[TYPES] Two-tier reviewing process

[Norman Ramsey]

 > In the current set-up, there is no "cost" associated with
 > submitting work that is not yet quite ready, or resubmitting a
 > rejected paper repeatedly, or trying to make 2 papers out of one.

This observation reminds me of a proposal Todd Proebsting made years
ago (tongue planted firmly in cheek): anyone submitting a paper to
PLDI must pay a $500 submission fee.  If the committee agrees your
submission is not a complete waste of the reviewers' time, you get
your $500 back.  Otherwise it goes to charity.

I don't take such a proposal seriously, but I will share some advice I
got from a senior scientist once: if you are given a paper to review,
and the paper is obviously junk, return the paper to the editor or
program chair with a short note saying that the paper is of such low
quality that it does not merit a full review.  I play this card
rarely, but it always saves me a great deal of time, since it is
difficult to write a decent review for a very weak paper, especially
for a journal.


Norman