[cap-talk] "ACLs don't" paper rejected from Oakland 09

[Karp, Alan H]

Tyler wrote:
> 
> I'm feeling demoralized now. Constructive criticism and productive
> next steps appreciated.
>
In days of yore, you would submit your paper to a journal and get back the referee's (Yes, there was often only one.) comments six months or a year later.  Outright rejections were rare, but the comments could be so devastating that there was no point in trying to revise the paper.  Most often, though, you'd respond to the comments and modify the paper in hopes of placating the referee.  A few weeks later, you'd get comments on your comments.  This cycle would repeat a few times until you or the referee was worn down.  In extreme cases, you would ask the editor to intervene.  The result of this process was a very slow conversation between author and referee that led to better papers.

Conference schedules don't allow for this process.  Rejections are frequent because there's no time to review the revised paper.  Instead, the conversation continues over different conferences.  You revise the paper to placate one set of referees and submit it to a different conference, where you're likely to get a different set.  Eventually, you get the paper to a state that the referees like, or, more likely, the same people get chosen to review the paper enough times that they get tired of seeing it, just as in olden days.

The biggest difference seems to be between "needs some changes before it can be accepted" and "rejected for this conference."  The latter is much easier to take personally.  Viewed in light of the process, it shouldn't.  It's as if the journal editor said you were going to miss the June issue.  You should think of the next conference as the December issue.

________________________
Alan Karp
Principal Scientist
Virus Safe Computing Initiative
Hewlett-Packard Laboratories
1501 Page Mill Road
Palo Alto, CA 94304
(650) 857-3967, fax (650) 857-7029
http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Alan_Karp

o/cap-talk