Accepted papers for LICS 2012

The list of accepted papers for LICS 2012 is now out.

The first thing to note is that the PC for LICS 2012 has selected 61 submissions for presentation at the conference. By way of comparison, there were 37 papers that were presented at LICS 2011 (modulo counting mistakes I might have made.) This increase in the number of selected papers follows one of the changes that LICS 2012 promised to implement:

In response to concerns about LICS becoming overly selective with a too-narrow technical focus, the program committee will employ a merit-based selection with no a priori limit on the number of accepted papers.

Does this higher number of selected papers imply a "decrease in the quality of the conference programme", whatever that may mean? I have not read the papers yet, but a quick look at the list of selected papers and a brief look at the introduction of some of those available on line seem to indicate that this installment of LICS will be at least as strong as the others. Time will tell. My gut feeling is that this will be a very exciting conference.

I hope that someone attending the conference will be willing to send me a report for this blog. Let me know if you are interested in sending me a short report from LICS 2012.

Holding LICS in Croatia will be an interesting experiment. LICS 2012 will be hosted by the University of Dubrovnik, in Dubrovnik, which is a lovely town along the Adriatic sea. The location and the quality of the conference programme should entice many colleagues to attend the event. Unfortunately, the early registration fee looks pretty hefty to me: $450 for ACM, IEEE or ASL members and $600 for non-members are a lot of money at a time when travel money is scarce. (By way of comparison, the registration fee for ICALP 2011 in expensive Zurich was roughly €334.)

Last, but not least, it will be interesting to see which papers will receive the LICS Test-of-Time Award for 2012. Do you have any predications you'd like to share in the comment section?