Call for Contributions
3rd U.S. Semantic Technologies Symposium 2020, 9 – 11 March 2020, Raleigh, North Carolina. https://us2ts.org/
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The US2TS Symposium series is an emerging premier forum for fostering community between academic, industry and government researchers and practitioners in the US that develop or apply semantic technologies. The interest in semantics has been strengthened by the growing dependence on the Web and the continuously increasing importance of large-scale data sharing, integration, and reuse.

Semantics is an inherently multi-disciplinary field that attracts engagement from a broad range of researchers and practitioners. Participants at the US2TS come from disciplines in computer science and engineering, natural sciences, geoscience, biology, library science, biomedical and health care sciences, social sciences and the humanities, and many others. Discussions at the symposium cover core topics such as the Semantic Web, Ontologies, Knowledge Graph, Linked Data and AI on the Web, Privacy and Trust, etc., as well as the intersection of such topics with areas such as the Internet of Things (IoT) and Blockchains.

US2TS 2020 organizational committee invites your contributions and participation in the 2020 edition of US2TS to be held on 9 – 11 March 2020, in Raleigh, North Carolina.

At this time, we are seeking two kinds of contributions (calls for other kinds of contributions will follow shortly).

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** Call for Sessions Proposals
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We solicit anyone with an interest in the Semantic Web to propose a session for US2TS 2020. A session is any relevant activity that can fit into a 90 minutes slot (you can also propose a session that takes more than one slot).
Examples of sessions are:
- a panel discussion
- a series of presentations on a topic
- breakout-style discussions on a proposed topic
- a tutorial

As the main goal of the Symposium is to foster synergies and collaborations from different fields, we recommend that:
1. At least 2-3 people, preferably from different institutions, propose the session. This is not a strict requirement, mostly a recommendation (if you have a good case for a different setting we will definitely take your proposal into account).
2. All the session leaders are asked to confirm and commit to participate at the time of submission.
3. If your proposal already names speakers or panelists, you must state whether their participation is already confirmed.

We encourage session proposals about cross-discipline topics which are of concern for participants from existing sub-communities

** Submission Guidelines
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Please prepare a (max) 2 page submission indicating:
- Name of the session
- Topic: please indicate which cross-discipline topics the session will tackle. Here you can also specify if there is any particular vertical of interest (e.g. legal, life science, medical, publisher/scholarly data, cultural heritage, library, museum, oil/gas, engineering, airplane, e-commerce, etc)
- Type of session: Panel | Presentations | Break-out discussion | Tutorial | BOF | Other (please specify)
- Short description of the session
- The 2/3 person team (names & affiliations) that will lead the session
- Speakers(when applicable). It is strictly required to specify the speakers if you are proposing a panel, in which case they must be already confirmed.
- Expected participation (give a prediction of who would be interested in attending your session)
- Submit your proposal on easychair: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=us2ts2020 and select Session Proposal as topic

** Symposium outcome
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After the Symposium we will invite all session chairs to co-edit a summary of the event, which will be formally published.

** Important Dates
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- Deadline for submissions: Dec 3rd 2019
- Notifications: December 18th 2019
- Final program for the sessions: January 14th 2020
- Symposium dates: March 9-11, 2020


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Call for Lightning Talks
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** Deadline for submissions: Open until slots filled (first-come first-served)
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We will have two Lightning Talks sessions. These will be an open forum where any of the participants can present on a chosen topic. Examples of things to discuss:
- late breaking research
- a position statement
- blue sky ideas
- new datasets announcements

** Rules:
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- each presenter will have exactly one slide (PDF, landscape, 3:4)
- each presenter will have 2 minutes (we might adjust the time slightly, according to participation, but at least 2 minutes)
- presentation slots will be awarded on a first-come-first-served basis (submit early to avoid disappointment)
- submit your talk using easychair: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=us2ts2020 and selecting "Lightning Talks" as topic


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** Contact
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All questions about submissions should be emailed to contact us at us2ts2020-org AT googlegroups DOT com
You are also welcome to join our social network on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/groups/13783135/

Look forward to your great contributions and participation.
See you all on March 9 - 11, 2020, Raleigh, USA.