The first official AVISA meeting was held at the AVSP'98 meeting. This brief meeting included information about the SIG's purpose (see above) and structure, including the naming of Officers and Advisory Committee members. A special issue of Speech Communication was distributed to the AVISA members. This issue, Volume 26, Nos. 1-2, October 1998, contains selected papers from the AVSP'97 meeting in Rhodes. Also announced were support for the Christian Benoît Award (see below), the release of the Talking Heads website (see below); and details on upcoming meetings (again, see below).

During the past year, a number of meetings took place that included AV-related sessions or papers. If you attended any of these meetings, we would appreciate receiving brief descriptions, highlights, etc. Contact Philip Rubin at: rubin@haskins.yale.edu