the availability of information,
navigating these vast resources and finding relevant information
remains a major problem. Perspecta's products will provide users with
a radical new way to turn increasingly overwhelming amounts of
information into a manageable , usable, and valuable resource.

The Founding of Perspecta Perspecta was founded in January 1996 by
Earl Rennison, Lisa Strausfeld, and Nicolas Saint-Arnaud, alumni of
the MIT Media Lab, and technology industry leaders Steve Holtzman and
Nicholas Negroponte.

Prior to founding Perspecta, the founders developed revolutionary new
ways of representing and navigating through large volumes of
information through their work in the Visible Language Workshop at the
Media Lab. Through their work, Rennison and Strausfeld painted a
visionary picture of the future of information organization and
navigation with their Galaxy of News, Financial Viewpoints, and The
Millennium Project which received worldwide recognition, won
international awards, and provided the foundation for other research
projects, both in and out of the Media Lab.



>From Boston to Silicon Valley

In 1994, the MIT students met Steve Holtzman, a computer industry
veteran from Silicon Valley whose recently published book, Digital
Mantras, had received critical acclaim as a philosophy of creativity
for the digital age. The book resonated with many people at the Media
Lab as it reinforced the notion that new methods and paradigms were
required to unleash the potential of digital expression. Upon
completing their research at the Media Lab, Earl, Lisa, and Nicolas
approached Holtzman and Nicholas Negroponte, the founder and director
of the Media Lab, to explore how they might establish a company to
commercialize their ideas. Together, they founded Perspecta in
January 1996, with initial seed funding provided by Holtzman and
Negroponte. The company moved to San Francisco and began the process
of building a team to deliver its first products.

Now with eighteen employees and venture-funding from Applied
Technology, Sofinnova, and Informix Software, Perspecta is well on its
way to implementing commercial software products that will
dramatically enhance the way people navigate and experience
information on the Web and corporate intranets.

About Perspecta, Inc. will dramatically enhance the way people
navigate and experience information on the Web and corporate
intranets. Founded in January 1996, Perspecta is based in San
Francisco with 18 employees. Major investors in Perspecta include
venture partners Applied Technology and Sifinnova, and corporate
investor Informix Software, Inc. (IFMX). More information on
Perspecta can be found on Perspecta's World Wide Web site at
http://www.perspecta.com

Functional Profile	
	The person filling this position will design, develop, and
integrate linguistic processing algorithms for Prospecta's proprietary
client/server technology.


Key Selection Criteria
	advanced degree in CS or Computational Linguistics
	expert knowledge in contemporary natural language processing:
	-empirical and experimental /theoretical methods
	-statistical and knowledge-based approaches
	-superficial processing and deep parsing/semantic analysis
	experience with knowledge representation issues, developing 
		semantic networks/ontologies
	very strong algorithm design and implementation skills
	experience with machine translation
	experience with summarization
	experience with morphological processing
	industry/product experience
	well versed in object-oriented design/programming, C++, Java
	Windows, Unix literacy
 Self-motivated, creative, "Can-do" engineer who knows how to 
		complete projects on time in a high intensity start-up 
		environment