ivory bazaar

at the staid but prestigious CHI conference engineers psychologists and human factors specialists get to discuss the future of computer human interface through peer-reviewed pseudo-academic papers and panels. but a lot of contributions to the field are somewhat hard to place, and for this reason, since 2005 they have included an ‘alternative’ conference within the conference: alt.chi. this is where i was fortunate enough to publish the dishmaker, and this year amanda parkes and i submitted a paper outlining the syllabus for this past fall course futurecraft. for a while people have suggested that alt.chi was better than CHI, and this year they’ve really gone out on a limb by making the conference-within-a-conference totally different by forgoing the peer-reviewed system and instead adopting an open, public forum where papers can be evaluated by anyone who logs on. will authors (who are required to review three of their colleagues’ papers as a condition for submitting one) be kinder or harsher or fairer? will popularity have an impact? this year’s alt.chi is not just a conference, it’s a research project on its own – one which may point the way toward open, democratic conferences where publication can be evaluated openly and independent of name or affilitation. why not give it a shot – but be nice…