Awards open for nominations
Microsoft BCS/BCS IRSG Karen Spärck Jones Award – nominations close on 12 September
The British Computer Society Information Retrieval Specialist Group (BCS IRSG) in conjunction with the BCS created an award in 2008 to commemorate the achievements of Karen Spärck Jones. The Award is sponsored by Microsoft Research. For more information on how to nominate please visit this page.
The timetable for the Award is:
12 September 2019 – closing date for nominations
26 September 2019 – deadline for support letters
16 December 2019 – notification of the prize recipient
14-17 April 2020 – recipient presents keynote at ECIR
Strix Award – nominations close on 27 September
The Tony Kent Strix Award was inaugurated in 1998 by the Institute of Information Scientists. It is now presented by UKeiG in partnership with the International Society for Knowledge Organisation UK (ISKO UK), the Royal Society of Chemistry Chemical Information and Computer Applications Group (RSC CICAG) and the British Computer Society Information Retrieval Specialist Group (BCS IRSG).
https://www.cilip.org.uk/members/group_content_view.asp?group=201314&id=712682
The Award is given in recognition of an outstanding practical innovation or achievement in the field of information retrieval in its widest sense, including search and data mining, for example. This could take the form of an application or service, or an overall appreciation of past achievements from which significant advances have emanated. The award is open to individuals or groups from anywhere in the world.
The deadline for nominations is 17.00 Friday 27th September.
The Strix panel hope to announce the winner at the 2019 Strix Annual Lecture in London on the afternoon of Friday, 29th November. This will be given by Professor Pia Borlund (Department of Archivistics, Library and Information Science at Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences, Norway.)
Nominations should be for an achievement that meets one or more of the following criteria:
- A major and/or sustained contribution to the theoretical or experimental understanding of the information retrieval process
- Development of, or significant improvement in, mechanisms, a product or service for the retrieval of information, either generally or in a specialised field
- Development of, or significant improvement in, easy access to an information service
- Development and/or exploitation of new technologies to enhance information retrieval
- A sustained contribution over a period of years to the field of information retrieval for example, by running an information service or by contributing at national or international level to organisations active in the field.
(A note from the Editor – I first met Tony in 1977 when we were both serving on a British Library Research and Development Department project on the future of chemical information handling. Tony made some very significant contributions to defining the scope of the project and in particular to the way the meetings were organized. His understanding and vision for the role of computers in chemical information handling was probably a decade in advance of any of the other members.)