IR

We are delighted to welcome you to the 35th edition of SIGIR, the ACM International Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval. The conference continues its tradition of being the premier forum for research and development information retrieval, the computer science discipline behind what many call "search". The high number of submitted papers, this year again, demonstrates both the breadth and depth of the research being done in this vibrant field, both in academia and industry. We have done our best to ensure that these papers meet high standards of quality in terms of technical contribution, innovation, presentation, reference to previous work, and methodology. At the same time, we have tried to be flexible in the application of these criteria in order to consider papers describing novel and innovative work that may be somewhat unconventional.

The conference received 483 full paper submissions this year. Examining the country code of the paper's contact author, we found that 185 (38%) come from the Americas; 158 (33%), Asia and Pacific region; and 140 (29%) from Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Of these, 98 (20%) were accepted, essentially the same as last year's acceptance rate and up from the 16.7% rate of the year before. There was almost no difference in the acceptance rates across the three broad regions. The top five countries in terms of accepted papers were the U.S.A. (36), China (14), the U.K. & Spain (both 7), and the Netherlands (6). In addition, 208 short papers were submitted to the poster track, of which 76 (36.5%) were accepted. In the other categories, there were 17 (47.2%) demonstrations, 4 workshops, and 16 tutorials accepted. The top five technical areas (as inferred from the primary keyword assigned by the authors) covered by the accepted papers, were queries and query analysis (18%), retrieval models and ranking (14%), web IR & social media search (13%), document representation and content analysis (11%), and users and interactive IR (9%). This was a small re-ordering of the topics from last year.

SIGIR this year again used a two-tier double-blind reviewing approach. In a first stage, at least three reviewers read every paper and provided ratings and comments. Then, in a second stage, the primary and secondary Area Chairs ensured the quality of the reviewing process by studying, validating, and summarizing these reviews, and adding their own feedback and ratings. When required, Area Chairs initiated a discussion among the reviewers to resolve any controversial issues or significant differences of opinion. Once the discussion stage was completed, the two Area Chairs made the final decisions for nearly all submitted papers. At the program committee meeting held in Haifa, Israel, the Program Chairs and the attending Area Chairs went over the reviews, verified the process, gathered additional input, and made decisions in the few cases for which assistance had been requested.