********************************************************* TSD 2006 - CALL FOR PARTICIPATION ********************************************************* Ninth International Conference on TEXT, SPEECH and DIALOGUE (TSD 2006) Brno, Czech Republic, 11-15 September 2006 http://www.tsdconference.org/ The conference is organized by the Faculty of Informatics, Masaryk University, Brno, and the Faculty of Applied Sciences, University of West Bohemia, Pilsen. The conference is supported by International Speech Communication Association. VENUE: Hotel Continental, Brno, Czech Republic IMPORTANT DATES September 11-15 2006 ..... Conference date TSD SERIES TSD series evolved as a prime forum for interaction between researchers in both spoken and written language processing from the former East Block countries and their Western colleagues. Proceedings of TSD form a book published by Springer-Verlag in their Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence (LNAI) series (as Volume 4188 this year). TOPICS Topics of the conference will include (but are not limited to): text corpora and tagging transcription problems in spoken corpora sense disambiguation links between text and speech oriented systems parsing issues, especially parsing problems in spoken texts multi-lingual issues, especially multi-lingual dialogue systems information retrieval and information extraction text/topic summarization machine translation semantic networks and ontologies semantic web speech modeling speech segmentation speech recognition search in speech for IR and IE text-to-speech synthesis dialogue systems development of dialogue strategies prosody in dialogues emotions and personality modeling user modeling knowledge representation in relation to dialogue systems assistive technologies based on speech and dialogue applied systems and software facial animation visual speech synthesis Papers on processing of languages other than English are strongly encouraged. PROGRAM COMMITTEE Frederick Jelinek, USA (general chair) Hynek Hermansky, Switzerland (executive chair) Eneko Agirre, Spain Genevieve Baudoin, France Jan Cernocky, Czech Republic Attila Ferencz, Romania Alexander Gelbukh, Mexico Louise Guthrie, GB Eva Hajicova, Czech Republic Jaroslava Hlavacova, Czech Republic Eduard Hovy, USA Ivan Kopecek, Czech Republic Steven Krauwer, The Netherlands Siegfried Kunzmann, Germany Vaclav Matousek, Czech Republic Hermann Ney, Germany Elmar Noeth, Germany Karel Oliva, Czech Republic Karel Pala, Czech Republic Nikola Pavesic, Slovenia Vladimr Petkevic, Czech Republic Josef Psutka, Czech Republic James Pustejovsky, USA Leon Rothkrantz, The Netherlands E.G. Schukat-Talamazzini, Germany Pavel Skrelin, Russia Pavel Smrz, Czech Republic Taras Vintsiuk, Ukraine Yorick Wilks, GB Victor Zakharov, Russia CONFERENCE PROGRAM The detailed conference program with links to presentation abstracts is now available on the conference web page http://www.tsdconference.org/tsd2006/tsd_prog.html KEYNOTE SPEAKERS Eduard Hovy, USA Learning by Reading: An Experiment in Text Analysis Louise Guthrie, GB Discovering Anomalous Material James Pustejovsky, USA Unifying Semantic Annotations for Linguistic Description Eva Hudlicka, USA Depth of Feelings: Alternatives for Modeling Affect in User Models and Cognitive Architectures PANEL DISCUSSION Panelists: Elmar Noeth, Nadia Mana, Geza Nemeth, Eva Hudlicka Emotions in Text, Speech and Dialogue FORMAT OF THE CONFERENCE The conference program will include oral presentations and poster/demonstration sessions with sufficient time for discussions of the issues raised. Papers will be presented in plenary or topic oriented sessions. The conference will welcome four keynote speakers - Eduard Hovy, Louise Guthrie, James Pustejovsky and Eva Hudlicka, and it will offer one special panel devoted to Emotions in Text, Speech and Dialogue. Social events including a Czech Welcome Dinner, a trip to Austerlitz Castle (with a "virtual battle" show) finished with Moravian dancing and Moravian conference dinner will allow for additional informal interactions. OFFICIAL LANGUAGE The official language of the conference is English. CONFERENCE FEES The conference fee depends on the date of payment and on your status. It includes one copy of the proceedings, refreshments, local transport, social events and organizing costs. The fee does not include accommodation. Full participant: On-site payment: CZK 12000 Student: On-site payment: CZK 8000 All costs are in Czech Crowns (Czech Koruna, CZK), see e.g. http://www.xe.com/ucc/ for the current exchange rate. ACCOMMODATION The organizing committee has arranged discounts on accommodation in a 3-star hotel and student dormitories at reasonable prices. The current list of available accommodation and prices is accessible at the registration page of the conference website. ADDRESS All correspondence regarding the conference should be addressed to Dana Hlavackova, TSD 2006 Faculty of Informatics, Masaryk University Botanicka 68a, 602 00 Brno, Czech Republic phone: +420-5-49 49 33 29 fax: +420-5-49 49 18 20 email: tsd2006@tsdconference.org The official TSD 2006 homepage is: http://www.tsdconference.org/ LOCATION Brno is the second largest city in the Czech Republic with a population of almost 400.000. The city is the country's judiciary and trade-fair center. Brno is the capital of Moravia, which is in the south-east part of the Czech Republic. Brno had been a Royal City since 1347 and with its six universities it forms also a cultural center of the region. Brno can be reached easily by direct flights from Prague, London and Munich and by trains or buses from Prague (200 km) or Vienna (130 km). For the participants with some extra time, some nearby places may also be of interest. Local ones include: Brno Castle now called Spilberk, Veveri Castle, the Old and New City Halls, the Augustine Monastery with St. Thomas Church and crypt of Moravian Margraves, Church of St. James, Cathedral of St. Peter & Paul, Cartesian Monastery in Kralovo Pole, the famous Villa Tugendhat designed by Mies van der Rohe along with other important buildings of between-war Czech architecture. For those willing to venture out of Brno, Moravian Karst with Macocha Chasm and Punkva caves, battlefield of Battle of three emperors (Napoleon, Russian Alexander and Austrian Franz - Battle by Austerlitz), Chateau of Slavkov (Austerlitz), Pernstejn Castle, Buchlov Castle, Lednice Chateau, Buchlovice Chateau, Letovice Chateau, Mikulov with one of the largest Jewish cemeteries in Central Europe, Telc - a town on the UNESCO heritage list, and many others are all within easy reach.