Welcome Note

The field of multimedia is maturing and one of the positive results of this fact is the increase in the quality of offered products and services. Nowadays, there is no longer only a question of which features are included in a multimedia product or service, but also how well such features are addressed, and even more importantly, which impact they have on end-users. The era of user-centric multimedia has already begun, where quality plays a center role. But what is meant by quality in multimedia services and products, how to measure it, and once measured, how to improve it?

The International Workshop on Quality of Multimedia Experience (QoMEX) has been created as a forum to address these important issues, and to bring together leading professionals and scientists active in disciplines relevant to multimedia quality and user experience.

The first edition of QoMEX takes place in San Diego, California, from July 29th to 31st, 2009. QoMEX 2009 is not only the first workshop built around the notion of Quality of Experience in Multimedia, but also features several first time organizational innovations, that hopefully will inspire other workshops and conferences in future.

A workshop dealing with quality cannot neglect the quality of its content, and dissemination. To secure the quality of accepted papers to QoMEX 2009, six to eight reviewers were assigned to each submitted contribution. This has resulted in nearly 45 accepted papers to QoMEX, which correspond to around 60% as acceptance rate. To guarantee the quality of dissemination, high visibility, and ease of access to its content, all accepted papers in QoMEX 2009 will be part of the IEEE Xplore digital library. Furthermore, among accepted papers in QoMEX 2009, 14 contributions have been identified as candidates for best paper, and best student paper awards (seven candidates in each category). The winners will be announced at the workshop venue, when our Awards Committee completes its work. Finally, it is our pleasure to inform you that the top candidates for best paper awards will be invited to submit a full version of their submission as a journal paper to a special issue, which has been set up to further disseminate the highest quality contributions to QoMEX 2009.

A workshop/conference, as opposed to a journal, is not only a means to inform others of one’s latest achievements in research and development, but also a forum to meet, and to interact, with other researchers and professionals sharing same interests. To further enhance this aspect of things, QoMEX 2009 has created a number of social networks accessible from its website at http://www.qomex.com, where everybody, including those who cannot attend the workshop, will be able to introduce themselves, present their interests, their ideas, results of their research in various multimedia forms, give their opinion and impressions, exchange all sorts of relevant information, ask questions, provide answers, and in short, become active members of the growing community of Quality of Multimedia Experience.

In addition to the above efforts aimed at building a community of interest in quality of multimedia experience, QoMEX 2009 features several oral and poster sessions, an exhibit session, a panel session, and four plenary speeches. Please refer to the program of the workshop to find out more about them, and make sure you will take full advantage of these sessions as they each bring a different and complementary information that will allow you to find out about what is going on today, what are the trends, what has been achieved in academia and industry, and what are the challenges ahead, in different disciplines relevant to quality of multimedia experience.

QoMEX 2009 could have not happened, if it was not thanks to a committed team of individuals. We would like to especially express our appreciations to QoMEX 2009 Technical Program Co-Chairs, Exhibitions and Demo Co- Chairs, Finance Co-Chairs, Publicity Co-Chairs, members of QoMEX 2009 Advisory Committee, members of our Technical Committee, Plenary Speakers, Panel Chair, Panelists, Awards Chair, members of Awards Committee, as well as our reviewers. A list of these individuals is available on the QoMEX 2009 website, mentioned earlier, to acknowledge their appreciated efforts.

We are grateful to our Sponsors Dolby, DCA Inc., and NTNU, and our Gold Sponsors Qualcomm and EPFL, whose financial support allowed us to maintain the registration fee to QoMEX 2009 low enough, while providing a quality venue and infrastructure at the disposition of participants. Especial thanks also go to our Gold Sponsors Qualcomm and EPFL for supporting the best paper and best student paper awards. Our appreciations finally go to our Technical Sponsors, IEEE and Petamedia, whose various logistic help and other assistance were instrumental in the success of QoMEX 2009.

Last but not least, we acknowledge the efforts of all submitters, contributors, and participants to QoMEX 2009, without whom, this workshop could have not existed. We wish you all a great time in San Diego and a fruitful workshop, and hope that QoMEX 2009 will be remembered as the start of new series of workshops in a key area of multimedia, in the years to come.

QoMEX 2009 General Co-Chairs

Prof. Dr. Touradj Ebrahimi
Dr. Khaled El-Maleh