Development of Industry 4.0 in the Manaus Industrial Hub from priority programs / Desenvolvimento da Indústria 4.0 no PIM a partir de programas prioritários

Owner of one of the most expressive industrial hubs in Latin America, the Manaus Free Trade Zone is inserted in the context of Industry 4.0, initially through the Informatics Law of Western Amazonia and Amapá, which regulates the application of resources in research, development and innovation (RDI) in the region. The Priority Programs as vectors for the development of Industry 4.0, at the Manaus Industrial Hub, are the central objective of this study, as well as their contributions through projects, partnerships, fundraising and investments in thematic areas focused on enabling technologies that are the “backbone” of Industry 4.0. To reach the general objective, information was collected from the coordinating institution of the Priority Program for Industry 4.0 and Industrial Modernization and other coordinating institutions of the Priority Programs that aim to demonstrate trends and reflections on the implementation process and the strengthening of Industry 4.0 in the Manaus Industrial Hub, especially, based on the action of the Priority Programs.

The Future of Forecasting Competitions: Design Attributes and Principles

Forecasting competitions are the equivalent of laboratory experimentation widely used in physical and life sciences. They provide useful, objective information to improve the theory and practice of forecasting, advancing the field, expanding its usage, and enhancing its value to decision and policymakers. We describe 10 design attributes to be considered when organizing forecasting competitions, taking into account trade-offs between optimal choices and practical concerns, such as costs, as well as the time and effort required to participate in them. Consequently, we map all major past competitions in respect to their design attributes, identifying similarities and differences between them, as well as design gaps, and making suggestions about the principles to be included in future competitions, putting a particular emphasis on learning as much as possible from their implementation in order to help improve forecasting accuracy and uncertainty. We discuss that the task of forecasting often presents a multitude of challenges that can be difficult to capture in a single forecasting contest. To assess the caliber of a forecaster, we, therefore, propose that organizers of future competitions consider a multicontest approach. We suggest the idea of a forecasting-“athlon” in which different challenges of varying characteristics take place.

Reģionālie mediji Latvijā: Covid-19 izraisītās krīzes izaicinājumi

A multi-stage study was conducted to find out what is the role of regional media in the crisis caused by the coronavirus Covid-19, what problems do the media face, what is the opinion of consumers about the work of regional media: 1) audience surveys (1428 respondents); 2) survey of national and regional media (26 respondents); 3) analysis of the content of the regional newspaper Alūksnes un Malienas Ziņas (during the state emergency, March 12, 2020 –June 10, 2020); 4) in-depth, semi-structured interviews with regional media consumers (audience); 5) in-depth, semi-structured interviews with regional media editors. The Covid-19 crisis changed the work of regional media. The ways of obtaining media information diversified, mutual communication and the created content changed, and interaction with the audience increased. The number of subscribers and advertisers decreased significantly (up to 50 %), and therefore the total revenue, creating a serious threat to the existence of the media. The financial situation forced several media executives to reorganise the media – to reduce the number of employees and their salaries, decide on reducing the periodicity of newspapers, and raise prices. Several regional media leaders predict that the media will be shut down if the situation does not improve. The public appreciates and trusts the work of the regional media, they are happy to consume them as well, but more and more often, they cannot afford to pay for them. The results of the survey confirm that with each decade of life achieved, people’s interest in local events (news in the municipality and region, culture and sports) and, consequently, the intensity of regional media consumption increase. Local proximity increases mutual trust between regional media workers (their content) and local community residents (audience). Interactions (seeking advice and assistance, participating in content creation, recording violations of restrictions) were particularly active during the Covid-19 crisis when the doors of state and local authorities were closed (the work took place from home) throughout the emergency. The rapid spread of Covid-19 changed the traditional agenda of regional media – methods of information gathering and mutual communication (remote interviews, video conferences, and meetings, virtual meetings on electronic communication platforms), as well as the content created. The results of the content analysis confirm the priority status of the Covid-19 topic (multiplicity, intensity, location) in the content of the regional newspaper Alūksnes un Malienas Ziņas. With the materials dedicated to Covid-19, journalists informed the audience about the latest events, explained the decisions made by the government, motivated them to act responsibly, appealed to conscience, called for mutual help, condemned, comforted, and also saved. During the emergency, journalists performed not only the functions of an informant but also an educator, psychologist, and social worker (educating, explaining, reassuring, motivating, and helping), while reducing one of their main functions – the watchdog function. The regional press is the only mechanism of balance of power in the regions that exercises power control in local governments, as well as the only ones that regularly record the uniqueness of the local environment, promote the construction of local identity, create a sense of belonging, ensure objective information from reliable sources. Without receiving the necessary support from the state authorities (financial assistance, tax relief, arrangement of legislation), the existence of regional media will be endangered in the coming year, thereby a versatile media environment, diversity of opinions, availability of objective information, as well as preservation of literary Latvian language and culture will also be in danger.

« Bourrage de crânes » et « slogans qui éternisent le mensonge » : les écrivains anarchistes face à la propagande

The French anarchist press positions itself from the beginning as the purveyor of honest and objective information, as opposed to the mainstream bourgeois newspapers, close to political power, who tailor their news to the needs of propaganda. This article offers an analysis of the role of the press as a vehicle for fake news from the point of view of anarchist writers and journalists, starting with Proudhon’s own newspapers (1848-1850), but focusing most of all on the polemics around the “bourrage de crânes" (brainwashing of the public) during the First World War. This through the writings of two of the most active writers of the individualist branch of the anarchist movement, Manuel Devaldès and Gérard de Lacaze-Duthiers, and their critique of language and the use of tropes, clichés and slogans for propaganda purposes.

THE SYSTEM OF PROTECTION OF STUDENTS FROM INTERNAL THREATS

The article focuses on the pedagogical system of protecting students from internal threats. Objective information about the social health of students, as well as the need for a qualitatively new approach to solving problems in the field of spiritual support for its comprehensive development and the "cleansing" of the spiritual environment of young people. Today, students are shown the skills, knowledge and competencies to prepare for professional activities, to develop immunity to internal threats. The components of the structure of protection of students from internal threats: purposefulness, initiative, patriotism, conviction, willpower, responsibility and conscientiousness are claimed. The lexical meanings of these components are also covered.

Research of the impact of vibration on the efficiency of dissemination of loose plant products from the motor vehicle bodies

The object of research is the process of unloading bulk crop products from the bodies of dump trucks, the subject of the study is the dependence of the energy consumption of unloading on the properties of products when exposed to vibration. This dependence is understood as a change in the properties of bulk products, such as internal friction and the angle of repose, in the direction of decreasing, providing a decrease in the angle of lift of the body. One of the most problematic areas is the lack of objective information on the dependence of the required lifting angles of the dump truck body when unloading fine-grained crop products when exposed to vibrations. There is also insufficient information on the dependence of these angles on vibration frequency for each of the products. In the course of the study, an experimental method was used to determine the angles of natural bevel for different crops without and under the influence of vibrations of different frequencies on the reference area. The proposed development makes it possible to quantitatively assess the degree of influence of vibrations, their frequencies and time of impact on the frictional properties of bulk crop products. The degree of reduction of internal friction in these products and the maximum angles of lifting the body required for its unloading were experimentally determined, and numerical data were obtained on their reduction under the influence of vibrations. The results obtained allow to consider it an effective tool for obtaining objective information about the effect of vibrations on the characteristics of internal friction of bulk crop products. This made it possible to determine the degree of influence of the lift angle of the dump truck body during unloading and to reduce energy costs. In contrast to the existing ones, the proposed development makes it possible to differentiate these angles depending on the frequency and time of exposure to vibration, as well as on a specific product. Certain parameters make it possible to regulate them to achieve minimum energy consumption.

COMPREHENSIVE ASSESSMENT OF THE COMPANY’S COMPETITIVENESS

The article is devoted to the development of methodological approaches to carry out a comprehensive assessment and analysis of the competitiveness of the enterprise. The relevance of the topic of research is due to the lack of a single generally accepted technique for its implementation in Ukraine at this time. The proposed method is based on a holistic hierarchical system of factors of competitiveness of the enterprise developed by T. Cono, thereby expanding the possibilities of assessing and analyzing the competitiveness of the enterprise. Among these factors: the market share that the company occupies, innovative potential, production and sales capacity of the enterprise, the company's strategy, the management potential, the main results of the enterprise. The focus on these factors made it possible to develop a methodology that is an effective tools not only in obtaining objective information to assess and analyze the competitiveness of the enterprise, but also to build an effective system of controlling it.

DSCope: Development of Automatic Program for Detecting Fractures and Measuring Dip Angles

Changes in underground environments have been predicted by investigating underground bedrock conditions and analyzing the shapes of discontinuities in the rocks. The most commonly used method is to drill a borehole, insert a camera inside and capture the wall of the borehole in a photograph to investigate the discontinuities. However, if the images of the borehole cannot be captured, the characteristics of the discontinuities in the bedrock are analyzed by capturing the drilling cores in photographs. In this case, considerable time is required to analyze the drilling cores with the naked eye and measure the attitudes of the discontinuities developed in the cores in detail. Moreover, the results may vary depending on the researcher’s perspective. To overcome these limitations, this study develops a program for analyzing photographs of drilling cores. The program can automatically identify discontinuities in drilling cores and measure the attitudes through linear fitting using only drilling core photographs. In addition, we apply the program to practical field data to verify its applicability. We found that the program could provide more accurate and objective information on drilling cores than the currently used method and could more effectively organize the characteristics of fractures in the study area.

Is corruption distasteful or just another cost of doing business?

Using data from a lab experiment carried out in Kenya, we show that while “legitimate” costs and costs imposed by corruption both deter investment, the latter is no more of a disincentive than the former. We interpret the evidence as consistent with the conclusion that our participants viewed corruption as just another cost of doing business. We also experimented with giving participants in some treatments information about the corruption expectations of participants in previous sessions and the actual extent of corruption in previous sessions. We find some evidence that the objective information actually increased investment without changing the participants’ own expectations regarding corruption. That result is compatible with the idea that revealing the level of corruption changes the descriptive norm and facilitates investment in a corrupt environment.