[agents] CALL FOR PAPERS: BTC4MAS Workshop @PAAMS 2019

[Timotheus Kampik]

CALL FOR PAPERS

The 2nd International Workshop on Blockchain Technology for Multi-Agent 
Systems (BTC4MAS)

In conjunction with the 17th International Conference on Practical 
Applications of Agents and Multi-Agent Systems (PAAMS 2019)

26th - 28th of June 2019 in Ávila Spain.

https://www.paams.net/workshops/bct4mas

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Description
===========

Multi-agent systems (MAS) are composed of loosely coupled entities 
(agents) interconnected and organized in a network. Every agent has the 
ability to solve problems and attain its goals by interacting with each 
other through collaboration, negotiation, and competition patterns. MAS 
are increasingly dealing with sensitive data. Therefore, enforcing the 
notion of reputation, ensuring trust and reliability, is essential for 
modern MAS. Blockchain (BCT) is a P2P distributed ledger technology 
providing shared, immutable, transparent, and updatable (append-only) 
registers of given values characterizing a given network (e.g., all the 
actions intercurred among the participants and information about the 
participants themselves). However, employing the BCT ``as-is'' and by 
itself in dynamic and quickly evolving scenarios can represent an 
unlucky choice. The reasons span from fundamental properties of BCT, to 
application/domain specific constraints. Reaching consensus in 
distributed multi-stakeholder networks with possible unaligned interests 
can be considerably complex or unsustainable.

Therefore, if properly managed, combining BCT and MAS can represent a 
win-win solution:
(i) the adoption and adaption of BCT can help to overcome trust and 
reliability limitations broadly known in MAS literature, enabling 
secure, autonomous, flexible and even profitable solutions.
(ii) MAS can contribute with its features to address limitations of BCT.

All proposed papers must be submitted in electronic form (PDF format) 
using the PAAMS conference management system 
(https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=paams19).

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Topics
======

Theoretical track
-----------------

* Main properties of blockchain technology
* Self-aware and smart contracts
* Reputation management
* Decision-making for policy
* Secure identity assurance
* Security and privacy management
* Trust and data integrity
* Procurement
* Conflict resolution in business collaboration
* Task allocation, coordination, and supervision
* Agreement technologies and artificial institutions
* Big data management in highly distributed environments
* Anonymization of distributed data

Applied track
-------------

* Distributed energy grids
* Collaborative governance
* Distributed Autonomous Organisations (DAO)
* Distributed artificial intelligence
* Swarm robotics
* Coordination models in Internet-of-Things (IoT)
* E-commerce and demand-supply relationships
* Software life-cycle management
* E-government
* Sharing economy

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Important Dates
===============

- Deadline for Submissions:      March 18, 2019 (strict)
- Notification of acceptance:    April 08, 2019
- Camera-ready:                  April 22, 2019
- Workshop day(s):               June 26-28, 2019

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Submission
==========

Submissions will be reviewed by at least two members of the programme 
committee, who are experts in the field.
The acceptance of the submitted papers will depend on their quality, 
relevance, and originality.
To conduct this process, the chairs will rely on easychair to make the 
reviewing procedure traceable, transparent and accessible.
In the case of accepted papers characterized by relevant demands (e.g., 
clarifications, changes, corrections) set by the reviewers,
the final acceptance will be subject to their accomplishment.

Accepted papers will be published as part of the PAAMS proceedings. 
Authors of outstanding papers will be invited to submit extend versions 
of their papers to the MDPI Information Journal, special issue on 
Blockchain Technologies for Multi-Agent Systems: 
https://www.mdpi.com/journal/information/special_issues/Blockchain_Technologies

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Organizing Committee
====================

- Dr. Davide Calvaresi - HES-SO Valais-Wallis (Switzerland)
- Dr. Alevtina Dubovitskaya - HES-SO Valais-Wallis (Switzerland)
- Prof. Dr. Michael Schumacher - HES-SO Valais-Wallis (Switzerland)
- Prof. Andrea Omicini - University of Bologna (Italy)
- Prof. Sooyong Park - Sogang University (South Korea)

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Publicity Chairs
================

- Amro Najjar  - Umeå University (Sweden)
- Timotheus Kampik - Umeå University (Sweden) / Signavio GmbH (Germany)

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-- 
Timotheus Kampik
PhD Student

Interactive and Intelligent Systems Group
Department of Computing Science
Umeå University
Sweden