September1999 October 1999 ICML-03 Mini-Tutorial The Three R’s of Publishing Machine Learning Papers: Research, ‘Riting, and Reviews Marie desJardins Rob Holte Rob Schapire Saturday, August 23, 12:30-2:00

September1999 October 1999 The Process of Getting Published Marie desJardins ICML-03 Mini-Tutorial The Three R’s of Publishing Machine Learning Papers: Research, ‘Riting, and Reviews Saturday, August 23, 12:30-2:00

September1999 October /23/03 3 Tutorial Overview  Programmatics and Publication  Review process  Ethical issues  Handling rejection   Writing and Being Reviewed  Reviewing  Writing a paper  Knowing your audience  Machine Learning Methodologies  Empirical methodology  Formal methodology

September1999 October /23/03 4 The Review Process  Program committees  Selection process  Senior vs. area chair vs. regular members  Paper assignments  Keyword-based  Self-selection  All for one and one for all  Decisions  Reaching a consensus  Final decisions  Conditional accepts (rare)  Acceptance rates (~~~20%)

September1999 October /23/03 5 Journal Reviewing  Length of decision cycle  Quality/length/depth of review  Decision options:  Accept as is  Accept with minor changes  Accept with major changes (subject to re-review)  Reject with encouragement to resubmit  Reject out of hand

September1999 October /23/03 6 Where to Publish  Workshops vs. conferences vs. journals  Quantity vs. quality  Aim high! (or at least appropriately)  Acceptance rate vs. time to prepare/publish

September1999 October /23/03 7 Knowing Your Audience: A Reviewer’s Perspective  First, I read the title: is it in my area? (self-selection)  Next, I read the abstract: is it interesting? (self- selection)  Next, I skim the introduction and form my opinion about the paper  Next, I read the rest of the paper looking for evidence to support my view   By the time I get to Section 2, I already have a very strong opinion about whether to accept or reject.  Your job is to give me the evidence I need in the title and abstract to select your paper for review, and in the introduction to result in the right opinion!

September1999 October /23/03 8 Ethical Issues  Multiple submissions  Journal versions of conference papers  Authors and author order  Listing papers in your CV

September1999 October /23/03 9 Rejected!! Now What?  Fix the paper!  Read the reviews, rail and complain, berate the reviewer  Calm down  Read them again with an open mind  Do more experiments, revise the paper, …  Go back to the reviews again – have you addressed all the points?  Have people read the revision critically  Do more experiments, revise the paper, …  Repeat until the next deadline