The New Year approaches, but first something of immediate interest ...

** SDForum Distinguished Speaker Series - This month, Brewster Kahle will be speaking December 16th at the Xerox PARC Auditorium in Palo Alto. He'll be talking about Universal Access to All Knowledge. (Perhaps you're thinking that next time, he might want to find a larger topic.)

Kahle's Abstract says, "Advances in computing and communications mean that we can cost-effectively store every book, sound recording, movie, software package, and public web page ever created, and provide access to these collections via the Internet to students and adults all over the world. By mostly using existing institutions and funding sources, we can build this as well as compensate authors within what is the current worldwide library budget. The talk offers an update on the current state of progress towards that ideal, which would allow us to bequeath an accessible record of our cultural heritage to our descendants."

** IEEE ISSCC 2005 - The International Solid-State Circuits Conference, as the companion conference to IEDM, is described by the organizers as "the foremost global forum for presentation of advances in solid-state circuits and Systems-on-a-Chip. The Conference offers a unique opportunity for engineers working at the cutting edge of IC design to maintain technical currency, and to network with leading experts."

ISSCC is taking place from February 6th to 10th at the San Francisco Marriott Hotel. If you're working at the cutting edge, attendance should be required.

** DATE 2005, which is described by organizers as "Europe's premier conference and exhibition for Electronic Design, Automation and Test," says that it has received an all-time record number of submissions to the conference program. The event, which takes places from March 7th to 11th, has received 825 submissions to date for review by the 342 members of the Technical Programme Committee. It's not surprising that the organizers are excited by these numbers as they are reporting that the number of papers submitted "is the highest number of papers ever submitted to an electronic design conference anywhere in the world." Those submissions have been received from five continents and more than thirty countries. You should be booking your flight for Munich right now.