UNDERLINE Hosts 28th International Conference On Computational Linguistics (COLING 2020)

Underline Science, the premier virtual conference venue for events in science, medicine, academia and other professional fields, is currently hosting the 28th Annual International Conference on Computational Linguistics (COLING 2020), through Friday, December 11th. Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and uncertainty about international travel, the COLING Steering Committee shifted to a virtual format, from the face-to-face meeting that was due to be held in Barcelona, Spain.

COLING, the International Conference on Computational Linguistics, is one of the premier conferences for natural language processing and computational linguistics. Often grouped within the field of artificial intelligence, but actually pre-dating the development of artificial intelligence, advances in computational linguistics and natural language processing are now some of the major drivers behind the use of artificial intelligence for commercial and social applications – for example, on-line search, machine translation and with voice-assisted conversational devices.

First established in 1965, the biennial COLING conference is held in diverse parts of the globe and attracts participants from both top-ranked research centers and emerging countries. Today, the most important developments in our field are taking place not only in universities and academic research institutes, but also in industrial research departments and in technological startups. COLING conferences provide opportunities for all these communities to showcase their exciting developments. To register for COLING 2020, or to learn more about the conference, please visit: https://coling2020.org.

The 4-day live stream/virtual conference features talks from world-renowned scientists, a selection of webinars, panel discussions, live tutorials, workshops, online presentations, interactive Q&A sessions and special events with leading professionals in the field of natural language processing and computational linguistics. Invited speakers include, among others: Amanda Stent, Bloomberg LP; Harald Baayen, University of Tübingen; Margaret Mitchell, Google Research and Machine Intelligence; Monica Lam, Stanford University; and Tal Linzen, New York University.

“These are extraordinarily exciting times for our field. Computational Linguistics is no longer just the future: it’s already here!” said COLING 2020 General Chair, Donia Scott, Professor of Computational Linguistics, University of Sussex. “The presentations and discussions at COLING 2020 will showcase the state-of the-art in natural language technologies and forefront some of the challenges that arise when language is viewed as not just data but as the most vital part of human communication in all its complexities.”

COLING 2020 content, including all live streams, presentations and lecture videos, is currently available for viewing on underline.io. With attendees joining the conference from around the globe and from different time zones, Underline’s platform maximizes the scholarship, interactivity and networking opportunities for this year’s COLING 2020 conference.

Underline’s mission is to capture and disseminate scientific knowledge through video, making it globally accessible by enriching and preserving both virtual and hybrid conference content. Through Underline, conferences – physical and virtual – can reach new global audiences, while conference attendees have the flexibility to watch and re-watch any lecture any place, any time. Underline enriches hosted conferences and lectures with transcriptions, real-time language translations, DOIs, MARC records and presenters’ slides and profiles.

In addition to enabling conference participants to connect with speakers, lectures can be easily cited, shared and searched, thus, turning presentations into sources of collaboration and conversation. With a custom-built virtual conference platform, Emmy Award-winning production team, and exclusive digital library – Underline is fast becoming an important destination for research, teaching and learning.

“We are honored to partner with the COLING 2020 chairs and organizers to host this important meeting on the Underline platform, and with no geographical barriers, we are pleased to help them expand their audience,” said Alex Lazinica, CEO of Underline Science. “Conferences and technical meetings are critical tools for scientists to learn about the latest breakthroughs and research. Like the globally oriented team on the COLING committee and with the International Committee on Computational, at Underline we are working to accelerate discovery in an open and connected world.”