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Vol.27 No.4, October 1995
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Vol.27 No.4, October 1995 |
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Motion: To approve the minutes of the March EEC phone call.
Vote: Yes: Atwood, Begg, Henderson, Adelson No: None Abstain: None
The exception to run unopposed candidates when no sincere opposition exists has been approved by ACM. The letter to membership announcing the slate and requesting member-petitioned candidates has gone out.
We will discuss the issues encountered by the nominating committee at the May business meeting. The discussion will include the possibility of creating a standing nominating committee to keep track of potential candidates for office.
The proposal to put the CHI '95 proceedings on the Web has been approved by ACM. The CHI '95 committee now needs to follow up with consultation with ACM.
In past years the conference video has been marketed as part of the SIGGRAPH video review. This made sense when the conference and the organization were young. Now that we are well established the video will be marketed under ACM's umbrella. The logistics of the transfer are currently being worked out.
Chairs for CHI '97 are actively being solicited. At the recent CMC meeting the selection of Technical Program Committee Chairs and exhibits were discussed.
We noted that with respect to the programming contest, exclusive relationships between ACM and corporate sponsors would be in opposition to ACM's need for impartiality. An ACM sponsorship policy needs to be created to ensure neutrality in related activities as well. Several other SIGs have raised this question as well. The issue needs to be resolved with Joe DiBlasi and Stu Zweben. Additionally, it might be handled through ACM's industrial liaison board. Diane will contact Joe about looking for solutions to the current situation.
The cover of the Bulletin will have gold for the four issues starting January 1996 to celebrate ACM's fiftieth anniversary.
Vivienne will contact Don and Scooter about structuring discussion lists.
Beth and Austin will discuss the presentation of nomination and volunteer-finding efforts for the business meeting.
The Conference Management Committee (CMC) is the chair's advisory committee. Its mandate is to provide training to future CHI conference committee members and manage SIGCHI's portfolio of sponsored conferences by developing management processes.
Last summer the CMC examined the goals of its portfolio of conferences. The CMC has developed good budgeting tools. A professional contractor trains the conference committee volunteers with the members of the Conference Management Committee.
Six goals have been established for SIGCHI conferences: support of technical merit; recruitment and development of volunteers/contributors; support of creativity within HCI; dissemination of HCI information; grow the reputation and recognition of the field.
The process of developing training and management strategies is on-going.
The budget year runs from July 1 to June 30. Each year we have a budget meeting in December. This year we reserved all of the money we needed for administration and conference expenses. The EEC members then put forth proposals which we discussed and voted on.
The budget is about $2.25M. Most of our income comes from the CHI conference.
We have built up a contingency fund in case we incur more expenses from the conference or from administration than we had budgeted for so that we will not have to turn to ACM. For FY '95 ACM recommends that we have on reserve funds of $551,600. We will have $489,775 for FY '95 which is what we projected.
Steven's editorial goal is to represent the broad field of HCI. Additionally, the Bulletin has positioned itself with respect to TOCHI and interactions so that the three publications form a comprehensive set. One unique element of the Bulletin is its coverage of SIGCHI news and events.
Other Bulletin features include: a students' column; a local SIGS column; special features such as the `real world' feature; a software tools and techniques column is planned, here Steven is looking for a contributor.
There has been a redesign of the Bulletin, with the goal of increasing its attractiveness; the hope is that readers will want to read it as soon as they see it.
We welcome feedback and an on-line questionnaire is forth-coming.
The proceedings are being put on the Web as an experimental activity. Developing a good Web site takes enormous amounts of work by people who play a number of different roles. On the other hand, this gives us access to millions of people and therefore should be a high priority.
The accessibility of the document and ownership and marketing are a set of issues under consideration along with the technical ones.
We are developing a Web site for SIGCHI. We want it to be a shining example of HCI design. The information on the site needs constant updating and Scooter (morris.chi@xerox.com) and Keith (instone.chi@xerox.com) are seeking volunteers. Feedback is sought; the URL is: http://www.acm.org/sigchi/
Scooter and Scott Robertson did a truly impressive job in putting up conference information. We plan to put minutes and policies on the Web as well.
ACM's Publications Board has been both supportive and cooperative. The proceedings will be available for at least the next two years at its current Web site. The proceedings can be accessed through the CHI95 home page.
Steven's starting question was "How do you make an electronic Bulletin as readable as possible?" A pilot experiment was done before putting up a public version. In December the first issue was made accessible for internal evaluation. ACM has created what looks like a good copyright policy for supporting electronic publications.
Some of the questions Steven asked were: Who gets to see the online Bulletin? Should it be accessible only to SIGCHI members? Should non-members see the document for free? We decided to ask ACM to allow all to access it for free. We believe that it will attract membership, and therefore SIGCHI won't lose money by making it free. In any case we will produce the Bulletin electronically alongside the paper version as an experiment for two years.
Austin reported that the nominations committee (Austin (chair), Robin, Jim and Don) developed a slate of candidates, that this had been approved by the EEC, and that elections were proceeding on time. However, despite following all the required procedures, and considerable additional personal effort in obtaining candidates, the committee was unable to find candidates to run against the two first-term incumbents who chose to run again. The committee, through the EEC, requested that ACM grant an exception to the election policy that requires opposition. This exception was granted so that the positions of Vice Chair for Conference Planning and Vice Chair for Finance will have single candidates running unopposed.
The presentation of information about candidates for the offices of Chair and Executive Vice Chair (to convey strongly that candidates are running as teams) has received considerable attention from the committee and ACM Headquarters staff. A uniform notation and set of instructions have been developed.
The nominations committee will propose to the EEC that SIGCHI amend its election policy to:
-- incorporate procedures for handling the case where attractive incumbents are the only candidates;
-- create a standing committee for developing candidates and addressing SIGCHI's elections needs; and
-- explore the use of electronic media in its election process.
Discussion followed, primarily addressing the means by which more candidates could be found/developed for SIGCHI offices.
We thank Susan Dray for her considerable efforts with respect to the issue of gender equity which was raised in the context of developing the slate. Susan brought considerable balance and insight to the nominating committee.
We are developing a policy to allow SIGCHI to recommend candidates for public office and to help identify qualified candidates for SIGCHI elections. The policy is designed to support an open and democratic process and to embody a spirit of active outreach into the broadest possible HCI community.
The fund allocates resources for all members. Its purpose is to advance HCI. The SIGCHI Bulletin will have a call for proposals. The fund is intended to support high quality work and communication of that work. Starting July 1, 1995 $20k is available. The funds available will be set in the annual SIGCHI budget and may vary from year to year.
Motion: To approve the minutes from the December EEC meeting
Vote: Yes: Mike, Austin, Beth, Vivienne, Advisory Board, Clare-Marie, Jakob. No: none Abstain: Gene.
Motion: To approve the minutes from the February, March and April EEC telephone conference calls.
Vote: Yes: Mike, Austin, Beth, Advisory Board, Gene, Clare-Marie, Jakob. No: none Abstain: Vivienne
Motion: To approve the slate for the 1995 SIGCHI officers' election.
Vote: Yes: Beth, Austin, Advisory Board, Jakob. No: none Abstain: Mike, Viv, Gene, Clare-Marie
This year the conference made use of an increased number of vendors of professional services; this cost money but saved time and avoided crises.
The conference made less but also cost less than expected. Expected returns will be made to SIGCHI and ACM plus a surplus of approximately $20k. More attendees are registering early and becoming members to get lower fees.
There were 1494 early and 494 late registrants for a total of 1932 paying registrants. Including complementary registrations the conference had 2257 attendees.
The chairs felt that the training from Carol Klyver was extremely helpful, as was her task of keeping track of deadlines. A data base of shared electronic documents would have been helpful. The chairs had a hard time finding out some conference policies, this is in the process of being fixed by the conference management committee (CMC).
By acclamation, the EEC thanks the chairs and the committee for a fine conference.
Conference Management Committee: Gene
A brainstorming session by the CMC of who we'd like to see exhibit at the conference produced the following candidates: exhibits of tools for prototyping and development; exhibits by users; internet service providers; producers of virtual reality.
CHI 97 will be held in Atlanta, March 22-27. We are looking for sites for 98, but have not yet made a choice.
We pass along our thanks to the CMC for their hard work.
Finances: Clare-Marie
The budget is about $2.25M. Most of our income comes from the CHI conference.
We have built up a reserve fund in case we incur more expenses from the conference or from administration than we had budgeted for so that we will not have to turn to ACM. For FY '95 ACM recommends that we have on reserve funds of $551,600. We will have $489,775 for FY '95 which is what we projected.
We need to develop a policy for the allocation of surpluses from conferences above what has been budgeted for.
We discussed what conference proceeding should be mailed to members with CHI Plus subscriptions. Designing Interactive Systems (DIS) would like to be included with UIST and CHI as the third conference in the CHI Plus membership package. As a new small conference it is in the spirit of what we had proposed to do.
The proceedings are on-line. We thank Jakob, Bob Mack, Keith Instone and all the others who contributed to the effort.
Steven and Scooter have been asked to look into the design of SIGCHI Web pages and the larger issues of what constitutes good Web-page design. Notes on the "HCI on the Web" Informal SIG are available via the CHI home pages.
Michael Muller proposed that SIGCHI do a trademark search and claim a name that can be used when referring to fictitious bad exemplar products. Diane will look into the costs and legal ramifications.
Vivienne and Rosemary will work with Diane on developing an RFP for a design for a logo for SIGCHI.
It was proposed that we might want to foster a discussion on discuss.chi. If we were to have a discussion of election issues on a .chi mailing list we would have to conform with ACM election rules. One candidate has put their election statement on their home page. We are concerned about leveling the playing field for all candidates in terms of access.
Clare-Marie will pursue fostering the discussion with Pat Ryan for the next phone call. Austin will pursue putting the candidate's statements on the Web. We will ask the candidates' permission before taking actions which will require new efforts.
The chair will appoint a three person review committee so that we can begin to review proposals.
Robin and Jim had the goal to provide consumers with information about the usability and usefulness of various pieces of computing technology. They are proposing to contact, for example, Consumers' Reports for the purpose of developing a collaboration. We are interested in extending this effort to consumer unions globally.
Diane will explore ACM's concerns about this: if they approve, Jim and Robin will prepare a letter for Consumer Reports and Diane will make the initial contact with Consumer Reports.
Diane, in conjunction with any SIGCHI volunteers who may care to work with her is interested in facilitating the creation of an ACM/SIGCHI Computer Users' Bill of Rights and Responsibilities. Volunteers are sought. The goal is to announce this at CHI96.
The event will have an exhibit of accessible technology in Atlanta in 1996. Susan Brummel of the General Services Administration is our contact point. Robin will report back to us on this issue.
Diane will work with Ian McClelland to develop a proposal on the mechanics of corporate sponsorship.
The proposal covers nominations for SIGCHI officers and for candidates for public office. It will be distributed to the EEC by email and brought up for a vote at the next EEC telephone conference call.
Our discussion focussed on balancing the need for carry-over against the need to keep the nomination process open. We also focussed on the differences between nominations inside and beyond the U.S.
We thank the authors of the policy for their work.
Nominations Process for SIGCHI Office: Austin
Austin will create a committee to deal with policy concerning cases in which only one candidate can be found to run for SIGCHI office.
Motion: To forward Steven's proposal to publish the SIGCHI Bulletin on the Web for at least two years beginning January 1996 to ACM's Publications Board.
Vote: Yes: Mike, Austin, Beth, Vivienne, Advisory Board, Gene, Clare-Marie, Jakob. No: None Abstain: None
Motion: To approve Steven Pemberton and Alan Edwards as CHI97 co-chairs. If appointed Steven will share the load of the SIGCHI Bulletin, of which he is editor-in-chief, with other volunteers. Additionally he will resign from the CHI96 committee.
Vote: Yes: Mike, Austin, Beth, Vivienne, Advisory Board, Gene, Clare-Marie, Jakob. No: None Abstain: None
Jakob will forward the proposal on the electronic Bulletin to the ACM publications board.
Austin will create a committee to deal with policy concerning cases in which only one candidate can be found to run for SIGCHI office.
Diane will work with Ian to develop a proposal on the mechanics of corporate sponsorship.
Robin will report back to us on the issue of SIGCHI's participation in the Paralympics accessible technology exhibit.
Diane will explore ACM's concerns about a collaboration between SIGCHI and Consumers' Reports. If they approve Jim and Robin will prepare a letter for Consumers' Reports and Diane will make the initial contact with the publication.
Within the next week the chair will appoint a three person review committee so that we can begin to review proposals for the SIGCHI Development Fund.
Clare-Marie will pursue the issue of fostering the electronic discussion of SIGCHI elections with Pat Ryan for the next phone call.
Austin will pursue putting the candidate's statements on the Web
Diane will give Gene financial information on DIS so we can decide on mailing the proceedings at the next conference call.
Diane will look into the costs and legal ramifications of doing a trademark search and creating a fictitious company.
The candidates for the up-coming SIGCHI election have agreed to have their election statements put up on the Web. Pat Ryan must also be consulted at ACM. It is not yet clear whether she has been contacted.
Jakob has passed the proposal on the Bulletin on the Web to ACM's Publications Board. The proposal will be considered on July 6.
Clare-Marie will send the proposal on nominations out to Jim to be sent on to Diane for legal review at ACM.
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Vol.27 No.4, October 1995 |
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