Blizzard Challenge 2010 Workshop

Call for participation

The Blizzard Challenge 2010 Workshop is the culmination of the Blizzard Challenge 2010 which is an open speech synthesis evaluation campaign using common data sets and a large listening test. The aims of the workshop are to present the results from the listening tests and for participants in the Challenge to describe their systems.

The workshop is a satellite of SSW7

Who can attend the workshop ?

The workshop is open to all and we encourage participation from anyone interested in speech synthesis.

Who can submit a paper to the workshop ?

All participants in the Challenge are expected to submit a paper describing their entry (even if they cannot attend the workshop in person). Papers will be refereed by the Programme Committee.

Programme Committee

• Simon King, University of Edinburgh, UK
• Alan Black, Carnegie Mellon Univerisity, USA
• Keiichi Tokuda, Nagoya Institute of Technology, Japan

Paper submission instructions

• Use the Interspeech 2010 authors' kit, but your paper should be up to SIX pages in length
• Remember that Blizzard is a scientific investigation - we are all trying to understand why some techniques work better than others.
• With this in mind, please write a detailed, technical paper aimed at a specialist audience. Focus on analysis and evaluation. Try to explain WHY your system performed the way it did, and what makes it different from other systems. Explain why your system is designed in a particular way. For example, report internal evaluations you have done to select certain methods.
• Submit your paper by email to blizzard@festvox.org by the 30th July 2010.

Location and date

Date:

Saturday 25th September 2010 (all day)

Location:

The location is the same as SSW7 - the ATR building in Kansai Science City, near Kyoto, Japan.

The shuttle bus provided during SSW7 from Nara Washington Hotel Plaza to the venue will also operate on the day of the Blizzard workshop.

Programme

A detailed programme will be published here in due course. The workshop format is single-track with oral presentations from the participants in the Challenge, the organisers and possibly other invited speakers. We may also have poster presentations.

We anticipate that the workshop will start at 9am and run until around 6pm.

Practical information

Registration

Registration procedure

Please choose one of the following options:

• If you are a member of a participating team that submitted an entry to the Challenge

• If you are not attending SSW7 and you are not a member of a participating team that submitted an entry to the Blizzard Challenge

• If you are attending SSW7 and you are not a member of a participating team that submitted an entry to the Blizzard Challenge: there is no need to register - just turn up.

Please send one email for each person registering (e.g., if three people from your organisation wish to register, send three individual emails). Please ensure that the "From:" address in your email is your preferred contact address. An email confirmation reply will be sent to that address within two working days.

You should also subscribe to the Blizzard Challenge mailing list, to ensure that you receive any further information about the workshop.

If you have any difficulties please email blizzard@festvox.org for assistance.

Cancellation procedure

If you registered (because you are only attending the Blizzard Workshop and not SSW7), then you may cancel your registration by emailing blizzard@festvox.org. Please do this by 20th September 2010.

Cost

There is no cost for attending the Blizzard Workshop this year.

Accommodation and travel

Please refer to the SSW7 website for suggestions.

Published proceedings

The papers will be published on festvox.org