Guide for making a proposal for the organisationof the ISMIR Conference
The ISMIR Board
Thursday 15th February, 2024

The International Society for Music Information Retrieval (ISMIR) is a non-profit organisation (seethe Society By-Laws on https://www.ismir.net/pdfs/ISMIR-Bylaws.pdf) which, among otherthings, oversees the organisation of the ISMIR Conference. The ISMIR conference is held annuallyand is the world’s leading research forum on processing, searching, organising and accessing musicrelated data.
The present document is intended to provide guidelines to institutions interested in making a bid
for the organisation of future editions of the conference.

Contact: board@ismir.net
Society’s website: http://ismir.net/

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Contents
1 General Information

3

1.1

The ISMIR Conference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

3

1.2

Format of the Proposal. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

3

1.3

Evaluation Criteria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

4

1.4

Communication with the ISMIR Board . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

42 Requirements

5

2.1

Location . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

5

2.2

Dates, Facilities and Local Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

5

2.3

Organising Committee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

5

2.4

Housing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

5

2.5

Diversity and Code-of-conduct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

6

2.6

Hybrid Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

6

2.7

Timeline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

6

2.8

Budget . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

7

2.9

Reviewing workflow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

8

2.10 Conference Website and Promotional Aspects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

9

2.11 Activities and Topics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

92.12 Papers and Proceedings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

93 Data about upcoming and previous conferences

12

Appendices

12

A Where to send the Calls for Papers and Participation

12

2

1

General Information

1.1

The ISMIR Conference

The revolution in music distribution and storage brought about by digital technology has fueled
tremendous research activities and interests in academia as well as in industry, resulting in thefield that is known as Music Information Retrieval (MIR). The ISMIR Conference reflects this
rapid development by providing a meeting place for the discussion of MIR-related research, developments, methods, tools and experimental results. Its main goal is to foster multidisciplinary
exchange by bringing together researchers and developers, educators and librarians, as well as
students and professional users.
The ISMIR conference has been held annually since 2000. It is a medium-size conference withan attendance of 200–400, and has traditionally intended to be accessible and affordable both toorganizers (in terms of organization complexity and financial burden) and to participants.
The conference has a length of four days preceded by one day of tutorials. Traditionally the
programme has included:− Day 1:– Tutorials– A welcome reception (cost included in registration)− Days 2 to 5:– Single-track oral paper presentations, organised in multiple sessions– Poster presentations– An invited keynote speech or speeches– A “Late-Breaking/Demo” session– An “Unconference” session– A public Society Business meeting (including Society elections every second year)– A “Women in MIR” (WiMIR) session as integral event in the regular conference program– Daily lunches and coffee breaks (cost included in registration)– A conference banquet (cost included in registration)– Optionally: a panel on a specific topic (e.g. industrial panel, panel on evaluation)– A concert consisting of music/sound art works submitted through the conference Callfor Music– Optionally: a session on a special topic (e.g. Hybrid deep learning for MIR)
– Optionally: some social event(s) (e.g. concerts, jam sessions, tours)
Proposals that deviate from the above-mentioned activities are possible, but should be discussedwith and agreed by the ISMIR Board.

1.2

Format of the Proposal

Proposals for hosting ISMIR can be submitted anytime, but the time between the proposal andthe conference is expected to be between 2 and 3 years.
Proposals to organise the ISMIR Conference should be written in a PDF document that should besent to the contact email provided on the first page of this document. The application document
must include the following aspects:(I) Motivation
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(II) Dates, facilities and local context (see Section 2.2)
(III) Organising institutions and proposal committee (see Section 2.3)
(IV) Housing aspects (see Section 2.4)
(V) A timeline of the organisation (see Section 2.7)
(VI) Budget (see Section 2.8)
(VII) Reviewing aspects (see Section 2.9)
(VIII) Website and promotional aspects (see Section 2.10)(IX) Activities and topics (see Section 2.11)(X) Papers and proceedings-related aspects (see Section 2.12)

1.3

Evaluation Criteria

Proposals will be evaluated by the ISMIR Board with respect to the following criteria:− Proposed mechanisms to guarantee the high level scientific quality of the conference− A clear intent or mechanisms in place from proposers to reach financial break-even (i.e. nofinancial gain nor loss)− Compliance to the format mentioned in Section 1.2 and the requirements listed in Section 2

1.4

Communication with the ISMIR Board

We encourage proposers to contact the Board informally before investing significant effort inproposal writing. Proposers are invited to communicate with the ISMIR Board via the contact
email provided on the first page of this document.

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2

Requirements

2.1

Location

Ideally, the location of ISMIR should alternate between Europe/Africa, Asia/Australasia andNorth/Central/South America on a rotating basis, but the Board sees this as one of many desirable
aspects of a bid rather than a strict rule.

2.2

Dates, Facilities and Local Context

Dates for the conference should be around the month of October of any given year, the date should
not conflict with other important meetings or major holidays.
Organisers are encouraged to indicate whether they would be interested in other years if their
proposal is not accepted for the proposed dates.
Organisers must agree to reserve an adequate number of meeting rooms for conference activities− that can accommodate a large enough number of people (currently 300–400)− that include rooms for diverse activities (panels, tutorials, posters, etc.)− that are within small distance of each other− that have very good transportation links to the housing solutions proposed
Proposals should include a description of the local context (town specificities, typical climate intarget dates, closest international airport, typical international travel costs, local transportation,etc.).

2.3

Organising Committee

The organising committee should propose at least:− one general conference chair− one general scientific (program) chair− one tutorial chair− one late-break/demo (and/or unconference) chair− One diversity and inclusion (D&I) chair− One sponsorship chair
Having multiple co-chairs for the above-mentioned roles is recommended. Other roles such as amusic chair, music curators, a publicity chair, a finance chair, local arrangement chairs, etc. are also
possible. The proposed chairs should have already been approached and given their agreement totake on this role. The proposal should include brief bios for the chairs and other principal involved
people.
To facilitate communication with the ISMIR Board, at least one general co-chair needs toattend the monthly ISMIR board meetings to give a conference status update.

2.4

Housing

In their formal application to host an ISMIR Conference, interested institutions must agree toeither reserve a large number of rooms, or provide evidence that a large number of rooms will be5available to participants:− In a suitable venue (hotel or other) for the whole duration of the conference− At a reasonable rate (we generally consider a “reasonable rate” compared to other international conferences (e.g., ICASSP, Interspeech) in the same or previous year).
− With availability until at least 1 month before the conference

2.5

Diversity and Code-of-conduct

The ISMIR Board invites proposers to foster diversity in their proposals, and as much as possible
to make more visible on every level of the conference minorities and parts of the MIR researchcommunity that have been traditionally under-represented (e.g. women, culture, geographicallocation), e.g.:− members of the organizing committee of ISMIR,− keynote speakers,− session chairs,− reviewers,− panel chair,− panelists− student volunteers for the conference (as a way of bringing them in contact with the MIR
community)
The open exchange of ideas and respectful, harassment-free scientific debate are central to ISMIR.
In their application, conference organisers must agree in writing with the code-of-conduct detailed
on http://confcodeofconduct.com/. They must also agree to publish it on the conference
website, and to enforce it throughout the conference.

2.6

Hybrid Format

Moving forward from 2022, ISMIR conferences will take place in a hybrid format, with an in-personcomponent (as is reasonable based on pandemic/other factors) and an online component.
Participants will be able to take part in all core conference activities, whether in person or online:• Present their work (tutorials, papers, music, LBDs)• Attend tutorial, paper, keynote, and other plenary presentations• Interact with presenters and other attendees• Socialize and network with other participants; attend dedicated social activities
The ISMIR Tech Team maintains a reusable set of technology tools to facilitate the online offeringof the conference.

2.7

Timeline

An indicative timeline should be provided, covering the whole period between the date of proposal
to target dates of the conference, and including milestones such as dates for:6

− Communication schedule with ISMIR Board− Establishment of conference web site
− Schedule of calls for papers, tutorials, etc.
− Selection of reviewers− Submission deadlines− All important steps of the reviewing workflow (e.g. papers out to reviewers, papers backfrom reviewers, etc.)− Selection of tutorials− Proceedings online− Registrations (early, late)This can be provided as e.g. a Gantt chart or any other format. Organizers are encouraged
to consider timelines for visa applications for attendees, and how the conference timeline canaccommodate timely issue of visas to ensure attendance.
2.7.1

Submission Deadline Extensions

We encourage organisers to keep to their advertised deadlines unless there are unexpected circumstances which create the need for an extension. Any extension should be fair (apply equally to
all authors) and public (announced on the ISMIR Community mailing list). What has worked
well for past conferences is to allow revisions of PDF files but no new submissions or changes tometadata (title/author) for up to a week after the deadline (during which time meta-reviewers
and reviewers can bid for and be assigned papers).

2.8

BudgetManaging the conference budget is the responsibility of the conference organisers. However, after
acceptance of their proposal, organisers should communicate regularly with the Treasurerof ISMIR with respect to budget-related matters, and make an updated itemized balance spreadsheet of the budget available to the Treasurer. After the conference, a final balance
spreadsheet should be provided to the Board.
The ISMIR Conference has traditionally intended to be accessible and affordable both to organisers(in terms of organisation complexity and financial burden) and to participants. Organisers must
explicitly agree to do their best effort to reach financial break-even (i.e. no financial gain nor loss)
in the proposal.
Organisers must agree to registration fees comparable to, or cheaper than, those of previous ISMIR
conferences. The registration fee must include the individual membership fee for the Society(currently 10 USD) which will not be counted toward the conference balance sheet and will betransferred to the Society at the end of the conference.
Proposals should include:− Spreadsheet estimate of budget− Estimate of registration fees (early, late, student)− Sponsorship plan
Depending on the financial status of the ISMIR Society, the Board may provide a financial subsidy to the conference organizers. The Board understands financial uncertainties of organizing a
conference, and will support the organizers with this financial “cushion”. This decision will bemade around the beginning of the year of the conference together with the conference organizers.
7Conference organizers are expected to adjust the conference registration rates to reach financial
break-even taking into account of the subsidy.
If the conference incurs a surplus of S larger than T (where T is a threshold that depends on thelocation of the conference), the amount S − T will be transferred to the Board. The amount T isthen kept by the organizers to promote ISMIR locally (by organizing workshops, summer school,providing local grants). The use of T should be detailed in the proposal when applying to hostthe conference. If 0 < S ≤ T then the organizers shall keep all of the surplus. Currently (as ofMarch 2023), the board has fixed T to 20K Euro for locations where it wants to actively promote
ISMIR, and to 5K Euro for locations where ISMIR is already largely active (Europe, USA and
Canada). If the conference incurs a deficit (S < 0), the Board will work with the local organizers
to attempt to cover the deficit.
Providing a financial subsidy to support conference attendance (e.g. by means of travel grants
and/or cheap housing) for groups of individuals who may not be able to attend otherwise is acommon feature of ISMIR conferences. Proposals should describe the financial support to beprovided for this purpose, and the groups of individuals for whom support is intended to beprovided.

2.9

Reviewing workflow

Organisers must agree to implement a double-blind reviewing workflow, following a two-tier model(i.e. with one level of “regular” reviewers, and another level of “meta-reviewers”), as in recent
editions of the conference.
2.9.1

Criteria for Paper Acceptance

Submitted papers should be evaluated according to the following criteria:• Novelty of the paper• Scholarly/scientific quality• Appropriateness of topic• Importance• Readability and paper organization
Proposals can propose a slightly different list of criteria, to be eventually decided between theorganisers and the ISMIR Board.
2.9.2

Conference Management System

Organisers must agree to use an appropriate conference management system for managing all
operations and communications related to the paper submission and review process, and a system
for long-term hosting of conference outputs (papers, posters, and videos). The Board respectively
recommends CMT and miniconf for the above tasks. Other conference management system options
can be put forward and will be discussed between proposers and the Board.

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2.10

Conference Website and Promotional Aspects

The Conference website will be called https://ismiryyyy.ismir.net where yyyy is the year of
the conference. The URL will be provided by the Board. Organisers must link their site to that
URL. Website hosting, content edition and management is the responsibility of the organisersfrom its initial publication online until at most two months after the completion of the conference.
After this date, the organisers must provide a static version of the website for public archivingon the official ISMIR domain.
2.10.1

Online Guidelines for Reviewers

The website must include guidelines for reviewers (see e.g. websites of previous editions of theconference).
2.10.2

Past ISMIRs

The conference website must include a link back to the Society website with past ISMIR conferences(https://ismir.net/conferences/).
2.10.3

ISMIR Logo Placement

The official ISMIR logo should be displayed prominently on the conference web site, proceedings,
programme booklets, and any other ISMIR-related document.

2.11

Activities and Topics

Proposals should include a list of scheduled activities (see Section 1.1), together with a draft
program for the conference (subject to change).
Proposals should identify any major changes in the Call-for-Papers (CFP) list of topics withrespect to recent ISMIR conferences (if any).
2.11.1

Keynote/Invited Speakers

The conference program should include between 1-3 keynote or invited speakers.
Finding an appropriate keynote speaker (relevant to ISMIR, a good speaker, well-known, etc.)
often takes a long time, so it should be started early.
Conference organisers must cover the travel and housing expenses of the keynote and invited
speakers, and provide complimentary conference registrations. If an honorarium is paid (which
has not been the norm at ISMIR), it should be symbolic, to avoid increasing the registration fees.

2.12

Papers and Proceedings

Organisers must agree to publish all papers and posters selected in the review process in PDF
format.
Papers must be made accessible and linked on the conference website, on the latest at the starting
day of the conference.

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A complete book of proceedings must be edited and a PDF version must be linked on the conference
website, on the latest at the starting day of the conference.
2.12.1

Copyright of Accepted Papers

Organisers must agree to publish papers under the following licence:− CC-BY Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC BY 4.0).
This license authorises anybody to share (copy and redistribute the material in any medium or
format) and adapt (remix, transform, and build upon the material) the work for any purpose,even commercially, under the following terms:− Attribution: The work must be attributed to its authors, a link to the licence must be
provided, and indications if changes were made should be given.
− The copyright is retained by the corresponding authors.
See http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ and http://creativecommons.org/
licenses/by/4.0/legalcode for full details. Accordingly, all papers must bear the following
footnote on the first page:©AuthorNamePlaceholder.
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
Attribution:
AuthorNamePlaceholder. “PaperTitlePlaceHolder”, International Society for Music Information Retrieval Conference, YearConferencePlaceholder.
2.12.2

Number of Papers

The number of papers presented at the conference must not vary too much from previous editionsof the conference (see Section 3).
2.12.3

Author Registration Requirement

Organisers must agree that for each accepted paper, at least one author must register for the
conference, and that papers with no registered author on the author registration deadline will
be removed from the conference programme and will not appear in the proceedings nor on theconference website.
2.12.4

Important Requirements for Papers

Organisers must ensure that papers presented at the conference and published in the proceedings
consist of original contributions (not previously published and not being considered for publicationelsewhere on the date of presentation at ISMIR).
2.12.5Paper Format

To ensure a consistent proceedings, organisers must provide templates for LATEX and MS Word,
together with detailed instructions on formatting paper submissions. We encourage organisers to
use the same format and templates as used in previous years.
10All accepted papers must have the same format.
All papers to be published in the proceedings must have a maximum of 6 pages excluding acknowledgements and references; the latter two sections do not have a page limit. Papers must conform
to Adobe’s PDF format (e.g. include all fonts).
2.12.6Late-Breaking/Demo and Unconference Documentation

At the discretion of each facilitator in the Late-breaking/Demo and Unconference sessions, notes
taken during a given session will be refined into a 1-2 page summary, with a deadline for thisdocument set at three weeks after the close of the conference.
2.12.7

Post-Conference Report

Organisers must also agree to provide, at the latest, 2 months after the end of the conference, a
final report describing experiences gained in organizing the conference. A template report fromprevious editions of the conference will be provided to organisers, which they can update at theend of the conference. This report is passed on to future conference organisers, to ensure continuity
and retention of best practice.

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3

Data about upcoming and previous conferences

A list of past conferences can be found at: https://ismir.net/conferences/
A list of upcoming conferences can be found at: https://ismir.net/
Diverse useful statistics for previous ISMIR conferences are available on the Society website.

AppendicesA

Where to send the Calls for Papers and Participation

The following is an indicative, non-exhaustive list of places to send the conference call-forparticipation− The ISMIR Community mailing list community@ismir.net− The NIME Community mailing list community@nime.org− AIMI list aimi@lists.aimi-musica.org− AFIM afim.info@afim-asso.org− MusicDSP music-dsp@music.columbia.edu− ICMA icma@umich.edu− SMC Network smcnetwork@llista.upf.edu− Computer Music Mailing List in Brazil compmus-l@sbc.org.br− Auditory mailing list AUDITORY@lists.mcgill.ca− SIGMM (linked to CBMI, etc.) sigmm@pi4.informatik.uni-mannheim.de− ICAD icad@santafe.edu− Wiki CfP www.wikicfp.com− UAI list uai@eecs.oregonstate.edu− LinkedIn RecSys http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Recommender-Systems-1758697− DMRN DMRN-LIST@jiscmail.ac.uk− CHI-ANNOUNCEMENTS CHI-ANNOUNCEMENTS@listserv.acm.org− DBWorld Dbworld@cs.wisc.edu− SIGIR IRList@lists.shef.ac.uk− User modeling um@di.unito.it− ML list 1 http://groups.google.com/group/ml-news?hl=en ml-news@googlegroups.
com− ML list 2 http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/datamining2/ datamining2@
yahoogroups.com− LinkedIn group EURASIP http://www.linkedin.com/groups?home=&gid=1970808&trk=
anet_ug_hm− The ESCOM mailing list escom-mailing-list@gaggle.email
− The
SMPC
communitylist
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/
1FAIpQLSfgQoMLQZjB0XPvu0__2XgkQ63ri-g1S-pz9BrjZtOrdIf1jQ/viewform− The SysMus community http://groups.google.com/group/sysmus-conferences12