9-th International Conference
"Speech and Computer" SPECOM'2004
20-22 September 2004
St. Petersburg, Russia

Organized by
St. Petersburg Institute for Informatics and Automation
of the Russian Academy of Sciences (SPIIRAS),
SIMILAR European Network of Excellence

Supported by
Ministry of Industry, Science and Technologies of Russia,
Russian Foundation for Basic Research,
Ministry of Education of Russia,
ELSNET European Network in Human Language Technologies,
International Speech Communication Association ISCA,
International Commission for Acoustics ICA.

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FIRST CALL FOR PAPERS

Dear Colleagues, we are pleased to invite you to 9-th International Conference "Speech and Computer" SPECOM'2004, which will be held in September 20-22, 2004 in St. Petersburg. The aim of the Conference is to discuss the wide range of problems and technologies connected with natural forms of Human-Computer Interaction. The main topics of the Conference are given below:

• Fundamentals of Human-Computer Interaction;
• Signal analysis, processing and feature estimation;
• Speech recognition and understanding;
• Natural language processing;
• Speaker verification and identification;
• Speech synthesis;
• Integration of various modalities and media (speech, handwriting, visual, tactile information, etc.);
• Multimodal analysis and synthesis;
• Discourse, dialogue and situational analysis;
• Ontologies and knowledge representation;
• Speech and language resources;
• Applied systems for Human-Computer Interaction;

Multimodal Interfaces Day devoted to discussion of achievements and challenges in designing perspective multimodal interfaces and systems will be organized during the Conference SPECOM’2004.

GENERAL CHAIR:

Rafael M. Yusupov, Director of the SPIIRAS, St. Petersburg, Russia

SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE:

Chair: Rafael M. Yusupov, Director of the SPIIRAS, St. Petersburg, Russia

Co-Chair:
Benoit Macq, University catholique de Louvain, Coordinator of SIMILAR NoE, Belgium

Members:
Steven Krauwer, Utrecht University, The Netherlands
Benoit Michel, University catholique de Louvain, Belgium
Niels Ole Bernsen, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
Andre Gilloire, France Telecom Research & Development, France
Ferran Marques, Technical University of Catalonia, Spain
Allen Gorin, AT&T Laboratories, USA
Gerhard Rigoll, Munich University of Technology, Germany
Heinrich Niemann, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany
Jean Caelen, Grenoble University, France
Thierry Dutoit, Faculte Polytechnique de Mons, Belgium
Jesus Savage, University of Mexico, Mexico
Michael Savic, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, USA
Sadaoki Furui, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan
Hiroya Fujisaki, University of Tokyo, Japan
Boris Lobanov, Institute of Engineering Cybernetics, Belarus
Rajmund Piotrowski, Hertsen Pedagogical University, Russia
Rodmonga Potapova, Moscow State Linguistic University, Russia
Andrey Ronzhin, SPIIRAS, Russia

LANGUAGES: Two official languages will be used at the Conference: English and Russian. The Proceedings of the Conference SPECOM’2004 will be published in English.

REGISTRATION FORM SUBMISSION: Prospective authors should fill in registration form, which includes a title, names of author (co-authors), position, affiliations, address, telephone, fax numbers and e-mail address, and send it by e-mail specom@mail.iias.spb.su.

ABSTRACT SUBMISSION: Prospective authors should submit the abstracts(at the most 400 words) by e-mail specom@mail.iias.spb.su before 15 March 2004.

PAPER SUBMISSION: Camera-ready full papers (4-8 pages) will be published in the proceedings distributed at the Conference. The paper must be sent to the Organizing Committee by e-mail before 1 August 2004. Instructions for camera-ready papers preparation will be distributed later.

ORGANIZING COMMITTEE:

Chair:
Andrey Ronzhin, SPIIRAS, Russia

Members:
Anatoli Tkatsh, SPIIRAS, Russia
Irina Podnozova, SPIIRAS, Russia
Alexey Karpov, SPIIRAS, Russia
Izolda Lee, SPIIRAS, Russia
Alexander Shalin, SPIIRAS, Russia
Leonid Mesnik, SPIIRAS, Russia

REGISTRATION FEES:
Western participants - 200 Euro;
Western students - 100 Euro;
Central Europe participants - 150 Euro;
Central Europe students - 75 Euro;
SIMILAR NoE participants - 50 Euro;
Russian and former SU states participants - 50 Euro;
Russian students - 10 Euro (without Proceedings).

The fees include the welcome reception, a copy of the Conference Proceedings, all Conference material, admission to all sessions and to the exhibition, banquet and coffee break refreshments. 1/2 of registration fees should be paid in case of correspondence participation.
Additional copy of Proceedings costs 15 Euro.

ACCOMODATION:
All participants will be provided with comfortable rooms (about 35-45 Euro per day) in Hotel "Russ" located in the heart of the city, in historical, cultural and business center of Saint-Petersburg (Artilleriyskaya street, 1). The conference hall for Conference SPECOM'2004 is located at the same Hotel.
Possibilities for acquaintance with historical valuables of Saint-Petersburg and cultural program will be provided in weekend before the Conference and other days.

IMPORTANT DATES:
Submission of abstracts:                       15 March 2004
Notification of acceptance:                    1 April 2004
Submission of camera-ready papers:     15 August 2004
Conference:                                         20-22 September 2004

CONTACT INFORMATION:
Organizing Committee,
SPIIRAS, 39, 14-th line, St. Petersburg, 199178, RUSSIA
Tel.: + 7 (812) 328 7081; Fax : + 7 (812) 328 4450
E-mail: specom@mail.iias.spb.su
Web: http://www.spiiras.nw.ru/speech