TAC 2008 papers, posters, and presentations

• Paper submission deadline has passed.
• copyright form (pdf)

Each team that submits runs for evaluation is requested to write a paper for the TAC 2008 proceedings that describes how the runs were produced (to the extent that intellectual property concerns allow) and any additional experiments or analysis conducted using TAC 2008 data. A draft version of the proceedings papers is distributed as a notebook to TAC 2008 workshop attendees. The final proceedings are published only after the workshop. The notebook version of papers gives workshop attendees something concrete to discuss during the meeting itself, while the final proceedings give participants the opportunity to revise their papers based on findings from workshop discussion.

All teams are strongly encouraged to present their system(s) and results during a poster session at the TAC 2008 workshop. A limited number of teams are also allowed to give full oral presentations at the workshop; full presentations are selected by the TAC Advisory Committee based on presentation proposals rather than on entire papers.

Unless specifically invited by the TAC Advisory Committee, a team may contribute a paper to the proceedings and give a presentation at the TAC 2008 workshop only if it has also submitted at least one run for evaluation.

Copyright release

Any organization whose paper will appear in the TAC proceedings must sign a copyright release form. The senior author at each organization can sign for other authors, but if a team consists of multiple organizations, a signed copyright release form is required from each organization.

To submit copyright forms: Print out the copyright form, fill it in, sign it, and fax it to NIST when the notebook paper is submitted. (Teams that are giving an oral presentation must also fill in the speaker section of the form.) Please provide a cover sheet with the team name, email address, and subject "TAC 2008 copyright release" and fax to:

ATTN: Lori Buckland
Fax #: +1 301-975-5287

Papers

Each team is requested to write a paper that will be included in the workshop notebook and the final proceedings. The paper should consist of a description of the team's TAC 2008 system(s) and any additional experiments or analysis of TAC 2008 tasks, evaluations, and results. Papers do not undergo a standard peer review, although the TAC Advisory Committee reserves the right to exclude non-responsive papers. (Participants are encouraged to expand on the work reported in their TAC proceedings papers and submit the results to peer-reviewed conferences, journals, and other venues.)

Each team should write a single paper for all tracks in which the team participated. Paper length is limited to 10 pages for the first track, plus two additional pages per additional track (e.g., a team that submits runs for three tracks would be allowed a total of 14 pages). NIST reserves the right to exclude papers that exceed the page limit.

Papers must print in black-and-white on 8.5 x 11 inch paper. These are the only paper formatting requirements:

• standard US-letter size (not A4)
• minimum 10pt type
• no page numbers
• maximum 10 pages for the first track, plus 2 additional pages for each additional track
• authors' names and affiliations should appear on the paper
• single .pdf or .ps file only (no Word documents)

The notebook paper and signed copyright release form(s) should be submitted to NIST by Wednesday, October 22. The paper should be submitted using the online paper submission form. The copyright release form(s) should be sent by fax when the paper is submitted.

Posters

Each team is strongly encouraged to present a poster at the TAC 2008 workshop. Posters should be no more than 4 feet wide and 5 feet tall. Pins are provided to attach the poster to a padded wall in a hallway (so it is better to not back the poster with anything like foamcore). Prior to the poster session, all teams are invited to give a boaster for their poster. A boaster is a very short (maximum 3-minute) "advertisement" for the poster that helps everyone identify those posters they particularly want to see.

Poster requests should be emailed to tac-manager@nist.gov by October 3 and should include the team ID. Requests made after October 3 are accepted only if space allows.

Full Presentations

While all teams are allowed to give a poster/boaster at the TAC 2008 workshop, there is time for only a limited number of teams to give a full oral presentation (approximately 25 minutes long). Each team may submit up to three presentation proposals -- one for each track in which it participated. For the purposes of presentations, the Opinion Summarization pilot is considered part of the Opinion QA track, and a single proposal is requested for presentations dealing with either Opinion QA or Opinion Summarization (or both).

A presentation proposal should consist of a short abstract about the team's experiments in that track. The abstract should not just give a general description of the system, but should emphasize what experiments were done and why they are interesting or unusual. Each abstract should be no more than 500 words. Do not send entire papers or presentation slides. Abstracts should be simple ASCII text and should be emailed as separate attachments to tac-manager@nist.gov. Please include the team ID in the email message and rank the proposals by the team's desire to present each proposed talk. For example:

1. Update Summarization
2. RTE
3. Opinion QA/Summarization

The Advisory Committee selects the final set of proposals to accept for presentation, factoring in the intrinsic value of each proposal, the needs of the program, and the desirability ranking provided by the team.

The deadline for submitting full presentation proposals is September 21. Teams are notified by October 7 whether a proposal has been accepted for presentation.

Schedule

TAC 2008 Schedule
September 21	Deadline for workshop presentation proposals
October 3	Deadline for requests for poster slot
October 7	Notification of acceptance of presentation proposals
October 22	Deadline for participants' notebook papers, copyright release forms
November 17-19	TAC 2008 workshop in Gaithersburg, Maryland, USA
early February 2009	Deadline for participants' final proceedings papers

BACK to General Information about TAC 2008 Tracks