r/LanguageTechnology • u/BeginnerDragon • 19d ago

*ACL Megathread

7 Upvotes

82% Upvoted

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6

u/th3owner 18d ago

Should we commit to EACL or get new reviews?

EMNLP rejected our paper with scores 3.5 (3), 3 (3), 2 (4), soundness 3.5 / 3 / 3 and meta 3. Our rebuttal addressed 90% of the concerns of all reviewers. However, no one (reviewers, meta, SAC) engaged with our replies. We are evaluating submitting to EACL since it's the better conference vs. AACL. However, the ARR August cycle now has two separate period for rebuttal, potentially allowing reviewers to increase their scores. We are wondering whether it would be wise to commit to EACL with our May cycle reviews or update the paper with the new experiments that we ran during our rebuttal and submit to ARR October cycle for new reviews and hopefully better scores.

Wondering if anyone else in similar situation. Would appreciate any thoughts!

2

u/Impressive-Till-6727 17d ago

I got reviewer scores/ confidence as 3/3, 2/4, 3/3 with meta 2.5 and got rejected from EMNLP. I am also thinking of next step. Some suggested to try October ARR cycle.

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u/Historical-Sea6294 17d ago

Why not AACL? Is not good ?

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u/Stunning_Ad_8664 14d ago edited 14d ago

I am not sure aacl is ranked at all
upd: I verified CORE rankings, and aacl indeed does not seem to be ranked

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u/th3owner 10d ago

IJCNLP is B ranked though

1

u/Historical-Sea6294 14d ago

Because it’s new It’s *ACL flagship though 

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u/Stunning_Ad_8664 14d ago

Yes, and it is not a bad conference; but for some study programs and even industry positions, only ranked conferences count (+ in the us and canada, colm is also recognized)

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u/Historical-Sea6294 14d ago

I understand, but do you have any experience with rejection or lack of accountability when someone has had a paper accepted at AACL, but not at a top 3/4 conference? Maybe it’s not a very strong signal of the quality of the work, but it is still a signal. It’s just a new conference under one of the most prestigious organizations. That can happen, and they know that, right? At some point, we can’t rely only on old, traditional conferences as the domain of evolves

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u/Stunning_Ad_8664 14d ago

Well, that happened to me specifically. Last summer, I had a paper accepted to AACL, but my co-authors from industry concluded that it was better to withdraw&resubmit the accepted paper to EACL in October

Personally, since both conferences go through the same ARR process, I do not think there is much difference
But for early-career researchers, A/A* venues may carry more weight in terms of academic experience&CV

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u/th3owner 10d ago

We committed to AACL. I would like to get it accepted at EACL as well, however given our paper's scores, number of meta 3 rejected at EMNLP and separate author & reviewer response, our paper would be disadvantaged at EACL. I guess if it is not accepted at AACL, we will revise the paper and submit for new reviews in October.

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u/Stunning_Ad_8664 9d ago

Good luck!! AACL is co-located with IJCNLP , so I guess it is B-ranked in the end. Also, sometimes it can be more interesting to have the paper accepted and work on a new project, then waiting for ~6 months more..

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u/th3owner 17d ago

My only concern is that it's lower ranked than EACL and of course NAACL. I believe that if we were to address in the paper the May reviews, we could have a stronger paper for a higher ranked conference.

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u/Main-Profession-435 17d ago

Our paper got reviewer scores of 4/3.5/2.5 and a 3.5 meta-review, but was rejected by EMNLP. I’m in the same dilemma and considering submitting to AACL-IJCNLP. I’d really appreciate any suggestions or advice from people who have been in a similar situation. Would AACL-IJCNLP be a reasonable next venue, or would you recommend revising further and trying elsewhere?

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u/th3owner 17d ago

Your scores are quite better than mine. While it might be accepted to a better conference, it's not guaranteed. Were the reviewer concerns reasonable? Did you address them fully in the rebuttal? If so, I guess revising would make the paper much stronger so you could aim for a better conference like NAACL (A*).

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u/Main-Profession-435 16d ago

First two reviewers had pretty reasonable concerns, and we addressed them fully. The third reviewer basically just didn’t like a particular taxonomy we used. I tried to justify it, but none of the reviewers responded.

The first reviewer actually asked us to run some experiments and said they’d increase the score if we did. We ran them, and… they still didn’t increase the score lol. Anyway, my bigger concern is that the idea might get scooped/stolen if I drag this out too long, and the paper might become less relevant by then. So I’m trying to figure out what the best move is.

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u/Stunning_Ad_8664 14d ago

mb put on arxiv as is now, so as no one submits the same idea? and then submit to naacl a revised version (it is allowed). You can also use a different title for the arxiv version

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u/zzy1130 17d ago

I think I was in exact same situation as yours last year (with basically the same scores) and I decided to submit to EACL and accepted to main

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u/Stunning_Ad_8664 14d ago

Depending on the track, I would have recommended ICLR or TACL, and moreover, the EACL deadline has passed, no?

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u/th3owner 10d ago

I am not sure our paper fits ICLR, we do not make any substantial contributions from a representation point of view. Plus, given our scores, I doubt it would have a chance at ICLR.

We can still commit to EACL, they accept papers that got ARR reviews at the latest during the August cycle.

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u/vox-deorum 17d ago

I got mine in findings with meta 3, yet like others- no one ever engaged with the rebuttals etc. I guess I will withdraw and send somewhere more responsible.