I submitted last week a proposal to give a paper in a conference and was wondering how easy it is to get accepted: do conference organizers do a very strict selection (they only accept, say, 1 in 8 or 10 papers) or would they accept everything as long as it is methodologically adequate and relevant to the conference? I guess it depends on the subject and on the conference - this doesn't seem to be an international or "big" conference, rather limited to the UK; it has a topic but they are looking for a particular "approach" rather than for a specific area/period within my discipline (history of msic), so I guess quite a lot of people would be able to submit proposals as the topic is not terribly obscure. Any thoughts?

I wouldn't worry about it too much if it's within the UK and not a huge gathering. Most likely they'll accept your abstract.
I've only had abstracts rejected at two conferences, one was really massive (I mean, HUGE medical conference which has submissions into the 1000s!) - you actually had to pay something in the region of $50 just to submit an abstract(!) The other one was where one of the leading professors organising the conference had a student of his talking in a similar area to mine!

Usually they're grateful to get submissions and only suggest topics as guidelines. Did you get a choice for submitting for a poster or oral presentation? Some conferences just have invited speakers for oral papers and only allow abstracts for poster submissions, which I think is abit unfair. That said, getting a poster accepted is generally quite easy.

Good luck!

What are your general opinions about poster submissions. If find it highly annoying and don't think it actually helps to promote the research in any way.

That sounds well - they didn't give the chance to submit proposals for posters but I don't think posters are very common in my area. When I browse for conferences I could contribute to, I have never seen a "call for posters" - only "call for papers".

They will announce the final decision mid-March and the conference is end-June so I hope to keep you updated!

I imagine it is different for every conference.

If you are submitting an abstract for a poster and your abstract is at least vaguely relevant to the conference and legible, I can't see why you wouldn't be a sure thing. Remember, they want bums in seats and your registration dollars just as much as you want to go.

Submitting for an oral presentation is a different thing all together - I imagine the competition to get one of those is a bit more tough.

I have my fingers crossed for you.

Otto - I have to disagree.

In my limited experience of conferences and posters, I think they are great. I am in science and have a great time chatting to people at poster sessions about their work and non-work stuff too. Great way to meet people and to find out what other people, particularly students, are working on. I am only sad I have never had the opportunity to have my own poster.

I'm in the pro-poster camp too, not least becasue I've done several, but I think it enables you to meet more people.In an oral paper, you have a limited amount of time to present, then questions are squeezed in at the end. With a poster, you can talk about your work in a much more relaxed way and often get more of a variety of questions.

Of course, it all depends on how well poster sessions are organised by conference teams. I've been to some where the poster session seemed to be nothing but an afterthought. However there've been some where they've made a real occasion of them (provision of wine usually helps!) and it's been interesting to look round.

Just an update - I´ve just received an e-mail from the organizers, my paper has been acepted so I´d better start preparing it! Thanks for your comments.

congrats.
Yep - i like poster sessions as well, a great opportunity for meeting people.

Congratulations. Have fun!

congratulations for acceptance of your conference paper!

And the same to Dr F.!