Minutes of the BoD Meeting at Crypto '99
Board of Directors Meeting
Crypto '99
Santa Barbara
15 August 1999
_______________________________________________________________________
The Board President called the meeting to order at 10:07am.
Present were Beaver, Benaloh, Berson, Biham, Brassard, Cachin, Clark,
Feigenbaum, Franklin, Hruby, Landrock, Matsumoto, Maurer, McCurley, T.
Okamoto, Preneel, Upton, and Van Oorschot. Also present as observers were
Mickey Swick and Catherine Clark.
A proxy for Vandewalle was held by Preneel.
_______________________________________________________________________
Clark asked that a report from the publishing subcommittee be added to the
agenda.
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Minutes of the 2 May 1999 meeting were approved. Motion by Preneel seconded
by Berson carried 16 to 0.
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Benaloh asked if minutes should be less detailed and the consensus was that
they should be. It was also agreed that Business Meeting minutes should
record all votes taken there.
________________________________________________________________________
Crypto '99 General Chair Beaver reported on the conference. The important
items of shrimp, strawberries, and t-shirts were all reported to be in
order.
Registrations as of 11 August were 497. Catering was ordered for 540.
Early arrivals were housed in San Nicolas residence hall and others were
housed in Anacapa hall.
The conference budget was within expected bounds.
Beaver suggested that it might be better to lower student registration fees
than to continue the practice of supporting selected students. This year's
registration included approximately 80 students of which approximately 20
received financial support. Beaver obtained financial support from CertCo
to supplement the conference budget for student support.
A discussion followed as to whether uniform fee reduction for all student
registrants was preferable to the discriminatory relief now placed in the
hands of the General Chair. No consensus was reached. However, Cachin
suggested recommendations be made for future General Chairs and Beaver
agreed to update the General Chair guidelines.
Beaver then made a presentation of the Coat of Arms for Crypto '99 which is
found on the conference folders.
________________________________________________________________________
Clark then reported on the status of membership services.
He said that Y2K compliance is about to be completed, but that there are
some problems with mailing lists for the Journal.
Mickey Swick said that she is becoming comfortable in her new role of
providing IACR membership services.
Clark said that the proceedings CD will be available at the conference from
Spinger-Verlag at the usual author discount price.
Feigenbaum asked that there be clear phone, e-mail, and facsimile contacts
for the membership office to facilitate conference registration and other
membership service requests.
Clark offered to organize a sub-committee meeting about managing the
relationship with the Membership Secretary.
________________________________________________________________________
Hruby then reported on the final status of EuroCrypt '99.
The final registration count was 390. There were 313 full-fee registrants
(146 early and 167 late) and 64 student registrants (37 early and 27 late)
[sic].
Revenues totaled $222,376 and expenses totaled $222,461 leaving a deficit of
$85.80 (2788 Czech Koruna) which was covered by Dr. Hruby's employer.
Hruby also delivered to the board 35 left over EuroCrypt '99 proceedings and
the board agreed to try to sell these extra proceedings if possible.
________________________________________________________________________
Landrock then reported on proposals for upcoming EuroCrypts. The Board was
told that it would see EuroCrypt 2001 proposals for Austria (Salzburg,
Innsbruck, and Vienna) and for Sorrento, Italy.
Other potential proposals including Poland, U.K. (Bath), Israel, Quebec, and
the Netherlands were encouraged to delay until 2002.
________________________________________________________________________
McCurley then raised the issue of details for Crypto 2001 in Santa Barbara.
************************************************************************
After discussion of possible candidates for General Chair, a list of
candidates was proposed and approved. Motion by Clark seconded by Benaloh
carried 16 to 0 with 2 abstentions.
************************************************************************
[Dave Balenson has subsequently accepted the Board's offer and agreed to
serve as Crypto 2001 General Chair.]
________________________________________________________________________
The Board then heard a proposal by Reihnard Posch to host EuroCrypt 2001 in
Austria.
The proposal consisted of three possible venues: Innsbruck, Salzburg, and
Vienna.
The Innsbruck site consisted of a conference center for the technical
program and hotels within walking distance. Daily hotel costs ranged from
approximately 1600 Austrian Schillings down to approximately 500 Austrian
Schillings. The registration costs (not including the $80 membership dues)
were expected to be approximately $450.
The Salzburg site consisted of a large hotel that would house the technical
program as well as most participants. Nearby secondary hotels were also
available. Registration costs were expected to be roughly the same as for
Innsbruck.
The Vienna site consisted of housing the technical program at the Vienna
Conference Center and lodging at various hotels 15-20 minutes away via
public transit. The registrations costs (not including the $80 membership
dues) were expected to be approximately $480.
After some discussion of the alternatives, the Board and the presenter
agreed on a preference for the Innsbruck site.
________________________________________________________________________
The Board then heard a proposal by Guiseppe Russo to host EuroCrypt 2001 in
Sorrento, Italy.
Sorrento is 52km south of Naples with regular transit connections and
roughly a 3.5 hour bus trip (available twice daily) to and from Rome.
The conference would be hosted in the Sorrento Palace Hotel with 410 rooms
and an integrated conference center that can accommodate up to 1700. Room
costs would be approximately $150 per day.
The total expenses are estimated at 51,000,000 Italian Lira [sic] with an
estimated attendance of 450 producing a cost of 1,052,000 Italian Lira or
$569 per participant.
Other nearby three star hotels have rooms available for about $97 per day.
Nearby two star hotels have rooms available for about $81 per day.
________________________________________________________________________
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After some discussion of the proposals, the Board approved a motion by Upton
and seconded by Clark to select the Austrian bid with a preference for the
Innsbruck site. The motion carried 16 to 0.
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________________________________________________________________________
At this point, Beaver left the meeting to attend to conference business and
gave his proxy to Berson.
________________________________________________________________________
Discussion then turned to Program Chairs for EuroCrypt 2001 and Crypto 2001.
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After discussion of possible candidates for Program Chair, two lists of
candidates were proposed and approved.
************************************************************************
[Birgit Pfitzman has subsequently accepted the Board's offer and agreed to
serve as EuroCrypt 2001 Program Chair and Joe Kilian has subsequently
accepted the Board's offer and agreed to serve as Crypto 2001 Program
Chair.]
________________________________________________________________________
Matsumoto, acting on behalf of AsiaCrypt Steering Committee Chair E.
Okamoto, then reported on upcoming AsiaCrypt activities.
The AsiaCrypt Steering Committee heard two proposals for AsiaCrypt 2001 --
one for Taipei, Taiwan and one for the Gold Coast of Australia. The
Steering Committee recommended acceptance of the Taiwan proposal.
************************************************************************
A motion was made by Berson and seconded by Upton that the Steering
Committee send its complete recommended proposal (including General Chair)
to the Board by 15 September and that the Board respond to this proposal by
15 October. This motion was approved by acclamation.
************************************************************************
[In a supplemental Board meeting two days later (see below), the Board heard
a detailed proposal from Prof. Wen-Guey Tzeng on the Taipei proposal. At
the time of the writing of these minutes, the Board has not yet taken
formal action on this proposal.]
The Board then discussed possible Program Chairs for AsiaCrypt 2001.
************************************************************************
After discussion a Program Chair candidate was identified and approved by
the Board.
************************************************************************
________________________________________________________________________
Cachin and Biham then reported on their proposal for a cryptology pre-print
server. Cachin suggested that pre-print servers are widespread and that
there is no conflict between another pre-print server and anonymous
submissions.
Maurer asked about detailed procedures and persistence of papers on such a
server.
Feigenbaum asked about the window of utility during which such a server
would be beneficial for any given research contribution.
Clark asked about additional downsides.
Berson asked if we could contract this service to an outside party.
McCurley suggested that it might be possible to contract for this service
through CORE.
Biham asked if we should approach someone to contract for this service.
Feigenbaum and others then expressed fears over giving an outside party
control over our publications.
Berson then asked for a straw poll on the desirability of an IACR pre-print
server. Support for the idea was unanimous.
Cachin asked for a commitment to proceed.
Van Oorschot and Benaloh suggested soliciting help at the Business Meeting.
A sub-committee was formed to study the issue consisting of Biham, Cachin,
Feigenbaum, and McCurley.
________________________________________________________________________
Journal Editor Feigenbaum then gave a report on the state of the Journal.
Feigenbaum described an opportunity from Springer-Verlag to increase the
page count of the Journal for a modest additional fee and asked whether we
should accept the offer given that the Journal's submission rate had
declined.
Brassard expressed a concern that the reduction in submissions might be due
to a long backlog.
Feigenbaum stated that the current backlog was approximately one year.
Cachin suggested that recent improvements in the print quality of conference
proceedings might have contributed to the decrease in Journal submissions.
Biham suggested that we tell Spinger-Verlag that we do not want to increase
the page count at present but may wish to do so in a year or more.
It was generally agreed that there should be no immediate increase in the
Journal's page count but that the situation should be watched and revisited
if the backlog increases.
________________________________________________________________________
Treasurer Upton then presented a brief financial report stating that the
IACR finances are healthy and recommending no increase in dues.
________________________________________________________________________
Upton then raised the issue of restricted donations to the IACR and asserted
that the IACR doesn't really have any pressing needs for more funding.
Clark offered to contact a potential donor and discuss the possibilities of
sponsorship of one of a variety of possible new initiatives including a
pre-print server, a student fellowship, and a lecture prize.
________________________________________________________________________
Preneel then raised the issue of an IACR Distinguished Lecture for AsiaCrypt
2000.
He said that no nominations had been received.
Tom Berson was suggested as a candidate and left the room.
************************************************************************
After discussion, the Board voted 16 to 0 to ask Tom Berson to deliver the
IACR Distinguished Lecture at the inaugural AsiaCrypt.
************************************************************************
Berson then returned to the room and accepted the invitation.
________________________________________________________________________
Preneel then raised the issue of whether "best paper" awards should be given
at IACR conferences.
************************************************************************
A motion was made by Preneel and seconded by Landrock that each Program
Committee be authorized to award zero or more "outstanding paper" honors.
The motion was defeated 7 to 8 with 1 abstention.
************************************************************************
________________________________________________________________________
Franklin reported that the Elections Committee had not yet received any
nominations.
________________________________________________________________________
Preneel then reported on EuroCrypt 2000.
He said that logistics were progressing smoothly. There would be a single
registration point for local hotels and that rooms could be held with a
credit card or by pre-payment. Hotel rooms would be released one month
prior to the conference.
________________________________________________________________________
Franklin then reported on Crypto 2000.
He said there were no current issues and that there would be no apostrophe
in the name.
________________________________________________________________________
Cachin then reported that the Newsletter was operating smoothly.
He said that e-mail addresses of note included newsletter@iacr.org (which is
forwarded to Cachin) and webmaster@iacr.org (which is forwarded to both
Cachin and McCurley).
The last electronic distribution of the Newsletter had only 27 member
e-mails that were returned as invalid.
________________________________________________________________________
Clark then reported on membership activities.
He said that, 2 years having elapsed since its inception, we were required
to review our arrangement with the Secretariat. Clark and Upton agreed to
conduct this review and report back at the EuroCrypt 2000 Board Meeting.
McCurley then reported that Clark had resigned his position as Membership
Secretary.
************************************************************************
McCurley then yielded his chair to Clark in order to offer a motion
(seconded by Berson) that Don Beaver be appointed as Membership Secretary.
The motion was approved 16 to 0.
************************************************************************
[Beaver subsequently accepted the Board's offer to fill this position.]
________________________________________________________________________
McCurley then reported on the status of electronic submissions.
He stated that the current code (written and maintained with no budget) is
experimental and that a permanent solution is desirable.
[Note: Preneel subsequently offered the following information about the
current electronic submissions code.
- the software was written in Perl by Sam Rebelsky and SIGACT's Electronic
Publishing Board (9 people, including Joe Kilian)
see www.sigact.acm.org/sigact/electronic.html
- for Eurocrypt '99, this software was ported to the ENS computers and
apparently it worked fine (but please confirm this with Jacques Stern)
- Eurocrypt 2000 will use the sigact.acm.org server - it has a.o. a backup
facility on a remote site.
- the software was called "experimental" when it was first used for
Stoc'95.
- the software was used for Focs, Stocs, Eurocrypt, Crypto, WDAG,...
- while it still not commercial software, it seems to be working fine.
A recent improvement is that it now accepts attachments.
- the main problem seems to be that some non-Unix platforms seem to produce
postscript that is hard to understand to ps printers (this is a
euphemism).
I suggested to Joe to switch to pdf, but it is clear that this cannot
be done quickly.
It seems that the Sigact solution is rather permanent, and that for the
time being the Program Chairs have not complained too hard about it.
But I agree that it would be nice if IACR could improve this software and
run it on our own server.]
________________________________________________________________________
Feigenbaum then reported that Springer-Verlag is about to do a publicity
blitz to seek more subscriptions and that they solicit any mailing lists we
can offer to help them.
________________________________________________________________________
McCurley then asked for items to be placed on the agenda for the forthcoming
Business Meeting.
Agenda items included the recommendation for no increase in dues,
announcements about future IACR conferences, solicitations for input and
assistance regarding a possible pre-print server, and an election report to
be delivered by Franklin.
________________________________________________________________________
Action items for McCurley were to extend offers for General and Program
Chairs for EuroCrypt 2001 and Crypto 2001.
An action item for Clark was to contact a potential donor about possible
uses for a restricted-use donation.
The pre-print sub-committee is scheduled to meet and report back at the
EuroCrypt 2000 Board Meeting.
________________________________________________________________________
The meeting adjourned at 6:01pm.
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Board of Directors Supplemental Meeting
Crypto '99
Santa Barbara
17 August 1999
_______________________________________________________________________
The Board President called the meeting to order at 12:15m.
Present were Beaver, Benaloh, Berson, Biham, Cachin, Clark, Diffie,
Feigenbaum, Franklin, Hruby, Landrock, Maurer, McCurley, T. Okamoto,
Preneel, Upton, and Van Oorschot.
_______________________________________________________________________
A presentation was made by Prof. Wen-Guey Tzeng concerning details of the
Taipei, Taiwan proposal for AsiaCrypt 2001.
Discussion ensued regarding Program Chair candidates and the role of the
AsiaCrypt Steering Committee.
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A motion regarding AsiaCrypt 2001 Program Chairs was offered and defeated.
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It was agreed that further discussions would be conducted by e-mail.
Upon a motion by Diffie seconded by Landrock, the meeting was adjourned at
12:56pm.
_______________________________________________________________________
Respectfully submitted
Josh Benaloh
IACR Secretary
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