Demonstration Chair Handbook

Current Chairs:

Name Affiliation Contact
Pushkar Mishra Google DeepMind / University of Cambridge pushkarmishra@google.com
Smaranda Muresan Barnard College, Columbia University smuresan@barnard.edu
Tao Yu The University of Hong Kong tao.yu.nlp@gmail.com

Overview of Responsibilities

The Demonstration Chair is responsible for assembling the system demonstration papers to be presented in the main conference program. They oversee every aspect of the System Demonstrations Track, including recruiting the programme committee, preparing and publicizing the Call for Demonstrationss, managing peer review, compiling the proceedings, and supporting presenters on‑site. They work closely with the Program, Publication, Web, Publicity, and Local Organizing Chairs.

The following are the main responsibilities of the Demonstration Committee Chairs:

1. Forming Committee & Reviewer Recruitment
2. Calling for Demos & Publicity
3. Reviewing & Acceptance Decisions
4. Proceedings & Programme Coordination

Breakdown of Responsibilities

1. Forming Committee & Reviewer Recruitment

This responsibility focuses on recruiting appropriate committee members and reviewers, building a diverse, balanced, and qualified evaluation team. It includes consulting former Demo Chairs for institutional memory, appointing Area Chairs who represent a range of geographies and research areas, and inviting a sufficient pool of expert reviewers while ensuring demographic and topical diversity.

Task Start Deadline Dependency Notes
Contact previous Demo Chairs for advice & reviewer list January 2025 March 2025 - Gather insights on committee composition and process.
Select the demo program committee January 2025 March 2025 - Prioritize diversity in research areas and demographics.
Recruit Area Chairs & reviewers March 2025 March 2025 - Maintain topical balance & industry/academia mix

2. Calling for Demos & Publicity

This responsibility covers drafting and publishing the Call for System Demonstrations so that the track attracts a broad spectrum of high‑quality submissions — from early research prototypes to production‑ready industrial systems.

Task Start Deadline Dependency Notes
Issue call for System Demonstrations January 2025 January 2025 - Encourage a diverse set of submissions, ranging from early research prototypes to mature production-ready systems, including technologically innovative industrial systems. Of particular interest are publicly available open-source or open-access systems.
Set up OpenReview Portal for Submissions February 2025 February 2025 Call Published Configure submission form & timelines.
Social‑media Promotion ASAP ASAP Call Published Coordinate with Publicity Chairs.

3. Reviewing & Acceptance Decisions

This responsibility encompasses managing the peer‑review workflow. Chairs assign reviewers, monitor the review period, encourage discussion—especially on borderline or conflicting reviews—and finally render balanced accept/reject decisions.

Task Start Deadline Dependency Notes
Assign Reviewers March 2025 March 2025 Reviewer Pool Ready Assign 3 expert reviewers per submission (with an extra paper bidding step, if needed).
Oversee Review & Discussion March 2025 April 2025 Reviewers Assigned Encourage reviewer discussions per paper, especially for the borderline and disagreement ones.
Make Final Acceptance Decisions April 2025 April 2025 Meta‑reviews Completed Make accept/reject decisions for each submission based on reviewer recommendations and the number of demo slots in the main conference (conveyed by the general/program chairs). It is important to maintain a balance of accepted topic areas, underrepresented or neglected areas, etc.
Select Best Demo Paper & Runner‑up July 2025 July 2025 - Based on reviewer scores & AC nominations

4. Proceedings & Programme Coordination

This responsibility focuses on integrating accepted demos into the conference experience. Tasks include preparing the companion proceedings, collecting presenters’ technical needs (hardware & software), and coordinating with General/Program Chairs to schedule demonstration sessions.

The Demo Chair should work very closely with the Program Chairs, to coordinate the amount of time in the program available for demos, the meeting space, and the demo descriptions for the conference proceedings.

Task Start Deadline Dependency Notes
Create Descriptions for the Conference Program June 2025 June 2025 - Assist the publication chairs in preparing the companion volume of the demonstration proceedings.
Coordinate Demonstration Technical Requirements June 2025 July 2025 - (1) Collect hardware/software needs; (2) Make sure that demo display requirements (monitors, cables, poster boards, etc.) are conveyed to the local organization chairs and to the authors.
Coordinate Time Slot for Presentation June 2025 July 2025 - Coordinate with general/program chairs to decide the time slot for demo presentation (e.g., jointly with an evening poster session).