Bill Rand
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billrand.bsky.social
Bill Rand
@billrand.bsky.social
McLauchlan Distinguished Professor of Marketing and Analytics.
Chris Kempes discussing universal laws of life for the dinner keynote at CSS 2025.
November 9, 2025 at 1:52 AM
Aaron Frank discussing an agent-based model of political elite dynamics at CSS 2025.
November 8, 2025 at 10:40 PM
Tim Gulden presenting his work with Aaron Frank and Ryan Brown on using LLMs as engines for social simulation.
November 8, 2025 at 10:39 PM
Andrew Crooks describing his work on modeling wildfire evacuations at CSS 2025.
November 8, 2025 at 9:19 PM
Matt Koehler discussing how to detect critical slowing down at CSSSA.
November 8, 2025 at 12:17 AM
Stefani Crabtree discussing how to use computational modeling to improve archaeology.
November 7, 2025 at 7:41 PM
Corinna Eisenbroich discussing Agents and Agency in a Complex World.
August 27, 2025 at 7:29 AM
Troy Tassier has written a fascinating look at how the pandemic has differential effects across socioeconomic classes. Not only is it well researched but it balances data with individual stories that make those facts personal.

share.google/7e7msl8SFGmX...
The Rich Flee and the Poor Take the Bus
How Our Unequal Society Fails Us during Outbreaks
share.google
August 24, 2025 at 6:14 PM
NFTs are a great technology, and are valuable for tracing the ownership of digital assets. But instead of using them to own Lazy Apes why not use them to help provide better control over health data.

How NFTs could transform health information exchange | Science share.google/8gqI6fKksIxu...
How NFTs could transform health information exchange
Can patients regain control over their health information?
share.google
August 23, 2025 at 7:57 PM
Excited to start a new position today as the Goodnight Executive Director of the Institute for Advanced Analytics. Looking forward to working with the hard-working and student-driven staff and faculty of one of the most preeminent analytics / data science programs.

provost.ncsu.edu/news/2025/06...
Bill Rand Appointed New Goodnight Executive Director of IAA
Goodnight Executive Director of the Institute for Advanced Analytics Michael Rappa is returning to the faculty in the Department of Computer Science in the College of Engineering, and Bill Rand will b...
provost.ncsu.edu
July 1, 2025 at 12:30 PM
Ravi Bapna discussing the effects of ChatGPT usage on student performance.
June 23, 2025 at 8:41 AM
Samandra Bhattacharyya discussing how to use LLMs in prioritizing social media content at SCECR 2025.
June 23, 2025 at 8:25 AM
Jeff Inman discussing the effect of generative AI on the online review landscape.
June 12, 2025 at 3:39 PM
Amna Kirmani discussing how AI helps and hurts relationship building.
June 12, 2025 at 3:19 PM
Bernd Skiera discussing how to do large scale student evaluation with AI.
June 12, 2025 at 2:18 PM
Bernd Schmidt discussing the preferences for human vs robotic salespeople.
June 12, 2025 at 1:59 PM
As a professor, I often get asked what major someone should choose in college. And I would always say that Computer Science was always a good choice. However, with the growth of generative AI coding recent graduates in CS have one of the highest unemployment rates.

www.newsweek.com/computer-sci...
A popular college major has one of the highest unemployment rates
"Every kid with a laptop thinks they're the next Zuckerberg, but most can't debug their way out of a paper bag," one expert told Newsweek.
www.newsweek.com
May 28, 2025 at 3:36 PM
I'm honored to be one of only four recipients of this year's NC State (@ncstate.bsky.social) Alumni Association Outstanding Research Award.

research.ncsu.edu/four-faculty...
Four Faculty Members Win the 2025 Outstanding Research Award
Felix N. Castellano, Bill Rand, Melanie Simpson and Ross Sozzani won the 2025 Outstanding Research Award — the university’s top honor recognizing faculty who lead in their fields, commit to mentoring ...
research.ncsu.edu
May 9, 2025 at 8:47 PM
Google is working on an AI co-Scientist. They have already shown that it can generate novel and interesting hypotheses, but the coolest part of this is that they demonstrated that those hypotheses actually led to valuable research results.

research.google/blog/acceler...
Accelerating scientific breakthroughs with an AI co-scientist
research.google
May 1, 2025 at 3:09 PM
I'm excited to announce that our paper on "How Firms Can Steer Social Media Conversations" with Mike Saljoughian, Kelly Hewett, and Harald van Heerde has been accepted for publication at the Journal of Marketing Research.

journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
EXPRESS: How Firms Can Steer Social Media Conversations - Mohammad “Mike” Saljoughian, Kelly Hewett, Harald J. van Heerde, William “Bill” Rand, 2025
Many firms struggle with how to craft their messages in conversations with customers on social media. The problem is compounded by the fact that these conversat...
journals.sagepub.com
March 24, 2025 at 7:19 PM
If you want a slightly more technical description of how DeepSeek scared American AI investors, this Venture Beat article is pretty good, without being a full on academic paper.

venturebeat.com/ai/deepseek-...
DeepSeek R1’s bold bet on reinforcement learning: How it outpaced OpenAI at 3% of the cost
DeepSeek R1’s Monday release has sent shockwaves through the AI community, disrupting assumptions about what’s required to achieve cutting-edge AI performance. This story focuses on exactly how DeepSeek managed this feat, and what it means for the vast number of users of AI models. For enterprises developing AI-driven solutions, DeepSeek’s breakthrough challenges assumptions of OpenAI's dominance -- and offers a blueprint for cost-efficient innovation.
venturebeat.com
January 30, 2025 at 10:00 PM
I like the idea of an AI that challenges our basic assumptions, but isn't that how you get SkyNet?

cacm.acm.org/opinion/ai-s...
AI Should Challenge, Not Obey – Communications of the ACM
cacm.acm.org
January 22, 2025 at 2:27 PM
🚨 We're Hiring! 🚨

Are you an expert in marketing research and/or brand promotion? Want to teach and mentor future marketers? @ncstate.bsky.social Poole College of Management is looking for a Lecturer in Marketing to join our team!

Apply here: jobs.ncsu.edu/postings/213...
Lecturer, Marketing
The Poole College of Management at North Carolina State University invites applications for a full-time, non-tenure track faculty position as a Marketing Lecturer, beginning Fall 2025.Responsibilities...
jobs.ncsu.edu
January 17, 2025 at 3:55 PM
I like the idea of branding all AI that does not specifically account for environmental impact as Red AI. But maybe we could go stronger: Damaging AI? Deadly AI? Earth Destroying AI?

dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/...
Green AI | Communications of the ACM
Creating efficiency in AI research will decrease its carbon footprint and increase its inclusivity as deep learning study should not require the deepest pockets.
dl.acm.org
January 2, 2025 at 4:05 PM
Our need for privacy evolved from a need for physical security, which explains why we don't understand the danger of silicon valley. We don't have physical clues. Every time you are online just imagine some creepy guy in a trench coach standing right next to you.

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
How privacy’s past may shape its future
An account of privacy’s evolutionary roots may hold lessons for policies in the digital age
www.science.org
January 2, 2025 at 4:04 PM