BIID Workshop Structure

At the 4th Beyond IID in Information Theory (BIID) workshop in Barcelona (18-22 July), a business meeting was held in the form of a general assembly. The purpose of it was to discuss the future of the workshop, in particular upcoming editions as well as editions in planning, and the format, scope and size of the workshop in general.

A number of constructive remarks were made, including the following, which should be taken as recommendations to future organisers:

1) Participants seemed generally happy with the single-track, workshop-style format, characterised by few, long talks and ample breaks.

2) Also the poster session is generally appreciated; in addition, it was suggested to advertise the posters in the form of flash talks (time permitting).

3) On the selection of talks, this should still be the task of the organisers according to their best judgement, ideally aided by a scientific committee. To encourage contributions from the community at large, it was suggested to allow submissions and nominations (with no specific format), up to a suitable deadline, from which then the programme or part of the programme will be selected. 

4) A strong recommendation was that organisers and committee members are excluded from giving talks.

Finally, to avoid situations where different groups independently work towards hosting a future BIID workshop, creating a clash, it was decided by acclamation of those present (a majority of the 80 participants of BIID4), to form a steering board consisting initially of the past organisers of the workshop. 

The principal task of the steering board will be to collect and coordinate bids for future editions of BIID, and decide the venues of future BIID’s. Beyond that, its role is advisory. Membership in the steering board is preliminarily defined by having been organiser in the previous three years, plus the organiser(s) of the upcoming BIID.