ACM SIGGRAPH Executive Committee January 2004 Meeting

Tony Baylis
Judy Brown
Colleen Case
Alain Chesnais
Gudrun Enger
Thierry Frey
Barb Helfer
Masa Inakage
Erica Johnson
Jacki Morie
Scott Owen
Dino Schweitzer
Stephen Spencer

Guests

MK Haley
David Hook
Vali Lalioti
Fran McAfee

The meeting was called to order on Saturday, January 17, at 9:00 A.M, with a review of the agenda. Guests were welcomed and introduced.

Motion (Brown, Spencer) To approve the minutes from the December 2003 conference call.

Approved (10,0,0)

Conference Administration Contract

There were four responses to the request for proposals for the conference administration contract: Smith Bucklin & Associates, Capstone, Talley, and Meeting Expectations. The high quality of the bids generated a lot of discussion. The Executive Committee decided to hold a face-to-face meeting at ACM Headquarters in February to interview the top three finalists.

Conference Management Contract

There were four bids in response to the request for proposal. They were from Talley Management, Smith Bucklin & Associates, Spargo, and Meeting Exchange. Three of the bids were considered to be reasonable.

Motion (Owen, Enger) To award the conference management contract to Smith Bucklin & Associates for three years with the potential for extension to five years.

Friendly amendment (Spencer) To make the contract period four years, since that is what the request for proposals stated.

Approved (8,0,2 Abstain: Baylis, Helfer)

General Services Contract

There were three bids in response to this request for proposals, with no significant cost differences among the bids.

Motion (Owen, Morie) To award the general services contract to Freeman for a period of three years, with possible extension to five years.

Approved (10,0,0)

Audio Visual Contract

There were three bids received in response to the audio visual request for proposals.

Motion (Frey, Case) To award the audio visual contract to AVW for the three years, 2005-2007, with a possible extension to 2009. There will be some further negotiations concerning the proposal.

Approved (8,0,2 Abstain Baylis, Helfer)

Action Item: Erica Johnson to announce the awarding of all contracts, to conduct negotiations, and to draft the contracts.

iHOLLYWOOD Proposal

The iHOLLYWOOD group approached the SIGGRAPH 2004chair with a request for a co-located event to be held with SIGGRAPH 2004 in return for a profit sharing agreement and an exchange of e-mail and mailing lists. iHollywood will hold their conference with or without his agreement, but they are looking for endorsement of their program by SIGGRAPH and a profit sharing agreement.

Since they are a for-profit company, any arrangement would require approval from the ACM Executive Committee. There was concern about the profit sharing component and whether this fits the mission of ACM SIGGRAPH.

Motion (Owen, Morie) To accept the iHollywood proposed co-location and affiliation with SIGGRAPH 2004.

Vote tied (4,4, 2 Against: Brown, Spencer, Case, Baylis; Abstain: Enger, Helfer)

Motion defeated by a tie-breaking vote against the proposal by the President, Alain Chesnais.

SIGGRAPH 2003 DVD

Gudrun Enger gave an update on the DVD prepared for SIGGRAPH 2003 by Soma. A survey was issued to purchasers, and responses were positive. She will provide a more detailed statistical analysis.

Soma has submitted a proposal for $150,000 to do broader content capture for SIGGRAPH 2004. It was felt that this should be a service with a set cost rather then the current profit sharing model. There are concerns that presenters might be unhappy to have someone make money from their content. Therefore, we should take all the risk and profit, and contract for the work to be done. Gudrun was encouraged to form a review group to develop a request for proposals to provide this service.

Conference Reserve Fund Proposal

The conference has formed two task forces, one to look into contributor recognition and one to look at the centralized database and electronic submission processes. It is felt that investment in these task forces will save money in the future. Each task force has five members. They are to meet and have their recommendations ready by the October 2004 Conference Advisory Group meeting.

Motion (Owen, Enger) To approve spending $20,000 from the conference reserve fund for these two task forces to have two meetings each.

Approved (8,0 2, Abstain: Brown Inakage)

SIGGRAPH 2005 Preliminary Budget and SIGGRAPH 2004 Final Budget

ACM Executive Committee approves the preliminary budget for a conference and does not require an additional approval for the final budget, although they monitor the progress. The SIGGRAPH 2004 final budget is not ready yet because the registration and conference management contracts are not final yet. SIGGRAPH 2004 and SIGGRAPH 2005 each assumes a 15% increase in exhibit space over SIGGRAPH 2003, and SIGGRAPH 2005 will revisit this number after SIGGRAPH 2004 actuals are known. Both have increased the amount to be spent on the reception. SIGGRAPH 2004 has added a one day pass, and student rates have been decreased slightly. There are no major programmatic changes. There is an increase in the required ACM allocation of 1.5-2%.

Here are the final budgetary numbers from recent conferences. All figures are after the ACM transfer.

SIGGRAPH 2001 lost $128,000

SIGGRAPH 2002 lost $1,800,000

SIGGRAPH 2003 had a surplus of $212,000

Motion (Owen, Morie) To approve the SIGGRAPH 2005 Preliminary budget

Approved (10,0,0)

SIGGRAPH Logo Use Policy

Stephen Spencer submitted a new draft of the policy, and there was discussion on how the logo should be used and what exceptions should be allowed. Alais Chesnais thanked Stephen Spencer and the committee for this report, and we look forward to seeing the final draft for approval at our next meeting.

ACM SIGGRAPH Budget Update

Tony Baylis gave an update on the status of the budget. Completion is pending some external factors, including a new ACM allocation policy

Southeast Asia Delegation Trip

This outreach effort is rescheduled for February of 2004. The team will visit seven countries in two weeks, and they have made contacts with chapters, government entities, and companies in the area. The team is comprised of Barb Helfer, Alain Chesnais, Alan Chalmers, YT Lee, and one other local representative.

Webex

Alain Chesnais gave an overview of webex, a new tool for electronic conferencing. He thanked Erica Johnson for doing a great job of negotiating with the company to get this tool.

Conference Call Schedule

February 11th at 5:00PM New York time

March 10th at 5:00 PM

April 14th (revisit schedule for Masa)

May 12th

June 9th

July 14th

Sunday Morning Strategic Planning Session.

On Sunday morning, the Executive Committee discussed ways to work together effectively.