Minutes of the SGB Meeting October 14, 2000
1.0 Welcome and Introductions
Notkin welcomed the attendees and began the meeting at 9:00 am. Each of the participants introduced themselves.
Notkin asked for comments on the minutes of the February'00 SGB Meeting.
Motion: move to approve the minutes of the February'00 SGB Meeting.
Partridge, Feldman
Unanimous
1.1 Review of SGB EC Positions
Chesnais informed the SGB that the Members-at-Large had taken on the following roles:
David Notkin - SGB EC Vice-Chair for Operations. Presides over SGB and SGB EC Meetings, including SGB EC conference calls.
Stu Feldman - SGB EC Vice-Chair for SIG Development. Identify emerging technical areas, oversee transitional SIGs. The SGB Information Director, SGB committees, and SIG Liaisons to ACM Boards, other than those who are members of the SGB EC, will report through the VC Development.
Rick Furuta - SGB EC Secretary. Act as elections advisor, policy advisor, and financial and budgetary advisor.
Stephen Hayne - Conference Advisor. Oversee issues related to conferences as directed by the SGB.
Alan Berenbaum - Large SIG Advisor. Act as liaison for large SIG issues.
Bruce Klein - Small SIG Advisor. Act as liaison for small SIG issues.
1.2 Review of Voting Practices
Notkin reminded the attendees that voting would be conducted via weighted voting if necessary. Weighted voting would not be necessary for issues unanimous or close. Any SGB member could call for weighted voting if they did not agree that a motion had an obvious outcome. The amount of votes that each SIG was entitled to could be found in the back-up materials.
1.3 SGB Operating Rules Update
Notkin reported that the SGB Operating Rules had been updated. The latest revision could be found in the meeting back-up or on the ACM web-site. The revisions focused on viability reviews (formerly program reviews). The changes to this section had been approved by the SGB during the Feb'00 meetings. SIG Leaders were encouraged to review the operating rules to familiarize themselves with how to prepare and present a viability review.
2.0 ACM Future Directions
John White, ACM's CEO provided the SIG leaders with an update on the future directions of the Association. He reported that a number of initiatives had been launched during the past 18 months. The goals of these initiatives address key challenges, reposition ACM for the future and are expected to grow revenue. The initiatives included the digital library, digital video library (on-line tutorials), IT profession, Career Resource Center, K-12 Education, International Computer Driving License (ICDL), public policy, the ACM1 conference and exposition and the enhancement of acm.org.
ACM does face some challenges ahead: digital transition, acting as an international organization, attracting young professionals and impacting and benefiting the public.
The digital transition will reshape ACM as a society, business and presence in the world. The organization is transitioning from a membership organization to an electronic community, from selling traditional products to selling electronic services and from being U.S-centric to global. ACM needs to focus on electronic products, services and community.
ACM will continue to grow internationally by increasing its focus on, and support for, members and IT professionals outside the US. The organization is making products and services available to a larger segment of the world and collaborating with national societies and other groups worldwide. ACM is fostering worldwide participation in the ACM electronic community (independent of membership) and ensuring acm.org works well worldwide. ACM is nurturing the information technology profession globally. To assist with international initiatives, ACM has developed an affordable dues structure (based on per capita GDP), has made a special investment for high-performance/ worldwide delivery of ACM content and services, has offered DL access to members of national societies worldwide and offered regional support for international activities.
To attract young professionals ACM is improving its practitioner offerings by adding third party, practical content to the ACM DL and through new practitioner-oriented publication efforts. ACM has started a career resource center; a unique ACM service for creating and managing an IT career and new electronic services like TechNews, Ubiquity, E-Forums, technical interest profiles and early alerts.
To impact the public, ACM is engaging public policy issues better by staffing a policy office in Washington and by building an international policy agenda. The organization is pursuing the Information Technology Profession initiative, pre-college (K-12) education initiative, the International Computer Driving License and the ACM1 Conference.
Digital Library plans includes virtual binders for organizing digital library content, electronic forums, DL Pearls, technical interest profiling and early alert service. The complete capture of all ACM content including journals and proceedings, more third-party content and moving form the DL to a portal.
White presented ACM's financial picture including actuals for the closing of FY'00 and budgeted figures for FY'01. The FY'00 digital library revenue sharing will provide the SIGs with $101,000. It's ACM's understanding that the SIG leaders are currently deciding how this money will be distributed.
White reviewed the ACM1 Conference and Exposition activities.
3.0 ACM Portal/Publications Reports
3.1 Portal Update
Snodgrass reported that funding was in place for proceedings and newsletters. All past issues of proceedings and journals will be in the DL by the end of December. All ACM magazines will follow. At this time, the SIG leaders need to come up with 160 missing proceedings. Snodgrass will send a list of these missing issues to the Portal Management Board. He reminded the SGB leaders that the Chair of each of the SIGs was the default committee member on this management board. For the missing issues of the SIGMOD proceedings he sent e-mail seeking volunteers to donate proceedings for digitization. He received a good response and encouraged the SGB leaders to quickly try to gather these before they are no longer available.
Snodgrass discussed the placement of SIG Newsletters in the DL. Some newsletters are newsy and it's not clear whether the information is relevant for the digital library. The Publications Board is evaluating this and will come up with a recommendation. Snodgrass will send a list to the Portal Management Board of missing newsletters.
The portal is really coming along. It will make citation analysis possible and will house collections such as Turing papers. Snodgrass thanked the members of ACM HQ staff for all their efforts in making the project such a success.
Snodgrass introduced Judy Brown, SIGGRAPH Chair to discuss a project that SIGGRAPH was embarking on. Brown explained that SIGGRAPH had a strategic planning meeting. Attendees looked at the future of organizations like ACM, SIGGRAPH and other SIGs. The portal is an important base but there are other areas to consider:
Personalized life long career guide
Belonging to a community
Individualization
Globalization
Brown reported that the result of their discussions would be known as a Hub. A place where individuals in the graphics community whether they are computer scientists or not, could go for information, guidance and a sense of community. Her report was met with enthusiasm from the Chairs.
The leadership of SIGMICRO has initiated a web resource considered a microarchitecture portal. Some of it is research and education focuses on SIGMICRO conference resources. The leaders are in the process of asking for donations to provide research machines for researchers that would like to try out different architectures. They've received a positive response from IBM. This will be a portal whereby researchers working on miroarchitercture will access machines on a gratis basis. They are seeking funding through corporations for this endeavor.
The leaders of SIGCOMM had a planning meeting and focused on efforts for educational support. They intend to select an outstanding paper in the field each week and have authors participate for 1 week and comment on postings. In order for students to participate they must be members. All leaders were encouraged to continue their efforts and reminded that as the SIGs do new things they must share the infrastructure with each other. There's no reason for each SIG to go through a development process for these programs if a successful process already exists. Snodgrass was thanked by all members of the SGB for his efforts on the portal project.
Action: Snodgrass will issue a list of missing proceedings and newsletters to the Portal Management Board.
3.2 Publications Update
Cohoon presented the document entitled, "Rights and Responsibilities in ACM Publishing" to the members of the SGB. This information was included in the meeting back up. The purpose is to recognize that publishing is a team effort between: authors, editors, reviewers, professional staff, ACM Council, Publications Board and SIGs. The publication process exists to support the membership of the ACM and computing procession in general. Success is judged in terms of facilitating the dissemination of knowledge. The major constituencies are the readers, authors, reviewers, editors and professional staff. Cohoon forwarded the document to SIG leaders several weeks ago and gathered their comments. The version he presented included changes based on their input.
Motion: Move that the SGB support in principle the Rights & responsibilities in ACM Publishing understanding that details included remain open to discussion.
Niederman, Ebcioglu
Unanimous
Action: Cohoon to report SGB support of Rights and Responsibilities to Publications Board.
Cohoon reported that he'd received a favorable response to SGB request for incorporating SIG multimedia materials into the Digital Library. ACM intends to expand the its DL efforts, to make the collection more valuable to its membership and to the information technology profession. The possibilities include lecture notes, non-ACM conferences and collections and new SIG initiatives.
An Editor-in-chief search has been initiated for TOPLAS with SIGPLAN being asked to take the lead in nominating a search committee. The proposal for Transaction on Internet Technologies is being reviewed with SIGCOMM and TON being consulted.
4.0 3 year SIG Membership
Haramundanis presented a proposal for the SIGDOC EC. They would like the SGB to endorse the concept of a 3 year discounted membership. This will allow SIGs to offer a 3-year membership at a discount. However, SIGs may retain the current 1-year option. Each SIG EC would decide for its own SIG. The SIGDOC leaders believe that this will maintain SIG members longer, increase consistency of membership, address SIG membership fallout, reduce ACM paperwork for renewals, reduce follow-up on lapsed membership and make it less likely for members to miss their renewals. Since most SIGs are experiencing a drop off in membership, the current 1-year membership may not provide the best services or renewal choice for members. It may also not be the best practice for ACM. The proposal is to let SIGs offer a three year discounted membership choice to members with the same member benefits as one-year membership. Each SIG working with ACM would establish the rates with these rates being evaluated every three years. The process to make this happen is for the SGB to agree that this is a program that should be established SIG-wide and make a recommendation to the ACM Membership Activities Board.
A discussion took place with several SIG leaders voicing concern that this type of arrangement would need to be standard practice for all ACM offerings. ACM membership would need to go hand in hand. There was concern that the costs of three years worth of services could be prohibitive. One SGB leader's ACM membership with SIGs, publications and the DL totals over $642/year. Making that a 3-year membership even with a discount would be a difficult bill to pay. Automatic annual charging of credit cards was discussed but dismissed by the group. There was concern about offering a three-year membership for SIGs only. As a result, the motion was modified for the MAB to consider the practice for all ACM offerings. Offering a discounted lifetime membership was also suggested and supported.
Motion: Move that the SGB recommend that the Membership Activities Board consider a three-year discounted membership choice.
Haramundanis, Brown
Unanimous
Motion: The SGB recommends that the Membership Activities Board consider a lifetime discounted membership choice.
Corless, Brown
Unanimous
Action: Chesnais to forward request made by SGB to Dave Arnold for the MAB to consider a discounted three-year and lifetime membership choice.
Action: Dave Arnold to report back to SGB on the MAB's decision for allowing a discounted three-year and lifetime membership choice.
5.0 Allocation Discussion and Task Force Report
Chesnais reported the allocation task force recommendations. He provided background information for those leaders that did not participate in the Friday evening allocation review and discussion. The allocation is a "tax" levied on all SIGs to pay the cost of doing business. It is currently calculated based on income. The current allocation structure was implemented in 1993. There are differing levels of assessment based on revenue and the nature of the activity that generates it. During the October'99 SGB meeting, the SGB EC was asked to put together a task force to review the allocation and ensure it reflected SIG activity and was fair.
The members of the task force included: Alain Chesnais (Chair), Bruce Klein, Gary Delp, Jim Cohoon, Judy Brown and Kathy Haramundanis, Donna Baglio and Pat Ryan.
The current structure is based on revenue with varied types of SIGs and revenue being assessed differently.
Multi-service SIGs are assessed 20% on organizational revenue, 9% on non-exhibit conference revenue and 2% for exhibit revenue. Multi-service SIGs are required to have 50% of their annual gross non-conference expenses and 20% of annual gross conference expenses in their required fund balance.
Conference SIGs are assessed 12% on non-exhibit booth revenue and 2% on exhibit booth revenue. They are required to keep 20% of annual gross expenses in their fund balance.
Publication SIGs are assessed 15% for all gross revenue and are required to keep 50% of gross expenses in their fund balance.
The services included in the cost of the allocation include: general office, financial services, information services, conference processing, conference site and facility activities, conference publicity coordination, conference proceedings production, conference financial and other activities, newsletter production, electronic service activities and SIG service activities. The budgeted allocation is determined based on the following.
| Direct Financial and Pubs Support | 270 | Based on # of personnel devoted to SIG activity | ||
| Direct Membership Services Support | 106 | Based on percentage of SIG transactions | ||
| Direct SIG Services Support | 868 | Based on # of personnel devoted to SIG activity | ||
| Direct Marketing Support | 170 | Based on portion of SIG mkt. As percentage of ACM mkt. | ||
| Support Allocation 20% | 932 | ACM HQ - rent, personnel, equipment, legal issues | ||
| Volunteer Mgt. Allocation | 240 | All aspects of VM net of revenue | ||
| Total Support provided to SIGs | 2,586 | |||
| FY'01 Budget - SIG Reimbursement | 2,336 | *All numbers in $000 | ||
| Unrecovered support | 250 |
After review, the task force determined that:
- Revenue was hard to correlate to services.
- Differing rates for types of expense may be seen as an incentive to push for some over others
- Huge variance in allocation amounts: 600x
- Services not linear with expenses (economies of scale)
- No notion of minimal cost of doing business
- Risk in having one SIG provide so much of the total allocation
The task force recommended:
- Base allocation on expense, not revenue
- Minimum contribution of $15K (actual cost estimated at $41k)
- New variable rate per $125K
- Start at 16%
- Decrease by .8% every $125 K
- Minimum of 5.35%
- Review allocation in 3 years
Chesnais explained that basing the allocation on expenses would make it easier to correlate to service rendered. Setting up a minimal allocation to cover the cost of doing business was appropriate as all SIGs are expected to be financially viable units. The new formula allowed for solidarity amongst the SIS with the larger SIGs still subsidizing the smaller ones. The single expense type model does not implicitly favor one specific activity and a single SIG's contribution was brought to 30% from 36.7%. Financially viable SIGs should be able to meet this new allocation structure; never more than 16% of expenses if above minimal cost of doing business compared to 20% previously. Those SIGs in difficulty making this new allocation (Startup SIGs, for instance) may apply to the SGB for aid.
If approved, this would take effect in July 1, 2001. All SGB leaders would need to take this into account for their upcoming budget meetings.
SIG Leaders were asked to discuss the recommendations during lunch and be prepared to vote on the allocation scheme following the reviews of SIGMOBILE, SIGecom and SIGKDD.
5.1 Cont'd - SGB Allocation Recommendation
Notkin reopened the allocation discussion. The SGB leaders were concerned about the smaller SIGs unable to pay the minimum. There needed to be assurance that no SIG would fail solely due to financial problems brought on by the new allocation scheme.
Motion: Move that the SGB ensure that no SIG fail before July 2003 solely due to financial problems caused by the new allocation system.
Partridge, Ebcioglu
(22,3,1)
Motion passes
There were discussions about the minimum amount a SIG should pay. A suggestion was made that the minimum be $12,000 rather than $15,000. At least this would soften the blow on the 1st allocation go-around. The formula would be revisited in 3 years and it could be tightened up and changed at that point.
Motion: Move to accept the allocation task force recommendation modified with a $12,000 minimum.
Vernon
Discussion about the minimum continued. There were some leaders that believed that the allocation should continue to be based on revenue.
Motion: Move that the SGB reject the proposed new allocation formula, and a new task force be formed to devise an improved formula based on revenue, not on expenses.
Siegel, Sipior
Motion failed
Motion: Move to amend the motion so that the end result is to return to the recommendation of the task force.
Brown, Cohoon
(16,6,2)
Motion passes
Motion: Move to accept the allocation task force recommendations.
Cohoon, Ebcioglu
(66,12,0)
Motion passes - weighted vote
Action: Baglio to inform appropriate HQ staff of new allocation scheme for FY'02.
6.0 Program Reviews
6.1 SIGMOBILE
Notkin reported that the SGB EC had taken SIGMOBILE out of transition and found it to be a viable multi-service SIG. Unless the SGB had objections, SIGMOBILE would continue with that status for the next 4 years.
Victor Bahl, SIGMOBILE's Vice Chair presented the viability review to the SGB leaders. SIGMOBILE was founded in 1997 as a transitional SIG in response to the exploding need to bring researchers and practitioners working in the area of mobility together. The SIG publishes a quarterly journal called MC2R, sponsors and manages MobiCom, sponsors and promotes new workshops in the area of mobility and wireless, recognizes visionaries with the SIGMOBILE Award for Excellence in Research and students with best student paper awards, keeps members informed about news, articles and event announcements related to the field via a moderated distribution list.
MobiCom is SIGMOBILE's flagship Conference. It's truly an international event: 1997 - Budapest, Hungary; 1998 - Dallas, Texas; 1999 - Seattle, Washington; 2000 - Boston, Massachusetts; 2001 - Rome, Italy. The conference is considered very prestigious and as a result the number of submissions is rising. Currently, there is 15-16% acceptance rate. Conference attendance is rising as well: 220 in 1997, 235 in 1998, and 532 in 1999 (sold out), 700 in 2000. The number of corporate sponsors and exhibitors is also increasing.
SIGMOBILE is a multi-service SIG with a thriving conference, a well-recognized journal, vibrant international participation and a prestigious awards portfolio. The group has built up a loyal and highly active base of core members. They have on-going collaborations with professional organizations all around the world. SIGMOBILE is able to attract significant financial support from industry for their conferences and workshops. The conferences have become the place to publish. They have several other new initiatives in the pipeline that will allow them to continue to grow. The bottom line is that SIGMOBILE is ready and able to become a multi-service SIG.
6.2 SIGecom
Notkin reported that the SGB EC had taken SIGecom out of transition and found it to be a viable multi-service SIG. Unless the SGB had objections, SIGecom would continue with that status for the next 4 years.
Stu Feldman, Chair of SIGecom presented the viability review to the SGB leaders. SIGecom's mission is to provide a venue for discussion and sharing in this new cross-disciplinary field. The SIG is striving to be valuable to people form ACM's traditional computer science constituency, but also those from economics and management departments and practitioners with applications experience.
SIGecom was chartered in late 1998 with enormous help from ACM HQ, a generous conference co-location plan with OOPSLA and strong support from the SGB and John White.
The annual event is the EC Conference which, was held in Denver in 1999. The 2000 conference is to be held during the upcoming week in Minneapolis. The conference structure includes a day of tutorials followed by a 2.5-day event. The program committee of the '99 conference accepted 21 out of 72 papers. In 2000 the program committee accepted 29 or 170 papers. The conference continues to draw influential speakers and participants in the e-commerce field.
The SIGecom Newsletter is available online only. It is planned as a quarterly with some sections updated asynchronously. The first issue was released in Summer of 2000 (August) and included 24+ pages.
6.3 SIGKDD
Notkin reported that the SGB EC had taken SIGKDD out of transition and found it to be a viable multi-service SIG. Unless the SGB had objections, SIGKDD would continue with that status for the next 4 years.
Won Kim, Chair of SIGKDD presented the viability review to the SGB leaders. The SIG was organized in August of 1998. Its primary focus was to provide the premier forum for advancement and adoption of the "science" of knowledge discovery and data mining.
The group has met all viability requirements for becoming full-service SIG. SIGKDD sponsors an annual conference, publishes a semi-annual newsletter and has built up a membership and fund balance.
The KDD'99 conference had 600 registered attendees; KDD'00 had 920. The SIG leaders believe this will continue to grow. The SIG leaders have formed strategic alliances with ACM SIGMOD, ACM SIGART, AAAI and ASA. They are preparing for standards initiatives on data mining (with CRISP-DM), metadata exchange and predictive model markup language (PDML).
The challenges ahead are to solidify the SIG foundation by increasing membership, maintaining/increasing the fund balance, maintaining/evolving strategic alliances and possibly turning explorations into a quarterly publication. The SIG plans on substantially increasing the pool of volunteers by reaching out to newsletter editors/reviewer, KDD conference function chairs and KDD conference program committee.
6.4 SIGART
Notkin reported that the SGB EC had found SIGART viable during their meeting on Friday. Unless the SGB had objections, SIGART would continue with the status of a multi-service SIG.
Jefrey Bradshaw, Chair of SIGART presented the viability review to the SGB leaders. The SIGART mission is to study intelligence and its realization in computer systems. The SIGART activities include conferences, both new and continuing, a Doctoral Consortium, web-site and Intelligence Magazine.
SIGART is the sponsor of the Autonomous Agents conference most recently held in Barcelona Spain. This was the first time the conference was held outside the US and it drew 500 attendees. Conference activities include student and best paper awards as well as agent research awards. Agents 2001 is scheduled for Montreal Canada and 2002 in Bologna, Italy. SIGART co-sponsors the Intelligent User Interface Conference. The 2000 event was recently held in New Orleans and had 150 attendees. IUI 2001 is scheduled to be in Santa Fe. New SIGART conferences include Knowledge Capture (K-CAP) an outgrowth of successful annual Banff Knowledge Acquisition Workshops. It is to be held in October 2001 in Victoria BC. Attendance is estimated at 250 people. Formal Ontology in Information Systems (FOIS) will be held in October 2001 in Boston. The first successful event was held in 1998 in Trento, Italy.
The Doctoral Consortium is coordinated by Marie Bienkowski and allows Ph.D. students to present proposed AI research. The Consortium allows for feedback from a panel of researchers. It is a 2-day event, which includes poster sessions, lunches and dinner and is co-sponsored, with AAAI with support of NSF and Microsoft. A fifth consortium was held in August 2000 at AAAI with 12 participants. A write-up will be available in Intelligence. A 6th consortium will be held at IJCAI in Seattle.
The SIGART web-site is minimal and out of date at this time. The SIGART leaders expect to take a new direction with Eric Wilson as Information director. The content will be updated and there will be a complete redesign with additional on-line content and community services.
Intelligent Magazine has made a successful transition from the SIGART Bulletin. The content looks-and-feels much more like a "real magazine." Its focus is on the practitioner. Preliminary data indicates evidence of impact on attracting and retaining members. The SIGART leaders have received a commitment from ACM to increase marketing and editorial support. There are also discussions about a new financial model and the long-term possibility of transitioning to web-only.
In summary SIGART has continued volunteer development by bringing on strong new board members. Has had success with new and continuing conferences and has had excellent results form the Doctoral Consortium activities and linking with the broader AI community. The focus for the coming year is to improve the web-site, continue the emphasis on intelligence quality and evolution of the business model. The SIG leaders intend to seek additional partnerships with the broader AI community.
6.5 SIGMIS
Notkin indicated that the SGB EC recommended the continuation of SIGMIS as a multi-service SIG with a viability review in 2 years. He requested that the SGB decide the SIGs viability.
Janice Sipior, Vice Chair of SIGMIS presented the viability review to the SGB leaders. The MIS mission is to serve the information systems and technology community for management and the management of these systems and technologies. The group was founded in 1961 as the Special Interest Group on Business Data Processing and was later known as the Special Interest Group on Business Information Technology. To improve their identity the name was change to Management Information Systems.
SIGMIS produces Data Base, a quarterly journal devoted to communicating advances in research and best practices in MIS. The publication is listed in Science Citation Index and Journal Citations Report. The newsletter is currently behind schedule.
SIGMIS co-sponsors the Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (CIKM) and cooperates with others such as the European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS), International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS) and the Pacific Asia Conference on Information Systems (PACIS).
In 1995 SIGMIS became the sponsor of the ICIS MIS Doctoral Dissertation Award.
In 1998, SIGMIS Leaders joined representatives of the Association for Information Technology Professionals (AITP) to develop a model curriculum for masters education in information systems. The draft has been produced and is currently being circulated for comment and revision.
SIGMIS leaders are concerned with their membership numbers. There is an average decline of 10% each year. To improve membership, the SIGMIS leaders are offering 1-year membership to ICIS, ECIS &PACIS annual doctoral student consortia participants. They are promoting a closer electronic community including a new member's e-mail list and will continue with the publication of Data Base and their involvement in ISWOLD Net. SIGMIS places to continue their conference activity as noted above and keep a representative on the development committee to model MS in IS curriculum.
Motion: Move to accept the SGB EC motion on the viability of SIGMIS as a multi-service SIG with a viability review in 2 years.
Berenbaum, Ellis
Motion passed
6.6 SIGMOD
Notkin reported that the SGB EC had found SIGMOD viable during their meeting on Friday. Unless the SGB had objections, SIGMOD would continue with the status of a multi-service SIG.
Rick Snodgrass, Chair of SIGMOD presented the viability review to the SGB leaders. The SIGMOD mission is concerned with the principles, techniques and applications of database management systems and data management technology.
Snodgrass reported that the SIGMOD conference has an acceptance rate of 16%-20%. SIGMOD papers have been referenced more than any other database conference and more than any database journal except TODS.
The SIGMOD Newsletter is the SIGMOD Record, which publishes 250 pages a year. There is an influential Papers column, which is especially popular. A newsletter and a conference no longer suffice for SIGMOD since adding new benefits membership is on the rise.
The SIGMOD Online web grew to 4GB over the last three years. This includes XML and HTML of SIGMOD Record, DBLP bibliography, with 170,000 entries, Dbworld mailing list archives and various repositories. From 1975 to 1998, SIGMOD distributed 60 million pages of technical material. Last year alone, SIGMOD distributed 123 million pages, most on CDROM. In the next six months, SIGMOD will distribute over half a billion pages, most on DVDRom.
After attempting a web redesign, the SIGMOD leaders decided to go with a professional design firm. They also had a professional redesign the cover of the SIGMOD Record. These changes resulted from the desire to project a professional image.
Most database societies have participated actively in the SIGMOD Digital Library. Extending Database Technology Endowment, IEEE Technical Committee on Data Engineering, Principles of Database Systems Executive Committee, ACM SIGIR, SIGKDD and SIGWEB, Very Large Databases Foundation. Non-SIGMOD conferences are forcing publishers to include proceedings in the SIGMOD DL, or are changing publishers.
Snodgrass thanked the SIG staff, in particular Lisette, Donna, and Heather. ACM Pubs staff, in particular Mark Mandebaum and Bernie Rous. Special thanks went to John White for his help and vision. In summary, SIGMOD is healthy and continues to serve the database community.
7.0 International Student Research Contest
Ann Sobel participated in the meeting as a representative of the membership activity board. She described the proposed development of the ACM International Student Research Contest to:
- Greatly enhanced participation
- Wider visibility of the research of the shortlisted candidates
- Enhanced rewards for participants, particularly in attendance at the most appropriate ACM research venues
- Recognition of Research Supervisors for competition continuity
Sobel reported the enthusiastic support of the SIG chairs that were contacted concerning the proposed new research contest model! At this time, the following SIGs have agreed, in principle, to host a subject-based contest during the contest year 2002: SIGPLAN, SIGCSE, and SIGCOMM at their Latin American conference. SIGGRAPH is also actively considering the scheme.
The MAB recognizes that many SIGs are doing contests but requests that they be flexible enough to work out a way to use this forum. Sobel explained that the new ACM International Student Research Contest model will be two tiered: several subject-based contests that are held in conjunction with the corresponding SIG sponsored conferences and one general research contest where the contestants are the winners of the prior contests. The addition of the subject-based contests will best meet the objective of having student research showcased at a conference that exemplifies research in that sub-area of computer science. The goal of the new Student Research Contest will be obtained by the recognition of multiple subject-based contests elevating the recognition of the overall contest. She requested that leaders forward their comments to her and SIGs that are interested actively participate off-line.
8.0 SGB EC Recommendations
Bruce Klein, Small SIG Advisor presented recommendations to the SGB for SIGCUE and SIGBIO.
8.1 SIGCUE
Klein reminded the SGB leaders that SIGCUE had been placed in transition during the last meeting and was headed for dissolution. A letter of intent to dissolve was distributed to the SIGCUE membership. Several of the recipients formulated a plan that shows positive signs for the future of the SIG. As a result, the SGB EC chose to extend their revitalization period to allow them more time to refine their plan so that SGB EC is comfortable recommending reinstatement of the SIG to the SGB. The SIGCUE leaders were instructed to:
- Develop a plan that included participation in national and ACM initiatives
- Revamp the plan with a proposed set of officers for each of the EC positions.
- Obtain letters of support from ACM's K-12 committee and appropriate conferences
- Provide explicit plans for the newsletter
The SGB EC will develop criteria for the success/failure of the plan in order to make an appropriate recommendation to the SGB.
Motion: Move that the SGB allow a 90-day continuance for revitalization of SIGCUE.
Notkin, Furuta
Unanimous
8.2 SIGBIO
Klein reported that the SGB EC has recommended dissolution of SIGBIO. A letter will be mailed to the membership announcing the intent to dissolve. The SIGBIO volunteers are speaking to SIGAPP leaders. It is possible that they'll find a home with this community. The EC believes there is a place for ACM to move into in this area.
Lamie indicated he'd requested time to merge with SIGAPP however, that was not supported. Klein explained that it would be possible for the SIGBIO leaders to move that forward during the 90-day dissolution period.
9.0 Other Business
Notkin reported that he'd received requests to discuss 3 items:
- Brainstorming session on the Digital Library revenue being returned to the SIGs
- Best Practices Session
- Motion on behalf of ACM1
Create a pool managed by the SGB to do good works with/for the SIG community.
Return money to the SIGs
Cohoon reported that the DL Revenue Task Force would make a report in March. The recommendation will be sent to the SGB prior to that for review and comments. There is approximately $100K that has been credited to the SIGs for FY'00. It was suggested that support of ACM1 be considered as a "good work".
Motion: Move that the SGB contribute $50K from the 50% of DL revenue that the SGB reserves for jointly sponsored "good works" to ACM1.
Cohoon, Ellis
(33,40,0)
Motion failed - weighted vote
The date of the next meeting was discussed. The SGB leaders had requested it be held at ACM1. The most opportune time for that meeting would be Sunday, March 11th. SGB EC meetings will be conducted via conference call prior and after rather than on-site. Having the meeting on Sunday will allow SGB leaders to attend ACM1.
There continued to be concern regarding the SIGs unable to exist with the new allocation scheme.
Motion: Move to direct the SGB EC to act on interim subsidy requests with respect to the new allocation scheme.
Cohoon, Cytron
Unanimous
Motion passes
Best Practices During the best practice session, SGB leaders were encouraged to share their successes and failures with their colleagues. SIGCHI is having an image analysis done by the institute of Design in Chicago. Members will be interviewed via focus groups. This is a graduate student project. The end result will be a report to indicate what the SIG is doing to meet their goals and service their community. Part of the issue is actually defining the community.
SIGPLAN had a program committee for the current year and year end-10 to select the best paper from 10 years ago. Gives wisdom and insight. SIGCOMM pulled together all winners of the SIGCOMM award for a panel session. It was so popular that they are going to take a subset of student paper award winners and do the same.
SIGCOMM and SIGDA are giving new members access to the ACM DL. It is being offered to the SIG at price. Will allow students the ability to tap into ACM's most valuable resource.
SIGAPL has granted all current and past winners of their annual award a lifetime SIG membership.
SIGCOMM is making an effort to nominate their award winners to become ACM Fellows.
SIGGRAPH is trying to promote organizational identity. Values of excellence and integrity are supported through membership. There are member only lines at the conference and member badges. They are raising the awareness of their organization.
SIGKDD and SIGMOD have added checkboxes to their conference registration forms allowing attendees to join the SIGs. SIGCHI has developed a SIGCHI Fellow program already approved through the ACM Awards Committee.
SIGIR holds it's main conference outside of North America every other year. During those years the conference moves from sponsorship to cooperation so there's no loss or gain for the SIG. This year there were long delays in the payment of program committee support. This posed a problem for SIGIR's image. Participants didn't realize SIGIRs non-financial commitment so when the bills were not getting paid, the attendees went to SIGIR. The leaders of SIGIR were prepared to make good on the promised reimbursements. The payments worked out in the end.
Other items
Mark Scott Johnson sought candidates interested in taking on the role of Awards Liaison for the SIGs. Anyone interested should contact him.
Johnson was thanked for his hard work on awards activities.
The meeting was adjourned at 5:00 PM.
Participants:
- Donna Baglio, ACM Director of SIG Services
- Victor Bahl, SIGMOBILE Chair
- Alan Berenbaum, SGB EC M-at-L/SIGARCH Chair
- Jeffrey Bradshaw, SIGART Chair
- Judy Brown, SIGGRAPH Chair
- Jan Carroll, Guest
- Alain Chesnais, SGB Chair
- Jim Cohoon, SGB Publications Liaison
- Rob Corless, SIGSAM Chair
- Ron Cyntron, SIGPLAN Chair
- Susan Dumais, SIGIR Chair
- Kemal Ebcioglu, SIGMICRO Chair
- Carla Ellis, SGB Past Chair
- Jennifer Fajman, SIGUCCS Chair
- Stuart Feldman, SGB EC Member-at-Large/SIGecom Chair
- Rick Furuta, SGB EC Member-at-Large
- Kathy Haramundanis, SIGDOC Chair
- Stephen C. Hayne, SGB EC M-at-L/SIGGROUP Chair
- Jim Hightower, SIGCUE Chair
- Mark Scott Johnson, SGB Council Representative
- Warren Jones, SIGBIO Newsletter Editor
- Won Kim, SIGKDD Chair
- Bruce Klein, SGB EC Member-at-Large/SIGCSE Chair
- Edward Lamie, SIGBIO Chair
- John McCormick, SIGADA Secretary
- Elli Mylonas, SIGWEB Chair
- Fred Niederman, SIGCPR Chair
- David Notkin, SGB EC Member-at-Large/SIGSOFT Chair
- Craig Partridge, SIGCOMM Chair
- Pat Ryan, ACM COO
- David Siegel, SIGAPL Chair
- Janice Sipior, SIGMIS Vice Chair
- Rick Snodgrass, SIGMOD Chair
- Ann E.K. Sobel, MAB Representative
- Marilyn Tremaine, SIGCHI Chair
- Mary Vernon, SIGMETRICS Chair