FROM THE CHAIR
As I write this note, the papers, posters, demonstrations, tutorials, and workshops have all beenchosen for SIGIR 2011 in Beijing, China, and registration is getting started. By the time theForum is published, JCDL 2011 will be happening in Ottawa, Canada, submissions will be underreview for CIKM 2011 in Glasgow, Scotland, and researchers will be preparing their papers for
WSDM 2012 in Seattle, Washington. On top of those SIGIR-sponsored conferences, there arenumerous workshops and conferences that SIGIR supports or advertises. The research activitywithin Information Retrieval has become so widespread and vibrant that you may be surprised at
the number of events happening. Take a look at http://sigir.org/events where more than 30 eventsare listed for 2011 alone.
Looking forward, the SIGIR 2012 conference is scheduled to be in Portland, Oregon. In 2013 itwill be in Dublin, Ireland. The 2014 venue will be announced at the business meeting in Beijing.
SIGIR is currently preparing the bidding process for 2015, open to venues within the Americas. It
will have been in Portland (2012), Boston (2009), Seattle (2006), Salvador (2005), Toronto(2003), and New Orleans (2001). If you’re interested in hosting SIGIR in 2015 or want to lobby
someone else to host it, start thinking about logistics. SIGIR welcomes presentations about
potential venues at the SIGIR business meeting in Beijing. Watch http://sigir.org or the IR
mailing list for further details.
Only vaguely related to conference venues, I have become increasingly concerned at the cost ofsome of the field’s research conferences. I raised this point in the previous issue of the Forum andhave been talking extensively with chairs of other ACM SIGs. High-cost conferences arecommon in a few SIGs, though nearly all of them have become concerned and started to search forways to reduce costs.
Most people are particularly concerned about the cost of student
registrations that can easily rise to more than US$1,250 for a student trying to maximize the valueof the meeting by attending a workshop, a tutorial, and the conference itself. The SIGIR
organization provides student travel grants to defray some costs for students who are presenting at
the SIGIR conference, but that does nothing to help students who aim to attend research
conferences and workshops for exposure, education, and networking.
The SIGIR executive and conference chairs have been considering a range of ideas to reduce
costs. Do we need expensive banquets at memorable locations? Does the wider availability of“4G” phone networks mean wireless internet access is no longer needed? Can coffee breaks besimpler? Is it acceptable to skip continental breakfasts and conference lunches? Is it stillreasonable that all registrations must include expensive events such as banquets and receptions? Is
it feasible and affordable to provide video feeds of conference presentations?
Do you object strongly to any of those ideas? Do you think that it’s time for some of them tohappen? Do you have other ideas – perhaps borrowed from other conferences – that might reduce
costs? Moreover, can any of these ideas be implemented without harming the quality and energyof the conferences? A cheap conference is a great idea… unless no one wants to attend. Pleasecontact me or any other member of the SIGIR executive with your thoughts.
James Allan
chair_sigir@acm.org